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thaxor
what?
L2 Check Mirrors
Just south of Amanda Park, dude in 20+ foot RV gets into fast lane (left lane) going up hill. I decide to pass on the right since this guy can’t read signs. “Slow moving vehicles stay right”. Big 4×4 Dodge truck in front of me passes him, I’m about 50% of the way past and he starts to merge right with no blinker.
I honk my horn and go 2 feet out onto the shoulder, basically as far as I can go without hitting ditch. Check my rear view mirror to make sure I can safely slow down without someone running into me. Red car that was in the left lane had switched right to pass as well. Luckily they backed off fast enough and I corrected back onto the road.
I laid on the horn for the next 30 seconds adrenaline pumping. This is the closest I’ve ever been to a serious accident, also the only time I’ve ever felt like road raging.
This reaffirms my previous suspicions held when growing up that RV drivers on the peninsula are all noobs.
Nagios conquered
I finally have a functional Nagios install going. It’s monitoring all major services mostly through check_tcp currently but will be expanded to be more precise through some plugins soon. Also installed a new theme from http://www.nagiosexchange.org Thanks to Sitzmar for the link.
Once I understood the relationships between services, hosts, and commands the whole thing came together pretty quickly. Also props to Brian for answering all my questions and helping me fix the final email problem. Definitely the most rewarding work project I’ve had in a while.
Links:
http://www.section6.net/wiki/index.php/Setting_up_Nagios_in_FreeBSD
kids fishing
I’m taking my niece to a kids fishing event this weekend. They cram a small pond full of trout and let the kids go crazy. If it’s anything like the derbies in Forks I went to growing up then it will be a cluster F of sharp/barbed & weighted objects.
I’ll be wearing long pants and sunglasses to keep myself safe.
google cellular
This is wicked cool, saw it on a TED talk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mJxA8eIWQUc about Phone+Internet (Phoneternet).
Text 46645 (googl) instead of 411 and only pay txt messaging fees. In addition the number and whatever else you get back is already on your phone so you can refer to it again later.
Example usage here: http://www.google.ca/mobile/sms/index.html
Another option is the free voice activated version, Goog-411: 1-800-466-4411 http://www.google.com/goog411/
I’ve also been using http://www.grandcentral.com. Although instead of using it to tie together multiple phones I got a local Forks WA number so my Mom can call it without having to use a calling card. Another neat feature is the emailed voicemails, although all I ever get is credit card offers and scams.
change into a truck
hah!
pandora fail
No matter how many times I downvote Jack Johnson it keeps coming back up.
browser hijack
Spyware is frustrating, then later on becomes hilarious.
A laptop came in from the field that had the internet connection hijacked. It would only go to some bogus anti-spyware site, and occasionally opens a bunch of popups.
I ran hijackthis without a problem, then I try to run spybot.
And when I hover over the “ok” this happens.
So that made me laugh. Real sneaky.
Finished up by running LSPFix.exe and removing a dll hook reported by Hijackthis. Finally a reboot and update of Nod killed everything and the internet worked again.
spam filtering services
Problem: Spam is a pain and people complain about it all the time. But I don’t want more apps to maintain.
Solution: Spam filtering services.
So I got hooked up with Verizon business, who handles all the cell/WAN cards at work already, they offer an anti spam/virus filtering solution for $2.70 per mailbox. We’ve only got ~35 boxes so it sounded like a decent deal. So I attend a 1 hour phone call/demo thing and configure optimum settings while on the phone with the rep. Contact our ISP (I forward mail from pop-boxes to exchange) get them to switch over our MX records and .. I’m done.
Less than a month later I find http://www.spamstopshere.com It’s gotten some really good reviews and is a hell of a lot cheaper than Verizon (almost 50%). http://www.spamstopshere.com/antispam_pricing.aspx
After our contract lapses I’ll be making the change. Will end up being ~$300-$400 dollar savings over the course of a year.
Windows XP SP3 Bluetooth problems
So an update following SP3 broke Bluetooth mouse/keyboards. I could re-add the Mouse/Keyboard but they would never really be connected. The solution (which took about 1 hour to find) was to edit the “Bluetooth Support service” and change the Logon information.
Start > Run > Services.msc
Logon tab, select “This Account” – must be local admin
Changing it to an admin account apparently lets the system install the HID drivers needed to use the devices. Whatever it works, I hate bluetooth.