huma79

I have to ask. Why aren't you getting married in Thailand and filing for DCF? It seems you meet the residency requirements. I realize everyone's situation is different.

I worked and lived in Thailand for around 7 years, but the past couple of years I technically have a job in the US (but it's IT, and for 90% of the job I can telecommute from anywhere). I needed to come back to the US this summer though for the past few months for work, so I'm filing while I'm here.

By the way, you said "girlfriend." She should NOT mention "boyfriend." If she does, I can almost promise you the B2 visa will be denied and she will be directed to go for the K marriage/fiancee immigrant visa.

The K visa's are not immigrant visas. They are temporary visas just like the Tourist visa (but with a much higher passing rate since you can file petition of support among other things), which is why they recommended them to you. Someone who came on a K visa would still need to make a residency visa after they arrived in the US if they wanted to stay permanently

I'm currently in the exact same situation as you - around 10 years in Thailand living with g/f, and now getting ready to move back to the US with her. I highly recommend reading the Nolo Fiance & Marriage Visa book (http://www.amazon.com/Fiance-Marriage-Visas-Couples-Immigration/dp/1413317375 ) which has been very helpful so far in describing what to do step-by-step. According to their lawyers, either the Marriage or Fiance visa could be the way to go for you, depending on your needs. One thing they strongly do not recommend is going on a tourist visa and getting married on it, because this could cause issues down the road if she ever wants to get residency and USCIS decides to question her actual original intent for going to the US back when she got that tourist visa.

Good luck!

It's been down for me for a few hours.. I'm on the south side of Bangkok

As a fellow web developer, this seems like a really strange way of dealing with the issue. There are literally thousands of other legitimate websites that are confronted with this issue, but are able to resolve it without resorting to completely banning a domain suffix from email lists. The only other sites I've seen that have resorted to this are illegal torrent sites and the like, which don't have much ground to stand on.

George: Have you read the Yahoo page on this issue located here? Also, have you filed for a bulk email exception form with yahoo located here?

IATA is Farang.

Why can't AOT, which is Thai, look after their domestic problem.

An International airport is not a domestic problem.

Custom officers just doing their job by checking if you are not exceeding the tolerated amount of imported duty-free products.

I think you misunderstand.. they weren't checking the visa run bus. I know that is normal. They were set up in front of the meetup point (in Bangkok), stopping people before they even arrived to start the visa run. My friend was stopped, as was another farang that came in a taxi from the same direction. I suspect they were looking for overstays to make a some tea money. On the other hand, maybe they were just doing their job and had received a tip that some red-flagged name was going to show up for a visa run.

Without being too specific on the visa run company... a friend of mine who did a visa run early this morning (VERY early) said that the police were intercepting taxis carrying just in front of the meet-up location and searching the belongings of foreigners. This is the first time I've heard of this, is it something that has happened before that anyone is aware of?

Kindle isn't great at handling PDF files. The Sony range of e-readers are better for those who have a lot of PDF stuff to read.

Goodreader app on the iPad for viewing any PDF files is the way to go these days.

The only advantage of the sony readers and indeed the kindle these days is the readability on the beach or next to the pool and battery life.

Some other advantages of Sony reader:

-Easier on the eyes, especially if you're using it for long reading sessions

-Smaller and more portable

-PDF reflow is the best i've seen

-75% cheaper than iPad

No, the risk is not negligible.

There is a specific risk of storing info in a location that is not under your control and is accessible by internet.

Arguably, 99% of the time users who are storing info under their own control have a vector that is open to an information breach, whether they know it or not. The reason why a service like lastpass works (if they are worth their salt, pardon the pun) is that they are dedicated mitigating these security vectors. No, it's not perfect. But it's the less flawed solution.

Trojan keyloggers can spy on your master password and send it out to the guys on the net.

Yes, but this is because single password signon for authentication is inherently flawed, and has nothing to do with lastpass itself. Actually, something like lastpass is safer in this regard because they provide ways to defeat keyloggers - software keyboard signon, one time usage passwords, and physical security keys.

Not only is the storage attackable from the outside, but those cloud storage sites have admins and developers who know every detail of the mechanisms used.

Those persons need money... like everybody.

Again, if the company knows anything about security (which I would hope, considering it's their business), they will have implemented a separation of duties as well as job rotations, so that no single rogue employee could access the data.

Everyone believes in anti-virus software.

But custom-made trojans cannot be detected by security software.

This is getting a bit off-topic, but this is not really true.. Good antivirus software with heuristics can detect a good portion of 0-day malware.

It amazes me that anybody would trust their passwords and any personal information to be managed by someone else, especially a web site.

No kidding. Write them down, pad and paper. You can't hack that, just keep it in the safe from your G/F

Can't hack that? Wanna bet? With 350 workstations to manage, sometimes the user was not available when work was required and a simple look under the mousepad, under the keyboard, or in the top drawer nearly always yielded the password. To impress on them the need to not do that, when they returned to the workstation and found a Notepad message that they had been hacked they frantically called for help and were reminded that it could have been a bad guy.

Absolutely.. in fact, nearly all password hacks are the result of people doing stupid things like writing them down or putting them in a TXT file on their desktop. These aren't the ones that get on the news, but they are the most common by far.

I also use lastpass and will continue using it. This news report is extremely misleading! A few megabytes of strange traffic patterns by their IDS does not necessarily mean they were hacked. The fact that they announced this is why I will definitely stick with using lastpass!

Re-using the same password *will* result in your accounts eventually being compromised, the question is just when.

Was LastPass hacked?? It looks like there is reason for concern=

Probably not, but their network security detected a small bit of unusual data transfer activity, so they made an announcement just to be on the safe side. This in an odd way is good proof why you should use a service like lastpass. They have much higher security intrusion detection running on their networks and servers than the other servers you would be storing your passwords on otherwise - and they immediately communicate with users about even a minor possible anomaly. Even if they had been hacked, all you have to do is go in and change your master password and you're secure again.

I see a lot of DANGEROUS information in this thread - people actually recommending to re-use the SAME 2-3 passwords.

I can't stress this enough:

Never re-use passwords!. You'd be surprised at the number of security vulnerabilities you open yourself up to if you go this route! Going this route is a ticking time bomb - the question is not if your password will be compromised, but when.

Next step, Digital ID's. That's what Obama is pushing in the USA.

Source, please?

^ <deleted> are you talking about ? You are talking such bs saying the thai language isnt a simple language unable to be used to explain anything complex. Some people will defend anything thai. One tense compared to twelve is just the beginning of the problems with the thai language and any other simple language for that matter. Im not down on the thai language only pointing out the facts of it. The only misleading statements here are yours. There is a reason there is an abundance of work editing research papers in english for thai masters and phd candidates, there just are not any words or grammar in the thai language to explain their work.

I'm guessing this isn't a serious post, just trying to stir up a reaction. I'm not sure on what authority you're making this claim, but anyone who is fluent in both languages would disagree. Anything that can be expressed in English can be expressed in Thai. Language is just a tool for communicating - and any deficiencies would likely come from the person communicating, not the language itself.

Great, i've been waiting for this for a few years!

they got tired of their first wife "going to pot and nagging them all the time,"

sorry, but what the heck does "going to pot" mean?

I can't see the stats at the moment, but if I recall a few days ago the wikileaks site listed that it had over 5,000 leaks from the Bangkok embassy.. Only like 3 have been released.. should be interesting to see what comes..

It will be fascinating.One nugget picked up in a brief scan is that Obama has never picked up the phone to speak to Abhisit and that Thaksin has easy access to Russia (including one to one meetings with Putin.)

Go figure.

Yeah, I thought that was interesting too. I have the impression that the BKK embassy was a little annoyed that the white house was so slow in talking with Abhisit.

Actually, from http://wikileaks.info/,'>http://wikileaks.info/, other official domain names and mirrors are:

http://wikileaks.com - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.net - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.biz - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.de - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.eu - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.fi - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.mobi - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.nl - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.pl - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://wikileaks.us - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

http://ljsf.org - Points to Official Site [88.80.13.160]

Real mirrors on different IP Addresses

http://wikileaks.info - Mirror hosted in Switzerland [62.2.16.94]

http://wikileaks.se - Mirror hosted in Sweden [88.80.6.179]

http://nyud.net - Mirror hosted in the United States [129.170.214.192]

I can't see the stats at the moment, but if I recall a few days ago the wikileaks site listed that it had over 5,000 leaks from the Bangkok embassy.. Only like 3 have been released.. should be interesting to see what comes..

This is getting complicated...

I suggest you skip everything that has to do with restore points.

Separate your thnking into

1. system (can be reinstalled easily)

2 user data (all the value in your life)

1.If you really need to backup your system so you can get back to a certain point including the installed programs and settings, do a partition backup (one of the very few times a recommend partition backup) Clonezilla have the tools you need like Partclone. Use these programs on your own responsibility. I have not tested enough to have any opinion on their quality. Once you have done a partition backup, restore it immediately to a different disk and test it, so you know it works.

2. Separate your user data in folders, one for each project.

Use a distributed version control system if it fits your work (editing 2 hour HD video clips does not) and push regularly to a remote location.

If you for some reason don't want to use version control systems backup using the traditional daily,weekly, monthly or Towers of Hanoi rotation schemes.

Martin

This is sound advice! Instead of a versioning control system, I use DropBox though. It's a bit easier to set up for the average joe than versioning control systems IMO! The only limitation is that access to file changes are limited to the previous 30 days - more than that and you have to pay for their packrat service.

- do not rely on "password tools" to store your passwords.

Firstly, these tools are software, and any software can be broken into.

Secondly, being "password storage" tools, they are prime targets for criminals.

If you really need to store your passwords in a file, use a simple text editor like notepad, textpad, etc. and write your accounts and passwords in there.

Then zip or rar the file and set a password, and store the zipped file on a USB stick.

Additional security can be achieved by zipping the file a second time with another password.

Don't forget to delete the unzipped version!

For the most part, everything you posted is good advice, but I disagree with this password protection technique..

Password protected zip files are an easy target for brute force or rainbow table attacks. Also, if you're on a computer comprimised with a keylogger, this method won't work at all since your password will be in plaintext as you copy and paste it into the password field.

If you do use this technique, make sure you follow some additional guidelines:

-Never use it on a computer that you don't know is secure

-Use a zip/compression program that supports higher encryption such as AES-256, and make sure you use it

-Set your zip password to at least 12 characters, and use a mix of letters, numbers, and symbols

-Name it something that doesn't draw attention. AllMyBankPasswords.zip isn't a good idea.

Yep Key-loggers are a huge problem these days.

A good idea is to use windows virtual keyboard for entering important passwords or CC numbers etc.

programs>accessories>accessibility>on-screen Keyboard

Want to find out just who is connected with your computer use cmd and netstat -a or -n and -b for the application list.

I just wanted to stop this minor piece of misinformation before others try it! Using the windows virtual keyboard does NOT protect you from many keyloggers!! AFAIK, most virtual keyboard software simply connects to the standard OS API functions for input, and from the software keylogging perspective it is no different than when you are physically typing on a keyboard. One thing it DOES protect you from is hardware keyloggers, but I doubt these are used as much.

Hey Katana, I've been 'popping' my own back every other day for 15 years and no problems so far. The only thing is that it gets noticibly easier to do it after you do it many times.

How do they know it's exactly 1,273 households?

Isn't Thai reporting great. Always accurate to the nth degree.

Accuracy is highly overrated ! -- mere details -- sensationalism is far more important.

You will notice that the number of sandbags is reported as one million in the first article. It drops to 400, 00 in a later article, and then rises ( no doubt for effect) to 4 million in a later article. Four million sandbags is a very major mobilization of sandbags !

Or possibly they meant "4 sandbags, each filled with 1 million grains of sand."