Re: Holy War

[David H. Adler]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:23:38AM -0600, Elaine -HFB- Ashton wrote:
> 
> This is my opinion and I'm not terribly interested in a holy war. 

Those stuffy boston people are just *no* fun...  :-)

dha, ducking...

-- 
David H. Adler - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - http://www.panix.com/~dha/
she's a lovetarian especially in the form of puppies
  - Jellyfish, Sebrina, Paste and Plato

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Piers Cawley]

David Cantrell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:34:31PM +, Leon Brocard wrote:
> 
> > OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
> > New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely interested
> > in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited.
> 
> Count me in.
> 
> The New World's on Gerrard St, isn't it?

Gerrard Place.

-- 
Piers

Re: Consultancy company

[Piers Cawley]

Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> David Cantrell wrote:
> > 
> > On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 05:04:54PM +, Piers Cawley wrote:
> > 
> > > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > > have people in the same room;
> > 
> > Plus there's too many distractions at home.  Even if you live on your own.
> > It's great to have the capability - for those evening brainwaves, or if
> > you're ill - but doing it every day just doesn't work, at least for me.
> > 
> 
> That should read there's too many distractions at home for me  (or
> you as the case may be).
> 
> I am about 150% more productive at home - 25 % because I save the
> journey, and the other 25% due to not having to go to meetings /
> going for long lunches / the chat that turns into a tangenical
> discussion on XZY / some Luser or PBH asking a stupid question that
> they could have worked out themselves if I was not there /  any other activity that takes me away from the task in hand>.

The vision I have is of a team (or teams) working in *our* premises,
with customers working with us. We avoid pointless meetings. The
customer is there because they know what we're supposed to be doing
for them, and they know what's important. When you're only working a
35 hour week (40 tops...) then you should have enough free time
outside work that there's less inclination to piss off for a long
lunch. And the whole point about setting this up is to get rid of the
PHB. 

> Sorry the above turned into a rant, I just get a bit pissed off with
> closed minds that assume that having people in an office =
> productivity.

*Ahem*. Were I to be the sort of person who takes things personally,
I'd take that personally. Or something.

Seriously, I tried working from home when the trains were up the
spout, and for a couple or three days it was great. However, one or
two points.

1. As a sole developer, working from home is/can be good, especially
   when your head is down and you're turning out the code for a
   particular bit. But working from home means you're away from the
   customer, and the customer is the only person who can make business
   decisions about what your code is supposed to be doing.

2. You are away from the team. Again, sole developer, this is not a
   problem. Consultancy where we're supposed to be doing the synergy
   thing, not quite so good. Time you spend away is time in which you
   aren't plugged into what's happening and (and this is *really*
   important), time spent away is time in which you aren't doing the
   mentor thing. I strongly believe that, in a joint consultancy deal,
   it is *really* important that gurus help to enlighten students,
   otherwise how do we get our partners up to speed so we can go out
   and get more fun work and make more fun money?

3. Every time I need to ask you something and you're not there and I
   have to phone you, there's a chance I'll think 'ah fuck it' and not
   bother. And there's a chance that that will be a *really* bad idea.

I'm not saying that offices (especially client offices) don't suck.
But they don't have to. If we're going to do this, lets do it right.

Now, I freely admit that I have partaken of the Extreme Programming
Kool-Aid, and dammit I want to do it. But dammit again, it makes
*sense*. Also bear in mind that when I made the decision (having tried
it) that I'd rather commute in and be near the customer rather than
work from home (in my *very* comfortable home office...) that meant
adding another 4 hours (count 'em) of travelling time to my day. If
I work from home I work too long. If work too long my code starts to
suck. If my code starts to suck I get embarrassed and my reputation
starts to slip. I want to work with copilots. I want to be able to
*have* that tangential conversation that'll turn out to be useful in
six months time. And table football's no fun if you're playing with
yourself. 

> Yes there are advantages to working in an office - i.e the team can
> be greater than the sum of its parts.

This is *so* important.

> But working from elsewhere also allows idividuals to be productive -
> often alot more.

How are you measuring productivity?

> Why not combine the two - i.e have a day a week where everyone meets to
> brainstorm / ask questions / do what needs to be done to take advantage
> of a group.

Because groups don't work like that. All of a sudden I'm taking notes.
And trying to remember the questions I needed to ask. And having to
plan further ahead than I want to. And I'm not cutting code. 

> Rant over.

Time to wrap up the counter-rant too.

-- 
Piers

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[alex]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Paul Makepeace wrote:
> Without wanting to sound too real-world and pragmatic, why not upgrade
> the server when you actually *need* to, i.e. learn how to monitor
> performance and when it starts to suck, *then* buy new stuff.

because as i'm gathering together this money, i'll want to spend it (on
the server) straight away rather than have it sitting around.

you have some good suggestions for what we should spend it on, though.

alex

-- 
Snack pastries are dramatic when shapes are combined

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Paul Makepeace]

From: "Greg Cope" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> No - just dont like the gun ho lets fry anyone on deathrow - and now a a
> great chestnut one of them got to be president ...

Fear not so much a leader of the Free World(tm) who is demonstrably unable to
form grammatically correct sentences in his one, only native tongue but the
fact that he's attempting to install one of the most hard-right anti-choice
judges in existence to Attorney General. Abortion is barely even legal here;
they'll be chasing womens' right to vote next...

> > No, cable installation "engineers". All cable company phone
> > support/accounts.
>
> Luckily I've not suffered from those.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/5/16186.html

Paul

Big Macs v The Naked Chef -- pitfalls of scaling consultancies

[Paul Makepeace]

Y'all might find this excellent piece interesting,

http://joel.editthispage.com/stories/storyReader$287

Paul

Re: Holy War

[Paul Makepeace]

From: "Michael Stevens" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> And, of course, there's the obvious downside of following the unstable
> branch of anything...

Except with Debian in my four years of using unstable I haven't had a single
(serious) problem. The times when they've occasionally messed up dependencies
I've simply left it 24hrs and tried again and someone's fixed it. Many, many
eyeballs :-)

I would, and do, use unstable for production boxes, although I also have a
non-production box I run update/dist-upgrade first on.

Paul

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Paul Makepeace]

From: "alex" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> [1] My first name is actually Christopher, but handily my parents changed
> their minds after registering my birth and decided to call me by my middle
> name.

[Oddly enough, same here. I'm Chris Paul ... It's an absolute pain in the
arse. Note to parents: don't do this.]

Without wanting to sound too real-world and pragmatic, why not upgrade the
server when you actually *need* to, i.e. learn how to monitor performance and
when it starts to suck, *then* buy new stuff. Otherwise you'll end up in the
situation it is now: a load of kit that's not being used & is depreciating
rapidly.

128MB RAM and a K6 is quite enough to run a decently hammered mod_perl site.
You only need more memory if you end up using a large database or doing
something rash like install Oracle. Assuming you're not on an OC-12 backbone
and you're not doing finite element analysis of an F15 jet per form
submission, your IO bottleneck will be the net.

Building reliability is probably your best aim: does it have a UPS? does it
have a RAID 1/0 config? Dual PSUs? Tape drive & backup policy? Those things
are way more important than a faster chip or RAM.

Paul

time

[Robin Szemeti]

On Sat, 06 Jan 2001, I wrote:

arse ... // ok .. so ive been sending mail dated for a different
week .  I hate it when it does that. moral of the story is
don;t turn your machine off when you go on holiday for a month and leave
it in freezing temperature as it will get amnesia .. and remeber to add
ntpdate to your root crontab someday too .. :)

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

Re: PIMB THC-shirts

[Paul Makepeace]

From: "Steve Mynott" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> THC isn't water soluble at all which is why you have to dissolve the
> stuff in hot fat before cooking it.

It is soluble, especially in smoke form. Perhaps not *miscible* but certainly
it'll end up in suspension. Not much admittedly, but it is and crucially from
a health angle, more so than tar. If you don't think so, try drinking some
bong water :-)

Paul

Re: Consultancy company

[Robin Szemeti]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, you wrote:

> That should read there's too many distractions at home for me  (or
> you as the case may be).

im with greg on this one :)

although I can see that some project would need 5 day a week attendance
at some stages I am not convinced that that is the only way to do it all
the time.

The probelm I have at home is NOT being averly dostracted, but getting
carried away and forgetting to eat for too many hours :)

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

Re: Consultancy company

[Robin Szemeti]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, you wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 05:04:54PM +, Piers Cawley wrote:
> 
> > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > have people in the same room;
> 
> Plus there's too many distractions at home.  Even if you live on your own.
> It's great to have the capability - for those evening brainwaves, or if
> you're ill - but doing it every day just doesn't work, at least for me.

it just requires a certain disipline.  Some people can, some people can;t

perhaps you should think in terms of the Perl motto itself .. TMTOWTDI 

If you;re the sort of person who needs the disipline imposed by turning
up and not being allowed out until home time then office working is for
you .. I can do it .. but I prefer not to.

team Building is a tricky business. to make a team work you need several
different sorts of people. I once worked for a guy who was a fastiious
documenter. over the years he'd assemebled a team of like individuals ...
who could have documented for nasa, but would never have come up with the
idea for a space shuttle if their lives depended on it.

theres a strong tendency to recruit people in your own image and this has
to be resisted if you are to be succesful. there is no such thing as the
'perfect consultant' .. you might have your own idea of what the perfect
consultant is .. establish a consultancy with 25 of em and I guarantee it
will fail. diversity is the key.  this has been proven time and time
again, hard as it may be to believe you actually do need the idiot that
wanders around all day from desk to desk, and the unix wizard whos always
late, wears sandals and a CAMRA t shirt. assemble a team of squeeky clean
straight-A computer science graduates and you will not have the success
that you think would be assured. the converse is also true ... don't
build a team soley out of 'ideas people' ... they'll dream it up but
never finish it. The true test of team managment is to prevent the
different team roles from irritating the hell out of each other ;))

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

RE: RE:Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Andy Mendelsohn]

> From: Paul Makepeace [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> 
> From: "David Cantrell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > > Is a million considered a lot in the UK still?
> >
> > Not by people who can add up.
> 
> OK, same here then. Having said that, it's amazing how much people can
> stretch a few $currency_unit if they *don't* have investment :-)
> 
> > > But then so's a 24hr stretch of uninterrupted electricity
> >
> > Yeah, it's always amazed me just how crap the north 
> American power system
> > seems to be.  Even in cities.
> 
> This is a different issue, 
> http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/power.crisis/
> 
> The US has much more to worry about than the UK, like high 
> water tables,
> vicious weather and earthquakes. The smart money goes on 
> hosting in Texas
> (San Antonio) not California though -- relatively
> earthquake/tornado/storm/etc-free!
> 
> On the upside, the US doesn't have BT "engineers" to deal with...
> 

No, the US has PacBell engineers and countless tin-pot, unregulated ISPs who
offer you DSL service, take your deposit money and then promptly go bust
FSCKRS

Oh, and none of these people ever talk to each other.

mail to DSL provider:   Where's my DSL?
Reply:  problems with PacBell. We'll get back to you

2 weeks later:
mail to DSL provider (COVAD):   Where's my DSL?
Reply:  Please contact your ISP.

mail to ISP:Where's my DSL eh? It's been four weeks since you mailed me
to expect a visit from PacBell 'within the next few days'.
Reply:  SILENCE

Call ISP to shout at automated call-handler: WHERE's MY DSL!!
Reply:  Sorry, due to the number of enquiries, we're unable to take your
call at present. please call back.

mail to DSL provider:   I can't get through to my ISP, either by phone or
email, will you please cancel the order
Reply:  Please contact your ISP.

Oh, well, that's a $50 deposit blown away.

rant over...idleness resumed.

andy

Re: Consultancy company

[Greg Cope]

David Cantrell wrote:
> 
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 05:04:54PM +, Piers Cawley wrote:
> 
> > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > have people in the same room;
> 
> Plus there's too many distractions at home.  Even if you live on your own.
> It's great to have the capability - for those evening brainwaves, or if
> you're ill - but doing it every day just doesn't work, at least for me.
> 

That should read there's too many distractions at home for me  (or
you as the case may be).

I am about 150% more productive at home - 25 % because I save the
journey, and the other 25% due to not having to go to meetings / going
for long lunches / the chat that turns into a tangenical discussion on
XZY / some Luser or PBH asking a stupid question that they could have
worked out themselves if I was not there / .

Sorry the above turned into a rant, I just get a bit pissed off with
closed minds that assume that having people in an office = productivity.

Yes there are advantages to working in an office - i.e the team can be
greater than the sum of its parts.

But working from elsewhere also allows idividuals to be productive -
often alot more.

Why not combine the two - i.e have a day a week where everyone meets to
brainstorm / ask questions / do what needs to be done to take advantage
of a group.

Rant over.

Greg

> > And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> > it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> > they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> > for me.
> 
> Yeah.  What he said.
> 
> --
> David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/
> 
>Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Consultancy company

[Greg Cope]

Piers Cawley wrote:
> 
> Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > Piers Cawley wrote:
> > >
> > > Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > >
> > > > Andy Wardley wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> > > > > > Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.
> > > > >
> > > > > It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
> > > > > writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
> > > > > Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
> > > > > something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
> > > > > of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
> > > > > was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
> > > > > weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.
> > > > >
> > > > > Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
> > > > > work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
> > > > > and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=
> > > >
> > > > Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?
> > > >
> > > > i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
> > > > commute - I live in a small flat)
> > >
> > > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > > have people in the same room; that way you get people who know the
> > > answers immediately on tap and able to overhear other discussions and
> > > contribute as appropriate. Whilst I love the journey to work in the
> > > home office I don't like the rest of the office conditions. Having
> > > people there is important.
> >
> > I can understand the idea of building a team, but I think I am more
> > productive here, than in an office where I am nearly constantly
> > interupted. Also not being able to ask a question of the person next
> > door, means I go look for the answer - and the person next door can
> > get on with it.
> 
> Hmm... Have you looked at the XP books?
> 

XP ?

> > MySQL AB is a example of a company that is developeing a "product" in a
> > virtual sense - why not try and develope a virtual company ?
> 
> Well, clients probably like offices. Admittedly not necessarily a
> *good* argument.
> 

Ah well there I agree - a posh office creates an impression that alot of
big clients (read high revenue clients), find appealing. 

I've not argued against an office - just the idea that everyone has to
be in it all the time !

> >
> > >
> > > And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> > > it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> > > they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> > > for me.
> >
> > But is treking into  that good to working from home ?  ADSL is
> > cheap and working from home can be supprisingly productive.
> 
> Where it's available. That would be 'not from my exchange in the
> forseeable future...'

Ah well, I want to move to Cornwall which will not get adsl for another
few years ;-(

Greg

Re: Holy War

[Dave Cross]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 05:13:30PM +, Redvers Davies ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> > Seriously, my current machine is a PentiumPro 200 Mhz and that's 
> > getting so frustrating that I knew I needed a new machine and I 
> > always buy the fastest I can so it will last as long as possible.
> 
> Was it a self-congratulations pressie for the publication of your book.

Oh. Yep. That too.

-- 
http://www.dave.org.uk | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Data Munging with Perl

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:34:31PM +, Leon Brocard wrote:

> OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
> New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely interested
> in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited.

Count me in.

The New World's on Gerrard St, isn't it?

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Consultancy company

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 05:04:54PM +, Piers Cawley wrote:

> I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> have people in the same room;

Plus there's too many distractions at home.  Even if you live on your own.
It's great to have the capability - for those evening brainwaves, or if
you're ill - but doing it every day just doesn't work, at least for me.

> And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> for me.

Yeah.  What he said.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Consultancy company

[Robin Szemeti]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, you wrote:

> I can do 200% as much work at home because I can work when and as I feel 
> able to and so work when I am my most productive.

well having spent the last year telecommuting I can affirm that it does
let you sometimes work at phenomeonal rates

But I also can see the other side .. contact and 'just being able to ask'
is important too .. the telephone still works, and when I worked in a
building full of people I;d just as lilely phone em up or email em as
walk round to their office to see them. I'd say on balance that both have
merit. at white heat development pace its better to be all in one room ..
when its thrashed out and just needs plain doing, then wandering off home
and doing it when it feels best is just as powerful.

I'd see an ideal solution as being flexible and not pre constraining
yourselves to a fixed pattern. If you prefer one type of working much
over another then do it that way .. both have merit.

and I'm still dead keen to be involved in an XP project :))

whatever .. if you lot are going to be in Chinatown on Monday thats as
good a reason as any I can see for making a trip to the smoke ... see ya
there. 

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

Re: Consultancy company

[Robin Szemeti]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, you wrote:

> > But is treking into  that good to working from home ?  ADSL is
> > cheap and working from home can be supprisingly productive.
> 
> Where it's available. That would be 'not from my exchange in the
> forseeable future...'

ISDN is cool .. and from this quarters BT bil I only was connected for a
paltry 786 hours too ...

:)

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

Re: OT : DVD

[David H. Adler]

On Mon, Jan 15, 2001 at 03:32:53PM +, Paul Mison wrote:
> On 15/01/2001 at 21:12 +, mallum wrote:
>  ^
> 
> Your clock's wrong...

Maybe he's just really obsessed with Rush...

dha

-- 
David H. Adler - <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> - http://www.panix.com/~dha/

Re: Consultancy company

[Natalie Ford]

At 17:42 19/01/01, you wrote:
>Piers Cawley wrote:
> > Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > > Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?
> > >
> > > i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
> > > commute - I live in a small flat)
> >
> > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > have people in the same room; that way you get people who know the
> > answers immediately on tap and able to overhear other discussions and
> > contribute as appropriate. Whilst I love the journey to work in the
> > home office I don't like the rest of the office conditions. Having
> > people there is important.
>
>I can understand the idea of building a team, but I think I am more
>productive here, than in an office where I am nearly constantly
>interupted.  Also not being able to ask a question of the person next
>door, means I go look for the answer - and the person next door can get
>on with it.
>
>MySQL AB is a example of a company that is developeing a "product" in a
>virtual sense - why not try and develope a virtual company ?

Sounds like a great idea.  Personally, as someone with M.S. (the MonSter), 
I need to be able to nap as and when I need to and work as and when I am 
able to.  Working from home allows me to do this...

> > And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> > it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> > they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> > for me.
>
>But is treking into  that good to working from home ?  ADSL is
>cheap and working from home can be supprisingly productive.

I can do 200% as much work at home because I can work when and as I feel 
able to and so work when I am my most productive.

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Alex Page]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 09:27:18AM +, Dave Hodgkinson wrote:

> It should be mandatory for all public servants to be adept at Sim
> City.

IIRC, Sim City is one of Ken Livingstone's favorites.

Alex

Re: Consultancy company

[Piers Cawley]

Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Piers Cawley wrote:
> > 
> > Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > 
> > > Andy Wardley wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> > > > > Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.
> > > >
> > > > It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
> > > > writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
> > > > Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
> > > > something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
> > > > of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
> > > > was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
> > > > weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.
> > > >
> > > > Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
> > > > work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
> > > > and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=
> > >
> > > Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?
> > >
> > > i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
> > > commute - I live in a small flat)
> > 
> > I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> > really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> > have people in the same room; that way you get people who know the
> > answers immediately on tap and able to overhear other discussions and
> > contribute as appropriate. Whilst I love the journey to work in the
> > home office I don't like the rest of the office conditions. Having
> > people there is important.
> 
> I can understand the idea of building a team, but I think I am more
> productive here, than in an office where I am nearly constantly
> interupted. Also not being able to ask a question of the person next
> door, means I go look for the answer - and the person next door can
> get on with it.

Hmm... Have you looked at the XP books?

> MySQL AB is a example of a company that is developeing a "product" in a
> virtual sense - why not try and develope a virtual company ?

Well, clients probably like offices. Admittedly not necessarily a
*good* argument.

> 
> > 
> > And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> > it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> > they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> > for me.
> 
> But is treking into  that good to working from home ?  ADSL is
> cheap and working from home can be supprisingly productive.

Where it's available. That would be 'not from my exchange in the
forseeable future...'

Re: Consultancy company

[Greg Cope]

Piers Cawley wrote:
> 
> Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > Andy Wardley wrote:
> > >
> > > On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> > > > Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.
> > >
> > > It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
> > > writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
> > > Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
> > > something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
> > > of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
> > > was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
> > > weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.
> > >
> > > Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
> > > work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
> > > and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=
> >
> > Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?
> >
> > i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
> > commute - I live in a small flat)
> 
> I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
> really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
> have people in the same room; that way you get people who know the
> answers immediately on tap and able to overhear other discussions and
> contribute as appropriate. Whilst I love the journey to work in the
> home office I don't like the rest of the office conditions. Having
> people there is important.

I can understand the idea of building a team, but I think I am more
productive here, than in an office where I am nearly constantly
interupted.  Also not being able to ask a question of the person next
door, means I go look for the answer - and the person next door can get
on with it.

MySQL AB is a example of a company that is developeing a "product" in a
virtual sense - why not try and develope a virtual company ?

> 
> And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
> it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
> they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
> for me.

But is treking into  that good to working from home ?  ADSL is
cheap and working from home can be supprisingly productive.

Greg



> 
> --
> Piers

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat wormdiscovered

[Jonathan Stowe]

On 19 Jan 2001, Piers Cawley wrote:
> 
> Put me down for that. Might bring Gill as well. 
> 

It seems like every tom dick and harry's other half is called Gill around
here :)

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: Holy War

[Redvers Davies]

> Seriously, my current machine is a PentiumPro 200 Mhz and that's 
> getting so frustrating that I knew I needed a new machine and I 
> always buy the fastest I can so it will last as long as possible.

Was it a self-congratulations pressie for the publication of your book.

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Natalie Ford]

At 14:55 19/01/01, Neil Ford wrote:
> >Dave Hodgkinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> >Mmmm... so, when are we going to have a meeting about all this?
>Well seeing as I will be amongst the great unwashed from next week,
>anytime soon would be good.

Me too!

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Natalie Ford]

At 15:49 19/01/01, Dave Cross wrote:
>I'd love to come along, but probably wouldn't have time to get there
>and back during lunch. Can we do it one evening?

An evening would be better for me, too...

Natalie

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Piers Cawley]

Leon Brocard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Dave Hodgkinson sent the following bits through the ether:
> 
> > Sounds like a table at the New World one lunchtime...
> 
> OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
> New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely
> interested in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited. People
> with business sense needed too, though: offices, computers and
> bandwidth don't come cheap.

Put me down for that. Might bring Gill as well. 

-- 
Piers

Re: Consultancy company

[Piers Cawley]

Greg Cope <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Andy Wardley wrote:
> > 
> > On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> > > Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.
> > 
> > It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
> > writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
> > Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
> > something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
> > of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
> > was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
> > weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.
> > 
> > Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
> > work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
> > and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=
> 
> Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?
> 
> i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
> commute - I live in a small flat)

I'm *really* unsure about telecommuting. Seems to me that the way to
really build a team (especially when doing serious development) is to
have people in the same room; that way you get people who know the
answers immediately on tap and able to overhear other discussions and
contribute as appropriate. Whilst I love the journey to work in the
home office I don't like the rest of the office conditions. Having
people there is important.

And I like central London because (whatever else is wrong with it)
it's relatively easy for everyone to get to by train no matter where
they live. Trekking out to (for example) Guildford wouldn't be good
for me.

-- 
Piers

Re: Holy War

[Robert Shiels]

> At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 16:33:40 -, "Robert Shiels" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
> > > >
> > > > What are you planning to do on the box?
> > >
> > > It'll be purely for home use, so:
> > >
> > > * Hacking perl
> > > * Prototyping web sites
> > > * Playing with new toys like AxKit and Camelot
> > > * Write
> > > * Surf the web
> > > * Read mail
> > > * Play the occasional game
> > > * Listen to MPs
> > > * Burn CDs
> > >
> > Apart from the games perhaps, I'm just wondering what a PIV1400Mhz
> > will do that a PII350 wouldn't :-) What was your inner justification
> > for getting such a monster machine Dave?
>
> Seriously, my current machine is a PentiumPro 200 Mhz and that's
> getting so frustrating that I knew I needed a new machine and I
> always buy the fastest I can so it will last as long as possible.
>
I'm just annoyed in that I quite recently bought a PIII866 with 256MbRAM
[1], and I'm way behind in the game already 

/Robert

[1]upgraded my P166MMX 64MB RAM

Re: Holy War

[Struan Donald]

* at 19/01 16:33 - Robert Shiels said:
> > >
> > > What are you planning to do on the box?
> >
> > It'll be purely for home use, so:
> >
> > * Hacking perl
> > * Prototyping web sites
> > * Playing with new toys like AxKit and Camelot
> > * Write
> > * Surf the web
> > * Read mail
> > * Play the occasional game
> > * Listen to MPs
> > * Burn CDs
> >
> Apart from the games perhaps, I'm just wondering what a PIV1400Mhz will do
> that a PII350 wouldn't :-) What was your inner justification for getting
> such a monster machine Dave?

that geek tendancy to get a farcially over powered machine 'cause they
can?

struan

Re: AUTOLOAD speed

[Simon Wistow]

Robin Houston wrote:

> Although the best solution would (obviously) be to
> use Symbol::Approx::Sub with an appropriate matcher :-)

[simon@ns0 simon]$ cat globtest
#!/usr/bin/perl

*foo = \&UI;

UI16();
UI32();
SI402();
foo12();


sub UI () {
print $_[0],"\n";
}

sub SI() {
print $_[0],"\n";
}

sub AUTOLOAD
{
my ($name) = $AUTOLOAD;
$name =~ /^[^:]+::([^\d]+)(\d+)/ && &$1($2);
}
[simon@ns0 simon]$ perl globtest
16
32
402
12
[simon@ns0 simon]$

Re: Consultancy company

[Greg Cope]

Andy Wardley wrote:
> 
> On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> > Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.
> 
> It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
> writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
> Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
> something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
> of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
> was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
> weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.
> 
> Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
> work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
> and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=

Agreed - why work in London - what about telecommuters ?

i.e I want to stay communtin to my desk - all 3 meters of it (the
commute - I live in a small flat)

> 
> On the matter of funding, I have a friend who works for Goldman Sachs
> who offered to put me in touch with VC somewhere in the range of 2 - 10m.
> No favours, no guarantees, but at least a foot in the door and the offer
> of waving a business plan under the noses of the right kind of people.
> Of course, you might argue that GS != Right Kind of People  :-)
> 
> But like others, I'm not convinced that VC is the way to go unless you
> really have to.  Having said that, if you want to start big and grow
> big quickly, I can't see a way to do that without significant moolah up
> front.  Maybe that means "really have to"?

Why need a VC's money for a consultancy - shurely most people involved
will have all the required kit (PC's / laptops) and all that may be
required is a small office.

A Consultantcy can raise cash quick via charging monthly like anyone
else - ok not everyone pays on time, but if a few do then thats cash in
the bank (especially as you pay everyone else at the end of the month.)

> 
> One consideration worth playing on is that good Perl people are hard
> to come by.  As a scarce resource, we might be able to convince backers
> that a solid collection of guru and demi-guru level Perl people represents
> a mighty design/development/consultancy force which could quickly corner
> a large chunk of the market.
> 
> I'd love to come to the meeting and hear the ideas, but I've done my
> trip to London for this month :-)

I've been 5 times this week - that's nearly my years quota !

Greg

> 
> A
> 
> Pipe dreamer.
> 
> --
> Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
>  <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: Holy War

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 16:33:40 -, "Robert Shiels" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > >
> > > What are you planning to do on the box?
> >
> > It'll be purely for home use, so:
> >
> > * Hacking perl
> > * Prototyping web sites
> > * Playing with new toys like AxKit and Camelot
> > * Write
> > * Surf the web
> > * Read mail
> > * Play the occasional game
> > * Listen to MPs
> > * Burn CDs
> >
> Apart from the games perhaps, I'm just wondering what a PIV1400Mhz 
> will do that a PII350 wouldn't :-) What was your inner justification 
> for getting such a monster machine Dave?

Heh! Dell's January sale prices were so good that it would have been
rude not too :)

Seriously, my current machine is a PentiumPro 200 Mhz and that's 
getting so frustrating that I knew I needed a new machine and I 
always buy the fastest I can so it will last as long as possible.

Dave...

Re: Holy War

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Robert Shiels wrote:

> Apart from the games perhaps, I'm just wondering what a PIV1400Mhz will do
> that a PII350 wouldn't :-) What was your inner justification for getting
> such a monster machine Dave?
> 

Some people buy Ferraris.

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: Holy War

[Robert Shiels]

> >
> > What are you planning to do on the box?
>
> It'll be purely for home use, so:
>
> * Hacking perl
> * Prototyping web sites
> * Playing with new toys like AxKit and Camelot
> * Write
> * Surf the web
> * Read mail
> * Play the occasional game
> * Listen to MPs
> * Burn CDs
>
Apart from the games perhaps, I'm just wondering what a PIV1400Mhz will do
that a PII350 wouldn't :-) What was your inner justification for getting
such a monster machine Dave?

/Robert

/Robert

Re: PIMB THC-shirts

[Andy Wardley]

On Jan 19,  9:39am, Steve Mynott wrote:
> THC isn't water soluble at all which is why you have to dissolve the
> stuff in hot fat before cooking it.

I belive that's true, but according to the paper I just found, presumably
the one Paul was referring to, the paper suggests that some THC *is* lost
when using a bong.

  http://www.ukcia.org/lib/pipes.htm

But note that the paper doesn't offer or claim any scientific evidence to
back this up, merely notes that "This suggests...".  I suspect the goodies
are getting stuck to the bowl, pipe, dirt and tar particles in the water,
but not actually dissolving the water as such.

If I were the kind of person to partake in such affairs, I'd suggest
that some objective testing is required.  But of course, I wouldn't want
to indulge in any activity which our wise and esteemed goverments have
decided is dangerous, immoral and quite sensibly illegal.  Nor would I
want to encourage anyone else to break the law.

Note that I also refrain from drinking tea as it's known to be
a gateway drug, according to the clear evidence that 97.2% of all
heroin addicts drank tea before progressing onto harder substance
abuse.  Be warned people!  Stick with tobacco, alcohol and the other
drugs which have been deemed safe enough for us to be trusted with.


A




-- 
Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: Holy War

[Elaine -HFB- Ashton]

Dave Cross [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] quoth:
*>
*>So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use. Bear in mind that
*>the existing box will currently become a firewall/proxy box so I'll 
*>do all the paranoid security stuff on there.
*>
*>Go for it. Give it your best shot. 
*>
*>Let battle commence.

OpenBSD is the best choice for a firewall box. It's fast, small, secure
and runs ona  myriad of platforms. I use it at home for my firewall and
have started sneaking it in at work. It's tag line is 'secure by default'
and from a base installation you won't get the same from most, if not all,
linux distros.

This is my opinion and I'm not terribly interested in a holy war. 

http://www.openbsd.org/

e.

Re: Holy War

[Dave Hodgkinson]

Struan Donald <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> * at 19/01 14:44 + Dave Hodgkinson said:
> > 
> > Dave Cross <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > 
> > > Go for it. Give it your best shot. 
> > 
> > Mandrake 7.2.
> 
> All I'll say about mandrake is that we have a mandrake box at work and
> when you run printtool the cdrom ejects.

Nothing wrong with committing random acts of weirdness


-- 
Dave Hodgkinson, http://www.hodgkinson.org
Editor-in-chief, The Highway Star   http://www.deep-purple.com
  Apache, mod_perl, MySQL, Sybase hired gun for, well, hire
  -

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Elaine -HFB- Ashton]

Jonathan Stowe [[EMAIL PROTECTED]] quoth:
*>> 
*>> Speaking of DNS, did we ever hear anything from the pm.org DNS people?
*>> 
*>
*>Not from my initial e-mail - I have fired off another today and hope that
*>we might get some action.

As far as I know, Ben Hockenhull is still doing DNS for the PM box though
it may take some time as things are in trasition from one place to another
and DNS changes probably aren't high in the queue.

e.

Re: AUTOLOAD speed

[Simon Wistow]

Dave Cross wrote:
 
> *ui8 = \&U18;
> *ui16 = \&UI16;
> *Word = \&UI16;
> *word = \&UI16;

That's the ticket.

Brain still fried today.

Re: Holy War

[Struan Donald]

* at 19/01 16:12 + Redvers Davies said:
> > All I'll say about mandrake is that we have a mandrake box at work and
> > when you run printtool the cdrom ejects.
> 
> You couldn't do an strace on that so we see what causes that could you?
> I would have thought a hardware conflict would be the most likely cause
> there...

i'm not if the box still exists. i could have a look and see though...

struan

Re: AUTOLOAD speed

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 16:02:23 +, Simon Wistow <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 
> I was just typing this ...
> 
> # Unsigned int  8bit
> sub ui8()   { my $self; = shift; $self->UI8()}   
> 
> # Unsigned int 16bit
> sub ui16()  {  my $self; = shift; $self->UI16()  }  
> sub Word()  {  my $self; = shift; $self->UI16()  }
> sub word()  {  my $self; = shift; $self->UI16()  }
> 
> ... 
> 
> And thought ... would it be big performance hit if I did this through
> AUTOLOAD.

How about something like this (at the file level of your package):

*ui8 = \&U18;
*ui16 = \&UI16;
*Word = \&UI16;
*word = \&UI16;

Typeglobs are your friend.

Dave...
[who doesn't like to encourage people to use AUTOLOAD as it has
potential to break Symbol::Approx::Sub]

Re: Holy War

[Redvers Davies]

> All I'll say about mandrake is that we have a mandrake box at work and
> when you run printtool the cdrom ejects.

You couldn't do an strace on that so we see what causes that could you?
I would have thought a hardware conflict would be the most likely cause
there...

Red

RE:Consultancy company

[Andy Wardley]

On Jan 18,  4:28pm, Leo Lapworth wrote:
> Ok, it's all a pipedream.. but what a nice one.

It sounds like an excellent idea.  In fact, I've even got as far as
writing a (fledgling) business plan for such a venture based around
Template Toolkit-ish web development, support and consultancy.  It's
something that Simon Matthews and I have been talking about for a couple
of years, but never really quite got around to taking the plunge.  I
was about to jump but work related improvments of the last few
weeks have pushed it back onto the back burner.

Now, what would it take to convince you that there are nicer places to
work than central London?  Guildford, for example, is quite wonderful
and only a train ride away from the smoke... :-)=

On the matter of funding, I have a friend who works for Goldman Sachs
who offered to put me in touch with VC somewhere in the range of 2 - 10m.
No favours, no guarantees, but at least a foot in the door and the offer
of waving a business plan under the noses of the right kind of people.
Of course, you might argue that GS != Right Kind of People  :-)

But like others, I'm not convinced that VC is the way to go unless you
really have to.  Having said that, if you want to start big and grow
big quickly, I can't see a way to do that without significant moolah up
front.  Maybe that means "really have to"?

One consideration worth playing on is that good Perl people are hard
to come by.  As a scarce resource, we might be able to convince backers
that a solid collection of guru and demi-guru level Perl people represents
a mighty design/development/consultancy force which could quickly corner
a large chunk of the market.

I'd love to come to the meeting and hear the ideas, but I've done my
trip to London for this month :-)


A

Pipe dreamer.

-- 
Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: Holy War

[Redvers Davies]

What I do:

For a workstation, Mandrake.
For a server, Slackware.

Once you've done the install forget that rpm existed and do everything
from source.

Red

Re: AUTOLOAD speed

[Leon Brocard]

Simon Wistow sent the following bits through the ether:

> And thought ... would it be big performance hit if I did this through
> AUTOLOAD.

Right, that does it. The next two talks I'm gonna do will be
"Introduction to Benchmarking with Perl and the Bechmark module" and
"Introduction to Testing with Perl and the Test module".

Leon
-- 
Leon Brocard.http://www.astray.com/
yapc::Europehttp://yapc.org/Europe/

... All new improved Brocard, now with Template Toolkit!

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Simon Wistow]

David Cantrell wrote:

> However, I don't believe it supports some of the more weird DNS entries
> you can have like HINFO and LOC records.

You learn fast young Grasshopper. Oh, wait. You weren't there last
night.

http://www.2shortplanks.com/simon/ip2ll/2.html

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Leon Brocard]

Dave Cross sent the following bits through the ether:

> I'd love to come along, but probably wouldn't have time to get there
> and back during lunch. Can we do it one evening?

OK, Penderel's Oak 6.30pm for those who can't make it to lunch. I'll
go to both and take notes.

Leon
-- 
Leon Brocard.http://www.astray.com/
yapc::Europehttp://yapc.org/Europe/

... All new improved Brocard, now with Template Toolkit!

Re: Holy War

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 04:02:01PM +, Roger Burton West wrote:
> On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:58:41PM +, Richard Clamp typed:
> >On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:44:42PM +, Roger Burton West wrote:
> >> I'd use Debian 'cos I like it. Downside: latest versions of stuff
> >> aren't usually available as packages.
> >Untrue, if you're following the testing/unstable branch and have sufficient
> >bandwidth that is.
> Depends on what you mean by "latest". Give it a week or two to get into
> unstable, a few more to get into testing - fair enough?
> Not what I'd use for CPAN modules, for example.

And, of course, there's the obvious downside of following the unstable
branch of anything...

Michael

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:48:03PM +, David Cantrell wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:43:28PM +, Michael Stevens wrote:
> > On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:31:00PM +, David Cantrell wrote:
> > > Heh.  djbdns is, despite being a bernsteinism, very good.  For values of
> > > 'very good' which are equivalent to 'not bind'.  It's smaller, easier to
> > > configure, and more secure.  All in all, it's a Jolly Good Thing.
> > 
> 
> However, I don't believe it supports some of the more weird DNS entries
> you can have like HINFO and LOC records.
> 
> [dcantrel@tim-the-enchanter dcantrel]$ nslookup
> > set type=HINFO
> > ariadne.barnyard.co.uk
> 
> ariadne.barnyard.co.ukCPU = Amstrad CPC   OS = Amsdos / CPCIP
> 
> Yay!  Not supporting such silliness may be considered a Bad Thing by some
> people.

I'm fairly sure it is supported, through an escape that allows you
to return any record type.

--cut--
:fqdn:n:rdata:ttl:timestamp:lo

Generic record for fqdn. tinydns-data creates a record of type n for
fqdn showing rdata. n must be an integer between 1 and 65535. The proper
format of rdata depends on n. You may use octal \nnn codes to include
arbitrary bytes inside rdata.
--cut--

(from http://cr.yp.to/djbdns/tinydns-data.html)

Michael

Re: thoth

[Mark Rogaski]

An entity claiming to be Roger Burton West ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 01:35:32AM -0500, Mark Rogaski typed:
: 
: >That would be c.l.p.m ... unless of course you aren't referring to Tom.
: 
: You weren't at the technical meeting last night, were you? This thoth
: is a network monitoring system.
: 

Some would argue the same point for common c.l.p.m posters.

Mark

-- 
Mark Rogaski  | "What in the ding-dong-heckama-doodle
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  hell is that?"
http://www.pobox.com/~wendigo |   -- a farmer in the 1992
__END__   |  movie "Seedpeople"

 PGP signature

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Redvers Davies]

> I like the idea of a backup disk and a procedure that automatically backs up

Do like I did on one of the machines I set up which was to have a backup
disk but not mounted except during backups.


Make it bootable and use rsync to keep peeps data current.

If you lose a disk, simply select the backup disk in LILO.

Its ammazing how many script kiddies don't check the rest of the SCSI
or IDE bus to see if there are any other devices available.

Re: Holy War

[Roger Burton West]

On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:58:41PM +, Richard Clamp typed:
>On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:44:42PM +, Roger Burton West wrote:
>> I'd use Debian 'cos I like it. Downside: latest versions of stuff
>> aren't usually available as packages.
>Untrue, if you're following the testing/unstable branch and have sufficient
>bandwidth that is.

Depends on what you mean by "latest". Give it a week or two to get into
unstable, a few more to get into testing - fair enough?

Not what I'd use for CPAN modules, for example.

Roger

Re: Holy War

[Richard Clamp]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:44:42PM +, Roger Burton West wrote:
> I'd use Debian 'cos I like it. Downside: latest versions of stuff
> aren't usually available as packages.

Untrue, if you're following the testing/unstable branch and have sufficient
bandwidth that is.


-- 
Richard Clamp <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:43:28PM +, Michael Stevens wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:31:00PM +, David Cantrell wrote:
>
> > Heh.  djbdns is, despite being a bernsteinism, very good.  For values of
> > 'very good' which are equivalent to 'not bind'.  It's smaller, easier to
> > configure, and more secure.  All in all, it's a Jolly Good Thing.
> 
> 

However, I don't believe it supports some of the more weird DNS entries
you can have like HINFO and LOC records.

[dcantrel@tim-the-enchanter dcantrel]$ nslookup
> set type=HINFO
> ariadne.barnyard.co.uk

ariadne.barnyard.co.uk  CPU = Amstrad CPC   OS = Amsdos / CPCIP

Yay!  Not supporting such silliness may be considered a Bad Thing by some
people.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Holy War

[Struan Donald]

* at 19/01 14:44 + Dave Hodgkinson said:
> 
> Dave Cross <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > Go for it. Give it your best shot. 
> 
> Mandrake 7.2.

All I'll say about mandrake is that we have a mandrake box at work and
when you run printtool the cdrom ejects.

-- 
Struan Donald
mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Code Flunky, 365 Plc.
http://www.365corp.com/

Re: Holy War

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:33:57PM +, Roger Burton West wrote:

> On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:29:18AM -0500, Dave Cross typed:
> 
> >So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use.
> 
> What are you planning to do on the box?

Look, we'll have none of that sensible advice stuff here Mr. West!

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 15:34:31 +, Leon Brocard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Dave Hodgkinson sent the following bits through the ether:
> 
> > Sounds like a table at the New World one lunchtime...
> 
> OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
> New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely interested
> in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited. People with business
> sense needed too, though: offices, computers and bandwidth don't come
> cheap.

I'd love to come along, but probably wouldn't have time to get there
and back during lunch. Can we do it one evening?

Dave...

Re: Holy War

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:29:18AM -0500, Dave Cross wrote:

> So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use. Bear in mind that
> the existing box will currently become a firewall/proxy box so I'll 
> do all the paranoid security stuff on there.

In that case, BeOS.  It has no security so won't get in your way, and it's
just soo sexy.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hatworm discovered

[Neil Ford]

>Dave Hodgkinson sent the following bits through the ether:
>
>>  Sounds like a table at the New World one lunchtime...
>
>OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
>New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely interested
>in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited. People with business
>sense needed too, though: offices, computers and bandwidth don't come
>cheap.
>
Well count me in... assuming I'm not needed to go to any meetings.

Neil.
-- 
Neil C. Ford
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.binky.ourshack.org

Re: Holy War

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Dave Cross wrote:

> When I got home last night there were two big boxes from Dell waiting
> in the middle of the lounge. This is my new 1400 Mhz Pentium IV, 
> 256 Mb Turbo Bastard Nutter machine.
> 
> One of the (many) advantages of having a new box is that I'll be able
> to do a completely fresh Linux install for the first time for many 
> years. My current box has been upgraded thru every version of Red Hat
> since (I think) 4.1 to its current 7.0.
> 


The only thing I have to say on the matter is that if you want to run any
sort of 'Commercial' software on the machine you might well have to stick
to Red Hat unless you want to go for a lot of fiddling around -  The
availability of the Informix stuff was basically the determining factor
for the choice of distribution for the laptop - but thats me :)

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: Holy War

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:29:18AM -0500, Dave Cross wrote:
> So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use. Bear in mind that
> the existing box will currently become a firewall/proxy box so I'll 
> do all the paranoid security stuff on there.
> Go for it. Give it your best shot. 
> Let battle commence.

Debian.

Or, if you want uber-paranoia, OpenBSD.

Michael

Re: Holy War

[Roger Burton West]

On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:39:47AM -0500, Dave Cross typed:

>It'll be purely for home use, so:

I'd use Debian 'cos I like it. Downside: latest versions of stuff
aren't usually available as packages. Upside: doesn't mess you about
the way the Windowsy distributions (RH, SuSE) do.

R

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 03:31:00PM +, David Cantrell wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:52:54PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:
> > I'm happy to set this up if anyone is interested (although, frankly, you'd
> > be mad to let me anywhere near a root password and a copy of bind)
> Heh.  djbdns is, despite being a bernsteinism, very good.  For values of
> 'very good' which are equivalent to 'not bind'.  It's smaller, easier to
> configure, and more secure.  All in all, it's a Jolly Good Thing.

Re: Holy War

[Dave Hodgkinson]

Dave Cross <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Go for it. Give it your best shot. 

Mandrake 7.2.

-- 
Dave Hodgkinson, http://www.hodgkinson.org
Editor-in-chief, The Highway Star   http://www.deep-purple.com
  Apache, mod_perl, MySQL, Sybase hired gun for, well, hire
  -

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:52:54PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:

> I'm happy to set this up if anyone is interested (although, frankly, you'd
> be mad to let me anywhere near a root password and a copy of bind)

Heh.  djbdns is, despite being a bernsteinism, very good.  For values of
'very good' which are equivalent to 'not bind'.  It's smaller, easier to
configure, and more secure.  All in all, it's a Jolly Good Thing.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Holy War

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 15:33:57 +, Roger Burton West <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:29:18AM -0500, Dave Cross typed:
> 
> >So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use.
> 
> What are you planning to do on the box?

It'll be purely for home use, so:

* Hacking perl
* Prototyping web sites
* Playing with new toys like AxKit and Camelot
* Write
* Surf the web
* Read mail
* Play the occasional game
* Listen to MPs
* Burn CDs

Sort of stuff we all do.

Dave...

Re: Holy War

[Neil Ford]

>When I got home last night there were two big boxes from Dell waiting
>in the middle of the lounge. This is my new 1400 Mhz Pentium IV,
>256 Mb Turbo Bastard Nutter machine.
>
>One of the (many) advantages of having a new box is that I'll be able
>to do a completely fresh Linux install for the first time for many
>years. My current box has been upgraded thru every version of Red Hat
>since (I think) 4.1 to its current 7.0.
>
>I could, of course, take the easy route and whack RH7 on it, but this
>may be my best chance for some years to _easily_ switch distros.
>
>So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use. Bear in mind that
>the existing box will currently become a firewall/proxy box so I'll
>do all the paranoid security stuff on there.
>
>Go for it. Give it your best shot.
>
>Let battle commence.
>
>Dave...

Well following recent discussions brought about by Jo's laptop 
purchase, I'd say the favour list goes something like this;

Debian
Slackware / SuSE
a deadrat derivitive (if you must)

No-one ever seems to mention TurboLinux or any of the minor distributions.

Of course I would strongly suggest investigating a BSD :-)

Neil.
-- 
Neil C. Ford
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.binky.ourshack.org

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[David Cantrell]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:42:19PM +, Neil Ford wrote:
> >On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:37:24PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:
> >>  > Personally I'd be happier if we had mirrored disks in there.
> >>  I'd go for a backup system before a mirror, myself.
> >
> >That could be good, too...
> >
> >We definately need one of the two. (IMHO)
> >
> >Michael
> 
> Well a tape drive would be easier and (for the most part) cheaper to 
> install. For mirroring you're either going to need a raid controller 
> or use software raid... how good is that under linux?

It's very usable.  At Oven, we used it for the main mail-and-stuff server,
managing something like a hundred gig of disk in RAID-5 loveliness.

Personally, I don't like tapes.  They go wrong easily and someone has to
remember to swap the media.  I favour doing backups to another machine
with rsync.  This has the advantage that you can do far more frequent
backups.  Perhaps that's what we should spend the upgrade money on -
a cheap-ass machine with a bg cheap IDE disk to handle backups *only*.

-- 
David Cantrell | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://www.cantrell.org.uk/david/

   Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

Re: Holy War

[Roger Burton West]

On or about Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 10:29:18AM -0500, Dave Cross typed:

>So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use.

What are you planning to do on the box?

Roger

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Leon Brocard]

Dave Hodgkinson sent the following bits through the ether:

> Sounds like a table at the New World one lunchtime...

OK. We might as well do this quickly, how about Monday 12.30 at the
New World restaurant in Chinatown. Everyone who is vaguely interested
in a Perl Consultancy of some sort is invited. People with business
sense needed too, though: offices, computers and bandwidth don't come
cheap.

Leon
-- 
Leon Brocard.http://www.astray.com/
yapc::Europehttp://yapc.org/Europe/

... All new improved Brocard, now with Template Toolkit!

RE: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Gareth Harper]

Title: RE: Hardware Upgrade Fund





I don't know about anyone else, but I'm quite happy to provide some money, but I'd much prefer to do a direct bank cash transfer (through online banking) I don't know if you'd want to publicise your bank acvcount details on the list, but if this is all going ahead and you don't mind transfers then can you send me your bank details and I'll set up the transfer.  if anyone else is interested in that then I'd suggest to keep the traffic off the list then email alex in person.

-Original Message-
From: alex [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: 19 January 2001 12:42
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund



On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Dave Cross wrote:
> Thanks for the offer. I'm more that happy to take you up on it.


no problems.


> How soon do you think you can have a list of the kinds of hardware
> that you want to buy? That would give us an estimate of how many new
> donors we're looking for.


I'd prefer to do it the other way round if you don't mind, and say you
have just one month to send a cheque for 50 pounds made out to C A McLean
[1] to state51, 8 rhoda street, bethnal green, e2 7ef , or brought along
to the next social or technical meeting.


At the end of the month I'll let you all know what money we have and we
can then decide what to do with it.



Alex


[1] My first name is actually Christopher, but handily my parents changed
their minds after registering my birth and decided to call me by my middle
name.


PS The guy with the tennants extra broke in to another part of the
building and caused some damage to a couple of studios :( it seems that he
couldn't find anything to steal, but still, not nice.


-- 
Snack pastries are dramatic when shapes are combined

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Dave Cross wrote:

> At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 14:52:54 -, "Jonathan Peterson" 
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > 
> > Could we create domains for every user and then put the zone files in 
> > each person's home dir, with a SUID script to kick named?
> > 
> > Then I could have *.jon.penderel.state51.co.uk and be able to quickly 
> > create names and mx records for things when I need to, which is 
> > surprisingly often. Everyone would get 
> > $USERNAME.penderel.state51.co.uk
> 
> Sounds like a fun idea to me, but then IANABOFH, so what do I know :)
> 

If this is being considered  perhaps we ought to get the london.pm.org
subdomain delegated to penderel as well - this will allow us to fuck
things up on our own without having to worry the pm.org dns person .

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: Compiling mod_perl on Debian

[Niklas Nordebo]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 01:28:21PM +, Robin Houston wrote:
> Hope you enjoyed it...

Yes, I did.

Heres the URL to the IP location project I mentioned yesterday, by the way:
http://www.networldmap.com/

-- 
Niklas Nordebo -><- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
  Per Section 301, Paragraph (a)(2)(C) of S. 618, further transmissions
  to you by the sender may be stopped at NO COST to you by forwarding this
  e-mail to mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?subject=remove
 

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Dave Hodgkinson]

Neil Ford <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> >Dave Hodgkinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> >
> >>  Piers Cawley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> >>
> >>  > Big monitors on workstations are *not* rewards. They are essential
> >>  > tools for the job. Anything smaller than 19" is rapidly approaching
> >>  > too cramped for serious work. TFT monitors on workstations are
> >>  > rewards...
> >>
> >>  19" on the first port of the G400, a TFT on the second?
> >
> >Mmmm... so, when are we going to have a meeting about all this?
> 
> Well seeing as I will be amongst the great unwashed from next week, 
> anytime soon would be good.

Sounds like a table at the New World one lunchtime...


-- 
Dave Hodgkinson, http://www.hodgkinson.org
Editor-in-chief, The Highway Star   http://www.deep-purple.com
  Apache, mod_perl, MySQL, Sybase hired gun for, well, hire
  -

Holy War

[Dave Cross]

When I got home last night there were two big boxes from Dell waiting
in the middle of the lounge. This is my new 1400 Mhz Pentium IV, 
256 Mb Turbo Bastard Nutter machine.

One of the (many) advantages of having a new box is that I'll be able
to do a completely fresh Linux install for the first time for many 
years. My current box has been upgraded thru every version of Red Hat
since (I think) 4.1 to its current 7.0.

I could, of course, take the easy route and whack RH7 on it, but this
may be my best chance for some years to _easily_ switch distros.

So I'm looking for advice on the best distro to use. Bear in mind that
the existing box will currently become a firewall/proxy box so I'll 
do all the paranoid security stuff on there.

Go for it. Give it your best shot. 

Let battle commence.

Dave...

Re: techmeet aftermath

[Andy Wardley]

On Jan 19,  1:26am, alex wrote:
> We have gained a set of whiteboard pens, and a pile of andy wardley's
> notes.  Any takers?

Ah well, as long as there's no pieces of paper that have things like
"Root Password: xx" written on them, feel free to bin them or
find another home for them.

The slides from my talks are online at:

  http://www.tt2.org/london.pm/pod_pom
  http://www.tt2.org/london.pm/xml_schema

Info about Camelot is at:

  http://www.tt2.org/camelot/

And a big thanks to Alex and Area 51 for having us and providing the
refreshments.


A

-- 
Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Dave Cross wrote:

> At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 14:52:54 -, "Jonathan Peterson" 
><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > 
> > Could we create domains for every user and then put the zone files in 
> > each person's home dir, with a SUID script to kick named?
> > 
> > Then I could have *.jon.penderel.state51.co.uk and be able to quickly 
> > create names and mx records for things when I need to, which is 
> > surprisingly often. Everyone would get 
> > $USERNAME.penderel.state51.co.uk
> 
> Sounds like a fun idea to me, but then IANABOFH, so what do I know :)
> 
> > I'm happy to set this up if anyone is interested (although, frankly, 
> > you'd be mad to let me anywhere near a root password and a copy of 
> > bind)
> 
> Yep. Bind scares me too. You can do Really Bad Things with it.
> 
> Speaking of DNS, did we ever hear anything from the pm.org DNS people?
> 

Not from my initial e-mail - I have fired off another today and hope that
we might get some action.

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: What's a perl person then?

[Andy Wardley]

On Jan 19, 10:35am, Greg Cope wrote:
> perl person:  Hacked a drawing program in 2 hours.

s/2 hours/1 line/


A



-- 
Andy Wardley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   Signature regenerating.  Please remain seated.
 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   For a good time: http://www.kfs.org/~abw/

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Robert Shiels]

> > Who is planning to store data on penderel that they won't
> > have somewhere
> > else anyway. I don't think we should ever rely on our data
> > being there. I
> > have a local copy of everything that I have on other servers.
>
> So, we need only buy two more of whatever size disk we want in there, and
> backup to disk is a world more fun than backup to tape (unless we feel
like
> spashing out for a tape jukebox).
>
I like the idea of a backup disk and a procedure that automatically backs up
to it; I guess what I'm unhappy about is giving someone else the
responsibility for all our data and the job of managing tapes, that doesn't
seem fair.
>From a security point of view (are we worried about hiding our data from
each other), the backup disk should only be readable by root. Yes? Or should
all the files retain the owners permissions so that we can restore our data
anytime we fancy without needing the sysadmin to do it. I like this plan.


/Robert

Re: Penderel query

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 10:15:29 -0500 (EST), I wrote:
 
> Basically, you get an account on a server which is permanently 
> connected to the web.

Net! I meant net, goddamit. I'm very tired and have been absorbing too
much media that doesn't know the difference.

I'm sorry. I'll go and have a lie down.

Dave...

Re: Penderel query

[Leon Brocard]

[EMAIL PROTECTED] sent the following bits through the ether:

>   I've got £50 I'd be happy to contribute but I'd like to know what it gets
>   me (other than a sense of satisfaction from furthering the perl cause :-)

Well, I'd suggest a donation to YAS (yetanother.org) would be better
if you really wished to further the Perl Cause[1]. That way they'll
have some more conferences and pay for Damian to fly all over the
world parsing stuff in crazy ways.

Leon

[1] Insert "I didn't know Perl"  "The Coors" joke here
-- 
Leon Brocard.http://www.astray.com/
yapc::Europehttp://yapc.org/Europe/

... All new improved Brocard, now with Template Toolkit!

Re: Penderel query

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 15:09:21 +, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> I've been lurking on the list for a while and am hoping to make the
> meeting on the 1st.
> 
> Please excuse my ignorance with this question, but could someone 
> outline what services penderel provides to account holders ?
> 
> I've got £50 I'd be happy to contribute but I'd like to know what
> it gets me (other than a sense of satisfaction from furthering the 
> perl cause :-)

Simon,

Basically, you get an account on a server which is permanently 
connected to the web. I'd envisage that we could use it for reading
emails (there will be [EMAIL PROTECTED] email addresses) or maybe
running small web servers (nothing too bandwidth hungry or State51
might get upset). If you're stuck behind a firewall that only allows
ssh thru, then you can get to a box that will allow you to do other
stuff (IRC, perhaps).

Basically, we have some very friendly sysadmins and are open to 
suggestions to what could be installed to make everyone's lifes
froodier.

Let me know if you need any more info,

Dave...

Penderel query

[Simon_Wilcox]

Hi all,

  I've been lurking on the list for a while and am hoping to make the
  meeting on the 1st.

  Please excuse my ignorance with this question, but could someone outline
  what services penderel provides to account holders ?

  I've got £50 I'd be happy to contribute but I'd like to know what it gets
  me (other than a sense of satisfaction from furthering the perl cause :-)

  Simon.



__


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Re: Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Dave Cross]

At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 14:52:54 -, "Jonathan Peterson" 
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 
> Could we create domains for every user and then put the zone files in 
> each person's home dir, with a SUID script to kick named?
> 
> Then I could have *.jon.penderel.state51.co.uk and be able to quickly 
> create names and mx records for things when I need to, which is 
> surprisingly often. Everyone would get 
> $USERNAME.penderel.state51.co.uk

Sounds like a fun idea to me, but then IANABOFH, so what do I know :)

> I'm happy to set this up if anyone is interested (although, frankly, 
> you'd be mad to let me anywhere near a root password and a copy of 
> bind)

Yep. Bind scares me too. You can do Really Bad Things with it.

Speaking of DNS, did we ever hear anything from the pm.org DNS people?

Dave...

RE: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Jonathan Peterson]

> Who is planning to store data on penderel that they won't
> have somewhere
> else anyway. I don't think we should ever rely on our data
> being there. I
> have a local copy of everything that I have on other servers.

What about applications running on penderel that generate data? Even if what
they generate is small, it's a royal PITA to be emailing it around the net
in the name of backup.

If you go for something like an 8 day retention period with weekly full and
daily differential backup, your backup data set would at most be double your
working data set (unless anyone has really funky plans for applications).
So, we need only buy two more of whatever size disk we want in there, and
backup to disk is a world more fun than backup to tape (unless we feel like
spashing out for a tape jukebox).

Or, just get the extra storage space and give everyone an allocation on it
that's double their allocation on the primary storage, and let them write
their own backup scripts. But unless we've already got quota's running (have
we?) that's not so practical maybe.

Jon 'yay! sysadmin!' Peterson

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hatworm discovered

[Neil Ford]

>Dave Hodgkinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
>>  Piers Cawley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>>
>>  > Big monitors on workstations are *not* rewards. They are essential
>>  > tools for the job. Anything smaller than 19" is rapidly approaching
>>  > too cramped for serious work. TFT monitors on workstations are
>>  > rewards...
>>
>>  19" on the first port of the G400, a TFT on the second?
>
>Mmmm... so, when are we going to have a meeting about all this?

Well seeing as I will be amongst the great unwashed from next week, 
anytime soon would be good.

Neil.
-- 
Neil C. Ford
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.binky.ourshack.org

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Robert Shiels]

- Original Message -
From: "Michael Stevens" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: 19 January 2001 14:41
Subject: Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund


> On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:37:24PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:
> > > Personally I'd be happier if we had mirrored disks in there.
> > I'd go for a backup system before a mirror, myself.
>
> That could be good, too...
>
> We definately need one of the two. (IMHO)


definitely

 that's better :-)

I think the backup system should be individual users writing cron jobs to
tar/gzip/ftp their stuff to other machines, or emailing it to their hotmail
accounts if they don't have other machines!

Who is planning to store data on penderel that they won't have somewhere
else anyway. I don't think we should ever rely on our data being there. I
have a local copy of everything that I have on other servers.

Perhaps I'm missing the point here...

/Robert

Re: Consultancy company was [Job] BOFH wanted was: Re: Red Hat worm discovered

[Piers Cawley]

Dave Hodgkinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Piers Cawley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > Big monitors on workstations are *not* rewards. They are essential
> > tools for the job. Anything smaller than 19" is rapidly approaching
> > too cramped for serious work. TFT monitors on workstations are
> > rewards...
> 
> 19" on the first port of the G400, a TFT on the second?

Mmmm... so, when are we going to have a meeting about all this?

Oh! Idea for penderel!

[Jonathan Peterson]

I realise all the l33t people with their own boxen don't have this problem,
but I'm constantly annoyed by not having instant flexible control of my own
DNS.

Could we create domains for every user and then put the zone files in each
person's home dir, with a SUID script to kick named?

Then I could have *.jon.penderel.state51.co.uk and be able to quickly create
names and mx records for things when I need to, which is surprisingly often.
Everyone would get $USERNAME.penderel.state51.co.uk

I'm happy to set this up if anyone is interested (although, frankly, you'd
be mad to let me anywhere near a root password and a copy of bind)


Jonathan PetersonIdeas Hub Ltd
(t) +44 (0)20 7487 1310
www.ideashub.com

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Neil Ford]

>On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:37:24PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:
>>  > Personally I'd be happier if we had mirrored disks in there.
>>  I'd go for a backup system before a mirror, myself.
>
>That could be good, too...
>
>We definately need one of the two. (IMHO)
>
>Michael

Well a tape drive would be easier and (for the most part) cheaper to 
install. For mirroring you're either going to need a raid controller 
or use software raid... how good is that under linux?

Seeing as access to the box is not currently an issue, tape changing 
can be done .

Neil.
-- 
Neil C. Ford
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.binky.ourshack.org

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:37:24PM -, Jonathan Peterson wrote:
> > Personally I'd be happier if we had mirrored disks in there.
> I'd go for a backup system before a mirror, myself.

That could be good, too...

We definately need one of the two. (IMHO)

Michael

RE: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Jonathan Peterson]

> Personally I'd be happier if we had mirrored disks in there.

I'd go for a backup system before a mirror, myself.

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Michael Stevens]

On Fri, Jan 19, 2001 at 02:41:57PM +, Jonathan Stowe wrote:
> > [gem@penderel gem]$ df -h
> > FilesystemSize  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> > /dev/sda6 3.9G  879M  2.8G  24% /
> > /dev/sda1 7.6M  2.9M  4.2M  41% /boot
> > 
> OK that'll be another disk or two then - if there are going to be a number
> of accounts on the machine then I would suggest /home should be a separate
> disk.  I would vote for separate /usr /usr/local and /var partitions too.

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Jonathan Stowe]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Greg McCarroll wrote:

> * Dave Cross ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> > At Fri, 19 Jan 2001 12:34:11 +, John <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > 
> > [upgrading penderel]
> > 
> > > What's the current specs of the machine? (Just out of interest)
> > 
> > I'm not sure. I don't think I've ever known this. I'm hoping that 
> > someone woh a) bought it or b) is sitting next to it will be able to
> > leap in with this information.
> 
> [gem@penderel gem]$ df -h
> FilesystemSize  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> /dev/sda6 3.9G  879M  2.8G  24% /
> /dev/sda1 7.6M  2.9M  4.2M  41% /boot
> 

OK that'll be another disk or two then - if there are going to be a number
of accounts on the machine then I would suggest /home should be a separate
disk.  I would vote for separate /usr /usr/local and /var partitions too.

/J\
-- 
Jonathan Stowe   |   
http://www.gellyfish.com |   I'm with Grep on this one 
http://www.tackleway.co.uk   |

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[Robin Szemeti]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, you wrote:

> [gem@penderel gem]$ cat /proc/meminfo 
> total:used:free:  shared: buffers:  cached:
> Mem:  130895872 125063168  5832704 46772224 63795200 15314944
> Swap: 271392768  6909952 264482816
> MemTotal:127828 kB

if its of any intereset I was offered 133mhz DIMMS of the 256Mb flavour
for ~65 + vat the other day .. memory has plummetted now is a very good
time to buy.

-- 
Robin Szemeti

The box said "requires windows 95 or better"
So I installed Linux!

Re: Hardware Upgrade Fund

[alex]

On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Greg McCarroll wrote:

ok i was a bit late ;)

-- 
Snack pastries are dramatic when shapes are combined