Categories
Off-Topic

Moved from AWS to Digital Ocean

Wow… this site still exists? Amazing! This old thing still sees a good bit of traffic, despite not seeing an update in a good many years. I’m very, very impressed with Digital Ocean, to be honest. Here’s why they’re really good:

It takes about 3 minutes to signing up, putting in billing information to having a shiny new SSD VM up and running, starting at a very reasonable $5.
To compare them with my previous hosting companies, Dreamhost gave me cheap ass shared hosting for $10. An Amazon T1.Micro instance and storage is $15 and change.
Security features all over. Upload your public key, root password disabled by default. 2-Factor-Authentication? Setup in seconds.
The control panel has a pretty uncluttered look, because they took off all the shitty knobs that everyone else plasters all over the place and never touches.
Want more knobs? Use their sweet API.

If you wanna give it the ‘ol heave ho, here’s a referral link that’ll put $10 in my pocket.
https://www.digitalocean.com/?refcode=b748068dd135

In the meantime, stay thirsty my friends.

Categories
Off-Topic

Moving from Dreamhost to AWS.

As it is with everything in the world, good things can’t last forever. Dreamhost was great and has seen me through millions and millions of page views with just a few pennies thrown their way in return.

To scratch my own itch, I’ve moved this blog to Amazon on a micro instance. The bonus is that it’s a real, virtualized machine, and I can run my own stack on it however I please. CloudFlare seems nice, they’ll host my DNS records for free and cache bunches of stuff… Varnish is pretty damn brilliant, let’s turn that on. WordPress/W3TC, Apache and PHP APC round out the regular suspects. Giving MySQL some breathing room. Done! Seems like I should start writing again so that I can see if my machine can survive a good Reddit attack.

feelsgoodman.jpg

Categories
Off-Topic

Started something new this week.

I’ve started a small new place for my thoughts to reside, which aren’t necessarily related to Linux. Visit my new blog about coding and such called importflying, totally infected with malware. It’s somewhere I’ll do nothing with for months.

Same style of humor and writing as you’ve always enjoyed at Fsckin w/ Linux, but a totally different topic. It just feels like there’s not a lot to write about anymore, because I’m able to find the answers I look for pretty easily.

Categories
Humor Linux Off-Topic

The Most Interesting README File Ever?

Another linux zealot at my old job gave me the heads up on this, it’s directly from gnome-cups-manager, and I thought you would all enjoy it. If you’re not aware, the readme file is for a Gnome graphical front-end for a tool used to manage print queues and adding printers/etc.

The only question is what illicit substances were not consumed during the writing of this file.

gnome-cups-manager
——————

Once upon a time there was a printer who lived in the woods. He was a lonely printer, because nobody knew how to configure him. He hoped and hoped for someone to play with.

One day, the wind passed by the printer’s cottage. “Whoosh,” said the wind. The printer became excited. Maybe the wind would be his friend!

“Will you be my friend?” the printer asked.

Categories
Off-Topic

I’m Now Writing for Ars Technica Open Ended

Big news… really really big breaking news…

Starting today, I’m writing daily news blurbs for the Ars Technica Open Ended news-oriented journal about Linux and open source in general. I’ve been wanting to do something like this for quite some time, since the Ars name brings along with it some credibility and respect from the community.

I’m not stopping the presses, they’re just rolling somewhere else a little bit faster. I’m not going to stop posting articles here, and trust me – there are some things I’ve written about that Ars wouldn’t ever think of publishing in a million years… a quick search concludes that I’m not always the most politically correct blogger around – I don’t try to be someone I’m not, but just for Ars, I’ll try to clean up my act a little bit. 🙂

That said, there are a limited amount of hours for me to write, and I’ve wanted to be a part of something bigger – and I have achieved that goal. I hope you’ll congratulate me and follow to the new digs.

I kinda think they have a better web designer than myself.. right?

Categories
Humor Off-Topic

I Was Rickrolled by a TTY Relay Operator

There is a first time for everything. Like calling Microsoft on April Fools’ Day to help uninstall Linux.

I’d like to share what happened earlier today: I received a TTY Relay call. Relay calls happen all the time, but this one is special… I was RickRolled by someone who is deaf or mute. Perhaps they just called via relay as a joke. Anyway, it was seriously the highlight of my week, and I think it’s the first time someone has been RickRolled by TTY relay.

Here’s a rough transcript of how it happened, enjoy:

Cellphone rings… [weird 5-digit number calling]…I answer.

Me: Hello, this is Wayne.

Operator: This is relay operator 7852, I have a relay call for you. Have you ever received a relay call before?

Me: Yes I have, hello, go ahead.

Operator: Hello… I just watched your video about the Linux and the Rickroll, don’t ever make a stupid video like that again, I just wasted 10 minutes.  Go ahead.

Me: [Sigh] [Laughing really hard] ah ga oh man, you’ve made my day (happy tone) Go ahead.

Operator: Seriously, what a loser! Go ahead.

Me: [Laughing] Ohhhh man, you’ve made my day! Go ahead.

Operator: Ok but I just wanna tell you one more thing that I’m never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down, never gonna run around and desert you, never gonna make you cry, never gonna say goodbye, never gonna tell a lie and hurt you. Go ahead.

Me: [Laughing] Ah that was really good, thank you.  Have a good day.  Go ahead. *hangs up*

Go ahead indeed! Well played, sir!  Edit:  The guy who did it was kind enough to contact me, and “SirGeek” sent along an email with the transcript as proof:

Hi. That were me. I attached an image for proof. Note that I really did love the video, I just wanted to see how far the operator would read off some insults before I got my ‘roll on 😛 So no harm intended.

I would have used my cellphone, but I couldn’t find the damn thing.

F**king brilliant.

Categories
Linux Off-Topic

The Linux Foundation is Looking for a Community Manager

Do you want to brag about being a co-worker with Linus Torvalds? Here’s your chance. I think I’ll toss my resume in the hat, just for giggles.

Categories
Off-Topic

While I’m waiting on Direct2Drive to Download 6GB of Data for COD4

…it is probably going to take all night… I just HAD to try out COD4 after Yahtzee’s most excellent quote of being “a pretty excellent gun wank.” Sigh. I watched that review and immediately headed over to the WineHQ to check the status of the game, and it seems to play very well under Wine. I’d be able to write an article AND play an excellent gun wank at the same time, so that’d be a win-win. So I went ahead and purchased it immediately.

In the meantime, here’s a picture of my most recent “computer” upgrade… the most excellent Mirra Chair by Herman Miller. Since the ~24 hours after owning this chair most of my dull and nagging lower-back pain have completely disappeared.

I highly recommend the chair and there’s not much more I can say about the Mirra other than the fact that it’s marginally more comfortable than the Aeron I used 40 hours a week for 2 years when I worked for a company that spoiled all of it’s employees with Aeron-goodness during the DotCom Bubble. Also, the aesthetics of the non-mesh back appeal to me, which is a side-bonus. I don’t care if the chair looks like it’s 45 years old, and has sagging nockers that have been used to breastfeed a baker’s dozen of really, really thirsty babies, as long as it makes my back more comfortable, that is all that matters.

Categories
Linux Microsoft Off-Topic

Microsoft to Yahoo – “We Will Add Your Biological And Technological Distinctiveness To Our Own.”

I’ve gotta give Steve Ballmer and crew a pat on the back. The Microsoft acquisition offer for Yahoo is the most fantastic idea they have come up with since the release of Vista. Unfortunately, Microhoo is not going to topple the top player Google anytime soon in the online advertising world.

You can’t take Microsoft, add Yahoo juice and get something magically better. Microsoft and Yahoo have relatively poor search results when compared to Google. Combined, they also do not have anywhere near the online advertising inventory that Google has available. Google dominates the online office suite (at the moment) with Google Docs, which is what I think got Microsoft on their case.

According to the WSJ, Yahoo is going to reject the offer on Monday. I speculate that Microsoft would raise their offer to $40 a share, they’ll do anything to be second best.

Categories
Off-Topic

Is It Just Me, Or Does Sun Comes Off As A Creepy Uncle?

I got an email from a professor today asking for some input on Java and Solaris… 15-20 minutes of my time is not asking much… but it seems like Sun is the type of guy who is offering some candy from the sliding door of a panel van…

We are inviting you to provide feedback and input by participating in this survey. We are offering a chance to win one of 4 American Express gift cards, each in the amount of US$50. We anticipate you allocating fifteen to twenty minutes to complete the relevant sections. The deadline for completion is February 5th.

Our objective is to better understand the following:

* What is your experience so far with Java and Solaris courses?
* What is your opinion of the books and other courseware available?
* Do you plan to work in a field using Java or Solaris after graduation?
* What do you know about professional certification?

http://bookdev.com/Sun/student_survey/

*shivers*