Born in the USA (Made in China)
Ξ May 24th, 2008 | → 1 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
I like the camera phone. The made in china label was just too ironic to pass up. This shirt is available in a store that rhymes with “Arget”
Well, It used to be my truck
Ξ May 23rd, 2008 | → 3 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
I’ll spare the details of how I lost my truck, but it has found an interesting new life in our teenager. A new paint job was in order. (Yes, this is the same truck!)
While I do miss it, I have to admit, it’s probably in better shape than when I bought it in 1996 when it was 4 years old with 40,007 miles. The A/C is fixed, as is the exhaust system, and it has a rear bumper - which wasn’t even included when it was new.
Oh, Sweet Surrender!
Ξ May 11th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
Two years ago, I wrote that I had finally broken down and bought a cell phone. I said that I did not want anything fancy, just something to make and receive phone calls. Two years entitles me to an upgrade. So much for old values. One of the things that I find myself doing more than expected is text messages. It is the main method of communication for the kids and the only way I can contact a tech in our district who is partially deaf and cannot use a standard phone.
I’ve been texting since the kids got their phones, but on the regular keys, it is slow for me. I know the kids can knock out a 20 word message in less than a minute, but for me … well, let’s just say it takes me longer, and I refuse to type a message saying “whre u at mom wnts 2 no?”
So, my upgraded phone has a mini-QWERTY keyboard that slides out and now I can send a 20 word message almost as quickly as I can type it on a PC keyboard. I don’t have to use short hand, and it is even easy to find less common punctuation marks - like commas!
Since I have only had it since yesterday, I am still learning the features. A camera/video recorder, MP3 player, and I don’t know what else. It uses a mini-sd card and I picked a 2GB up at WalMart for less than $25, but the USB adapter that I bought to plug it into the PC does not work. I am just glad it didn’t fry the card.
I am sure much of the novelty will eventually wear off, but for now, learning how to use it seems like a fun project.
How Novell
Ξ May 6th, 2008 | → 2 Comments | ∇ Computers and Technology, Miscellaneous, The Caffeinated Duck |
No, it’s not a typo. I mentioned in an earlier post how some of the technology we currently use is a getting a bit long in the teeth. Warning: Geeky Tech Post - run away if this kind of stuff is not your bag! There are not alot of people in my world who can really understand and appreciate this kind of stuff, so posting it here may reach some random geek … somewhere.
Last week, a Netware 4.11 server power supply finally died after a couple of weeks of intermittent abends (crashes). Kudos to Gateway, as this power supply was 9 years old when it finally went. We were able to get a new power supply, but the system refused to fully boot. When it couldn’t find the SYS volume, I figured that all of the abends must have damaged the OS and file system. Still, there was some data on that server that had not been backed up and I wanted to see if I could get it to boot.
Some Novell forums showed that is was not an rare event, but I was unable to find any specific details that would fix this system, but it did give me the hope that it could be fixed. It was the deepest that I have ever dived into the guts of Novell - drivers, startup, and configuration files. I finally had some clues that the SCSI drivers were not loading properly (I warned you that this would be a geeky post). I was able to load the SCSI drivers manually and then mount SYS. I edited the changes in the startup file and the system booted, but still wouldn’t connect to the network. So it was more of the same with the network card drivers. After 2 hours the system was back and running normally.
Now, some of this may be simple, old hat to some gray-haired Novell Masters, but this was my first Novell crash, so I was pretty excited to get it fixed. Now if the rest of the servers can hold on until we get the new Windows 2003 servers sometime next year or so …
End of the Semester
Ξ May 1st, 2008 | → 2 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
I didn’t do great on either of my finals, but I also didn’t do poorly. 87 on the final in Organizational Business and 89 on my French II final - both grades were high enough to earn an A in each class.
I’ll be taking an academic break this summer, but it is my goal to pass another Microsoft certification exam (70-291 Network Infrastructure) which will upgrade my certification from an MCP (Microsoft Certified Professional) to an MCSA (Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator). I’m looking to take that exam sometime in mid-June.
Cramming
Ξ April 27th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
Shessh, I thought studying for finals would just be a review of everything I learned this semester, but going back over the material, I have found that I have just plain forgotten some of the early things, so I am having to relearn them. Is this normal or is it just me?
I suppose I Could Script It
Ξ April 25th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Computers and Technology, The Caffeinated Duck, Unix-Linux |
Like many people, I use Wordpress for my blogging software and host a server with 3 other Wordpress based websites. It seems like I just upgraded Wordpress a few weeks ago, and now there is another update. In all honesty, it doesn’t take that long to upgrade 4 websites, and the software is free - in fact it is not only free, but it is an awesome package to boot. Plus, it’s nice enough to tell me that I need and upgrade as soon as I log in. All in all I do appreciate the effort the people who maintain this software put in to making it great!
Finals are next week for the 2 classes that I am taking this semester. French II and Organizational Business. I should be able to pull an A in French if I do well on the final, but I am not sure about business as I haven’t received my last exam grade. I think that I’ll probably end up with an A or B depending how I did on the last exam and do on the upcoming final. I’m looking forward to some downtime this summer before starting again next fall.
Intel Giveth, Microsoft Taketh Away
Ξ April 15th, 2008 | → 1 Comments | ∇ Computers and Technology, The Caffeinated Duck, Windows |
One of the first things that I noticed about Vista is that on a PC with a 2.2Ghz dual-core processor and 1GB of RAM, it “feels” like XP running on a 1.6GHz PC with 128MB of RAM. When I tried to explain this to some technical people, they just seemed to think me crazy. But I know how XP “feels” on PCs ranging from 400MHz to 3.2GHz with various amounts of RAM and cores. I am disappointed after seeing huge gains in XP with the introduction of dual-core processors seemingly lost in Vista. Intel giveth, Microsoft Taketh Away.
This article in Infoworld is justification that I am not crazy. They say the same thing, but have the numbers to back it up.
New Job and Such
Ξ April 13th, 2008 | → 2 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
I’ve been at my new job as a network administrator for a county public school system for just over 3 months. At this point, it is mostly supporting the techs at the 8 different school locations in the district. The technology varies widely and I’ve had to dust off some old knowledge of Windows 9x and Novell 4. Overall, there is some of just about everything - Mac OS 8, 9, and X, Windows 95, 98, 2000, XP, and Vista, and on the network side, Novell 4 and 5, Windows 2000 and 2003 Server. It’s really not a mess, it’s just the nature of a public school system with limited funds. It is not uncommon for a grant to purchase an entire new lab, but over time, the technology in that lab starts getting old and the funds just are not there to upgrade the systems. Still, keeping older systems running at their peak is something I enjoy - not that I would mind having all the clients running XP or later and the servers all Windows 2003.
New systems with Vista are starting to trickle into the classrooms and labs. Vista’s been a frustration mostly trying to figure out where Microsoft moved everything that had been in the same place since Windows 95. Also, some of the older applications won’t run in Vista, but I am starting to get a feel for the new OS.
I am taking 2 classes this semester - French II and Organizational Behavior. Both are going well, but have been alot of work. I am really looking forward to this summer. The school district also goes on 4 day weeks for the summer just like the college does.
Ξ December 2nd, 2007 | → 0 Comments | ∇ The Caffeinated Duck |
Deux plus examens. Mardi et Jeudi. Je crois que je vais avoir un “A” pour la classe. J’ai un 3 semaines de vacances en décembre and janvier et le plan pour aller à New York avec mon famille.