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GRAFFITI -- March 01, 2004 thru March 07, 2004>> Link to the Current Week <<Last Week << Mon Tues Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun >> Next Week Welcome to Orb Graffiti, a place for me to write daily about life and computers. Contrary to popular belief, the two are not interchangeable. About eMail - I publish email sometimes. If you send me an email and you want privacy or anonymity, please say so clearly at the beginning of your message. |
 
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March 1, 2004
0706 - Good morning. I've not much new to report at the moment. Surprisingly, after the weekend's efforts (rototilling a new garden patch on Saturday, putting up a little fence and mowing the rest of the back 40 on Sunday), I'm reasonably mobile and pain-free. Writing that last word reminded me, however, to put a superglue variant on the one blister that burst. That's an old bowler's trick and works great, by the way. I've got a couple of half-day gigs today, and we're meeting with the tax-prep lady tonight. Now I must run, so have a great day!
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March 2, 2004
No Post.
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March 3, 2004
0722 - Good morning. The past two days have been busy and moderately successful as such things go, but fairly uneventful. I bailed out very quickly yesterday morning, not even stopping to say "Hi!", more's the pity. In the evening, I did some web-work for ETS until Marcia got home from her evening dinner meeting. I think I'm still whacked from the weekend yardwork to be honest. There's lots of interesting stuff going on out in the world, from elections to OpenSource, and I'll drop back into the groove shortly. So you have fun, okay?
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March 4, 2004
0725 - Good morning. Larry and I had a good day yesterday, installing and configuring new systems for a new customer. Today I've got a three part task-list, with a short article to work on for NERDS for an association newsletter, then I'm going to pop down and install a new hard drive in a machine for a client in Silver Spring, then back to the office to start installing RHEL 3 AS on clean hardware for a new hosting/colo customer. Much fun is.
My friend and neighbor Scott wrote to say:
From: Scott
Subject: I was wondering what you think about EV1servers paying off SCO
Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2004 11:22:59 -0500
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2004/03/01/ev1servers_pays_license_fee_to_sco.html
I think if they were my hosting company, I'd be looking elsewhere, but I'm curious what your view on it is?
Scott
Hey, Scott.
I've been tracking this, and I think from a strictly business perspective, that Marsh may have made the correct decision. Evading the possibility of a likely lawsuit for a reasonably small sum of money is really good business sense.
One must be pragmatic about some things, and while SCO blows chilean llamas, they do have big lawyer guns at the moment, and they can make people suffer until they're put down. A lawsuit is an incredible drain on a company's resources - I've seen suits without merit kill more than one good company, just from the drain on cash, and more importantly, all of the attention of the top end of the firms, which otherwise would have been focusing on business.
Additionally, since we ARE a hosting box (that is, with paying clients and such) it's a different situation than if it were just Greg and I. I'll ride it out, knowing that one of two outcomes is possible:
A) SCO is a grease spot on the rolls of history, they lose and everyone that paid license fees in advance of proof is shown to have been wusses, or just paranoid (or prudent, depending on your perspective).
B) SCO gets a judge/jury to agree with their insanity, and the only safe ones are those that have paid already, and in which case the world changes dramatically.
There are judges and juries that can be convinced that the world is flat and the moon made of green cheese, as long as some evidence is held inadmissible. Therefore there is a distinct possibility that SCO can win in spite of their ludicrous stance. Thanks for asking,
.brian
I have other feelings about SCO, but they fall afoul of an assortment of US and International laws, so I'll keep them to myself. Now I need to get on with my day, but reposting this letter has got me all worked up again, and I was trying to be so reasonable... Sigh. You have a great day, where ever you are!
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March 5, 2004
0719 - Good morning. No work on any projects again last night. I just futzed around, had a light supper, and went to bed before 10. That's a good thing, I've still not really caught up from the burst of physical activity over the weekend last. Tomorrow, Marcia and I are going to put the peas in the ground. They are outside in their starter tray now, hardening.
I fought with a SCSI subsystem on an HP server for most of yesterday afternoon - I can configure the array just fine, but on next reboot, it believes that the array is horked. I have a suspicion about what's going on, but I'll wait until I hear back from the tech support guy who worked with me for about two hours. I sent him the Array Diagnostics Utility output via email late in the afternoon.
So more of that today, I fear. We'll also be working on a Dell domain controller, and I really must get to that short article today. Be seeing you...
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March 6, 2004
0835 - Good morning. I was up until nearly midnight last night working on recovering a customer system from what appears to be an amateurish inside job hack attempt by a disgruntled former employee. They didn't finish the job, and left footprints a mile wide letting me see what was done to the system (and allowing me to fix it). A real pita. I need to involve AIDE and Tripwire on this box soon. Why both? Well, Tripwire is extremely effective, and has a cryptographically protected database. It is, however a nightmare to configure. AIDE doesn't do crypto, but is a breeze to config. The idea I read someplace recently is to use Tripwire to protect the AIDE database, and AIDE to protect the system. Sounds like a plan to me.
What I don't understand is this: Before this broke, Martha was worth about $800 million dollars. Now admittedly, that's not up in Gates territory, but it's nothing to be sneezed at. Did she really do this? Is she both that stupid and that greedy that with 800M in the bank, she'd go to the wall for a paltry 51K loss from 228K worth of stock? It boggles the mind. Oh, well, it'll make for more mini-series' than you can shake a stick at over the next few years.
The day won't start with gardening, since it's still raining buckets. But I'd best have some coffee and see what trouble I can find. Later...
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March 7, 2004
1028 - Good morning. Yeah, I'm awake, finally. I slept until 10 this morning, 11 hours total. Yesterday I spent working in the garage and the woodshop. I was moving stuff from the former to the latter, rearranging things in the garage, and building a short steep ramp up into the attached shed. I've been having to lift heavy things up and down into that, and a ramp will be a great boon. Anyway, we must be off to our shopping, maybe gardening later today if the sun lasts. Who knows? Take it easy!
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Visit the rest of the DAYNOTES GANG, a collection of bright minds and sharp wits. Really, I don't know why they tolerate me <grin>. My personal inspiration for these pages is Dr. Jerry Pournelle. I am also indebted to Bob Thompson and Tom Syroid for their patience, guidance and feedback. Of course, I am sustained by and beholden to my lovely wife, Marcia. You can find her online too, at http://www.dutchgirl.net/. Thanks for dropping by.
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