Strong password generation
 

Is there any nifty cool program around for generating strong 8 character passwords?

More than one. There's makepasswd http://packages.qa.debian.org/m/makepasswd.html
and if you want better pronouncable passwords, passook http://mackers.com/projects/passook/

Thanks nikai, for some reason my brain wants to default to using the dog's name... Yeeech.