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64 Things Every Geek Should Know

laptoplogic.com — If you consider yourself a geek, or aspire to the honor of geekhood, here's an essential checklist of must-have geek skills.

Who dugg this? Made popular Apr 21, 2009

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  • quadrant6, on 04/21/2009, -3/+7211. P2P - Person to Person data sharing

    I thought it was Peer-to-Peer.
  • RunDiggMC, on 04/21/2009, -9/+56265. What boobs feel like.
  • uzair21, on 04/21/2009, -7/+555All on one page, dugg for that.
  • dygel, on 04/21/2009, -7/+384Seriously? Their explanation for "SATA" is "Serial ATA"?
    Geez, that's not half-assed or anything...
  • Lawbringer, on 04/21/2009, -8/+364Taken from a reply that most people will not see:

    1. The Meaning of Technical Acronyms
    2. How to Reset RAM
    3. Identify Keyloggers
    4. Surf the Web Anonymously
    5. Bypass a Computer Password on All Major Operating Systems
    6. Find a Users IP Address on AIM
    7. Hide a File Behind a JPEG
    8. Crack a Wifi Password
    9. Monitor Network Traffic
    10. Recover Master Boot Record
    11. Retrieve Data off Hard Drive
    12. Load Rockbox onto an MP3 Player
    13. Unbrick a Smartphone
    14. Replace a Laptop Keyboard
    15. Rip Streaming Videos
    16. Strip Windows DRM
    17. Homebrew Hack Game Systems
    18. Find a Website IP Address Without Web/Command Prompt Access
    19. Bypass School or Work Website Blocks
    20. Screw with Wifi Leeches
    21. Hexadecimal and Binary Number Systems
    22. How to Hot Wire a Car
    23. Increase Wifi Range
    24. Carrying a Computer Cleaning Arsenal on Your USB Drive
    25. Running an Operating System from a USB Thumb Drive
    26. Understand What "There's no Place Like 127.0.0.1" Means
    27. Read 1337 At Normal Speed
    28. At Least One Fictional Language
    29. How to Survive in a Linux Argument
    30. Identify Major Constellations
    31. Use a Camera in Manual Mode
    32. Who Mulder and Scully Are
    33. Javascript
    34. How to Unlock an iPhone
    35. How to Install Mac OS X on a PC
    36. Build a PC
    37. Tethering a Smartphone
    38. Wiring a Home Theater System
    39. Replacing a Laptop LCD
    40. Make a Laptop Cooling Pad
    41. Unleash a Laser Pointer's full potential
    42. Keyboard Shortcuts
    43. Soldering Glasses Together
    44. How to Execute a Shell Script
    45. How to Hack a Pop Machine
    46. Turn a Laptop into a Digital Picture Frame
    47. How to Mod a Flash Drive Case
    48. Do Cool Things to Altoids Tins
    49. Convert Cassette Tapes to Digital Audio Files
    50. Lock Your Computer with a USB Drive
    51. Run Your Own Ethernet Line
    52. Set Up a Streaming Media Server
    53. Setting up a VPN
    54. Turn Webcams into Security Cameras
    55. Control Your House Lights with a Computer
    56. Play Retro Games without Retro Consoles
    57. Put LEDs Inside a Lightbulb
    58. Create Music with Keyboard
    59. Make Your Office Ergonomic
    60. Adding a Third Monitor
    61. How to Convert a DVD to x264 (or XviD or DivX)
    62. Flash System BIOS
    63. How to Irrecoverably Protect Data
    64. The Fastest way to Kill a Computer
  • borez, on 04/21/2009, -7/+29765. How to run a server.
  • d4mi4n, on 04/21/2009, -5/+233it feels like... a bag of sand.
  • inactive, on 04/21/2009, -3/+224Why is this not called "2^6 things every geek should know"?
  • tehstupid, on 04/21/2009, -2/+211#65 how to spell where
  • freeridstylee, on 04/21/2009, -5/+20766. Keep a website from crashing
  • PaulClayberg, on 04/21/2009, -7/+1977) Hide a file behind a JPEG.

    Best skill there is.
  • mistergoomba, on 04/21/2009, -9/+144I always thought P2P was Peer to Peer...
  • FearisFailure, on 04/21/2009, -32/+158#65 Were the clitoris is.
  • diggnidy, on 04/21/2009, -19/+14065. How to get out of the basement
  • AmyVernon, on 04/21/2009, -11/+118I have a lot to learn.
  • techdever, on 04/21/2009, -4/+110Porn-to-Porn
  • BySubmittedBy, on 04/21/2009, -1/+104Grammer should be grammar.
  • topher1078, on 04/21/2009, -9/+107P2P stands for "peer to peer", not "person to person."
  • cosmotic, on 04/21/2009, -2/+90This list is pretty lame. Half the stuff just uses other programs to accomplish the task... And reset RAM? What the hell?
  • e8989, on 04/21/2009, -9/+88I didn't see anything about memorizing the youtube url for RickRoll, but still a good list
  • Lykil, on 04/21/2009, -1/+80Since we're being very critical, what does "quite reading" mean?
  • SpaceParanoids, on 04/21/2009, -2/+79"For those of you who don't habla español, El Niño is Spanish for... The Niño!"
  • GeorgeGraves, on 04/21/2009, -16/+91Don't worry amy - just show us your *****.
  • ethnicman, on 04/21/2009, -11/+81From the Article:
    18. Find a Website IP Address Without Web/Command Prompt Access

    Some school admins think they're being sneaky when they lock down the command prompt and block all major IP search websites and block all the websites you actually want to visit. Of course, that is child's play for any geek.

    First, to get a new command prompt, open Notepad and type: command.com. Then, save as "cmd.bat". You now have a command prompt.

    Now, open the command prompt and type "ping http://www.website.com/" to find the IP address of that website.

    Enter the website into the browser and you will officially have impressed all your friends.
    ----------

    So a true geek is supposed to be able to find the IP address to a website without Web access or without a command prompt yet their howto tells you to open a command prompt and ping the website which resolves DNS which you require Web access for.

    This is a mega fail
  • hesslich, on 04/21/2009, -1/+69Think his point is that they reduced an acronym to another acronym instead of just looking up SATA -> Serial Advanced Technology Attachment.
  • RagManX, on 04/21/2009, -1/+68No, no, no. Clearly SATA -> Serial ATA, where ATA -> Advanced TA, where TA -> Technology A. We need to iteratively unroll our acronyms. :)
  • agitpropre, on 04/21/2009, -1/+6564? Surely 1000000 things...for geeks.
  • BNSF9647, on 04/21/2009, -10/+73The writer must not have been a geek.... I read #1, found two errors and quite reading. Who cares what the rest are if they cant get one right.

    SATA - Serial ATA ????? Try Serial Advanced Technology Attachment
    P2P - Person to Person data sharing ?????? Ever hear of Peer to Peer
  • Krissam, on 04/21/2009, -1/+63Well, females should know too, unless ofcourse they want me to do their daily breast exam for them.
  • drmangrum, on 04/21/2009, -6/+62Yes, I know I used the wrong word. I would love to edit it and replace it with "Their." However, Digg's stupid edit system doesn't allow me. Thanks for being a dick though.
  • poodlenuggets, on 04/21/2009, -2/+58That's okay MrAwesomeMan. You're still awesome, man.
  • V3n0M, on 04/21/2009, -2/+561. The Meaning of Technical Acronyms
    2. How to Reset RAM
    3. Identify Keyloggers
    4. Surf the Web Anonymously
    5. Bypass a Computer Password on All Major Operating Systems
    6. Find a Users IP Address on AIM
    7. Hide a File Behind a JPEG
    8. Crack a Wifi Password
    9. Monitor Network Traffic
    10. Recover Master Boot Record
    11. Retrieve Data off Hard Drive
    12. Load Rockbox onto an MP3 Player
    13. Unbrick a Smartphone
    14. Replace a Laptop Keyboard
    15. Rip Streaming Videos
    16. Strip Windows DRM
    17. Homebrew Hack Game Systems
    18. Find a Website IP Address Without Web/Command Prompt Access
    19. Bypass School or Work Website Blocks
    20. Screw with Wifi Leeches
    21. Hexadecimal and Binary Number Systems
    22. How to Hot Wire a Car
    23. Increase Wifi Range
    24. Carrying a Computer Cleaning Arsenal on Your USB Drive
    25. Running an Operating System from a USB Thumb Drive
    26. Understand What "There's no Place Like 127.0.0.1" Means
    27. Read 1337 At Normal Speed
    28. At Least One Fictional Language
    29. How to Survive in a Linux Argument
    30. Identify Major Constellations
    31. Use a Camera in Manual Mode
    32. Who Mulder and Scully Are
    33. Javascript
    34. How to Unlock an iPhone
    35. How to Install Mac OS X on a PC
    36. Build a PC
    37. Tethering a Smartphone
    38. Wiring a Home Theater System
    39. Replacing a Laptop LCD
    40. Make a Laptop Cooling Pad
    41. Unleash a Laser Pointer's full potential
    42. Keyboard Shortcuts
    43. Soldering Glasses Together
    44. How to Execute a Shell Script
    45. How to Hack a Pop Machine
    46. Turn a Laptop into a Digital Picture Frame
    47. How to Mod a Flash Drive Case
    48. Do Cool Things to Altoids Tins
    49. Convert Cassette Tapes to Digital Audio Files
    50. Lock Your Computer with a USB Drive
    51. Run Your Own Ethernet Line
    52. Set Up a Streaming Media Server
    53. Setting up a VPN
    54. Turn Webcams into Security Cameras
    55. Control Your House Lights with a Computer
    56. Play Retro Games without Retro Consoles
    57. Put LEDs Inside a Lightbulb
    58. Create Music with Keyboard
    59. Make Your Office Ergonomic
    60. Adding a Third Monitor
    61. How to Convert a DVD to x264 (or XviD or DivX)
    62. Flash System BIOS
    63. How to Irrecoverably Protect Data
    64. The Fastest way to Kill a Computer
  • SangekiRein, on 04/21/2009, -5/+59#65 - How to get a mirror up of a Digg stormed server. Geeks?
  • N0DIGGITY, on 04/21/2009, -0/+4866. how to number lists higher than the previous entry
  • GISuck, on 04/21/2009, -7/+55I don't see anything at all. Obviously #65 should be how to survive a digg storm.
  • hesslich, on 04/21/2009, -5/+52http://rorr.im/digg.com/tech_news/64_things_every_ ...
  • vman81, on 04/21/2009, -0/+47it is
  • robEstyles, on 04/21/2009, -4/+50Buried for not including up up down down left right left right B A start will give you 30 guys
  • iDiggYa, on 04/21/2009, -0/+45It's funny how he can spell "clitoris" and not "where."
  • danwallace, on 04/21/2009, -2/+44Any programmer (or other subvariety of geek) knows you don't need to "know" any of this *****. You just need to know how to google it up when the time comes.
  • digglover6, on 04/21/2009, -5/+46Actuallay the " P " stands for any word but " Pay " coz u never do.
  • bonarez, on 04/21/2009, -1/+41actualy the entire 127.0.0.1/8 network is a loopback interface.
    I remember someone threatening to take someone down with a ping of death once on IRC years ago, then another guy giving him their so-called IP. Totaly random but within the 127 range. It was hillarious seeing his connection drop and see him return complaining about 'someone hacked me', truely hillarious!!
  • efitz11, on 04/21/2009, -8/+47poon to poon
  • jba68, on 04/21/2009, -6/+45its peen to peen
  • DPowers08, on 04/21/2009, -1/+39*babby
  • Khiva, on 04/21/2009, -1/+3967. Sunlight.
  • Lososaurus, on 04/21/2009, -3/+41What about C++?
  • jhandfield, on 04/21/2009, -0/+37There's no place like ~?
  • buddyw, on 04/21/2009, -5/+42because it isn't a very geeky article.

    Seriously, most of this stuff is stupid.
  • inactive, on 04/21/2009, -52/+88"How to Reset RAM"? The *****? I rolled my eyes here, not because of how trivial it is, but because they posted a link to download a Windows program that "defragments" your memory after a program crashes.

    Here's a suggestion: use an OS which doesn't completely suck.

    Oh, and geek tip #65: learn to avoid the PC utility scams which have been going around since the '80s.
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