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GRAFFITI -- June 16, 2008 thru June 22, 2008 >> Link to the Current Week << Last Week << Mon   Tues   Wed   Thu   Fri   Sat   Sun >> Next Week Search this site : 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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June 16, 2008

2149 - Good evening. A relatively (relative to the last few days of chores (and fun) at home) restful day at work today. The usual Monday routine consumed the evening, and what was left went to catching up on the schoolwork. I've still got to finish painting my office, and move furniture back in there. I hope to be done with most of that before the week's end. For some reason, that reminds me of Star's End, which means that it's about time to re-read the Foundation series again. Right now, in my five minutes a day of pleasure reading, I'm struggling through Odd Thomas, a Koontz book. I think I'll go crack that again, now. Ciao!

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June 17, 2008

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June 18, 2008

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June 19, 2008

2127 - Good evening. It's got to get better soon, right? My office is painted (that got done last night, along with the shoe molding), the big furniture is all in (last night and tonight), and the important computing gear is in place. I had Magickthyse down in the lumber room, well out of the way of all the work going on up here. What's left is 6 boxes to unpack, a few desisions about where to put some gear, and a thought or two about changing some incidentals around this room (shelving, a desk or secretary for the MacBook Pro, etc. Pictures someday. I have a bucketload of schoolwork to do, weeding and mowing too. But things seem to be coming together, and pending big changes, my schedule may ease a little bit. One can but hope. Ciao!

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June 20, 2008

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June 21, 2008

1240 - Good afternoon. Last night I got mostly caught up on the school work. This morning? Laundry and yardwork. I've more to do, though. But I want to share with you some of the progress over the last week or so:

Above left, the dining room color palatte revealed. I still need to finish the electrical work in there, and we need one side table, a dining table, and chairs. In the middle, you can see how the bamboo flooring looks in my office. I ended up taking out the compressor, hose, and nail gun while I was painting. Then I dragged them back in to install the shoe molding. At right you can see how the color came out on the walls. It's darker and colder in the picture (on my monitor at least) than it is in reality. Now to get motivated for whatever's next. Ciao!

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June 22, 2008

2127 - Good evening. Since I can't find the furniture I want for my office, I'll have to build it myself. In the meantime, the Sauder bookshelves will do. So just about everything's unpacked and "organized" in my office. One casualty of the strip-down for flooring is the wired network connection between my office and Marcia's. I'd get that fixed sooner rather than later, since I usually like to leave my wireless gear turned off... Here's what I wrote in a class forum the other day:

Rule number one - wired is safer than unwired - who wants the FBI banging down your door because some upleasant person used your unsecured wireless connection to download kiddie porn. I spent a lot of attic time and basement time wiring my house with CAT5E. When it's not needed, the wireless is simply shut off (and the antennae is unscrewed from the gateway, giving it an effective range of about 3 feet, were it on).

That said, I have wireless available on the router/gateway from my vendor. I first flashed the gateway to the latest (and theoretically most secure) firmware. I shut off all the management functions that I didn't need, and only allow connections from my (wired) workstation - permitted wireless guests can't change the router settings.

Next, I use WPA2, and I change the passphrase every three months or so. It's a long passphrase, over 30 characters, and I used as much robustness as I could without breaking into non-printing characters - some passphrases can be put into the system by a Linux system (my primary workstation), that can't be typed into a windows dialog box. Who knew?

Finally, even though it's relatively easy to change the MAC address on any system to spoof this protection, I do it anyway - I get the MAC address of the guest who's connecting, and put it into the allowed MAC list in the router admin interface. When they're gone, I go in, remove that MAC address, change the WPA2 passhprase, and then shut down the wireless until the next time it's needed.

The only thing I don't do at this time (but could with another router) is have a separate wireless segment, so that someone connecting to my wireless (with permission and all the protections noted above) could only get to the internet, and not to the machines on my internal network. I had that setup once upon a time, but simplified it out of existence a couple of years ago, and haven't gotten back to it ... yet.

Tonight I did two more quizes for class. It's an accelerated summer session - next week I need to start working on both the group and individual projects - about 10 pages each. The big downside this semester is that four weeks in, no one has had any of their deliverables graded yet. It sucks not knowing how you're doing when you're a full third of the way through the class.

Only one combat-related death in Iraq reported this week. Afghanistan was a much more dangerous place, leading to this long list today. My hat's off to our fine men and women in service - I couldn't be prouder! Our condolences to the families and units of thirteen more fallen warriors.

• Lance Cpl. Javier Perales Jr., 19, of San Elizario, Texas, died June 11, from a non-hostile incident in Al Anbar province, Iraq.
• Lance Cpl. Kelly E. C. Watters, 19, of Virginia Beach, Va. died June 11, from wounds suffered while supporting combat operations in Al Anbar province, Iraq.
• Sgt. Michael Toussiant-Hyle Washington, 20, of Tacoma, Wash., died June 14 while supporting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Lance Cpl. Layton Bradly Crass, 22, of Richmond, In., died June 14 while supporting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Pfc. Dawid Pietrek, 24, of Bensenville, Ill., died June 14 while supporting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Pfc. Michael Robert Patton, 19, of Fenton, Mo., died June 14 while supporting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Sgt. 1st Class Gerard M. Reed, 40, of Jacksonville Beach, Fla., died June 11 in Baghdad, Iraq, of injuries sustained in a non-combat related incident.
• Pvt. Eugene D. M. Kanakaole, 19, of Maui, Hawaii, died June 11 in Balad Iraq, of injuries sustained in a non-combat related incident.
• Hospitalman Marc A. Retmier, 19, of Hemet, Calif., died June 18 as a result of wounds suffered from an enemy rocket attack in northern Paktika province, Afghanistan.
• Petty Officer First Class Ross L. Toles III, 37, of Davison, Mich., died June 18 as a result of wounds suffered from an enemy rocket attack in northern Paktika province, Afghanistan.
• Capt. Eric Daniel Terhune, 34, of Lexington, Ky., died June 19 while conducting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Lance Cpl. Andrew Francis Whitacre, 21, of Bryant, Ind., died June 19 while conducting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.
• Hospitalman Dustin Kelby Burnett, 19, of Fort Mohave, Ariz., died June 20 while conducting combat operations in Farah Province, Afghanistan.

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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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