A serious technical issue occurred to this website weeks ago has reminded me about the word that one of my lecturers likes to use, “bullet proved“.  Years ago, when I was studying in the university, I could hear this word from his mouth very frequently (almost every lecture and tutorial for the first few weeks of the semester.).  He was teaching us how to make the software as “bullet proved” as possible!!!

However, there is no software with 100% bullet proved in the real world.

“Bullet proved” here means a software which is secure from any attack, or can handle any input properly even the human has intentionally taken over the control from the normal software operation.

A standalone computer without external storage or networking might be safe from virus, but certain human input might be harmful especially to its data.  Furthermore, it might not be practical nowadays to isolate a computer from accessing external media or to prevent it from connecting to a network.

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Without any sign,  I got the following when I tried to load my blog into a browser…

First thing to do was to complain to the hosting provider, but it was still not solved after a few hours.

The database had corrupted, and I was not able to recover it with the backup that I had.  Finally, without the help from the hosting provider, I have successfully restored the database by creating a new database.

The hosting provider said that my account might have been compromised, but I think it was more likely that someone has injected some commands into the database.  The old database has just gone like that, and the hosting provider was not able to find it out.  I believe it is still hiding somewhere in the server, and they were not putting effort in recovering it.  What I might have lost was only some comments from the readers but they wanted to backdate my database for a few weeks by their outdated backup.  No way!!! I think it was better to restore it myself with my latest backup.

I have gained some experience in rescuing a website, and I will make it more “bullet-proved” too.

We were attracted by the Malt Sugar Art in one of the stalls in the Kuching Festival this year.  It is an art from China which is categorized as “non-material inheritance“.

There were some samples being displayed at the stall, but their prices were very costly, from RM 4 to RM 20 or more, depending on the design.

We chose to turn the wheel with RM 4, and the artist would make the design where the pointer has pointed to.  Luckily, we have got a dragon.  He said that it cost RM 10 if we did not take the wheel.

This is what we have got.

I thought it might take 5 to 10 minutes, but the entire process took less than 3 minutes.  I have taken a video clip as well, but since it was so fast, the video clip is very short.

He first melt the malt sugar.

Then he used a tool which is similar to the one used for storing wax for batik.

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The Food Fair and Fun Fair
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It is the main attraction here and we can’t skip introducing to those who have not been here.

But since SiewPeng and I are vegeterian, we do not have much choices.

Come and try hundreds of types of food next year.

Besides, there were also some games to play to win a prize or two.

This part of the festival was the area for a mini fun fair.  At the entrance, we were welcomed by a few dinosaur statues.  Don’t be threatened by them though.  They are friendly! Haha… If you take a good look, you can see a merry go round at the far end.

Every year, there will be a massive jam outside the venue of the Kuching Festival and it is often difficult to find a parking space.  The jam usually starts around 5:30 p.m. and you can see people walking in and out of the festival with all kinds of food which they have bought.  There is also a big crowd within the festival and it’s hard to move around.  But that is okay if you like to be in the crowd.  So, if you have missed it this year, don’t be disappointed.  It will be on again next year with more exciting ‘tummy adventures’!