Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2017 January 4

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January 4[edit]

DNS Jumper?[edit]

What is it and its purpose? How it will help me if I install? 103.230.105.18 (talk) 18:40, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

The purpose of such applications is to allow you to use different DNS servers than your ISP provides. I don't think most people would find it useful, but it might be useful if you've got unreliable DNS lookups, or you want to use a DNS service which provides (or removes) filtering, or you think there's some other problem with using your usual DNS. -- zzuuzz (talk) 20:08, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • One of the purposes is to evade light government censorship, for which DNS blocking is a cheap option (government demands internet service providers stop giving correct DNS lookups for ungood domains, average Joe trying to access badsite.com fails because ISP resolves it to an incorrect IP (e.g. 23.4.6.249), though typing directly the correct IP in the URL bar would work). The idea is that ISPs are bound by local law, and can fairly easily implement such a request, so it is a good tradeoff between efficiency and technical and political feasibility, even if efficiency is rather low. TigraanClick here to contact me 12:03, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Address hider/skipper[edit]

Which opensource software will give me the ability to hide/block giving away or give wrong address of my PC and Internet address to other users or websites, regardless of whether they are monitoring me or not? 103.230.105.18 (talk) 18:40, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

You want a proxy server. You can't simply change the IP address you report. When you send out a request, you have to include where the response will go. If you fake that and give someone else's address, the response will go there - not back to you. A proxy server acts as an in-between. The other end sees the address of the proxy server, which knows who you are and knows to forward responses back to you. 209.149.113.5 (talk) 19:46, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Category:Anonymity networks - some are opensource. But beware because of what the IP above said, the proxies might be monitoring you instead. -- zzuuzz (talk) 20:26, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Are you claiming that some person or organization or government might set up a free open proxy for people to use so they can track what is likely illegal activity? That is crazy talk! 209.149.113.5 (talk) 20:35, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
As if they would do such a preposterous thing. Category:Virtual private networks is another useful category, with the same cavets. The problem with any kind of proxying is that while some of the software might be open source, not all the processes will be. -- zzuuzz (talk) 20:51, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
See The Onion Router. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 07:50, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Bytes monitoring software[edit]

Require an opensource software that will play, pause, stop and reset the ‘bytes’ ‘downloading’ and ‘uploading’ information. 103.230.105.18 (talk) 18:40, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Firefox is open source and the file transfer part of it has stop, pause, and restart capability. 209.149.113.5 (talk) 19:47, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, that message came out wrong... 103.230.106.16 (talk) 07:37, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Require an opensource software that will play, pause, stop and reset the ‘bytes’ ‘downloading’ and ‘uploading’ information, something like the DU metre... 103.230.106.16 (talk) 07:37, 5 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Password protecting software[edit]

Require a fantastic password protecting software that will allow files and folders to be password protected including the RHDD drive itself that I possess. “Folder Lock” software disallows RHDD mitigation, and “BitLocker” software can’t even pass the ‘initialising’ stage because of the volume of the RHDD… 103.230.105.18 (talk) 18:40, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Encrypting large drives can take time. A few weeks ago, I took an unencrypted computer and encrypted the drives. It took about 6 hours. 209.149.113.5 (talk) 19:43, 4 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]