Ping Your Way to Packet Perfection: The Ultimate Bookmark Hack

In the crazy world of network troubleshooting, sifting through endless packet captures can feel like searching for a needle in a haystack. This clever video from The Technology Firm introduces a simple yet brilliant technique called the "Packet Bookmark." By creating a quick desktop shortcut that pings a reliable site like Google.com, you generate distinctive ICMP packets that act as visual anchors in your traces. This method shines especially when you lack time for detailed note-taking during live captures involving web forms, streaming media, or VoIP sessions. 

The demonstration walks through the entire process in under three minutes: setting up the ping shortcut, starting a Wireshark capture on your wireless interface, performing key actions like submitting a contact form, and strategically placing pings before and after events.

Kafka on the Network - Wireshark Analysis (Paul Offord)

This post follows on from my earlier Kafka Basics and Demo blog. This time we take a look at the packets. How does a Kafka producer send a message to a topic? How on earth does a Kafka consumer know that there is a message waiting to be fetched?

In this video, we look at the Kafka protocol basics with Wireshark.

Who Do You Want to Be When You Grow Old? - A Review (Paul Smith)

 

I have reached that point in life where my doctor starts many of his comments with “At your age....”. I have come to realize this is more than a mere figure of speech. Like most of my contemporaries, I began by trying to figure out “what” I was going to be (first a physician, eventually an engineer). I gave little thought to when or how age might nudge me onto an off-ramp from the expressway to money and success. Who Do You Want to Be When You Grow Old? by Richard Leider and David Shapiro reminds us that sooner or later, our life-long model for living an accomplished life will fall apart. The book is not a list of answers or techniques, but rather a new perspective that will provoke thought and provide inspiration. Getting old is inevitable (provided you choose your parents carefully and take good care of yourself), but growing old, pursuing the “who” of your life, requires purpose.

Speedtest Anyone??

I’m fairly confident everyone has used a speedtest site. They are handy and provide a pretty good idea of performance to your computer. Some of the more popular sites that I have used is www.speedtest.net and www.fast.com

In spite of their convenience, there are always caveats and general things to keep in mind when using these sites. External internet connection and related equipment as well as internet variables will affect your overall performance. For example, you might have a weak Wi-Fi signal or busy router that would impact your performance numbers.

QUIC is Here! RFC 9000 (Chris Greer)

 After six years of development, the RFC's around the QUIC protocol have arrived. (Welcome to the world, QUIC!)

Actually, QUIC has been here as a draft for several years, particularly with Google services and chromium based browsers. The protocol has slowly evolved to include built-in TLS 1.3, HTTP/3, and TCP-like flow control and reliability.