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As 2014 draws to a close here is a (not nearly complete) list of the lesson I learned this past year:

Ignore the sign: Jump in the bouncy castle.

There are two ways you can look at your life: What happened to you or What you did. You only get to pick one.

If you want the truth ask a 5 year old.

Find ways to forgive mistakes.

Not every problem has an entirely acceptable solution.

To get things done tell an amazing story.

Travel every chance you get. Travel makes you brave.

Be grateful for every moment you have. Every single one.

I was challenged by my friend on Facebook to name 10 books the influenced my life.  I figured if I was going to put together a list I might as well put it on my blog.

So here are the 10 books in alphabetical order that have influenced my life:

48 Laws of Power
I read this book 4 or 5 years ago and decided that if this is what it took to be successful l didn’t want to be.  I would rather be a nice guy and be “unsuccessful” then to base my life on this book.

Augustus: The Life of Rome’s First Emperor
You didn’t think I could make a list of my favorite books and not include one on roman history did you? Augustus found Rome made of clay and left it made of marble. As Rome’s first emperor, Augustus transformed the unruly Republic into the greatest empire the world and laid the foundation for all of Western history to follow.

Maniac Magee
I read this book when I was in 5^th grade and having a hard time fitting in.  It really made a huge difference in the outlook in my life. I still love this book.  

Mere Christianity
I first read this book when I was so teetering on unbelief.  I’ve reread it many times since but that first read through was life altering.

Paddington Bear
I bought this book for my son when I was in London. He and I like to read it and laugh at Paddington. This book will always be special to me.

The Outsiders
I read this book in 8^th grade English. It is one of the best books I have read about class warfare and about how we all really just want to fit in.

The Pursuit of Happyness
A great story about how a man can drastically change his life if he never gives up.   One of the most inspirational stories I’ve ever read.

Titan
Titan is a biography of John D. Rockefeller, the founder of Standard Oil and the world’s first billionaire. At its core it is about work ethic and about taking what you have and making something out of it without anyone’s help.

To Kill A Mocking Bird
To quote Homer Simpson ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ gave me no useful advice on killing mockingbirds but it did teach me not to judge a man based on the color of his skin.

You are not so smart
This book is a fun read. It talks about 48 things we do that don’t make any sense. After reading this book I started catching myself making a lot of irrational decisions on a daily basis.

At Derbycon I picked up a Minipwner and have been spending the last few days playing with it and came up with a few awesome scripts that if you have one you need to install all your device if you have one.

The First one is a wireless picker script that I found and edited from here. 

killall -9 wpa_supplicant
iwlist wlan0 scanning > /tmp/wifiscan #save scan results to a temp file
scan_ok=$(grep “wlan” /tmp/wifiscan) #check if the scanning was ok with wlan0
if [ -z “$scan_ok” ]; then
    killall -9 wpa_supplicant
    iwlist wlan0-1 scanning > /tmp/wifiscan
fi
scan_ok=$(grep “wlan” /tmp/wifiscan) #check if the scanning was ok
if [ -z “$scan_ok” ]; then #if scan was not ok, finish the script
    echo -n “
WIFI scanning failed.

”
    exit
fi
if [ -f /tmp/ssids ]; then
    rm /tmp/ssids
fi
n_results=$(grep -c “ESSID:” /tmp/wifiscan) #save number of scanned cell
i=1
while [ “$i” -le “$n_results” ]; do
        if [ $i -lt 10 ]; then
                cell=$(echo “Cell 0$i – Address:”)
        else
                cell=$(echo “Cell $i – Address:”)
        fi
        j=`expr $i + 1`
        if [ $j -lt 10 ]; then
                nextcell=$(echo “Cell 0$j – Address:”)
        else
                nextcell=$(echo “Cell $j – Address:”)
        fi
        awk -v v1=“$cell” ’$0 ~ v1 {p=1}p’ /tmp/wifiscan | awk -v v2=“$nextcell” ’$0 ~ v2 {exit}1’ > /tmp/onecell #store only one cell info in a temp file
        onessid=$(grep “ESSID:” /tmp/onecell | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’ | awk ’{gsub(“ESSID:”, “”);print}’)
        oneencryption=$(grep “Encryption key:” /tmp/onecell | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’ | awk ’{gsub(“Encryption key:on”, “(secure)”);print}’ | awk ’{gsub(“Encryption key:off”, “(open)  ”);print}’)
        onepower=$(grep “Quality=” /tmp/onecell | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’ | awk ’{gsub(“Quality=”, “”);print}’ | awk -F ’/70’ ’{print $1}’)
        onepower=$(awk -v v3=$onepower ‘BEGIN{ print v3 / 14}’)
        onepower=${onepower:0:3}
        onepower=“(Signal strength: $onepower of 5)”
        echo “$onessid    $oneencryption $onepower” >> /tmp/ssids
        i=`expr $i + 1`
done
rm /tmp/onecell
awk ’{printf(“%5d : %sn”, NR,$0)}’ /tmp/ssids > /tmp/sec_ssids #add numbers at beginning of line
grep ESSID /tmp/wifiscan | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’ | awk ’{printf(“%5d : %sn”, NR,$0)}’ | awk ’{gsub(“ESSID:”, “”);print}’ > /tmp/ssids #generate file with only numbers and names
echo -n “Available WIFI networks:
”
cat /tmp/sec_ssids #show ssids list
echo -n “Enter the numeric option for your selected network: ”
read nsel
pattern=$(echo “ $nsel : ”)
wifissid=$(grep “$pattern” /tmp/ssids)
wifissid=$(echo “$wifissid” | awk -v pat=“$pattern” ’{gsub(pat, “”);print}’ | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’)
wifissid=${wifissid:1:`expr ${#wifissid} – 2`}  #several commands to get clean name of ssid
if [ $nsel -lt 10 ]; then
    cell=$(echo “Cell 0$nsel – Address:”)
else
    cell=$(echo “Cell $nsel – Address:”)
fi
nextsel=`expr $nsel + 1`
if [ $nextsel -lt 10 ]; then
    nextcell=$(echo “Cell 0$nextsel – Address:”)
else
    nextcell=$(echo “Cell $nextsel – Address:”)
fi
awk -v v1=“$cell” ’$0 ~ v1 {p=1}p’ /tmp/wifiscan | awk -v v2=“$nextcell” ’$0 ~ v2 {exit}1’ > /tmp/cellinfo0 #store only the selected cell info in a temp file
grep -v ESSID /tmp/cellinfo0 > /tmp/cellinfo # delete ESSID line to avoid later grep mistakes
rm /tmp/cellinfo0
wifichannel=$(grep “ Channel:” /tmp/cellinfo)
wifichannel=$(echo “$wifichannel” | awk ’{gsub(“ Channel:”, “”);print}’ | awk ’{ sub(/^[ t]+/, “”); print }’) #get clean wifi channel
wifimode=$(grep “ WEP” /tmp/cellinfo) #check if encryption mode is WEP
if [ -n “$wifimode” ]; then   #check if $wifimode is not an empty string
    wifimode=“wep”
else
    wifimode=$(grep “WPA2 ” /tmp/cellinfo) #check if encryption mode is WPA2
    if [ -n “$wifimode” ]; then
        wifimode=“psk2”
    else
        wifimode=$(grep “WPA ” /tmp/cellinfo) #check if encryption mode is WPA
        if [ -n “$wifimode” ]; then
            wifimode=“psk”
        else
            wifimode=“none”
        fi
    fi
fi
if [ “$wifimode” != “none” ]; then #ask for passwork when needed
    echo -n “Enter password of the selected WIFI network: ”
    read wifipass
fi
rm /tmp/cellinfo
rm /tmp/ssids
rm /tmp/sec_ssids
rm /tmp/wifiscan
#write results in the wireless config file and reset wifi interface
uci set wireless.@wifi-device[0].channel=$wifichannel
uci set wireless.@wifi-iface[0].ssid=“$wifissid”
uci set wireless.@wifi-iface[0].encryption=$wifimode
uci set wireless.@wifi-iface[0].key=$wifipass
uci commit wireless
echo -n “

Trying to connect to WIFI network.
(Wait a few seconds and check status with: iwconfig )

”
wifi down
wifi0

The Second script is a reverse SSH Script that will allow you to connect to your Minipwner from anywhere on the net.

set -x

TARGET_HOST=ec2-XX-XX-XX-XX.compute-1.amazonaws.com
if test -n “${2}”
then
    TARGET_PORT=${2}
else
    TARGET_PORT=1111
fi
TARGET_USER=’UserName’

while true
do
    echo “establishing reverse ssh tunnel to ${TARGET_HOST}:${TARGET_PORT}”
    ssh -R ${TARGET_PORT}:localhost:22 -N ${TARGET_HOST} -l ${TARGET_USER} -o ServerAliveInterval=30
    sleep 1
done

Yes this is super geeky but I just wanted to have them somewhere I could find them.