slackwrdave

Posts tagged with "net"

trapped in the matrix

Wednesday, 14. January 2009, 05:04:58

I watched the original Matrix movie on the hotel TV tonight. That film always recharges my emotional batteries enough to get through another few days. Tomorrow I have most of the day free, just have to drive to Florence, South Carolina from Columbia. I'm hoping for hotel net access there. The hotel where I have a reservation is situated in the middle of a whole nest of other hotels, so hopefully there will be some signals in the air.

6 comments

big old net outage

Sunday, 28. December 2008, 19:02:14

internet storm center, traffic, sans.org, level 3 ...

There seemed to be a major net outage this afternoon starting around 18:00 GMT lasting about 45 minutes. The fact that we even noticed it means we're online way too much.

About 3/4 of the sites we usually hit were unreachable. It seems to be over now. Resuming the downloading.

By the way, if you're a time freak, like I am, wikipedia has good stuff on GMT and timekeeping at this link.

Outage report from the storm center:

Level3 Outage: confirmed
Published: 2008-12-28,
Last Updated: 2008-12-28 18:25:20 UTC
by Raul Siles (Version: 3)
0 comment(s)

An ISC reader wrote in to let us know about a current Level3 outage based on Internet Health Report. It seems the main issues are with its Detroit origin, although St. Louis seems to be affected too, probably as a consequence of the former one. In fact (although not necessarily directly related), Level3 main web page is not available: http://www.level3.com.

UPDATE: (UTC, Sunday, December 28, 2008 at 18:21:00) During the last few minutes we have confirmed the Level3 issues with several ISC readers. Thank you to all who wrote in to let us know and confirm it!

If you have any additional information about the real reason for this, please, let us know.

1 comment

a little net access while traveling

Wednesday, 3. December 2008, 04:09:49

hojo, lumberton, howard johnson, wardriving ...

I wanted to do a good e-mail check and look at a few things while out on the workweek. The Howard Johnsons hotel on I-95 in Lumberton, North Carolina had a great signal in the parking lot. I got all my stuff done while watching people pushing shopping carts go by in the darkness. The HoJo wireless was real fast.

4 comments

public libraries on the road

Tuesday, 25. November 2008, 20:04:24

access, sc, internet, library ...

The Chester County Public Library graciously gave me an hour of Internet time today while I was waiting to go to my job. I enjoyed catching up on interviews and news from my favorite websites. They
also have free unlimited wireless for when I get my netbook, but today I had to ask for a terminal.

When on a public terminal, I won't log onto any of my password sites due to worrying about the machine being compromised, but for casual surfing, the library is perfect. It also makes a great
temporary office due to the desks, copiers, and fax machines. Sometimes I even take a little nap in a cubicle.

8 comments

morning routine when not working

Sunday, 9. November 2008, 05:06:59

aim, democracy now, linux, democracynow ...

I like about a two hour net session when I get up on a free morning.

Here's the approximate routine:

Struggle to the bathroom to wipe the glop out of my eyes with a washcloth.
Put on the coffee. I like freshly ground beans and the French press method of brewing it. So yummy with a half teaspoon of sugar and a splash of soymilk in it.
First thing online, I check my messengers to see if anyone left me a message overnight. I prefer the Jabber messenger, but will also respond to ICQ, Yahoo, and AIM. I like it when there are a bunch of messages left for me in the morning. Please do this! My about page will give you a couple of them.
After the message check, I stop all the overnight file transfers I had running on BitTorrent. Usually, overnight, over a gig has uploaded, but in the morming I want all the bandwidth just for me! Strangely enough, I only share legal files, like Linux iso's, or ogg music files from jamendo.com.
Next thing is to get a little music throbbing to get me awake for the day. The Trance over at somaFM is particularly good.
Then I get my e-mail. I have a several accounts with different purposes, and Thunderbird gets them all with a single click. I don't use Opera for e-mail. I prefer it only as a browser, and a darned good browser it is. I can spend ages looking at the e-mail, as I like to get a lot of reminders and newsletters this way.
Then I hit MyOpera! This can be a real time killer. I look forward to seeing what has happened while I was sleeping. I still find it a miracle to see messages, comments, and blog posts from such far-flung places as Moscow, Tehran, Vietnam, Washington state, and even revolutionary Cuba! It sure wasn't that way when I was a child.
Next is some news from DemocracyNow and tech fun from slashdot.
On some mornings I will then proceed to look at some certain special binary files.
Lastly, a hot shower!

What do you like to do when you get up?

6 comments

our connection to the cyber underworld

Sunday, 2. November 2008, 03:50:14

kubuntu, linux, intrepid ibex, laptop ...

I enjoy looking at pictures of what people have for computers and working online. I especially like the computers that are online yet half taken apart, beat up, particularly old, etc. Please post links or pics of what you have, if you like.

Here's a little photo tour of what we use right now in all its dirty glory. I did not clean up for this photo session. Each pic is clickable if you need to see a larger size. Just click "all sizes" once you land on the flickr page.

Image #1: This is Brian's elderly laptop, a Sony Vaio. We've lost count of how old it is. It's still running beautifully with Kubuntu 8.04 on it, the Hardy Heron. Notice the Palenque desktop wallpaper.

Image #2: My dusty 4-year old tower built by a local store called Intrex. It's never had the pleasure of running Windows. It's had Debian, then a long run of Slackware, then finally Kubuntu 8.10. It has an AMD something in it, and an ATi Radion something or other video card. I can't remember without looking them up.