Swing In A Tree: codes

Monday, April 15, 2019

"Passwords"

In the not so distant past, I hated generating passwords for my endless accounts. I fumbled to come up with something that I could remember, that would flow from the tips of my fingers over a keyboard effortlessly. I have many friends who use generators, but I dragged my feet over going that route.

My latest technique for creating passwords stems from my use of obscure things only I will know, like the name of my best friend’s third grade crush. I morph “Jeff” to something like J3ff3rd1966IL? In my way of thinking, I can remember Jeff, third grade and the year I was in that grade coupled with the state I lived in at that time. Right? The question mark makes me stop and think on whether this is the right combination before I hit ENTER. For me, generating a new password changed from a tedious exercise to something fun. Need another new password? How about my second grade teacher? MsWh!t3@Dov3r! (Ms. White at Dover).

Occasionally, I generate something that trips my fingers up too much, but usually the end result means I hold within my head more passwords than ever before!

Friday, April 11, 2014

“Heartbleed”

heartbleed.com

The latest invasion into my privacy means I have to generate new passwords. Many people can do this task easily. They come up with some nifty combination of letters, numbers or symbols that they can easily recall. For me, creating passwords takes more effort than stringing eight or more letters together. I need something that I can remember, first and foremost. That means tapping into old memories for a person, place, or event that I can use as the basis for my code. Then I have to add a variety of numbers or symbols at the beginning or ending of this building block. Always focusing on a combination that will be easy for me to remember while making absolutely no sense at all to anyone else. So, I’ll spend the next day or two playing around with ideas that will seem obscure to anyone but me.

Wish me luck!