scott

OS X & It’s BSD Root

by

Every time I talk to a hard core computer guy (or girl) and tell them I am into Mac’s now, they say “cool, have you done anything with the terminal?” Or something like that. Meaning have I used the BSD commands in it? Until today, not really. I finally had a project I wanted to do, and it required me to play with config files. I wanted to do something with Samba that would allow me to share other files besides my home folder on the network. I played around and got Swat to work. Swat is a web GUI based configurator for Samba. I know I could have just edited the smb.conf file, but I wanted to play with swat also.

Next up is playing with apatche a bit, and maybe try moveable type on a Mac. it has been done, and a mac is after all built on BSD!!!

Saturday Recovery

by

Saturday I took it easy. I was semi recovering from Friday, and I had stuff I wanted to do around the house.

Even though I wanted to keep my desk area clear of extra cables, I broke out the KVM so I could build a new desktop machine. I had two in the closet. I had my Dad’s old Dell Dimension XPS 600r, and my old P-4 800 that I still had lying around. The P-4 is a better box, but I had problems with it the last time I was building a computer. I couldn’t remember what was up with it, but I still cannot get an OS to build on it. I ended up using my Dad’s old dell to put Suse 9.0 on it. I want to start using Linux again at home. My website still runs on a Windows 2003 server, but I don’t feel like a real tech guy if I let Gus host my blog on his moveable type setup. I at least want to try and get the system to work. If I don’t use it, I am cool with that.

Other than that I did some quick grocery shopping. I love fresh direct, but sometimes you want small stuff that doesn’t make using the service worth while. Also they don’t have everything so I still have to goto the grocery store every so often. I do need to make another fresh direct order this week. I am running out of food at home.

Friday Softball

by

Friday was my companies first softball game. We got cool new jersey’s this season. I am again my lucky #3. It was an interesting game. I of course didn’t play, but I went to watch. If last year is any indication, in the beginning everyone wants to play softball. After a few games you get less and less people showing up. I think the sign up sheet had almost 40 people wanting to play. With that kind of turn out I don’t want to play. Not that into it, and I figure I would let others play that wanted to. I got a jersey in case they need players later when everyone doesn’t want to go to games. Either way it is fun to watch. We won 16 to 15. It was an interesting game.

Before the game Cari, Dari, & I went to dan’s to give him a gift basket. He has been out due to back surgery so he welcomed the company, even if it was for 5 minutes. We surprised him at his apartment. It wasn’t a good idea. He couldn’t get up to buzz us in, and his dad (who is staying with him after surgery) was out walking the dog. We had to wait till his dad got back before we could get into the apartment.

After the game we went to a bar near the field. We had a few drinks and pizza on Glenn our CEO. He played first base. It was cool of him to treat us.

Stuff To Do

by

I wasted most of this evening already. My mom is out of town on vacation with some friends, so my dad is all alone. We went out to dinner tonight. After dinner I got home and checked my mail and did the usual reading the news sites, etc.

I then fixed my problem with my Powerbook & Bluetooth dialing the internet on my new Sony Ericsson T610 phone. Not sure that I did anything differently from yesterday but when I started over for the 3rd time it worked. More on that later.

I know I have other things I have to do. I need to probably do food shopping. Tons of work beckons me from the office. I also need some clothes that I have to buy off of some websites. One or two other things I think I have to take care of, yet what they are escapes me as I sit here and write. I am in my comfy chair listening to music and writing. All is right with the universe. If my doctor saw how I was sitting right now he would laugh and tell me “no wonder you get back pains”. I am just so comfy right now I don’t want to move.

I started taking my allergy medication again 2 days ago. I take Zertec. Today I finally noticed it working. My sinus’s are killing me. I was so stuffed up for so long it is weird how good it is to feel them clearing out. Man I never knew how much mucus a person can produce. Enough nasty thoughts for you tonight.

Now I a lullaby song came on and I am more tired than I was before. Great song but I need sleep. Maybe more writing tomorrow.

This blog entry was written while listening to When You Dream from the album “Stunt” by Barenaked Ladies

Bluetooth Gear

by

I talk allot about the technology gear that I use. To me recently, the holey grail of technology gadgets is wireless interaction between devices. Ussually that means Wifi. Wifi is out there and it works great, when it works. For me the big thing is getting good Bluetooth devices that work well together. I have been trying for this goal for over 2 years.

I had a good setup with my T68i and my motorola bluetooth headset about a year or so ago. The problem was that I broke the headset one day when I dropped my backpack. The T68i, with headset and my Powerbook made an unbeatable combination. Now I have a T610, a different powerbook, and I plan on getting another bluetooth headset. Hopefully everything will work as advertised and I will have a complete portable wireless setup. Is it a pipe dream? Maybe, but I am going to try to get it to work.

As I mentioned earlier today the next step for this solution is to get GPRS to work on my Powerbook via the T610 over bluetooth. If I get it to work, I may even suck it up and buy a new PCMCIA Bluetooth card for my thinkpad. I have a Xircom Realport2 Bluetooth card, but it doesn’t have resident XP drivers, and I am finding it doesn’t work 100% correctly. The cards have come down in price so I will see how much they are.

This blog entry was written while listening to Bent from the album “Beneath These Fireworks” by Matt Nathanson

Productive Day

by

I had a really productive day in Kingston. Kai, Brian, and I met and got some due dates on a few projects done. I got a new project from Gus regarding upgrading our FTP system also. Fixed some issues in both offices, and answered a few trouble tickets.

It was one of those days where I worked and got allot out of the way, but it feels like I didn’t do very much. I know it is that way because I was in meetings and other planning sessions, but I still feel like I got no projects closer to completion.

I took Kai, & Brian out to an early dinner at Ruby Tuesday’s. Not many other places to go up there that will be good for most people. That is why we go there every time. I like the food so I don’t mind. It is no angelo & maxi’s or Outback for that matter, but it is ok. I am on the 5PM train out of Kingston (RHI) but it was an hour late so it left at 6PM. I was supposed to be on the 6PM train but it was also late. I didn’t want to wait so I got on whatever train showed up first going to NYC.

It will be a long day today. I won’t get into my apartment until 8:45PM the earliest if I am luck. Lets hope this train shows up when scheduled (7:40) so I can catch the 7:49 train to my apartment. The jury is still out on that one.

I was active (either physically or mentally) all day, so I was awake. Now sitting on the train I am finally getting tired from the work and allergy medication.

This blog entry was written while listening to Washin’ and Wonderin from the album “Nasty Little Thoughts” by Stroke 9

Powerbook Ram Boost

by

After using my new 12″ 1Ghz Powerbook for a while I realized that I can’t live with the on board 256megs of ram. I tried since it isn’t my main computer and I use it for light work most of the time. I realized that when I use it in the office (even though it is my personal computer) I need the extra ram boost. I went out and got a 512 meg upgrade giving me a total of 768megs of ram.

So far the boost in ram is working. I haven’t seen the powerbook lag when opening a program.

I also got another mini DVI to VGA adapter just in case I want to use the laptop at home on my flat panel.

This blog entry was written while listening to Father of Mine – ACOUSTIC from the album “So Much for the Afterglow” by Everclear

Moveabletype

by

This blog is running on Moveabletype. It is an awesome piece of software. You should read their own company blog they started. It is a nice insight on a tech company.

Moveabletype runs run’s on linux if you didn’t know that already. For me Linux is still the wild west. I need to learn allot. With Gus’ help I got Moveabletype working on a Red Hat box when I first started this blog. For the past 6 months or so I have been running the blog off of Gus’ Mandrake Linux server. I had issues with my cable modem and using 2 box’s for web sites. I needed an IIS box for something and the port forwarding to the linux box was messy. it worked but I didn’t like to see the :port# in the URL.

Now with moveabletype 3.0 coming out this sprint (or so) I want to build another linux box to run my blog on. Gus’ machine is stable, and works great, but I am a tech guy. I should be able to host all my own stuff. I will need to overcome the same port forwarding issues I had before but now I have the resolve to figure them out, or so I hope.

This means breaking out the old dell desktop in my closet out and configuring my KVM again. This means less desk space and a messy living room again, but it also means I can be more flexible and have another server. If I can do this in VMWare I will, but I don’t know if I am ready to do a “production” system in VMWare yet. Hey, it may be my site, but it is a production environment to me. Updates on what I do as I do them!!!

This blog entry was written while listening to 100 Years from the album “The Battle For Everything” by Five for Fighting and Sympathy from the album “Gutterflower” by Goo Goo Dolls

Sony Ericsson T610

by

My new T-Mobile phone is a new Sony Ericsson T610. It is supposed to be the upgrade to the T68i that I had. I actually still have the T68, but I am never happy with the signal strength I get on it. T-Mobile discounted the phone by %50 with a mail in rebate so I took it. I will wait till they offer the Motorola V600 and the price comes down.

So far my reviews of this phone are limited. The screen is nice. It is bright and crisp. The buttons are small and annoying like the T68i, but I can deal with that. I only used it for 2 minutes on the phone so I am not sure about voice quality or volume.

Bluetooth looks good on it. I was able to setup and pair the phone with my Powerbook in 2 minutes. I don’t know how that will work with my Thinkpad. I like that the new bluetooth devices don’t need you to specify that you want to make them discoverable. That is good for setup, but bad for security. Also nice is the fact that I don’t have a big bright blue light that is always on when bluetooth is on. My T68i did that. It was really annoying. All I have is an icon on the top of the phone screen telling me I have bluetooth on. That is all I need.

iSync with bluetooth was easy also. I dumped my entire phone book to the phone in 3 minutes. I didn’t even take out the Sony Ericsson software for the PC since I can do that all on my Mac with no special software. Have I mentioned I love my Powerbook?

Downloading or uploading pictures was a snap also. Just told my Powerbook to browse folders on bluetooth devices and up came my phones memory. I downloaded the two photos I took yesterday.

What I was unable to do was setup my powerbook to use the T610 as a GPRS modem via bluetooth. I found a few sites on the internet that explain how to do it. I downloaded some modem scripts, but have still not been able to get it to work. I only worked on it for like 15 minutes last night before I needed to get to bed. I had an early train to catch today.

I got bluetooth GPRS to work on my old Powerbook and my T68i using AT&T Wireless last year. I should be able to get it working with the T610. I just need to work on it. Kind of pissed that I couldn’t get it working before my trip. I could be using it right now on the train. Instead I get to clear my head and update my blog!

This blog entry was written while listening to Angry from the album “Mad Season” by Matchbox Twenty

Mobile Technology

by

I tell everyone I used to hate traveling for work. That is partially true. In the end I dreaded the trips, the waits in the airport, getting lost in po-dunk towns in rental cars, etc. In the beginning I loved traveling. I think I did too much too quick. Also I did this during a period of the worst air traffic delays in the history of US air travel. I also flew out of the most delayed airport in the US. An airport that the FAA said accounted for 25-30% of all delays at the time, Laguardia airport (LGA).

This entry is not about my love or dislike of travel, that I can save for many entries later. What I am thinking about is the cool technology you can use or rely on when traveling.

Studies are coming out now saying more and more people are “cutting the cord” or becoming wireless phone only households. I have been using my cell as my primary (or only) home phone since 1998. Earlier than that I lived at home with my parents and they did have an extra line, even though I never used it.

When traveling you can use the coolest tools that keep you in touch or working. The stuff out now is even better than what I was able to use when I traveled regularly 3 years ago. Wow, it has been 3 years since I did that.

When I was on the road I relied on a laptop (Compaq Presario 1875 or something with an AMD K6-2 180mhz processor, then a number of Micron 15″ TFT laptops, and eventually a Dell latitude CPx). The laptops I have now kick the ass of the ones I had then. My thinkpad T-40 I use for work is literally half the thickness of the micron’s I used and 3-4 times more powerful. The battery lasts like 4 hours. If I got 90 minutes on the micron or 60+ on the Compaq I was happy. Even my tiny Powerbook gets better battery life than the old desktop replacements.

My cell phone back then was several flavors of the Nokia 6160, Motorola Timeport, or later on a Nokia 8890. The service actually was as good as it is now. T-Mobile’s coverage has gotten better, but I used to go everywhere with my AT&T Tri-mode TDMA Nokia’s. The phone was big but worked all over. From Canada, to Portland Oregon, to Portland Maine. The difference is I am paying about half the price I paid back in 1999 for about the same amount of minutes or even more minutes now.

The other difference with cell phones are that my Treo 600 is a handheld and a phone. I also get wireless internet access on it. For me between 1998 and 2001 that was impossible for me. now I can get email on my phone or use another phone with bluetooth to get mail on my laptop. I didn’t even have a blackberry then. I would have killed for a blackberry when I traveled. I take it for granted now.

The WiFi hotspots would be awesome to have had when I traveled. I used to use Laptop Lane at some airports back then, but they weren’t everywhere.

VPN software and Exchange 2003 with RDP over HTTPS would have been awesome. Either would have been awesome. At Datastream we had to use outlook from outside the firewall using AT&T Global net dial up. It was so slow. Now it would be trivial and fast to use, especially with high speed internet in some hotels now. When I went to vegas last winter I plugged my Powerbook (then a 15″ TiPowerbook) into the network jack in the hotel and I was able to VPN back to work. It came in handy when Keith needed something when I was out. That is the coolness I am talking about. Technology that just works when you are on the road.

If I was still traveling I would probably look at the bluetooth GPS receivers they have out now. Connect it to my iPack 1945 and know where I am. It would be killer.

What is also funny is that more and more people are using gadgets on the road. Besides the pain in the ass people on cell phones everywhere (writing this as someone’s phone goes off on the train). I mean laptops PDA’s, and other neat stuff. Around me right now on the train is 4 ladies with huge laptops doing work. One has to be my mom’s age. 4 years ago that wouldn’t be going on. When I am on the train to kingston I always see several people with blackberry’s or Pocket PC’s & Palms of several varieties. Then there are the iPods. They are everywhere. Note to self need new iPod for train trips like this. must replace sold one ASAP.

I just find these observations amusing. Why, because all this stuff that I see I have been doing for years. That is no big deal, but I always used to get made fun of by some of my friends about doing it. Then like clock work 6 months later they would be doing the same thing. I don’t consider myself a trendsetter but some technology stuff I get right away because I think it will work for me. I was that way with the first bluetooth phones. I got it and used it to connect to my PC and use a bluetooth headset. Turns out that it didn’t work very well, but it worked and I used it for months.

Enough of my observations. I am off to stretch my legs on the train for a while and maybe take some pictures with my Treo and post them to my MoBlog!!!

This blog entry was written while listening to Higher from the album “Human Clay” by Creed And Superman from the album “America Town” by Five for Fighting