Tue Nov  7 08:57:47 EST 2017

Slept from ten to seven without waking.

High of forty-six and partly sunny today.

Work:
- Order new computer for Bob
  Done.
- Work on MECS
  Done.

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/erasing-ssds-security-is-an-issue/
> 12 different SSDs were sanitized using the computer's built-in sanitize command (legacy ATA/SCSI "Erase Unit" command). Only four were sanitized completely. The paper concludes this approach was not reliable and to be avoided.
> They determined running the whole-disk (to avoid the FTL issue) overwriting process twice (for those remembering my Coca Cola question) is usually, but not always, sufficient to sanitize the drive. The researchers then added a note of caution, "Overall, the results for overwriting are poor: while overwriting appears to be effective in some cases across a wide range of drives, it is clearly not universally reliable."
> The researchers tried degaussing (designed to erase magnetic-style memory) the flash memory and it had no effect, the data remained intact. Trying to sanitize a single file was the next test. Simply put, none of the existing hard drive-oriented techniques for individual-file sanitization were effective when applied to SSDs.
> The research team did not come out and say it, but reading between the lines has one believing there is no reliable way to sanitize SSDs other than physically destroying the device.
http://www.securis.com/destroying-solid-state-drives-size-does-matter/
> Shred particle size is critical.  The best practice to destroy a solid state drive is via hard drive shredding. After a few tests with our client, we discovered that the shred width (particle size) was critical to the success of destroying the small memory chips where the data is stored. Typically, a shred width of ½” or smaller is needed to break through the small memory chips and securely obliterate the data. Many standard industrial shredders will shred to 1” particle size, thus allowing the memory chips to slip through the hammers that shred the data, leaving sensitive information in tact.

Fifteen-minute walk at lunch.
A bright, sunny day. Lots of leaves on the ground.

I've really been into the PsyChill channel on di.fm the last few days.

Home:
- Work on blogs
  Done.

Half-hour walk after I got home from work.
Started at the tail of sunset, walked through Beverly Park, and returned after dark.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/animalia/wp/2017/11/07/how-sheep-with-cameras-got-these-tiny-islands-onto-google-street-view/
https://www.google.com/maps/@62.106,-7.4348938,3a,75y,49.47h,90t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s0gzb8f2c-zP19Eq1N-vxqQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

https://mystical-trash-heap.blogspot.com/2017/09/d-teeth-of-barkash-nour.html
> I wonder if we would have turned back, if Gygax hadn’t already gone into the house and come back with his purple velvet dice bag and a black binder, a module he wrote for a tournament in 1975. This was before the Tolkien estate threatened to sue TSR, and halflings were still called hobbits. So I got to play a hobbit thief and a magic-user and Wayne played a cleric and a fighter, and for four and a half hours we struggled through a wilderness adventure in a looking-glass world of carnivorous plants, invisible terrain, breathable water, and so on. All of which Gygax presented with a minimum of fuss. The author of Dungeons & Dragons doesn’t much care for role-playing: “If I want to do that,” he said, “I’ll join an amateur theater group.” In fact, D&D, as DM’ed by E. Gary Gygax, is not unlike a miniatures combat game. We spent a lot of time just moving around, looking for the fabled Teeth of Barkash-Nour, which were supposed to lie in a direction indicated by the “tail of the Great Bear’s pointing.” Our confusion at first was pitiable, almost Beckettian.

Lunch: coffee, Thai catfish
Dinner: chips