Things have been quite hectic for me since the last post! I ended up going to the f3conference 2006 in the end, which was really interesting (if your that way inclined).

There were some very interesting lectures; most were (digital) forensic software specific (EnCase, FTK, C4P), but there were some other interesting topics such as: how to analyse the artifacts left behing by Skype, a hex editor called Phormat which appears to be very useful when trying to determine protocol formats from fragments of packets (from the same guy who talked about Skype), The virtues of analysing volatile data and and interesting talk about how to retrieve forensically interesting data from GPS Navigation devices (Specifically TomTom).

The extra curricular activities of the delegates seemed to revolve around alcohol and playing with new and geeky toys (on display), such as some very cool looking hard drive imaging gadgets, a really cool standalone GSM (mobile phone) network device which allows you to set up your own mobile phone network, and some interesting NAS devices.

Last weekend was Nina's birthday, so Laura and I went up to Tunbridge Wells to help her celebrate, and enjoyed a very pleasant bonfire procession, which didn't actually include any fire as we had expected, but instead was full of small children with crappy battery powered lanterns. then we got to watch the fireworks, which were pretty cool, but not a patch on the ones we say a couple of weeks ago in Hastings.

I currently have a distinct lack of desk to rest my PC on, the current arrangement involves precariously stacked boxes, upon which perch my monitor, next to them sits my PC. Unfortunately, I dont have a proper chair to sit on in my mongrel like office, and as my lovely office space doubles up as a spare room, therein sits a sofa bed, which has now become my 'office' sofa, from which I can sit and control my PC. This brings me on to the point of accessibility; I now know what Dan meant in AWD when he talked about people not being able to see small fonts. My 'office sofa' sits me a good 4 foot away from the screen, and as such, it becomes very difficult to read the screen, meaning that I have to turn the font size up to some stupidly large size, which fills most of the screen, therefore making my experience rather uncomfortable! In this respect Firefox wins hands down, with its nice unlimited(ish) limits on large text! Not so IE. But thats and argument for someone who cares! Practically, I need to get a proper desk!

Yesterday, I met Tom for beer/food after work, and we ended up having a posh dinner (at Yates lol) and having a few drink in leicester square area, before heading off home with a promise to meet up again soon!

I have further developed my train seating theory: If you (like me) get on a train that often has school children on, they invariable like to sit in groups. So, if you happen to have some near, you. You are likely to have a large number of seats being vacated at their stop that would otherwise be the case. This means that when they get off, you are more likely to have more seats to yourself, providing this stop is a fair way up the line.

Next week I'm off to Slough (pronounced Sluff) for some 'training' in EnCase, which is one of the main tools used by us for digital forensics. THis will be interesting, but a little, ahem, simple, as I have been using the tool for a little while allready, and the course I am going on only really covers the basics, but it'll be interesting to see if I am doing it properly!

I promise to get in touch with everyone soon to get some sort of a gathering arranged!

Pretty boring post I know, sorry!

P.S. I only hope for James' sake that the Viewing fix Tom Sent Him isn't a recording of Tom's interpretation of Chris's suggestion that: "we could hold our own Anne Summers party and play with dildos and watch tom dress up in frilly underwear 'n stuff??" when asked whether he wanted to meet us for beer.

Poor, poor James.