Computing

Computer and technology related topics

2005-07-30 18:06:00

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2005-07-30 18:06:00
Bait and Switch or Standard Cell Phone Company Practice?

After careful thought my family decides it is worth the $9.99/month/phone to add 3 extra phones to my plan. Killer gives me three of his old Verizon phones and I call up Verizon Wireless but the cost is actually $19/month/phone. I just don’t get cell phone business practice. Do they think they’re going to get business and loyalty with this kind of practice?

I’m not asking for something that they aren’t advertising to me..in the mail..every week.

Comments [8]

2005-07-29 16:39:00

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2005-07-29 16:39:00
It’s SysAdmin Appreciation Day

From: Jon Clede

Happy Sysadmin day!

w00t!

-Jon-

From: Emmanuel Mwangi

Happy SysAdmin Apprecation Day

To the Greatest SysAdmin Evar!

Even if I don't update my website.

-E.Mwangi

sniff, thanks guys. I have the best customers in the world.

Comments [2]

2005-07-28 15:37:00

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2005-07-28 15:37:00

Feminine Intuition

Men think we are not blessed with souls,
Are useful, yes, for drudgery
and helping them attain their goals
(Ours to them, a boring mystery).

We can read, this they accept,
Can work out sums, and write a bit:
Store stuff, remember where it's kept,
And fetch it, when a man wants it.

We're tired of condescension, tired
of being Adam's latest rib
(Woman, the first, rather misfired).
We've had enough.  Computer Lib!

–From “Tales from the Computer Room” by John Race. © 1977. 

Comments [4]

2005-06-23 01:45:00

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2005-06-23 01:45:00
Narnia Toast?
The experimental gaming server, Narnia has been toasted. Mk and I are trying to figure out what happened. It could be bad blocks, bad inodes, or one of my dead interface programs running lockf on the pk3 files (this is why you should never do a kill -9). In the meantime please don’t panic. A backup vps is ready to roll into action if we can’t fix Narnia.

2005-05-16 21:53:00 

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2005-05-16 21:53:00 
Physical Volume Knobs

If I were to design The Ben Notebook Computer it would have many improvements over today’s antiquated laptops. The first feature would be a hardware volume knob. I can not fathom the reasoning going through the engineer’s head who said, “I know, let’s make software control the volume so we don’t have to have a volume knob by making users press Fn+UP or FN+DOWN!”  

The worst part is the most popular OS doesn’t allow control of the volume until it has started playing some ridiculous startup chime. 

Phil – email – 2005-05-17 12:53:24
The problem with mocking the “most popular OS” is that it’s too easy…. The challenge is pretty much gone.

Jeff – 2005-05-17 18:43:25
I always wanted both my compys to start with a flip of a switch. Just like in the old movies where they had to use the huge electric switch with a burst of sparks to get the machine going.. Ah, good times.. good times.. 

Ben – email – 2005-05-17 19:39:55
sorry Phil, i guess i could have said the same thing about Linux…so i will: one annoyance in Ubuntu Linux is the only way to control the sound in X11 is through the Gnome volume thing. This is very bad because when I’m playing a game like Quake III it is impossible to get to it without exiting the game. 

toggle switches… i wired one of my desktops to use one for power and a momentary toggle switch for the reset. …it was pretty cool, and very convenient to have that reset switch. …until i electrocuted myself that is.

Phil – email – 2005-05-20 12:52:46
I don’t get it…. Why don’t you just adjust the volume from within Quake? It seems like it’s a flaw in the game if it doesn’t allow you to adjust the master volume. 

How would you rather have it?

Ben – email – 2005-05-20 15:41:09
If only all games were flawless in design. 

Most games have some ability to control the volume (usually not the master channel) in-game. Sadly it is a pain as you have to back into the game’s menu, find the volume settings (and mind you that some game menus are hard coded for right-handed mice so if you’re left-handed you end up secondary clicking all over the place), and drag a slider… 

By the time this is done you have been shot at, killed, and have respawned only to be killed again. On desktop computers speakers usually have a manual volume knob allowing for quick adjustments. 

Sometimes older methods are better for controlling certain things. The main reason software is taking over more control is because it is much cheaper than hardware.

Phil – email – 2005-05-24 17:11:48
Oh, I see. Your problem is that Ubuntu doesn’t auto-detect your hardware volume buttons. I thought it was a GNOME flaw or something. 

Once again, Laptop users end up being second-class citizens. It’s a shame, but things are definitely looking up.

Ben – email – 2005-05-24 19:31:49
Gentoo automatically set up the pseudo-hardware Fn volume buttons for Gnome (but not for KDE)… and that was an older version of Gnome than Ubuntu is using.

2005-05-14 21:10:00 

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2005-05-14 21:10:00 
COMMENT SYSTEM ONLINE

In one sitting–except a break for lunch, a friend dropping by, and a few phone (fancy hearing from you Jenny) calls–I wrote the long anticipated and requested comment system.

Many of the ideas are shamelessly stolen from genius Phil Hagelberg. 

Please report any bugs here. Enjoy. 

Jeremiah – email – 2005-05-14 21:42:19
Nice work Ben, I was wondering when I was going to be able to post comments to your blog… 

There seems to be a little trouble with the cursor positioning though… Maybe its on my computer.

sab771 – email – 2005-05-15 01:23:07
No, the cursor is goofy for me too. 
Wait, now it’s fixed. 
Um… maybe not. 

Nice blog.

Ben – email – 2005-05-15 01:40:05
Fixed Firefox jumping cursor bug (i think).

Ben – email – 2005-05-15 01:46:26
Fixed nasty regex matching incorrectly for s when preceded with r bug which resulted in converting the characters “rs” to a non-sgml character in posts.

Phil – email – 2005-05-15 14:02:58
Nice system. Just checking to see if you save name/email/uri in a cookie for later use.

Phil – email – 2005-05-15 17:23:16
Here’s a nifty regex to replace URIs in the comment with links to the given URI. My apologies if my entites get blasted by your system. 

——- 

$regex = ‘/http:\/\/([^\ ,\n

Phil – email – 2005-05-15 17:24:13
Yep, it got taken out. Maybe this will go through: 

——- 

$regex = ‘/http:\/\/([^\ ,\n<]*)/’; 
$replace = “<a href=’http://$1′>http://$1</a>”; 

$comment[content] = preg_replace($regex, $replace, $comment[content]);

Ben – email – 2005-05-16 00:31:49
Thanks for the regex code Phil, sorry my script blasted it the first time. Cookies are on the todo list.

2005-05-13 13:51:00

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2005-05-13 13:51:00
Ben buys Cell

Well by now everyone I don’t want to have the number has it so it’s safe to let people know I have one…

After waiting a LONG time and much research I bought the LG VX-6100 from Verizon Wireless.

The good: It can sync with BitPim (opensource). With analog capability it can even get a signal at my house. It uses the superior CDMA technology (although I think GSM is the future, CDMA is so much better right now).

2005-04-20 01:43:00

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2005-04-20 01:43:00
Ubuntu Linux on the Acer Aspire 2000

Ubuntu Logo

The last few weeks I tried FreeBSD, Gentoo, Novell Desktop, Ubuntu, and MEPIS. FreeBSD surprisingly had the best out of the box hardware support except for ATI drivers. I use FreeBSD for just about all of my servers, but stuff took too long to compile and I wanted the 3D hardware acceleration. Novell failed the left-handed mouse test. MEPIS failed to even get past grub. Gentoo takes weeks to get all the hardware working. Ubuntu, took some getting used to, and has a long way to go. But I was so impressed that it detected most of my hardware and had it working with no configuration on my part that I decided to delve into it further. It is the only distribution that has been able to allow my mouse to work left-handed (buttons reversed) while not making the touchpad context-click when tapping. It has a lot of quirks but it by far was the easiest install I’ve ever had on my Acer Aspire 2000. If you’re interested read my How to install Ubuntu Linux on an Acer Aspire 2000. Your mileage may vary.