Wardriving: The act of driving around with scanning equipment, searching for wireless networks (usually of the 802.11 variety). The "War" part of the name comes from the age-old practice of setting up a computer to aggressively dial thousands of phone numbers in a row, looking for other computers or fax machines, or "War Dialing". In and of itself, wardriving is not a malevolent practice. Wardriving, done passively, is totally legal in the US.
WarCycling, then, is the same tactic applied while riding a bicycle. WarCycle 1.0 was set up as follows.
Hardware:
Diamondback Outlook (Hybridzilla)
HP Jornada 680e
Garmin eTrex
EnGenius 200mw 802.11b/g high-power card
Two 19dBi Antennae
Software:
Windows CE HPC 2000
MiniStumbler
WarCycle 2.0 used my newer Jornada 720 which was more stable, and was installed onto a metal plate on my DB Sorrento (The Goat). Still powered by WinCE and MiniStumbler, though.
This time, though, I have made significant changes. For the price, you really can't beat the Wireless card that I've got, and the antennae are superb omni-directional antennae. Sure, better hardware exists, but this stuff is better than you'd find built-in on any laptop. Here's the new digs:
Hardware:
Trek 1200 (The Twelve)
HP Jornada 720
EnGenius 200mw 802.11b/g high-power card
Garmin GPS12
Two 19dBi Antennae
Software:
JLime Linux
Kismet
Of note are a different bike, different GPS, and vastly different software. The GPS12 isn't any more accurate than my (currently destroyed) eTrex but it runs quite a bit longer on a set of batteries. The software is where this rig really shines. You can see a review of this scanning setup (off the bike) on one the the other blogs I occasionaly write for.
What's it look like? Well, when I'm riding, it's pretty stealthy. You can just see a pair of antennae lashed to the top of the panniers, but laying flat. I could get more networks with them mounted upright, but I didn't have anything to mount them on and my aluminum rack isn't magnetic.
Unpack the gadgets and it looks like this:
I rode to church today, too. I only scanned for networks on the way home. Here are the obligatory photos du jour.
Getting ready to roll out. I didn't realize my panniers were on backwards. Whoops.
Lenexa Fire Department on Pflumm Rd.
At church. The green thing is a "Buy one get one free" for Mountain Dew.
As usual, I played sound engineer today. I actually had to re-wire a significant portion of our sound system before church. When we stopped using the subwoofer (we didn't need it really), someone botched the wiring and hooked stuff up all wrong. This is why I wish people wouldn't mess with it unless they fully understand it first.
My Dad and Christie's guitars. Kinda blurry, oh well.
Loaded up for the trip home. I just carried my bottles out in the panniers. I needed the mesh pockets for something else on my way home...
Tasty mountain dew! My favorite bike fuel. With my BOGOF Bottle Cap, this stuff set me back about $3.15 per gallon. Cheaper AND tastier than gasoline.
Miscellaneous Railroad Photography:
A train brake.
Me, being a trespasser. Oh noes!
Random Tunage:
Casting Crowns - Voice Of Truth
Plumb - Stranded
Sunday, June 01, 2008
The WarCycle v. 3.0
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6 comments:
Of course, the phrase "War Dialing" comes from the movie "War Games" where Matthew Broderick's character dials for modems and stumbles upon the ultra secret government computer called WOPR that controls the entire nuclear arsenal.
"Would you like to play a game?"
Ah, such a good movie. Yes, although the technique of "War-dialing" predated War Games by more than a decade, the practice was known as Demon Dialing before that, and often included programs that performed automatic redial of the same phone number in order to win call-in radio contests or to otherwise gain an unfair advantage over a busy phone line (such as the case with popular bulletin board systems of old)
Although, I believe the correct quote is "Shall we play a game?" ;)
Not that I've watched the movie twice this year already or anything.
I've never been good at movie quotes. Although, in my defense, I was quoting J.D. from Scrubs who was quoting the movie. (Are you buying this?)
I'm buying it, but I'm taking your geek card until you watch War Games again.
The Warcycling setup just keeps getting better -- it's just freaking awesome! And a reminder that I haven't combined cycling and geekery sufficiently.
War Games was on AMC last night. I didn't watch it.
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