Traffic graphs for a site affected by a smurf attack yesterday.

.. from all that cooking, cleaning and general holiday anoyances.. so going to see the "Two Towers" today.. I'm probably the last remaining geek who hasn't seen it yet.

In other news..

About copyright law and DMCA:

"In balancing the rights of the public domain against commercial interests, I say that public officials need to favor the public domain," Eric Eldred

Government wants help spying on us:

In a set of preliminary guidelines released in September, the White House said high-tech companies that keep an eye on the Internet should combine their efforts and work with the government to better defend against computer viruses, worms and other cyberattacks.

Suuuure.. we all know how that will end..

That translates into laundry, cleaning, cooking, baking, running around like crazy.

All this so we can have a big, family dinner on Christmas eve (Poles have the 'big dinner' on the eve as opposed to Christmas day, we also get our gifts after the dinner not next morning). On the bright side, Christmas eve is a lenten day so for once I can cook all-veggie dishes and not listen to a litany of complaints about the lack of meat on the table.

What I make ever year:

• Dumplings with dried mushroom filling - uszka - they look a bit like ears, so that's what we call them and they're served in barszcz (spicy red-beet soup).
• Sauerkraut and mushroom (fresh) filled pierogis
• Cooked vegetable salad - carrots, potatos, eggs, onions, apples, pickles all finely diced and mixed together with mayonnaise, bit of mustard and few drops of vinegar.. salt, pepper, etc..
• Cauliflower and peas samosas - this is a hindu dish, not Polish with tumeric and other spices - it's really yummy

Time permitting I'll probably make other things.. plus the staples.. potatos and such.. and then there are the numerous fish dishes my mom always makes..

Anyone who has ever brought up a dos-formatted file in a recent versions of emacs may (or may not have) noticed that you no longer see the ugly ^M characters at the end of every line.. That is because emacs automagically switches to "DOS" mode for your convenience.

Which is great..

Unless you're trying to get rid of the bloody ^M's easily without going outside of emacs to do it. Then it becomes a pain.

It becomes a bigger pain once you realize there's no easy way to figure out just how to get out of that "DOS" mode.

Well, after long searches.. it's been found.. there is a magic variable that will switch you back to the good 'ol mode that will show off all those ugly ^Ms for your M-% convenience.

inhibit-eol-conversion

So to set it..

M-X set-variable<RET>
inhibit-eol-conversion<RET>
t<RET>

To make it permanent put
(setq-default inhibit-eol-conversion t)
in your .emacs file.

Copycoditis

Main Entry: copy·co·di·tis
Pronunciation: "kä-pE-co-'dI-t&s
Function: noun
Date: December 19, 2002
: inflammation of the programmer caused by a previous programmer copy-pasting code from another source without actually bothering to read or check what said code does. May also include inflammation due to comments from copied code no longer applying to new code yet left in for confusion purposes.

Usage:
"Why is this method deprecated? Oh, it's just copycoditis.. ".

Possible cure:
A large clue-by-four applied repeatedly to the offending programer's head.

I have to learn PHP for this little project I'm doing.. Resisted it until now but I suppose it's time to get assimilated.

Picked up this book. It looked informative enough.. so hopefuly it's a good one.

As I notice more and more spam in my inbox and more and more people attempting to spam a website I help out with.. it makes me wonder.. Is spamming only going to get worse?

It seems logical to me that it will as economy has not improved much at all. Jobs are hard to find - particulary in technical fields - and people get more desperate...

For a laid-off technical person spamming may seem like a good temporary solution to a bad situation, after all it has to generate some results -- otherwise so many wouldn't do it. The recent stories of Alan Ralsky and his new home purchased with spam-earned income won't help this any.

So given a relatively easy to deploy possible income generator, I think more and more people will go this route.. It's surely unethical and slimey.. but better than stealing.

I've had AT&T cable Internet for over a year (since @home days). They've raised the price this year.. They raised it again for customers who have their own equipment.. and today I received a letter anouncing another raise.

This one because I do not subscribe to cable tv.

I don't watch tv.. I don't want to.. I will *not* pay for something I do not use... but apparently now I don't have a choice, because my cable modem bill is going up from $45 a month to $60 a month. If I subscribe to basic cable it will be $55 a month for *both*.

This is not the right way to treat your customers AT&T.

It's easy to deprecate classes in Java.. a little too easy. All you have to do is add a Javadoc-style comment with the @deprecated tag. That leads to problems... Something I see over and over again.. example:

/**
 * @deprecated
 */
 public String getSomeValue(int id);

The problem here? This method is now deprecated, but no reason stated as to why, no date or version provided as of when and no alternative call. In other words zero useful information but it will generate compiler warnings when called.

I see that as a big problem... I think Java should require *more* information before allowing for this to compile and generate compile errors otherwise.

When I deprecate a method I like to provide either a "as of" version or date and an alternative to use. Really, the most important part is the alternative method. Otherwise any programmer who is going to attempt using this code will either have to leave compile warnings (something I really don't like as it can lead to bugs) or do (possibly extensive) detective work to figure out what he/she should be using instead.

This is all really easily fixed by proper commenting -- but we all know how many programmers really utilize proper commenting.

I think Java should at the very least require the use of the @see tag with the @deprecated tag.

/** 
 * @deprecated as of version 1.1
 * @see getSomeOtherValue
 */
 public String getSomeValue(int id);

Javadoc documentation recommends this usage but it is not enforced by the compiler.

More info about Javadocs here.

The kernel upgrade I wrote about yesterday turned out to have gone well after all. The new kernel booted up fine and is completely happy and cheerful. Why did I complain then? I couldn't connect to the machine.. and today I found out why.

This is a dual CPU, dual network card (on-board) rackmount server. It's really a quite nice machine. The only problem is we're not using both network cards. It's a server, not a router and we only need one of them.. so only one is connected to the network. So far so good.

Why couldn't I connect to it after the reboot last night? Quite simple, the wrong network card came up as eth0. The one not connected to a life-giving, data-bit-flowing network cable. Which would explain why I had some trouble connecting to it. It's really not wireless.

That's the problem. The machine randomly assigns eth designations to the two cards on reboot. Sometimes one is eth0, sometimes the other. That can become a problem when only one of them is actually hooked into a live network. Particularly when I do not have local access to the machine.

The only logical explanation I could come up with is something like this..

The linux kernel assigns the eth designation to network interfaces based on the nic's IRQ -- unless they're ISA cards, at which point one has to tell the kernel what to assign where.. but these are not ISA cards. The IRQ is assigned to the card at bootstrap based on the position (I'm really guessing a bit on this one, but it's an educated guess). There is either a bug in how the IRQs are assigned, a bios misconfiguration (I don't have local access, so can't really check easily, remember?) or because both cards are the same make/model/revision it gets confused and assigns the IRQs rather randomly. I find it hard to believe that this would be by design.

At least according to Joel.

I'm doomed.

I must have done a hundred of them.. of course the first time I do one remotely the machine fails to boot... and it's at a data center.. couple hours drive away..

I thought Friday the 13th was last week? Am I stuck in a time warp?

All I've been doing lately is work, work, work and then some more work.. This morning I've actually sat down with a cup of coffee and started catching up on some of my reading.. work be damned, I need to relax for an hour or two.

Bits and pieces:

Jeremy writes:
It's a rare engineer who can see both sides of the coin: the technology and its application toward achieving a company's business goals.

However, there's a stranger breed that I've encountered: the engineer who has somehow forgotten how to look at things from a traditional software engineer's perspective. This odd creature has little trouble explaining how his work supports the company's broader goals. Yet he has difficultly communicating with the more common engineers--those who mainly see technology.

Wild guess... but maybe they're the recently created MIS majors? In my world, an engineer should focus on technology.. that's what makes him/her an engineer, otherwise they're just tech-savvy business people.

-----

RIP DirectTV dsl

-----

Tony Bowden:
No wonder, then, that developers are attracted to XP, It values what developers consider to be important. It also taps into the pride in work that most developers share.

I was subjected once to some XP.. thankfuly it was briefly.. Maybe I'm just too much of a loner, but working in pairs made me want to strangle the developer I was paired up with.. and we normally get along famously! He's a great coder.. yet I hated coding with him, go figure.

-----

In other news..
Weblogic still sucks and I'm still coughing.

It's not particularly hard to keep morale low, but just in case someone is not sure how to accomplish this, here's a couple of pointers:

• Keep adding and changing requirements on a project that's in last stages of development.
• Don't allow schedule changes despite changing and additional requirements.
• Spend lots of time complaining about really minor visual and setup issues when a project is still mid-development.
• Schedule end of development right around Christmas holidays which in combination with additional requirements and no allowance for extended schedule should assure your employees have no time for Christmas vacation.

I think that about should do it..

True to my procrastinating self, I waited until this past weekend to purchase my very own copy of the new Peter Gabriel album.. Being even more so a procrastinator I didn't really listen to it until today at work when co-worker chatter forced me to apply the soothing device known as headphones to my ears.

I'm in love with this album. To say it's terrific is probably an understatement. I suppose cannot expect anything but the best since it took him merely ten years to record it..

Peter Gabriel has always been near the top of the list of my favorite musicians and once again I've been reassured as to why.. He's one of the very few artists with integrity, honesty in his sound and the talent to back it up.

I'm particulary drawn to "Growing up" despite the rather heavy techno undertones (maybe it's just me..)..

my ghost likes to travel so far in the unknown
my ghost likes to travel so deep into your space

Did I mention I really like this album?

Holiday season is coming and I'm nearly done with my giftmas shopping. Thankfully, most of it was online so it was relatively painless and lacking in crowds and screaming kids. Money spent on DVDs, books and Old Navy clothes (thankfuly no nine year olds read this as far as I know..) not withstanding, I intend to spend about $110 more. On myself.

This probably sounds awfully out of character.. but what I really want for Christmas is a Pasta roller for my kitchenaid. It would make cooking soo much easier for me.. and since I don't want to drop heavy hints and wait until Christmas day for it, I'll go buy one this weekend.

This way my holiday cooking will be that much easier.

Some good tips from Blogging Roller:

• Don't store too much in each session
• Don't create sessions at all if you can avoid it
• Use database connection pooling
• Avoid string concatenation
• Minimize thread synchronization
• Don't use SingleThreadedModel

Couple more:

• Cache frequently used information
• Keep the number of database hits to the bare minimum
• Avoid unnecessary string comparisons

A pretty interesting article from David Green.

The upshot is that the semantic web may act as a 'collective memory', augmenting individual brain power and accelerating the pace of human learning and discovery. But we will need to careful about controlling its development and our dependence on it if we wish to avoid the emergence of a dystopian digital dictator.

May seem as a premature warning, but who would have predicted thirty years ago just how credit cards will control our lives.. At least in this country, there isn't much one can do without a proper credit rating.. down to buying cell phone service or applying for a job.

The most frequent question I tend to be asked via e-mail is how is my name pronounced.

It's kah-shia, sort off.. really hard to explain actually.. and that's just the first name. Trying to explain how to pronounce my last name will put everyone to sleep.. So as a service to humanity and to save myself from answering the same question over and over again, I'm posting a recording of my work voicemail message. I suppose I could just post the number and have everyone call, but I have this annoying aversion to receiving phone calls from strangers mid attempting to work..

What you can hear in here (mp3) (it's probably hard to understand for most due to my accent and fast speech - I do talk this fast all the time, sorry).. is me pronouncing my first and last name..

Oh yah, don't leave a message.. it's just an mp3 not my voicemail.

Edit: I'm an idiot and screwed up the mp3.. it should work now, sorry.

CORE Advisory.

Looks like a nasty one..

Status: Vendor confirmed, firmware upgrades are available for some
products, others are still under development.

Severity: High (exploit code, server root compromise, significant
deployment, attacker must entice victim, mostly home user issue).

Today was a kind of a milestone for a project I'm currently working on along with some of my co-workers. As part of our many-a-day trips to refill our coffee mugs, my boss and I were unofficially (in other words, just a conversation, not policy making) discussing how the project flow could have been improved..

There was the obvious..
Good lord people, haven't you ever heard of unit test files!

and the ever popular, yet often ignored..
Proper test data setup before you attempt to test code

What was more interesting is the discussion how improvements to Java would have made our lives easier.. mainly couple things..

1. (this one's mine) Templates.. not just interfaces (which Java has, duh) but templates ala C++.
2. Common error handling. What a drag it is to have to write try-catch blocks.. Certainly, you can combine and streamline much of that code, but cannot avoid those try-catches.

That's my Java wish list for the day.

I'm so out of shape it's not funny. Went to the gym today for the first time in roughly three weeks (missed all that workout time due to being sick and on a tight work schedule besides that).

I ran a mile.. barely.. and now I'm exhausted.. None of that lovely exhiliration as endorphins kick in - didn't run nearly long enough for those, sadly. To make matters worse.. I think my muscles will hurt tomorrow!

How frustrating.. takes months to get in shape and barely few weeks to fall back into stagnation.

It must be having some issues.. for some reason I'm #38 on it this morning which would explain my increased traffic..

What is it about unix geeks with ssh access that scares corporate policy makers so badly?

I work from home sometimes.. it's easier than dragging myself into the office on the weekend to fix some bug I'd like to have fixed by Monday.. Since I'm a unix user (home and work) I prefer, very much so, to use ssh instead of VPN.. but in order to test my code I need to be able to hit a webserver.. so of course the solution is tunneling ports via ssh..

Well, no, apparently I cannot do that.. because that's a "security hole". This is so sad it's not even funny.. Anyone with an vpn account can do all kinds of nasty things on the network but knowledgeable people (there's maybe three of us) trying to work using ssh are denied the most basic of tools.

*fuming mad*

This was working the other day.. once again it got turned off.. (not the first time this happened).. not just turned off.. my session killed in the middle of working!

Edit: I should clarify, it wasn't my ssh access that was shut off - just port tunneling was disabled on our ssh box.

Why you shouldn't buy kids teddy bears...
(view only if you like sick jokes)

You never know about those bears!

[I'd credit someone but not sure who..]

What once used to be just on usenet has sprang up on every other website over the last few years. Forums.

Easy to have your own forums these days. Plenty of free software, online support, technical documents. Download some software, throw into a server, stir and add users.

It's hard to even grasp the idea of just how many online communities there must exist these days.. and every single one thinks it's unique in its membership and closeness. I'm sure they all are unique.. after all we're all unique as human beings go.. so we all form unique communities.

What is not unique to any particular forum is dramas. This article at the Register is what brought up today's topic. This is something I've seen several times now.. a user's brother/sister/mother/significant other/dog posts in a forum that the user has died.. few months later turns out it was a joke/hoax/whatever you want to call it.

The online world has finally brought us something every teenager wanted at some point. Who has not thought, in a moment of teenage angst and hormone driven self-pity, "I'll kill myself, that'll show them!".. Of course the major flaw in this plan is that if you do commit such act you cannot be around to watch the results.. The crying, the pain, the guilty feelings "Oh, look what we've done, what we've driven him/her to".

Internet to the rescue! Once again, the virtual reality has provided us with something true reality cannot.. Well, at least I think reality cannot.. for all I know ghosts of suicides past are hanging around my desk right now with disapproving looks on their faces (hm, can ghosts have faces?).

Steve has once coined a perfect term for this behaviour.. dramacide.

This brings me to my good deed for the day, mainly this declaration:

I do solemnly swear and declare, that if I ever decide to kill myself (online or in reality) I will not commit dramacide.. I will quietly go and none of my cats will come back to post about it.

You're welcome.

When I finished writing my previous entry, I remembered an article that Justin wrote nearly a year ago after he came back from Japan.

All the nifty features that Japanese phones had back then are just now available in the US (in fact, I can find most of them on my new phone).. hm, so maybe I was wrong, we're only a year or so behind Japan, not three..

Nice perspective, I remember being awed by all the cool stuff Japanese cell phones had and ours didn't.. I wonder what they have now?

Specifically, new cell phone.

I visited the local Verizon office the other day to see about switching my plan to one that doesn't charge roaming charges as soon as I set a foot outside of Connecticut (or to be more accurate northern east coast). It seems the new plans are not offered on old cell phones like my old, trusted Motorola Star Tac that I've had for three years or so. I didn't really intend to get a new phone, but what the heck, might as well go for a new gadget.. and since I'm getting something new, might as well get something that's only three years or so behind Japan.

My new toy - Motorola T720.

The color display is kinda cool, the sound is really quite good for a cell phone (8 bit sound card, I think) and everything can be voice-controlled, which I really like for those times when I want to dial when driving (yes, mom, I use a headset).

The battery doesn't last very long, so I spent another $50 on an extended battery that gives me about an hour and a half more of talk time (for about 3 hours total) and some impossible amount of stand-by time.

What I like the most - and this is probably something that's been around for ages, but my old cell phone was just that.. old.. - text messages come with a return address and an easy way to reply. On my star tac they just showed up as phantom-messages and I had to figure out who they were from if the sender didn't sign them.. That can lead to some funny stories to tell your grandkids.

I'd say the phone was definitely worth the extra money it costs.. ($100, after a $100 trade-in rebate).. of course now I have two more years of a Verizon contract.. but heck, I've been using them for six years now anyway.. (back when they were Bell Atlantic around here).

I suppose.. Can't really take a picture of myself in the bathroom mirror using flash, so yellow-tinted-picture it is.. This is after two weeks of being very sick.. can't really see how pale I am now because of the yellow tint, but at least the black circles under my eyes should be pretty noticeable.

Taken today at 7pm, or so..

An informative article in Linux Magazine from Steve. Go pick up a copy. It's good.. I know.. after all, I reviewed it :)

Congrats Steve, good job.

Connecticut is covered in pretty, white snow.. and spun out SUVs as another crop of drivers learns that a four wheel drive doesn't really help much on ice.

I picked a bad day as my first day back in the office.. had to leave early due to the snow fall. Roads were already pretty bad around 1pm and I was not about to wait and find out what will happen by 5pm. Expected snow fall around 5-10 inches and there is probably 2 on the ground already.

These pictures are actually from last week's snow storm (11/27) which was the first of the season, but better late then never.. (to post them that is).

Three more pictures right here, here and here.

Nearly back in the world of the living. Today I woke up with almost normal temperature (37.8, that's a huge improvement from the nearly daily 39+ I've been waking up with for the last week and a half) and my headache was almost bearable.. (meaning I could function without waiting for medication to kick in).

That means I'm almost well. Wonderful.

This has been a doozy.. I caught the flu and instead of staying in bed like any normal, sane person would I decided to work and function anyway.. Bad idea. Caught a secondary infection and a nasty one at that. I think the last time I had fever in the 40s was when I had kidney problems as a kid.. long, long time ago. The red teeny dots in random places on my body weren't very attractive either (petechiae - due to increased viral count in blood).

Well, that will teach me to not take better care when sick.. Almost back to normal functioning, I'm working from home (falling behind at work would only create more stress which doesn't help in getting well) and slowly getting caught up on email and stuff.

Just very sick. I apologize for the lack of updates. I should be getting better soon and catching up with reading, email and the world in general.. right now I'm just focused on getting better.