Mmm... Router

Huzzah! It's later. I'm here at work waiting for Carl (Fluxbox Carl) to meet me here so I have time to rant about things. I am going to start looking for a wireless router. If I don't find one that I like, I will build one. And put Slackware on it. Muhahahah! Why? Because understanding and setting up a DHCP server and using IP-chains sounds like a great way to learn more about networking. I already have a decent knowledge of hardware and it's underpinnings, but I'm not exactly a network guru yet. That's where I want to improve. Besides, it may save me a coupla bucks. I already have a 5-port switch, so I'm set as far as needing to wire a machine up. The apartment would benefit from a wireless network, as I wouldn't have to run obtrusive cables from the cable modem to my room... Plus, if I built a modem, I could use Slackware. Did I mention that already? Wellp, I gtg... methinks Carl is here. I will post more later. -Slackware Errrr.... David.

There Goes another one!

Well Poop. I got home last night and thought that right before I went to bed I'd hop online and check some E-mail-y goodness. Just the other day I reinstalled Slack 10 on my 40GB hard drive on my desktop. (I forgot just how much faster that beast is compared to the slacktop) Anyways, so I enter my room to find that sid (the hostname of the computer, for you lesser and non-nerd types) is shut down. At first I think "Did I shut that off?" then start to wonder if something hardware related could've caused the premature poweroff. The power button confirmed my fears, as pressing it did absolutely nothing. I unplugged all the devices (except for RAM, CPU, and Motherboard) and it still wouldn't light up. I don't think that there is a problem w/the Motherboard or Powersupply, as the "I've got power" indicator light on the MB was gleaming in it's blissful ignorance. So I'm looking at perhaps a poorly seated PCI/AGP card, fried RAM, or a toasted CPU. The latter two options would piss me off pretty bad... I just spent $115 at the beginning of the summer for the CPU. Oh well. Works been going alright this week. I meant to get more done yesterday, but had 80 MILLION things to take care of, and then after my class, I still had 40 MILLION things to do but had a meeting that lasted the rest of the day. Bleh. SO today's dockett consists of finishing all the projects I've been working on throughout the week. Oh, I just realized that you, Joe/Jane Reader, probably don't know what I do for work. Well I work at a Video Productions/Advertising Agency. Sound interesting? Kinda-sorta. I suppose in any work there's the cool interesting things you get to do and the awful, boring-as-hell things you have to do. Just in my mind, it seems like most everything I do is boring-as-hell. ... Ok, I typed that previous segment this morning, and now it is almost 6 o'clock in the evening. What I personally do to create posts is crack open the needlessly fast "xedit" and type to my hearts content. This is for two reasons. 1) Sometimes Firefox isn't a very Fastfox on a 333, and 2) I'm still without fast internet. Well, folks... that's all the gibberish my mind can puke at you right now. Later.

Supresa Supresa!

Just when you thought it was safe to stop checking my blog... BAM! Another post! Ok, bad humour aside, I regret taking so long to churn out another post... The past month has been a little crazy in terms of everything. So in order to get you folks caught up, I'm gonna fire down the happenings of me in a list-like form. -Laptop I bought a laptop. Specs (IBM 570): PII 333Mhz 192MB RAM 13.3" LCD Screen (Only 1.5" Thick!) Silly Dock-like bottom half which adds a CD-ROM and floppy drive 10GB Hard Disk Other Stuff I'm Too Lazy to Mention This Laptop I bought used (duh) from the parents of a friend for an agreeable price. The first order of business was (of course) to remove windoze and install a proper OS. Once I found out that Slack 10 was released, I used the laptop as the pioneer system to see what new features the latest release of my favorite distro had to offer. So far, things are turning out great. According to divx's site, you need a 450 to watch DIVX video. Well, I can get two full-sized movies running simultaneously without invoking framedrop. Yes, I'm quite proud of what I'm able to accomplish with this little thing. It works out perfectly for everything I mean to do on it. Granted, it's no gaming powerhouse, but then again, to get gaming power in a laptop is rare and expensive. -Summer Class Yes, I started taking a summer class: Political Science. As my Mother works at the local community college I get tuition free. So I found a class which transfers to EMU and am hacking away at it currently. It's more like learning by osmosis. I generally sit in back and mess around with my laptop, but still manage to do quite well. I'm going to hae to look into this "osmosis" thing. -Apartment The inevitable could be delayed no longer. I got together with Mike Steffke, a friend and fellow trumpet player, and signed a lease for a two-bedroom apartment in Ypsilanti. The place will work out well, I imagine, and it is close enough to EMU to make gas expenses negligible. -Girlfriend Jessica is still putting up with me. Poor girl. -Marching Band I'm one of the two Trumpet Section Leaders for EMU's 2004 Marching band, and without sounding cliche, I am very excited about this upcoming year. The trumpets are now the largest section at least as far as the wind instruments go, with a number of at least 24 players. There's a lot talent in the section, and Jayme (the other section leader) and I have managed the parts so that we will be much more balanced in terms of power. Talent + Balance = Wall of Sound -Car I cleaned it. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal, but trust me, it is. I'm not 100% certain the last time I cleaned it was, but I was digging out Easter Candy as I began to reach the bottom of the mess. Scary. -WiFi Yes, this should prolly be closer to the Laptop section, but I deem this important, so shut up. I bought a WiFi card for the slacktop. It works good. WiFi is good. Good. -Desktop Bad Blocks are named as such for a reason. They are very... very... bad. I'm currently w/o an operating system on the larger machine. Which is really a terrible waste, as I just invested $115 at the beginning of the summer for a new processor. I just have a hard time accepting fate and reverting to my old 40GB drive. As I'm typing I've realized that this "Desktop" subsection may seem a little cryptic. Long Story Short: My Hard Drive Broke (which is bad). -Work This week my bosses deserted me, and I'm here holding the fort down all by my lonesome. Despite the temptation of the recently installed cable internet, I intend to finish a great amount of work before they return. (after I check slashdot) -Sleep Contrary to my norm, I've actually been getting some! -Sense of Humour Still Socially Unacceptable. -DOS Yes, that's right. The unendurable boredom of school has forced me to delve deeper into gaming possibilities. Unfortunatley, the Linux gaming movement is still relatively new, so most natively available games require any graphics card without the name "neomagic." As my luck is, that just so happens to be the card in my laptop! So I'm looking to oldschool answers. Nintendo Emulators and DOS games. These have hardcore gameplay and graphics which the slacktop can manage. So don't go knockin' DOS games until you're forced to play them. (p.s. Jetpack r0x0rs!) -Exuberance! Insubstantial! Phew, this is getting lengthy. There's more to come, but I've got a number of things to get done this evening, so it'll have to await another month. Until Next time! -Me (-Not You [-unless you are Dave])