PawSense: Catproof Your Computer(bitboost.com)
29 pointsby zdw8 hours ago10 comments
  • rented_mule4 hours ago
    Late one evening, about 15 years ago, we were wondering why we were seeing several hits per second from a single IP address on our company's search page. It didn't follow any of the patterns of the (admittedly simple) bot detection we had in place. It wasn't bad enough to be a problem, but we were trying to watch some real-time metrics and it was a distraction.

    We had a monitor on the wall showing the most popular search terms over the past hour. A few minutes into the event, we saw a search term steadily move to the top of the list. It was something like `'[]`. After thinking about it for a few minutes, we concluded a user left their browser on our search page, a cat stepped on their keyboard in just the right pattern, and then sat down on the F5-key (i.e., refresh key).

    No way to know if we got it right, but it was the best we came up with in the 20-ish minutes before it stopped. Oh the things you'll diagnose...

  • belZaah4 hours ago
    Some internal Skype versions had cat detection. When the client discovered cat-like key presses, the other side would see a cat walking animation instead of typing animation. Don’t think this feature ever made it to a public release.
    • 1bpp4 hours ago
      It did! I remember seeing this.
  • NAR87896 hours ago
    > When cats walk or climb on your keyboard, they can enter random commands and data, damage your files, and even crash your computer.

    And they might turn you into the Freakazoid

  • eichin6 hours ago
    > Except when playing a sound (when a cat is detected) PawSense occupies less than 120K of RAM.

    Maybe add a 1999 or 2000 datestamp to this (it won the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ig_Nobel_Prize_winners... Ig Nobel prize in Computer Science in 2000...)

  • two-sandwich5 hours ago
    Oh, I really believed this was some strange keylogger spyware. Maybe it is? I really can't tell. Either this was the hook to get people to install it, or the front to make it seem like a real thing when people find it and google "why is pawsense installed on my computer".

    > Even while you use your other software, PawSense constantly monitors keyboard activity. PawSense analyzes keypress timings and combinations to distinguish cat typing from human typing.

    • anonymous9082135 hours ago
      On an OS like Windows, which does not have a granular permissions model for something like prompting the user to allow a program to hook keyboard input when not focused, literally any binary you run could be a keylogger. One that openly says it analyzes keypresses is not especially more of a security risk than any other binary, which can do all the same things even if they do not announce on their webpage that they do.
  • hekkle6 hours ago
    I give it One Star: It keeps locking me out of my computer whenever I rage at video games, which makes me rage further.
    • nine_k5 hours ago
      It keeps you from turning into a cat!
  • jmspring6 hours ago
    This is timely. Out of my five cats, my primary boy has been really needy or making a game out of hop on table, walk on keyboards, get picked up, scritched and tossed down. Repeat. Even cat tv on youtube hasn't been helping.
    • toledocavanian hour ago
      The other 4 cats are eat-only replicas? Is the primary predetermined or voted?
  • shepherdjerred6 hours ago
    Unfortunately the program can be bypassed by typing “human”

    Ultimately all this does is incentivize cats to type more accurately when inputting malicious commands

  • grebc6 hours ago
    How good! Just need the cat to try it.
  • SanjayMehta6 hours ago
    Aluminium foil on flat surfaces works very well.

    After the cat has been trained to avoid the shelf or desk, you can remove the foil.

    • nawgz6 hours ago
      Highly hit or miss strategy, my cat didn't care at all about foil, he even rolled around on it.

      I personally recommend motion-detecting air spray cans, I didn't want the cat to feel punished by me, he just needs to be redirected. Therefore I opt for these as a deterrent, since it is both effective and an action I undertake from the cat's view. I think he hates it because of the hiss, but the air spray itself might play a role.