2018-05-20 Sunday - Conda Package Manager

In preparation for exploring fast.ai deep learning library, lessons, and tutorials...

• http://course.fast.ai/
• https://github.com/fastai/fastai

As well as PyTorch tutorials...

• https://pytorch.org/tutorials/

I'm reading-up on the Conda package, dependency and environment manager

• https://conda.io/docs/index.html
• "Package, dependency and environment management for any language—Python, R, Ruby, Lua, Scala, Java, JavaScript, C/ C++, FORTRAN"

2018-05-10 Thursday - Useful Eclipse Plugin: GitHub Flavored Markdown viewer

An Eclipse plugin providing an accurate view of GitHub Flavored Markdown (.md) files           

• https://github.com/satyagraha/gfm_viewer
• https://marketplace.eclipse.org/content/github-flavored-markdown-viewer-plugin-eclipse 

Note:

• "You may wish to add the exclusion pattern .*.md.html to your projects .gitignore file, which will prevent their inclusion in version control operations"

2018-05-09 Wednesday - Sparx Enterprise Architect Version 14 Released

This is my placeholder posting for my review comments on the new Sparx Enterprise Architect Version 14.

http://www.sparxsystems.com/products/ea/14/

Many, many details covered in the Release Notes (re:  Builds1400-1419)
http://www.sparxsystems.com/products/ea/history.html

Selected Notes:

Over 1,000 all new patterns included Each pattern includes 
- A model fragment targeting a specific use
- Package structure (where appropriate) 
- Detailed notes and discussion material on usage 
- Detailed links to help material and other resources related to the pattern 
- XMI based implementation for quick and easy insertion of the pattern into the current model


Initial Impression:
- Wow.

2018-05-06 Sunday - NIST Draft Special Publication 800-52 Revision 2

Some background reading I'm doing on future requirements to conform to TLS 1.3:

https://csrc.nist.gov/CSRC/media/Publications/sp/800-52/rev-2/draft/documents/sp800-52r2-draft.pdf

From November 15, 2017
https://csrc.nist.gov/News/2017/NIST-Releases-Draft-SP-800-52-Rev-2-for-public-co

"NIST announces the public comment release of Draft Special Publication 800-52 Revision 2, Guidelines for the Selection, Configuration, and Use of Transport Layer Security (TLS) Implementations. Transport Layer Security (TLS) provides mechanisms to protect data during electronic dissemination across the Internet. This Special publication provides guidance to the selection and configuration of TLS protocol implementations while making effective use of Federal Information Processing Standards (FIPS) and NIST recommended cryptographic algorithms. It requires that TLS 1.2 configured with FIPS-based cipher suites be supported by all government TLS servers and clients and recommends that agencies develop migration plans to support TLS 1.3 by January 1, 2020. This Special Publication also provides guidance on certificates and TLS extensions that impact security."

Note the pdf of comments received:

• https://csrc.nist.gov/publications/detail/sp/800-52/rev-2/draft
• https://csrc.nist.gov/CSRC/media/Publications/sp/800-52/rev-2/draft/documents/sp800-52r2-draft-comments-received.pdf
• See the review comments, in particular:
• Chary Chapinksi: "19. §3.3.1 contains cipher suites which appear in the RFC 7540 blacklist."
• NSA: "3. page iii, lines 142-143, page iv, lines 170-171: There should be absolutely no plan to deprecate TLS1.2. In fact in the case where static RSA is required, those use cases should stay on TLS1.2. I do agree that TLS 1.3 should be supported, but don't give the impression that TLS1.2 is being deprecated by saying 'migration plan'. Or add a clarifying sentence/phrase stating that TLS1.2 will be acceptable in the long term."

Note that Revision 1 was release in April 2014

• https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/SpecialPublications/NIST.SP.800-52r1.pdf

References:

• RFC-5245 The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Protocol Version 1.2
• RFC-8120 Mutual Authentication Protocol for HTTP (Experimental) [April 2017]
• https://tools.ietf.org/id/draft-ietf-oauth-mtls-07.html [January 30, 2018]
• https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-oauth-mtls-07 [January 29, 2018]
• RFC-7540 -Hypertext Transfer Protocol Version 2 (HTTP/2) - Appendix A. TLS 1.2 Cipher Suite Black List

TLS Basics:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_Layer_Security
• http://www.zytrax.com/tech/survival/ssl.html#ssl
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/security/tls/tls-ssl-schannel-ssp-overview
• https://blog.talpor.com/2015/07/ssltls-certificates-beginners-tutorial/
• https://dzone.com/articles/tls-security-tlsssl-explained
• https://dzone.com/articles/tlsssl-terminology-and-basics
• https://dzone.com/articles/tlsssl-certificates-part-4

Creating Self-Signed TLS Certificates:

• https://www.openssl.org/
• https://dzone.com/articles/create-a-self-signed-ssl-certificate-using-openssl
• https://www.linode.com/docs/security/ssl/create-a-self-signed-tls-certificate/
• https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/en/SSWHYP_4.0.0/com.ibm.apimgmt.cmc.doc/task_apionprem_gernerate_self_signed_openSSL.html
• https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-create-a-self-signed-ssl-certificate-for-nginx-in-ubuntu-16-04
• https://devcenter.heroku.com/articles/ssl-certificate-self

Configuring TLS Mutual Authentication:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_authentication
• http://blog.fourthbit.com/2014/12/23/traffic-analysis-of-an-ssl-slash-tls-session
• https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/app-service/app-service-web-configure-tls-mutual-auth

Youtube F5 DevCentral: Explaining TLS 1.3

Youtube F5 DevCentral: TLS 1.3 Handshake

2018-05-06 Sunday - Experimenting with Docker on Windows

Today I uninstalled Oracle's VirtualBox software - and decided that I would use Docker for Windows exclusively going forward.

There are two options for downloading Docker Community Edition - from either the Stable or Edge channels.

https://docs.docker.com/install/

• Stable gives you reliable updates every quarter.
• Edge gives you new features every month

I'm running the latest Edge channel release (18.05.0-ce-rc1-win63)

So far, it has been a joyful experience.


Choosing Edge gives you the ability to run a standalone Kubernetes server and client:
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/kubernetes/

• "Kubernetes is only available in Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Edge. Kubernetes support is not included in Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Stable"
• "Docker for Windows 18.02 CE Edge includes a standalone Kubernetes server and client, as well as Docker CLI integration. The Kubernetes server runs locally within your Docker instance, is not configurable, and is a single-node cluster."
• "The Kubernetes server runs within a Docker container on your local system, and is only for local testing. When Kubernetes support is enabled, you can deploy your workloads, in parallel, on Kubernetes, Swarm, and as standalone containers."

I noted that the install process doesn't offer the option of installing on a different drive - but you can configure where the Disk Image Location is specified.  In the system tray, you'll see the whale icon:




Which you can right-click to access "Settings" - to then modify the Docker Disk Image Location path, for example:

The Docker documentation is excellent:

https://docs.docker.com/get-started/

https://docs.docker.com/get-started/#containers-and-virtual-machines

• "A container runs natively on Linux and shares the kernel of the host machine with other containers. It runs a discrete process, taking no more memory than any other executable, making it lightweight."
• "By contrast, a virtual machine (VM) runs a full-blown “guest” operating system with virtual access to host resources through a hypervisor. In general, VMs provide an environment with more resources than most applications need."

https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/#what-to-know-before-you-install
https://docs.docker.com/docker-for-windows/install/#switch-between-windows-and-linux-containers