10 things you didn’t know you can do with Linux

Even if you’re a Windows (or Mac) user, knowing how to use Linux is a valuable skill, and it can run a bunch of awesome things in your home-even if it isn’t your main desktop OS.

Here are 10 ways you can use Linux even if you’re not ready to go full Ubuntu.

Troubleshoot other computers

You don’t even need to install Linux on a box to make it useful-all you need is a solid live CD. Just boot from the CD and you can grab any files from the hard drive, even if the computer won’t boot or you’ve forgotten your password. Linux can even help if you accidentally formatted your entire drive.

Of course, not all system rescue discs are Linux-and there are a lot of good ones out there-but a bit of basic Linux knowledge can turn you into a troubleshooting expert.

Make Chromebook more useful

You’d be surprised how much you can get done in Chrome OS. There are a lot of great Chrome apps out there for editing audio, video, images, coding, and more-but sometimes you just need a more powerful desktop app you’re familiar with. Luckily, you can install Linux alongside Chrome OS really easily, and get access to a traditional desktop with a bunch of apps.

It won’t get you Photoshop or something of that caliber, but if all you need is a bit of a safety net, it’s perfect.

Host a website or Web app

You’d be surprised how many web sites you visit every day actually run on Linux-and if you want to build a web site, you probably will too. Possibly more interesting, though, is how you can use a Linux–based web host-like Dream host-to host your own personal RSS reader with Tiny Tiny RSS, or your own Dropbox clone with Own Cloud.

You could, of course, host these on a Linux box in your home, too. It’s a bit more complicated, but it gives you complete control over everything rather than putting your data in someone else’s hands.

Work with hard drives and partitions

If you dual- or triple–boot your system and ever want to move partitions around, you’ll have a much easier time with a Linux live CD and GParted. 

Heck, even if you don’t dual–boot, you’ll still need a bit of help from Linux if you ever migrate to a solid-state drive, or upgrade to a more spacious drive. And, if you want to securely wipe it so no one can get at your data…well, Ubuntu can do that too.

Automate everything in your home

With a little Linux knowledge and a cheap computer-like the Raspberry Pi-you can create all sorts of tiny home automation gadgets. You can control your home with Siri, mount a Google Calendar tablet on your wall, set up a home surveillance system, control your blinds and air conditioner, stream music in your living room, build a digital photo frame, build a sunrise alarm clock, and…Pretty much anything else you can think of.

With a cheap board like the Raspberry Pi and a free OS like Linux, you’re more limited by your imagination than your wallet.

Run a home server for backup, streaming, torrenting, and more

If you don’t want to leave your computer on 24/7 just to share files or download torrents, a tiny dedicated Linux box might be a better solution. With an old computer or a cheap new one, you can put together a home server that stores your backups, streams movies and music’s, seeds torrents, or performs any number of other tasks quietly in the corner. You can put one together with Nas4Free, FreeNAS, or even Ubuntu.

Create a dedicated media center or video game machine

If you have a computer that won’t even use the desktop-like a media center or dedicated emulation machine-why not just set it up with a Linux backend? It’s free and easy to do. XBMC works great on Linux, whether you’re running on a Raspberry Pi or just a low-powered PC, and you can turn just about any PC into an all-in-one retro video game console.

The Raspberry Pi works well for older games, but you’d want something more powerful to play newer stuff. Heck, you could even use it to create a retro arcade coffee table.

Brush up on your hacking and security

Some Linux distributions, like BackTrack or Kali, are security-focused distros for testing security systems. That means you can use them to learn how to, say, hack WEP or WPA Wi–Fi passwords, which is a great way to learn a bit more about your own network security and how to protect yourself from similar attacks.

Of course, we don’t recommend using these powers for evil-but knowing evil’s tricks gives you a good path to preventing them.

Revive an old or slow PC

And so we come to one of the most obvious and common uses for Linux-and still one of the best. If you have a PC that’s seen better days, Windows is far from the ideal OS. Install a lightweight Linux distribution on it (like Lubuntu or, if you’re a bit more savvy, Archbang) and it’ll feel like a new machine again.

It may not be able to do everything your powerful Windows machine can do, but it’s better than having a non-functional computer, and works perfectly for basic tasks.

Learn more about how computers work

If none of the above sound like anything you need, why not just get in the spirit of DIY and learn a little bit more about how computers work? Tons of things run Linux these days, from TVs to the Android phone in your pocket, and learning about Linux is not only a fun hobby in and of itself, but it’ll help you learn a bit more about what makes these machines tick.

We recommend getting started with something like Ubuntu or Mint, then when you get a little more familiar, move onto Arch for some serious learning. There are a ton of great distros out there, and even if you’re just playing around, you may find that those skills come in pretty handy one day.

Tips for hacker-proofing your website

Business is becoming more web oriented each and every day, in accordance with the times, web hackers are a frequent problem for every person who utilizes the Internet to be carrying out its daily affairs.

Every little thing from bank information, business online and facts to private web pages that have become targets for hackers interested in personal information. Whether an online store, a personal blog or a web-based service like SEO organization, your website and also its matters may be targets for hacking.

List of techniques and also tips for protecting yourself and your website from online menaces :-

Use Very Powerful Passwords

Simply much most basic for protecting your website is to use a very strong passwords that hackers are using bots that could be attempted to disclose your password via trial and also error. These robots try out a very basic username and password combinations that are primarily based on any readily available information and fact.

If we set username as admin and WordPress Password as a “admin123″, it’s not a good idea for safe our site.

There are a number of tools that you can use to automatically create very powerful passwords. KeePass has a password generator tool that is generally built into its application OR you can use a free tool like PC Tools that is a very Secure Password Generator.

Stay Up to Date

Maintain website and software up to date are also very essential aspects of a web security.

There are many Popular sites like Blogger and WordPress are constantly sending out a very new updates for a basic safety purposes. Continue to keep up on a very new versions of the software that you can use and also look out for a problems.

Use Very Secure Web Hosting

Larger websites that see a much more website traffic estimator that have a very secure hosting is a very critical for protecting against hackers. Many web hosting organizations advertise that they take a much more various different security measures to be protecting the servers that they can be provided for their customers.

There is very smart investment to be receive antivirus software or any of the other applications that can be identified that if you have been hacked.

Good antivirus software should identify any malware that has crawled onto your computer and also that’s actually helping hackers to be stolen passwords.

Plugins

The plugins and apps that you have download for your websites is a very safety measure that each and every site manager should be taken out.

You can delete unused plugins and continue to keep a current plugins to be safe supported out to limit the various numbers of possible means for hackers to be accessing your site.

The plugin only keeps one version of the website so make sure that you are updating backup each and every month.

We Chat hacked on Google play store

It appears to be We Chat’s recent competitive advertising and marketing strategy caught them with an inappropriate eye. Tencent supported a very instant online messaging app has been reportedly hacked on Google play store developing a roar from user looking to be downloading it.

Attempting install We Chat app through an Android play an altogether different app ‘Trivial Drive’ is obtaining downloaded. The trivial drive appears to be a card game where after you drive the car that it notifies you of empty fuel, then it is encouraging you to buy gas. When we pressed the icon to buy-gas for some reason it didn’t worked out and also showed us an error.

It is very popular that some users even mentioned in Android play store that 0.99$ has been determined from their accounts.

The app has been simply just one of the much most downloaded apps on iOS and Android with its daily users expanded 5 fold in the very last 1 month. We recently protected the strategy taken by We Chat in improving its user base to reach 400 million. It currently has crossed 50 million user mark in overall whole countries outside China. At the time of composing this article We Chat app Ranked 1st position in Top Rated Free App category at Google play store and also billion dollar group Tencent backing it must be trying out to so hard to be get things back in the place.