Changing careers

Now that I will soon be free of my old job I have been putting more thought into changing careers. I like being a sysadmin, but I don't know how much longer I will be able to keep it up. The work is placing too much physical strain on me. I have always loved programming, so that seems the obvious next move.

Through the years I have worked with several programming languages. Pascal was my first (BASIC doesn't count, I barely used it). AWK has been my favorite. Perl is used the most. Lisp was the most challenging to learn, and probably the most fun to use. Python annoys me, and the changes made to version 3 make it more confusing (what an inconsistent language). Java never appealed to me, it looks so messy. C is an exercise in frustration, but I could get used to it with some work. And then there is VIM script, nothing but insanity!!! Shell script is an interesting challenge, but is more of a utility/toy. I know SQL, again a utility.

I think I will probably specialize in Perl. I'd love to become a Lisp developer, but I don't really see z market for it. Pascal might lead somewhere interesting though.... For now j an just pondering and thinking.

NetBSD on PowerMac G3 3Com PCI Card problem

I've managed to get NetBSD installed on a Beige PowerMac G3. Unfortunately the only 10/100 network cards I have are 3Com. The Mac has a measly old 10M card in it. Every time I try to ifconfig the 3Com card the system reboots. It's rather frustrating, and I can't even find another person with the same problem via Google.

Also frustrating is the memory manager doesn't seem to do squat with SWAP space. I actually ran out of Memory thanks to file caching, I guess, and the MFS /tmp mount. The system has yet to touch the SWAP space. I've disabled the MFS/tmp mount and it seems to be working. I don't really see the point in wasting the disk space on SWAP if it is never going to be used.

Power Mac and Neoware Cluster - Genesis

I spent Saturday getting NetBSD on an old G3 Power Mac. The Mac server is working well. It is surprisingly fast for its age. We shall see how well it does with some of my more intense shell scripts. Sunday I got a Neoware to finally boot NetBSD. I has to use the 4.0 kernel on a bootable flash stick. Got a minimal install on the internal flash drive. Then compiled a new kernel, over NFS, that performs a net-boot. Now to decide what to do, map /usr over NFS or net boot with the new kernel. Decisions, decisions...

I have three Neowares thus far. They are quite limited, but seem to run NetBSD OK, once I get them to boot. I think I might be able to get them setup to boot a local kernel that will then boot over the network. I need to get a base configuration for the net boot. I'd like to have as much as possible shared. Then setup a script to just copy the base for a new host. Thankfully the bulk of a NetBSD system is in /usr. If I can get the netboot to work I can dedicate the limited internal flash drive to swap and temp space.

All I need is Mr Pooky Bear

In life, all you really need is a good friend.

This is how I feel sometimes

Thanks to LOL Cats I can express a common feeling.

Medco is STILL screwing with me!

Medco now requires "prior authorization to dispense" before they will send me my sleeping pills. I will have to get this every time I need my sleeping pills. No one has EVER mentioned this before. My wife talked to them twice in the past week, not ONCE did they ever mention this. Both times they told my wife we had everything we needed and there was no indication as to why my medication was again denied. I now have 5 days of sleeping pills, including today. I will take 5 - 7 business days before I get the pills once they get this new authorization. The earliest I can contact my doctor is Monday. Their answer, and I just love this, is to get a prescription for 5 days. My doctor charges for prescriptions like that. Damn, these people are such fuckups. And they seem to do it on purpose.

This is all on top of the last fight she had with them to get my sleeping pills. She fought for a month before they would finally send my pills. Same kind of crap. They would deny it saying we needed authorization, then they would say we had it and the meds were on the way, then they would deny it again. A never ending loop of frustration and lies.

Medco is now officially the WORST company I have EVER dealt with. If I wasn't paying for the privilege of being screwed over by these people I'd get another prescription insurance.

More Macro Photography

I reworked my macro lens and took a few more pictures. The reworked lens has it's own album. I evened out the back and cleaned up the tape a bit. It fits on the camera much better now. The lens also sits a bit closer to the camera lens. Not sure if that makes any difference, it does not seem to.

I also tried using the big glass magnifying glass on my articulated magnifying lamp arm thing. The result is interesting. The lamp tends to want to cook anything I magnify though. That could be a problem. It has a Halogen bulb in it that tends to run very hot. Lots of light, which is useful, but way too much heat for many things.

I shot some screws on a plain white piece of paper. The results are quite nice. They also have their own album. I included a shot without the macro lens to give an overall view of the pile and to give better scale to the macro shots. The results are pretty good. I could do better if I had two lights and some sort of diffuser. Perhaps a little macro light box would help? It should be easy to make one from a small box, plain white paper for the background and something like tissue paper to diffuse the light. I'll have to work on that some time.