Note to Skywise – July 25, 2013

The following has been discussed here in the past.

Earthquake researchers around the world need to have a protected resource such as EarthWaves where they can discuss various earthquake or Earth Change related topics. And the present EarthWaves does help with that. But a more sophisticated bulletin board is needed.

As part 5 below proposes, researchers need to have their own Web page where they can discuss forecasts data without interference from critics. And a single WWWBoard program can be programmed to generate multiple Web pages like that.

One of my projects involves getting such a bulletin board created. But there is no sense in reinventing the wheel. And I have perhaps three dozen such projects all of which are important and all of which take time to get developed.

Once again, if you would like to build additional sophistication into the EarthWaves board then that is what I recommend. If not then I plan to ask people in the Perl Newsgroup and other locations for help with that.

If you like doing programming work then this could actually be fun. And it might get Shan, Pavel, and other earthquake researchers to post more notes.

Here is what could be done. And there are many more possible additions.

1. The newest version of the WWWBoard program should be used. I believe that I am using the newest version. The one you have might be that same one. If not then the modifications that Canie had made could probably be easily added to the one that I have. It is more secure than older versions.

2. Your bulletin directory structure could and should be changed so that it is more secure. The one I have organized for my own bulletin board has a number of different security features. For example, the bulletin board program itself is stored in a Web site directory that is outside the public directory area. When people submit a “post” request a simple Perl program uses a “do” statement to send the request to the real CGI program that is in that other directory. So, no one can gain access to the program unless they have Web site access privileges.

3. Additional security features should be added to the program. For example, modifications that I added to my own program make it immune to “Denial of Service” attacks. It keeps track of the number of post requests. If they exceed a certain number per unit time such as per hour or day then the CGI program stops running and has to be reset. That WWWBoard program could also be easily modified so that there was an “invisible” post Web page that only approved parties would know about. So, they could keep posting notes even though the main post request page was not longer running.

4. The bulletin board needs to have a feature that lets people include a picture file with the post. I don’t know how to add that feature directly to the program. But some of the people posting to the Perl Newsgroup probably would.

5. As stated earlier, the board program should be able to generate a number of different Web pages at the same time. And each one would be different from the others in some way. For example, there might be one version just for geologists who don’t want to see the words “Earthquake” and “Prediction” used in the same sentence. So, none of my forecast posts would appear on that Web page. The program would still use post numbers to keep track of the posts. And on that Web page there would be gaps in the numbers. That wouldn’t confuse people. When people posted notes they would specify which Web page or Web pages that note would appear on. I and some other people would simply avoid posting any forecasts to the geologists’ special Web page.

So, the main Web page that would display all posts combined could be: wwwboard.html

The forecasters’ Web page might be: wwwboard-forecasts.html

The geologists’ Web page might be: wwwboard-geology.html

And on and on.

To do this type of programming work you would need to learn how to program using Perl. And that does not mean becoming a Perl expert. Anyone who can program using Fortran or Basic can learn how to write Perl code with just a little help.

The main reason to stick with the WWWBoard program and Perl is because the Xampp program can be used to develop the bulletin board program on a PC. Wampp makes the PC look like an Internet Server. So, CGI programs such as WWWBoard will run on the PC and handle post and html Web page read requests.

Finally, some of the other projects I am working on involve developing new and sophisticated cancer treatments and other medical program, getting us out of this eternal global recession, developing new energy sources such as massive orbiting solar reflecting mirrors that would shine light on populated areas so that rescue workers could see what they were doing at night after a disaster such as a tornado or earthquake had hit the area, an education system for the future, extremely safe and user friendly airports of the future that could and should have been developed decades ago, and many, many other advanced projects.

My technical background lets me work in virtually any area of science. People who might someday need those cancer treatments would not want me spending my time developing an Internet Bulletin Board. Such a board is important. But other people can do that. Not everyone has the type of technical background needed to develop advanced cancer treatments.

These are personal opinions.