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October 30, 2003

Psycho Sensei Meltdown - The Whole Story

"When called by a panther, don't anther" - Ogden Nash

Maybe I should have listened. As wonderful as the new Panther operating system is for macs, the server version should come with a big warning label that says "Caution - This Product Could Blow Away All Of Your Server Configurations - Leading to heart palpitations, dangerous behavior, and sleep disorders."

The plan - replace ancient G3 server technology with a nice G4. Implementation was to include a low, careful progression of steps, mapping out exactly where things should be, carefully copying things from one machine to another, leaving the G3 in place until completion, testing each piece as I went along, etc. I prepared the G4 by putting in SCSI cards so I could add tape backup, replacing one of the hard drives to a much bigger one, adding some memory, and basically making it a kick ass server. Then I read that Panther Server has a wonderful new feature that allows you to export all of your server settings in one fell swoop. Well gee, I thought....why not upgrade the G3 to
panther, then export all of the settings to the G4. What a time saver! Yeah, great idea.

Except for one thing.....upgrading to Panther caused EVERYTHING to stop working. Everything. All virtual hosts were gone. All server administration settings were gone. Attempting to connect to the administration functions failed. Attempting to rebuild the virtual hosts in the web server configurations would not save, and gave a strange dialog box about bugs I should report to Apple. This was all, obviously, not good joss.

After planning ritual sepiku, a much more rational friend told me that perhaps I should just restore the boot disk from the backup I had made the week before. Wow, what a concept! :-) So I prepared to do this by installing a new bootable version of the operating system on another disk, which I would then tell the machine was the boot disk, so I could wipe the original boot disk and bring it up via restore. Well, that didn't work either. Try as I might, the machine outright refused to boot off of any other disk but the boot disk or the CD for the OS,
which immediately wants you to install the new OS. I was too tired to fight with it anymore, and was about to just toss it all out the window, when I figured, why not check the G4 and see if it behaves in a rational manner. After all, I could just move most of the files over there in one fell swoop, and cross my fingers, cast a few spells, and see if it works.

It did work. After a few fits and starts, and the time ticking closer and closer to dawn when I turn into a pumpkin, I actually seem to have gotten most things to work. I'm sure it will need some tweaks, and the slow careful configuration I wanted to do is history, but things I think MOSTLY work. Once I wake up, maybe a few more spells will be in order.

Posted by mikki at 11:58 AM | | Comments (0)

A new day dawns...

And after staying up past the wee hours of the morning, I seem to have been able to recover much. However, the new server is very much in need of being tweaked so that it works properly. It has some frustrating little unhappy issues. It seems I've been able to recover most of the postings from previous blogs, so I'm a bit happier about that. Perhaps a SOOPER GENIUS will come help me at some point. PLEASE :-)

Posted by mikki at 10:57 AM | | Comments (0)

October 29, 2003

Psycho Sensei Has Psycho Meltdown

Repeat after me - I will NEVER install a new operating system, making the assumption it will not blow away ALL of my settings. Now repeat it 10 more times.

I installed Panther server over 10.2.8 server on my G3 server box. It ATE all of the configuration files, and would not even LET me reconfigure, saying it couldn't connect to server administration, etc. etc. After trying various ways to boot from another drive, and wipe the boot drive and restore things to a previous backup, I found I was also unable to restore anything properly, so I basically had a fit and began my plan to migrate everything over to a faster server a bit earlier than I'd planned.

So I will be restoring more of this week's and last week's postings as I can. Bear with me.

Posted by mikki at 01:38 AM | | Comments (0)

October 28, 2003

Stupid people SHOULD NOT DRIVE

It's true...stupid people should NOT be allowed to drive. Under ANY circumstances. Of course, most of the stupid people don't believe they are stupid, and think I'm talking about someone else, but I'm not. I am talking about YOU, you stupid person. YOU, the one who cut me off today, turning onto route 7, diving into the left lane, then going 45 in a 55. And YOU, the moron with the DC plates who tried to swerve into our lane because you were too STUPID to drive and yap on your cell phone at the same time, then started GESTURING to the person on the phone. So you had one hand on the phone, stuffed into your ear, and the other, wildly gesticulating. The fact that you didn't hit us was sheer luck!

And what about you stupid people who don't know how to use that little lever on your steering column that is put there so you can indicate TURNS? Yes, that lever with the dust built up on it. The one you never use when careening through lane changes, or stomping your brakes in front of me, as if somehow I'm supposed to KNOW you are going to turn, and not just hitting your brakes for the fun of it. And YOU with the out of state plates, putzing down the road with a STREAM of cars behind you. As you slam on your brakes at every intersection so you can read the road sign to see if that's where you're supposed to go, has it EVER crossed your mind to pull over and use a map? Or perhaps find a pay phone and get better directions?

They wonder why there are aggressive drivers. Perhaps it's because so many STUPID people are on the roads, driving the rest of us totally insane. The sheer frustration of dealing with SO MANY stupid people on the road takes its toll when you just want to get where you're going. So please, if you're a stupid person, get your stupid self off the road. And remember, I'll try to be nicer, when you try to be less stupid.

Posted by mikki at 10:40 AM | | Comments (3)

October 26, 2003

A man riding a tricycle and wielding...

Here's one for the STUPID files

A man riding a tricycle and wielding a handgun struck a car and attempted to hijack it Tuesday morning in northeast Salem, police said Tuesday.

But officers said that what could have been a tragedy had comic-opera aspects that resulted in the arrest of 24-year-old Oswaldo Alejandro Valenciano.

Lt. Dan Cary said the only word to describe Tuesday’s sequence of events was “bizarre.”

. [Madville.com]

Posted by mikki at 10:44 AM | | Comments (0)

Yo, Mr. CEO, Get Our Point Now?

Oh how utterly fantastic! What's good for the goose... Almost as good as the telemarketing executives putting themselves on the "Do Not Call" list. You've gotta love it.

A privacy group wants banks to know that they shouldn't be allowed to pass customer information around so easily. So they made their point above New York City by having a skywriter paint a bank CEO's Social Security number in the sky. By Kim Zetter. [Wired News]


Posted by mikki at 02:21 AM | | Comments (0)

*Sniff* Becky and John have left

My sweet, demure, petite sister and her GQ style husband John have left us, heading back to NH. They were fun to have around. Between that and Morgan cutting her eye, it was a rather strange week, spent mostly at the Leesburg Tae Kwon Do school while Grandmaster Choi did his thing in Korea. This week, hopefully the house will get back into a rather normal semblance, although Wes starts his new job tomorrow, I'll still be in Leesburg til at least Wednesday, and after that, I'm hoping to have time to play with Panther! Woo hoo! Gotta love the Mac OS. Happy happy joy joy.

Posted by mikki at 02:19 AM | | Comments (0)

October 24, 2003

Our Tax Dollars Well Spent?

Ok...someone explain to me again how general aviation is a terrible threat, with all those people in those little airplanes who might cause such HORRENDOUS trouble, while the TSA sit on an email from some kid who says "gee, I'm a REAL THREAT" for FIVE WEEKS. I feel just SO SAFE! Don't you?

From the Washington Times (Note that I hardly ever read anything from that rag...but occasionally they put out something interesting :-))

A 20-year-old college student just made a mockery of Uncle Sam's 50,000 member airport security army. Nathaniel Heatwole of Damascus, Md., carried concealed weapons ¡ª including box cutters and dummy explosives ¡ª onto two flights, stashing the goods on airplanes where they remained hidden for many subsequent flights.
Mr. Heatwole e-mailed the Transportation Security, Administration informing them of his actions ¡ª but it took the TSA five weeks after receiving the e-mail before it began investigating.

[Continue reading]


Posted by mikki at 02:24 AM | | Comments (0)

An EXCELLENT Open Source Article

This is a great article. Well worth reading

Unplugged:
How Microsoft's Misunderstanding of Open Source Hurts Us All
By Robert X. Cringely

This week, speaking at a Gartner conference in Orlando, Florida, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said some fascinating things about Linux and about Open Source software in general. And thanks to those remarks and the blinding realization they caused for me, I finally understand exactly why Microsoft doesn't understand Open Source.

Ballmer asked, "Should there be a reason to believe that code that comes from a variety of people around the world would be higher-quality than from people who do it professionally? Why is its pedigree better than code done in a controlled fashion? I don't get that. There is no road map for Linux, nobody who has his rear end on the line. We think it's an advantage a commercial company can bring -- we provide a road map, indemnify customers. They know where to send e-mail. None of that is true in the other world. So far, I think our model works pretty well,"

[Rest of the Article]


Posted by mikki at 02:22 AM | | Comments (0)

October 23, 2003

Virgin on the ridiculous

So what is this? The Block Mary?

United States: Optimists in a run-down area of New Jersey are flocking to a tree stump in which a simulacara of the Virgin Mary has appeared. They take it a sign of something generically positive for the future.

The piece of wood, whose shape believers say resembles a veiled Virgin Mary with a bowed head, was noticed by passers-by over the weekend on state-owned land alongside a street that residents say is a hangout for illegal drug users.

Since then, a steady stream of visitors have left candles, flowers and handwritten notes and prayers at the site. It has her form, definitely, said Jackie Cohrs. It looks like her.

Virgin Mary appears in New Jersey tree - Yahoo! News, 22nd October 2003.

[The Pagan Prattle Online]


Posted by mikki at 02:27 AM | | Comments (0)

October 22, 2003

Lots of that Marine Life

Make that 210,001 when I'm in the water :-)

210,000 Life Forms Estimated in Oceans There are more than 210,000 life forms in the oceans, but this could be a small number of the total number of marine species, according to early results of a marine census released yesterday. [Washington Post: Nation and Politics]


Posted by mikki at 02:26 AM | | Comments (0)

October 15, 2003

Hallowe'en banned in Wrexham

I guess only "mainstream faiths" have any rights in England. Is it only a matter of time before it becomes the same over here?

Wrexham Council has banned hallowe'en displays in libraries, and prohhibited hallowe'en related activities in schools after what looks like an orchestrated campaign. The council says it has received a number of complaints but insists they only banned the ancient festival because it doesn't relate to any mainstream faith. Christians who mark All Souls' and All Saints' Day will be surprised. Halloween on the shelf - BBC News, 15th October 2003.

[The Pagan Prattle Online]

Posted by mikki at 01:38 PM | | Comments (0)

October 13, 2003

Today is Wessiepooh's Birthday!

And our 3rd wedding anniversary. Happy Birthday Wessiepooh!!! I'm still working on a surprise for him, so of course I won't mention it on a public weblog because SOMEONE will likely tell him, thwarting the surprise.

Today my sister, Slobbo Pithicus will arrive so that I can annoy her and her husband John Boy. We must pick up the hounds before they arrive so they can get the full picture of strange puppies chewing on their possessions.

Posted by mikki at 09:15 AM | | Comments (0)

October 12, 2003

We are HOME!!!

And it was a relatively uneventful trip home. After a night of sleeping in our OWN BED, I have put two pages of my best photos up Right Here.

Got home to meowling kitties, squawking birds, and a PILE OF MAIL FROM HELL. It is going to take quite some time to dig our way out of it all. But I'd better hurry. Seester of Psycho Sensei will arrive on Monday. Monday is also Wessiepoofle's birthday AND our anniversary. Then on the 16th is Morgan's birthday. What a nutty month October is :-)

Well, it's nice to be home. Time to dig into some of this work.

Posted by mikki at 08:47 AM | | Comments (0)

October 11, 2003

Wish us a good trip...

We are all packed, and soon to go to the airport to begin our trip home. Please send positive energy to ensure a smooth set of flights, and a smooth trip through customs and immigration who often tries to find reasons not to let us back into the country :-).

Posted by mikki at 09:56 AM | | Comments (0)

October 10, 2003

Last Dive This Trip

We took the boat to Captain Don's Reef on Klein Bonaire. Very nice dive, with many gazillions of critters, including a pretty yellow frogfish and a cool crab hiding in a sponge. Photos when we get home.

Tomorrow's trip is scheduled to leave Bonaire at 3pm, go to Montego Bay, change planes to Baltimore there, and usually get home sometime after 11 or so. Then it'll be about an hour drive down home.

It will be nice to get home and see the kid and the aminals.

Posted by mikki at 06:15 PM | | Comments (0)

October 09, 2003

Two men get so drunk that they wind up in Moscow

Don't cha just love the idea of airport security?

Two drunken Germans, apparently looking for a toilet during a conference at Frankfurt airport, got on a plane by mistake and flew to Moscow. The 20-year-old men were wandering round the airport when they found themselves on the tarmac, where they boarded a shuttle bus which drove to an aircraft bound for the Russian capital.

On arrival in Moscow, they noticed it was cold and realized they had no passports, let alone entry visas. Russian police put them on a flight back to Frankfurt, where they were met by Federal Border Police who have charged them with joyriding.

"They weren't even at the airport to fly anywhere. They were at a conference and had been walking around, evidently in a drunken stupor," said Frankfurt state prosecutor Job Tilmann. [Madville.com]

Posted by mikki at 03:51 PM | | Comments (0)

Trip Winding Down

Soon to go home (Saturday) so our last full day of diving is today. I am both sad and happy to go home. Sad because I love Bonaire. It's people, it's climate, it's undersea life is all wonderful. Happy because I miss my daughter, my doggies, and the comforts of home (like not worrying about being bitten by spiders while I sleep :-)).

While we were gone, the Bushi was neutered, so perhaps he will be stud puppy no longer. I'm certain that we have a pile of physical mail, and work that needs to be done. And, of course, there's Grandmaster Choi wants me back to teach class again :-).

But for today, the most difficult task will be choosing which photo to put into the photo contest. Oh feel bad for ME :-)

Posted by mikki at 09:35 AM | | Comments (0)

October 08, 2003

Cell phone explodes in trousers

Ring ring....**BOOM** Or, be careful what you put in your pants

A Dutch supermarket employee is the second person to be injured by a malfunctioning Nokia phone in the past two months, according to a consumer group. [CNET News.com]

Posted by mikki at 04:20 PM | | Comments (0)

World turns while we vacation

The amazing debacle between Verisign and "The Rest of the World" about who can do what with the billions of unregistered character strings in the dot com and dot net namespace brought ICANN to Washington, DC yesterday in order to have a technically oriented meeting regarding Verisign's Sitefinder "service" that "serves" to break the net and foster a "all your names are belong to us" mentality.

The horrendously bad idea of making all unresolved domain names magically resolve to Verisign in order to become advertising vehicles for their registry service, brought gazillions of people out to attempt to convince the world that this is yet another money grab, albeit a lot more brazen than others.

And in yet another brazen move, our friend RS showed up at the meeting in an actual SHIRT with a COLLAR. And he looks respectable!

Many others attended the meeting, details of which are better covered by someone who was actually there :-). More of Declan's photos here .

Posted by mikki at 07:56 AM | | Comments (2)

Diving the Town Pier

One of the most fun dives on Bonaire is the Town Pier, where lots of cool sponges, corals, and critters hang out. It is generally a night dive, where you are only allowed to go with a local divemaster, and you have to get permission from the officials first (in case some cruise ship is going to come squish you :-)).

Our trip to the town pier was my first over 100 minute dive on one tank. Boy was that fun. And, of course, there are photos. See the strange critters here .

Posted by mikki at 07:36 AM | | Comments (0)

October 07, 2003

More Pictures

More fun scuba pictures have been put up today. These are from Ebo's Reef Today . And these are from the Habitat "home reef" on Sunday.

And yes, we are still having a fantastic time.

Posted by mikki at 02:38 PM | | Comments (0)

This Plane Is a Flotation Device

While we are vacationing, it's great to see that the world continues to turn in our absence :-)

Otherwise sensible folks gathered this weekend to dress funny and jump into the river. It was all for aviation research, honest. Michelle Delio reports from New York. [Wired News]

Posted by mikki at 08:02 AM | | Comments (0)

October 06, 2003

Naughty Wessiepooh

We are still in Bonaire, having a fantastic trip as usual. We're doing great diving, seeing wonderful critters and taking more pictures (which you can see here), and in general thoroughly enjoying it.

However....my naughty husband decided to make a faithful stop at the bar. By the time he was finished, he was having a very difficult time walking, has been quite ill, and now is worshipping the porcelain god. Perhaps he will see the light and become a Pagan yet :-)

I have never seen hubby drunk before. I don't think I want to again.

Posted by mikki at 10:04 PM | | Comments (0)

October 03, 2003

Psycho Sensei HAS ACCESS

Due to some really cool people at the Internet Cafe up the street from Habitat, going around the imbeciles at Bonaire Live, we have access. Woo hoo! Thanks to Michael, here is the first batch of pictures:

Click To See Psycho Pictures

Yay!

Posted by mikki at 12:24 PM | | Comments (0)

October 02, 2003

Another Day in Paradise

Gee, what a horrible time we're having under beautiful sunny skies, low humidity, and those pesky warm waters. Every time we try to go scuba diving, these creatures get in our way. It's just awful. They swim all over the place, distracting us. And those colorful sponges just really make it difficult to concentrate on breathing and doing scuba stuff like mask removal and replacement. Just feel so bad for us!

I still can't get email due to the Bonaire Live crew likely being out in the sun and looking at colorful sponges too. Maybe they just went a bit too deep and forgot all their passwords. What can ya do?

Posted by mikki at 08:14 PM | | Comments (0)

October 01, 2003

We are in Bonaire

Here we are in Bonaire after an uneventful trip on Air Jamaica. As soon as we got here, of course, we had to go diving. Almost immediately. What a surprise. Anyway, I lept into the water, and then discovered that ooops, I didn't check my mask properly before the leap. There was no lens in the right eye piece. After a nose full of water, I went and got another mask :-).

Unfortunately, Internet access is not going to be as easy as it usually is, since the local service provider broke itself and is unable to revive old accounts. So I'm not sure when I'm going to be able to do things like....let's say...access email. Egads.

More soon. Hopefully we'll have real email soon.

Posted by mikki at 07:25 PM | | Comments (0)