Bates it's gonna be
Oh dear… I’m busier than ever… I know I’ve said that before, but really… I am…
So, in short, the cat’s name has become Bates… Although the geeky names have been way more popular and I want to thank everybody who thought with me.
But Bates (check the enormous(!) thread on the name to see why she’s called Bates now) it is…
This week or actually the last two weeks, I’ve been busy with Nika and Devan from C-TRL Labs from New York, to work on a project for a thing called City on a Roof. Working together has been splendid and I need to find the time to write some of these experiences down, but in the mean time, my City on a Roof-set on Flickr is all there is…
I’m sorry for the delays on blogging and stuff… There’s a lot (apart from what I’m telling here) going on and it all should generate tons and tons of content… But I’m in the process of seeding a lot of things now. I mean, this site is still my number one favourite thing to do, although at this point and with this frequency of blogging it doesn’t look that way… In the end, it’ll all be alright… :D
'man cat' doesn't quite cut it here...
So… somewhere last week, there she was… waiting in front of my balcony door… this little cat…
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I let her in, and well… she hasn’t left since. Yeah well, I let her out a couple of times, also for longer periods of time, but no matter what, she keeps coming back and I hardly have a clue where she comes from. I’ve put a sign up in my street, to ask if people know anything about this little cat, but nothing to this day and that must’ve been a week by now… Well, I started to take care of this little cat, every day a little more and I guess we’ve become friends by now. If no one’s gonna react to any of the signs I’ve been putting up, she’s welcome to stay… *^_^*
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Well… she takes an interest in my ‘serverroom’ and other equipment laying around…
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And euuuhhhmmmm yeah well… she sleeps for 90% of the day… It’s quite a life these cats have… But anyway… reason I post this is…
This little female cat needs a name!
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Now I don’t want it to be too geeky, so no Tux or whatever… Lisa seems nice… but I want you readers to decide with me… Drop any name in the comments and if there are several good ones, I put up a poll…
*^_^*
...some serious hardware...
Well, of course, I already got plenty of serious hardware! *^_^*
..but somehow I’m pushing the envelope here… I mean… take a look at the sheer sizes of these boxes…
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but well… I really couldn’t let go of these beauties… reason I could get them is/was since they’re the wrong models for the European market… these are UPSs for the American market and somehow the first person who bought them probably ordered the wrong models and these boxes probably have been pushed around for 4 to 5 years…
Anyway, believe it or not, these we’re planned to go to the scrapheap and well… I’m way too much of a nice guy to let something like that happen! ^_^
I mean… brand-spankingly new hardware going to a scrapheap because of some voltage-difference? I don’t think so!
Reason they haven’t been sold has been that shipping these back to the US probably would cost a fortune(they weigh in at 150lbs (70kg) ...each!), so… here they are!
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Soooo… what am I going to do with these? Well… there are of course ways to convert 220V -> 110V and vice versa… It’ll take some heavy equipment doing that in case of these beauties, cause they’re rated for 3000VA each… But for some home-use I guess I can come up with something…. In the mean time, I parked them inside my stereo… I like the looks and I wanted to get rid of those godawful big boxes! (well, I keep the boxes… but not in my livingroom!)
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website of the day, yay! (^o^)
The übernice people over at Tech Digest decided this very site should be WOTD aka Website of the Day!
click to go to the actual post on Tech Digest
So, thank you! You’re all too kind! *^_^*
putting OpenBSD/AMD64 on my fileserver ^_^
This last sunday I finally found some time to do a fresh install on my fileserver…
click to go the pic on Flickr
My fileserver’s been an AMD MP1800+ before, (yeah yeah yeah, that’s this one, the slashdot-machine ^_^) running OpenBSD and encrypting everything on-the-fly… In that setup I got around 6MB/sec througput… Enough for everyday use, running MP3’s and stuff off it but I want to upgrade my home network to gigabit(just because…) but that seems a little useless if my fileserver can’t even fill up a 100MBit-line…
Sooo… since a while I got this great Asus SK8N with an AMD Opteron 146 on it, 2.0GHz 64-bit and of course, I wanted to know how much throughput I could expect out of this setup. Now at first I didn’t have the time to do a fresh install, so I ran this new hardware on the old OpenBSD-install for about a month, but finally, last sunday, I started from scratch, using my own How-To actually ^_^, and was up & running again in no time…
So, what’s the score!?!?
Some yummy console-output *^_^*
First of all… what are we working on?
scramjet:markie {19} uname -a
OpenBSD scramjet.macstuff.local 3.9 GENERIC#462 amd64
scramjet:markie {20}
...and out of the dmesg-output:
scramjet:markie {21} dmesg
OpenBSD 3.9 (GENERIC) #462: Thu Mar 2 03:52:16 MST 2006
deraadt@amd64.openbsd.org:/usr/src/sys/arch/amd64/compile/GENERIC
real mem = 536211456 (523644K)
avail mem = 448024576 (437524K)
using 13142 buffers containing 53829632 bytes (52568K) of memory
mainbus0 (root)
cpu0 at mainbus0: (uniprocessor)
cpu0: AMD Opteron™ Processor 146, 2000.25 MHz
cpu0: FPU,VME,DE,PSE,TSC,MSR,PAE,MCE,CX8,APIC,SEP,MTRR,PGE,MCA,CMOV,PAT,PSE36,CFLUSH,MMX,FXSR,SSE,SSE2,NXE,MMXX,LONG,3DNOW2,3DNOW
cpu0: 64KB 64b/line 2-way I-cache, 64KB 64b/line 2-way D-cache, 1MB 64b/line 16-way L2 cache
cpu0: ITLB 32 4KB entries fully associative, 8 4MB entries fully associative
cpu0: DTLB 32 4KB entries fully associative, 8 4MB entries fully associative
...and of course… the crypto-setup!
scramjet:markie {22} df
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Avail Capacity Mounted on
/dev/sd0a 2062190 595100 1363982 30% /
/dev/sd0d 5605652 7438 5317932 0% /var
/dev/wd0a 192275708 192275682 -9613758 105% /datacrypt/disk1
/dev/wd1a 192275708 192275682 -9613758 105% /datacrypt/disk2
/dev/svnd0c 189129336 153003564 26669306 85% /data/disk1
/dev/svnd1c 189129336 164217244 15455626 91% /data/disk2
scramjet:markie {23}
...copying some files from my desktop to my fileserver… through sftp…
markie@oblique /data/media/video $ sftp scramjet
Connecting to scramjet…
markie@scramjet’s password:
sftp> cd /data/disk2/temp
sftp> mput PaulRobert*
Uploading PaulRobertson_PirateBabysCabanaBattleStreetFight2006.mpg to /data/disk2/temp/PaulRobertson_PirateBabysCabanaBattleStreetFight2006.mpg
PaulRobertson_PirateBabysCabanaBattleStreetFight2006.mpg 100% 113MB 8.1MB/s 00:14
sftp> mput sims*
Uploading sims_evolved_virtual_creatures_1994.mpeg to /data/disk2/temp/sims_evolved_virtual_creatures_1994.mpeg
sims_evolved_virtual_creatures_1994.mpeg 100% 234MB 8.1MB/s 00:29
sftp>
...soooo, that’s around 7-8-9 MB/sec which is nice if you think about it… (it gets encrypted, remember? ^_^ )
...and the top-output while copying these files to the fileserver
load averages: 0.31, 0.26, 0.17 22:53:38
35 processes: 2 running, 32 idle, 1 on processor
CPU states: 21.7% user, 0.0% nice, 37.7% system, 12.5% interrupt, 28.2% idle
Memory: Real: 20M/105M act/tot Free: 385M Swap: 0K/1024M used/tot
26320 markie 35 0 1484K 2520K run – 0:19 11.72% sftp-server
16598 markie 34 0 4964K 3776K run – 0:14 7.96% sshd
25849 markie 2 0 3152K 3324K sleep select 0:06 0.00% smbd
31996 root 2 0 1096K 2104K sleep select 0:01 0.00% sendmail
23991 root 2 0 1548K 2488K sleep select 0:01 0.00% httpd
17124 root 2 0 1076K 1412K sleep select 0:00 0.00% nmbd
32109 root 2 0 668K 1832K idle select 0:00 0.00% sshd
25757 root 2 0 668K 904K idle select 0:00 0.00% cron
21850 _syslogd 2 0 436K 820K sleep poll 0:00 0.00% syslogd
...well, as you can see… this machine isn’t running on it’s toes… not in a long way… sooo… I need to put some work in tweaking and tuning this machine… but I’m also filling this 100Mbit-line almost already… so an investment in a small gigabit-switch should be justified now… (I just needed some reason for that! ;-))
For this install, my old How-To was still pretty current, so rewriting it just for this seemed a little useless… Once I’ve got some fresh disks so I can combine it with a RAID-setup, I’ll rewrite the whole shebang… promise!
UPDATE
....and I did some read-write-tests on my fileserver, with SMB instead of sftp…
from my workstation (Gentoo Linux X86_64, Gnome)
reading from fileserver (screenshot): 7.4MB/sec
writing to fileserver (screenshot): 4.1MB/sec
from my mediacenter (Windows XP MCE)
reading from fileserver (screenshot): 8.7MB/sec
writing to fileserver screenshot: 8.0MB/sec
awesome OMGWTF-patches
The other day, I saw this awesome OMGWTF-patch on Phil Torrone’s photostream on Flickr.
After seeing that patch, I just knew I had to get one of these myself. Phil was kind enough to share where he got them, the info is right there on the pic of the patch on Flickr. Now that’s how I like it!
I contacted Steve Cooley, the artist who made these patches, he’s got a little shop on etsy.com. So for those liking these patches, you can go there and order them!
Anyway, look what I found in the mail yesterday!
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click to go to the corresponding pic on flickr
...the patches! I ordered a whole bunch of them… My guess was, I only order these once, so get a few extra… including a pink one, but not for me *^_^*
click to go to the corresponding pic on flickr
This afternoon I thought I’d surprise my friend Nijne with the pink patch… somehow that one had her name all over it… *^_^*
That pink bag is hers (nooo, I’m not carrying a pink bag! what’s up with you people!?!?)
click to go to the corresponding pic on flickr
...and I just stitched the green with pink one onto my laptopbag… Somehow that one matches my iBook the best I guess… and *NO!* I’m not going to write a how-to on how-to stitch a patch onto a laptopbag… I mean… ask your mother or sister or something or reverse-engineer it yourself! You could learn something there! ^_^
click to go to the corresponding pic on flickr
Anyway, I’m very happy with the patches, so thank you Steve!
DIY trackback
OMGWTF-patches in the Netherlands @ somejunkwelike.com
project: getting your eMate wireless
click to go to the projectpage
I’m aware it’s 2006 now… But still I spent some time in getting this marvelous little eMate wireless. Why? because I can and even more, because this little eMate can! And just like my other project involving the same Lucent WaveLAN Orinoco Silver-cards, the one where I put it into an iBook, it’s not like it hasn’t been done before or anything. I just wanted to try this out myself and make a current journal/how-to out of this.
read on, on the projectpage
DIY trackback
hackaday.com
MAKE:blog
Ars Technica: Infinite Loop: Friday morning Apple Links
TUAW: The Unofficial Apple Weblog
...and another toy... TomTom BT GPS
I didn’t plan everyone of my purchases I did lately or anything, but it seems there’s a lot of stuff going for good prices the last few weeks… Maybe it’s because of the weather and because it’s summer and such, but I’m making sure I’ve got enough gear to be able to get myself geeking through a long winter :D
My last purchase is this older model TomTom Bluetooth GPS-unit. I’ve been on the look-out for these for quite a while, but whenever I thought about really buying one, my sense (i’ve got some of that… sometimes ^_^) prevailed. I thought I was really pushing it, wanting a GPS-unit for on my bike and for city-trips and such… Buuuuut… Every now and then I kept looking for getting me such a nice unit for scratchmoney (of course! you know me…)
I already was looking for older bundles of TomTom Navigator 2 with this nice BT GPS-receiver combined. The bundle being priced down because of the older software and such… But I couldn’t find it decently priced… And then… yesterday I found this one… Most definitely used, and coming without software (as if I care) charger and such… Oh, and to make sure, it isn’t stolen or anything, it comes out of the stock of the company I work for. We probably had to take back this unit from a customer at some point or another, but this is hardly sellable to anyone (well… except me of course… ^_^)
Sooooooo… I’ve got the unit!
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I took it apart, cause I didn’t have the proper connector for charging it(I do have that connector now, btw), so I charged it directly on the PCB. And since it looked so … used… I decided to spraypaint the unit while I was at it.
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On the last pic, the unit is laying outside on my balcony and the raw data is visible on my phone… so… it works!
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...and this is how it looks now… it’s quite hard to take a decent pic of something matte black, but it looks a whole lot better now than it did before (imho of course).
Well, there’s plenty of fun stuff you can do with this, but more on that later… I mean, it’s summertime! *^_^*
cheap solarpanel from a clothes store?
This afternoon I got myself this solarpanel, with a whole bunch of connectors for only EUR 9.95!
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When I got home, I checked the site of this panel and the regular price seems to be $109.99… euh?
Soldius1 with iPod® and Mobile Phone Kit (mysoldius.com)
It’s being sold here in Holland at this clothesstore called WE (a very awkward name imho… we compete with Japan in having the strangest ‘english’ around I guess… ‘WE is me’ what’s up with that?)
Any way, I guess this company, with a whole lot of stores throughout Holland bought a whole bunch of these panels… At this price I guess one of the resellers went for bankruptcy or such, cause this is really scratchmoney for this kind of stuff. The actual deal in the store is that you’re allowed to buy this panel for 9.95 if you spend 30 euros on clothes. Seperately it should be 19.95 (which still is a steal). I found out about it cause someone linked to one of my old projects on this forum and in one of the replies somebody is talking about this deal. I saw this forumthread popping up in my referrers and when I found out about it, I went out to buy one of these for 19.95… I asked the salesclerk if I could buy one of these panels seperately for 19.95, but she wouldn’t really listen and insisted in selling me one for 9.95… well, all right then… If you insist… ^_^
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On the last pic you can see the panel’s got a regular mini-USB-connector on the panel… Really, this is some good stuff… This model even comes included with a whole bunch of connectors, for all regular types of phones and even an iPod-connector and iPod-shuffle-connector (which is a regular USB-connector actually). Now let me think what I can do with it :-)
Thanks go out to the guys on that forum which pointed me to this deal, I’m very happy with it! *^_^*
project: Use heatsinks to organize your life!
Well, this is more or less is a reason for not doing more sane things… I promised myself to clean out my livingroom… starting with my cupboard… but all of a sudden, I’m busy making this… (in other words, I’m slacking in a big way here… *^_^* )
click the pic to continue reading…
Use heatsinks to organize your life! (continued)
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