Ditch Witch, I think I love you.. On my never-ending quest for fresh graphical chunks, many a ridiculous warning sticker have caught my eye. Upon encountering such gems, I immediately slip into stealth mode and plan for attack. Once the stage is set and the time is prime, I move in for the kill — another ripe chunk cold plucked from the vine. Of course, only the nonsensical, pointless, redundant or otherwise ridiculous labels are snatched from existence — anything even legitimately informative requires a more compassionate approach..

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Harvesting Raw Logs For those of us using cPanel as the control panel for our websites, a wealth of information is readily available via cPanel ‘Raw Access Logs’. These logs are perpetually updated with data involving user agents, IP addresses, HTTP activity, resource access, and a whole lot more. Here is a quick tutorial on accessing and interpreting your cPanel raw access logs.

Part One: Grab ‘em

To grab a copy of your raw access logs, log into cPanel and click on the "Raw Access Logs" icon. Within the Raw Access Log interface, scroll through the list of available log files and download the raw access log(s) of your choice.

Exit cPanel and navigate to your local copy of the raw access log, which should have been downloaded as a zipped/g-zipped file (i.e., .zip or .gz file extension), with a name similar to accesslog_your-domain.com_4_20_2007.gz.

Unzip the file and extract its contents, which should be a single file named your-domain.com. Rename the file by appending a .log or .txt extension to the file name. Alternatively, if the file is not named with a .com, .net, or .whatever extension, no rename is necessary, as it also may be opened via right-click » ‘Open With…’.

That’s all there is to it. If you understand how to interpret the contents of your Raw Access Log, you’re solid gold, baby. Otherwise, continue reading for a breif tutorial to get you started with the basics..

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Of all the bizarre, nonsensical, and pointless spam we have received so far this year, this one takes the cake. It was delivered to our designated spam account earlier this month as a plain-text email, which opens with an explanation. Apparently, "Bob Diamond" is "an Hiring Manager" looking to advertise a couple of important items. The first ad seems remotely realistic, but the second ad.. it’s like, "teddy bear features" out of nowhere — you can’t be serious. Also worth mentioning, the triple signature effect — Bob signs his name not once or twice, but three times. Check it out..

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Default DNS Error page for Internet Explorer

First of all, congratulations if you are geeky enough to understand the title of this article. Many would be like, "CSS, MS.. IE, error ..what..?" Whatever. If you get the title, you will get the point of this utterly pointless exercise. If that is the case, prepare for a delightful romp through geekland. Otherwise, save your precious time and stop reading here (exit strategy).

Well, okay, for the seriously unenlightened, let us explain the object of our present focus:

The default "DNS Error" page for Internet Explorer unfortunately remains a familiar sight for millions of Microsoft users. Typically, the default MS DNS Error page loads whenever a browser is unable to connect to the internet or other networked resource. Once loaded, the error page announces itself with a message that reads "The page cannot be displayed." The page then presents several options: refresh browser, retype address, check connection, check configuration, etc.     — Monzilla Media (i.e., me)

Still interested? Well, okay. Actually, it’s no big deal. Just a nice, standards-compliant, CSS-based redesign of that old, nappy Internet Explorer 404 Error page. You know the one. Whenever you can’t connect to the internet, it jumps up at you, sticks out it’s tongue and mocks you. Yes, we hate it, too. But alas, with the release of Internet Explorer 7 comes a ‘brand new’ 404 error page. Surely, it’s just a matter of time before that dumpy old 404 error page circa IE5/6 disappears forever. So, before that tragedy unfolds..

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