Cool and wet. Damp at a minimum. Misty rain most of yesterday with occasional downpours depending on where you were. Where I was it rained pretty much non-stop, just slacking for short periods.
Spent the day getting ready then driving north to look at a property. It’s pretty much what we expected, and we’re making an offer on it. It’ll be another house that sold “before it was ever listed.” We only learned about it through a friend. Meatspace and tribe came through.
I expect there will be a LOT of things to share about the process and the work. This is intended to be a ‘weekend’ or vacation home, but will also function as a retreat if we need it. I hate to think ‘bug out location’ because you don’t get much use from a bug out place if things go well. It does give us somewhere to go if we need to go, and that has been a major prep that was missing from our capabilities.
It’s also supposed to be a financial move to get something real instead of a rapidly inflating currency. Our timeline is long. If the world somehow manages to not go to helI in the next year or two, it will be a fun place to go on summer weekends and lakefront property always finds buyers, if there are any buyers at all.
Which brings me around to the title of the post (which most of the time is an opportunity to sneak in a joke or quick hit commentary, or is totally unrelated to the post, which is a tiny little joke in itself) and relates to CommanderZero’s post today. How do you know when it’s time to pull the cord and bail? ESPECIALLY when that moment hasn’t come despite looking like it was imminent any number of times, and when the consequences for NOT going can be dire. I’ve mentioned in other contexts that ‘if you think it’s time to leave, it’s probably too late…” And I’ve mentioned that it helps to set trigger points so that you don’t have to second guess yourself.
But specifically, how the heck can I be willing to spend the money on this place after a day, and seeing it for only a couple of hours? Weeeeelllllll…… because we’ve done lots of thinking about it before hand. We have been looking at lake properties for three years. We feel like we’ve got a pretty good understanding of the current pricing and current demand. We’ve been looking at houses for a lot longer than that, and have a lot of confidence we can evaluate the condition and potential of the property. We had the money in place, and although we had to revisit that, another year of putting money aside for the purpose made the pot big enough, as it turned out. It’s still a stretch, but my wife agrees that time is getting short, the money we had saved was losing value every day, and we’re not getting younger, and the kids aren’t either.
I had a similar situation with my replacement truck. By the time this one came up, I’d looked at a lot of trucks, knew a good price when I saw it, and knew I needed to act swiftly. The house we live in took only a few minutes to convince us this was the house for us, mainly because we’d looked at more than 60 and rejected them.
And in the case of my truck, along with our previous ALMOST purchase of the prepper retreat, we were ready to change our minds if the information or our needs changed. The first truck I almost bought, I didn’t understand the warranty situation. Once I did, we bailed on the deal. With the great looking property with all the animal protein, and smokehouse, and artesian well… once we understood where the flood line was, and that the property was unbuildable for the most part, and that we wouldn’t ever be able to sit on a dock watching the sunset, we bailed.
Be ready to move when the opportunity presents itself. But be ready to stop moving if things change, or you change.
Finally, in answer to CommanderZero’s question, when do you head for the hills and burn the bridges and boats behind you? I’ve got a rule that none of my prepping can be irrevocable. Even if I decide to head for the hills I’m going to do my best to not burn the bridges behind me. Because I make mistakes. Lots of them and all the time. And I believe that “there is ALWAYS another way.” Searching for and finding that way made my career. Those two things make me strongly biased against the dramatic exit… and so far it’s worked for me.
The other thing that works for me is stacking up the preps, because it gives me choices. Give yourself some, and stack up your own preps. You know you wanna….
nick
EyeRobics?
48F with 95%RH and no wind.
Seller accepted our informal proposal. Now comes a bit of hurry up and wait as the unavoidable gears turn and all the official stuff happens.
One great big plus for me, it should stop the talk about remodeling here at home 🙂
n
I'll bet ya wish you'd bought one o' them self-driving Tonymobiles, don't ya?
Driver who stopped to help when truck carrying 100 lab monkeys crashed in Pennsylvania and put her hand in one of the cages says she now has a cough and pink eye: CDC urges anyone in contact with the macaques to seek medical attention
You definitely want the copper line if they will provide it. I pay $65/month, but that is the regulated service which they have to keep going even if they roll a truck on Sunday afternoon.
At this point, if broadband may be a deal breaker and you buy the house with the plan for Tonydish service being real at promised bandwidths, that is a serious roll of the dice. Musk’s PR firm is working overtime this week because the Tesla share price is in the tank, and you’ll see all kinds of crazy claims in the next few days … starting with the Tonyfactory in Fremont being the most productive car plant in the US.
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2022-tesla-factory-california-texas-car-production/
Wagg-Ed in the good old days of pre-2000 Microsoft is amateur hour compared to whoever Musk uses.
How far is it across the lake to where service may exist?
Any unused microwave licenses?
Don’t laugh. At WSU Vancouver, we had a 2 W link from the campus to the Internet node in Downtown Portland. Ultra stable and enough bandwidth for the entire campus.
It sounds like we will hear shortly whether Tonydish is for real.
Disclaimer: I own Comcast stock, but that's it for things I've deliberately bought on an individual share basis in telecom.
And I bought Comcast as a long term holding, looking at the Nintendo theme park attractions going up at the Universal parks in Orlando in a few years.
Americans are a**holes at parks in general so the attractions’ interactive aspects will have to be modified slightly from Japan, but try finding even a Switch Lite these days.
“Put her hand in one of the cages”?
WTAF?
Good monkey. The CDC needs to come forward and be completely open on the infection status of those monkeys. Where’s PETA when you need them?
There are no deal breakers at this point. Even if it burned to the ground. The remodel budget would just turn into "get a big box up on the property so we can stay there" budget, or a "park a trailer there" budget.
First intent is as a weekend get away from it all place. I'd call it a 'digital detox'…. But practically speaking, I want some bandwidth for cams if nothing else. Starlink sounds like it would be awesome, but Tonystuff always does, for a while.
Some of the locals use Nomad, which is a reseller of 4G LTE and various flavors of cellular data. Kinda pricey in my book and I'd probably at least look at rolling my own. First try would be the ATT booster I have, and the verizon MiFi access point I have with an external antenna. There were zero bars of ATT while we were there.
If it comes to a chain of wireless links, I've got some 100 and 200 MBps links I got at auction in unlicensed spectrum, and there is always ubiquiti…. (again, I've got some bits in a box…) And if I didn't care about licenses, I've got some carrier level links in a very unused band.
The north side of the lake is in one county and ISD, the south side is in another so there are some big differences between them. The south side is closer to the nearest town too.
n
I'll bet ya wish you'd bought one o' them self-driving Tonymobiles, don't ya?
— hah, that'll be the day. I'm not sure which would be the actual dealbreaker, the remote forced OS updates, the "can't open or start the car without an internet link" or the range and carrying capacity issues….. haven't given it much thought as it's a non-starter.
n
@Nick
Woo hoo! Crossing my fingers for no hitches, and that the sale is quick, painless, drama less and results in all the good things.
Thanks Jenny, and everyone else for the well wishes. I'm hoping for the best too…
n
LOL! 38% gain in six months; 1,692% over five years.
Down 13% in the last five trading days, giving up all the gains since October. Tank.
Tony's Wagg-Ed equivalent staunched the losses yesterday/today with the "most productive car plant in the US" story I linked earlier.
Another $100 or so down and the trading algorithms will start selling, once the stock price is below the magic 200 day moving average.
The entire market is heading towards giving up the pandemic gains. A lot of people have to hope that’s where the carnage stops.
Wanted to comment earlier, but the editor didn't cooperate on my phone.
Nick, does getting to this house early mean before a realtor is involved. If so, congrats. FWIW, I have always worked outside the realty community. I know some, and that is part of the reason. Also have not done any moving after we settled here and built our own house. Nowadays, with the Internet it is easy to find properties, which is about all even good realtors do. Most of them bring negatives to the table. I had a SIL who was one. Nope,
@Ray, you once mentioned that you started using Microsoft Edge, probably when you moved to Windows 10. Update please: do you still like it?
I set it up on my wife’s notebook, and suggested she use it exclusively until there was a need to do something different. She had no bookmarks or history from older systems. I asked her later how she liked it, and got the usual shrug. Fine. Then, we took her notebook on a trip, running it off her phone’s hotspot. She was happy. I needed to use it for some light work, and found Edge to be horrible. One of my rules is that I never change anything on someone else’s computer without their permission. I had noticed earlier that Edge apparently doesn’t allow opening to a blank page; the only choices are some default or a page of my choosing. I guess I could just specify Google. Side note: my wife has been exposed to corporate stuff for decades, and has become accustomed to a corp web site on the browser. Doesn’t bother her to see a bunch of distractions. Bothers me.
But what surprised me most was its seeming slowness, and this was on a connection much faster than home. There could be many explanations for this. Topmost could be that I usually go to the same sites quite a bit, and my browser could cache enough that those sites seem fast. Chrome seems especially good at that. It also seems to look forward to links in a page and prefetch them. Edge apparently doesn’t, even though it is supposed to be based on Chrome. A puzzle.
That’s only strike one. If it were my computer, I would install Chrome, which works fine on mine. I also use Brave for those occasions where I don’t want to see ads. Anyhow, your thoughts, please.
For my browsing purposes it works fine. I haven't found anything that really ticks me off and motivates me to change browsers. I avoid Chrome because it is Google and Google makes money off data, including my data. I don't trust Google. Firefox I have seen too many issues with weird behavior. Edge just works for what I want and need.
I do use a couple of extensions to make browser better. Eliminate or reduce ads, well duh. I have a cookie editor extension as I occasionally blast unwanted cookies. A password manager, Bitwarden, to manage passwords. They all seem to work without issues.
And in other news. I ordered a USB-C to HDMI/USB-A/USB-C adapter from Apple. It is supposed to arrive tomorrow. It arrived today. I checked the Apple site and it still shows a Wednesday delivery with the order still in the processing stage. Have no idea what is going on with the order. If I get a second adapter I will start a return on it and see what happens.
Thanks, Ray. One more thing: whenever I check my wife’s computer, Edge has dozens of tabs open. She says she didn’t open them, so I suspect some integration with (possibly?) her email, which is on Outlook. I haven’t taken any time to troubleshoot this, but it bothers my sense of control. Edge does not seem to use any more RAM or slow in any way, just like Chrome in that respect, so it is low priority. Any ideas?
@Ray, thanks also for mentioning Bitwarden. I need to look into a password manager, especially for my wife. For her, it needs to be transparent, so I wonder if Bitwarden fixed the auto logon issue you mentioned? Also, does it autofill as well as the browser based managers? That will be a must for her. Another project. Heh, why not, I am retired, and have plenty of spare time. Riiight.
I have no firm idea. I have never had a problem with unwanted tabs. There is a setting that opens links in a new tab. Maybe that is the issue.
Bitwarden installs an extension in the browser that will fill in user ids and passwords if it recognizes such. Passwords are generally not an issue. User ids are not recognized on all sites because of the way user id box is represented. I suspect Bitwarden looks for some key words.
Bitwarden is fairly transparent to me. I like that I can get to passwords on all my devices including iDevices. I can also access the Bitwarden site on foreign computers without installing anything.
I was using Lastpass. They sold out to some Russian group and the price went up to $30.00 a year. Bitwarden is $10.00 a year and is open source. Lastpass is closed source.
I store all information that I think is important in Bitwarden. Passport numbers and information, vehicle information including insurance, credit card information, in addition to site passwords. Primarily so that when I bite the bucket my son can get access to that information. If he logs in I get an email. If I do not respond within 4 hours he would be granted access.
Bitwarden will not allow access from foreign countries unless I specifically specify such access is OK. I do this before I travel to Europe so I can get access to my accounts.
Bitwarden has an extension, a program, website and apps for Android and IOS.
When my best friend died his wife really struggled with getting access to his accounts. It was an eye opener for me. Providing that information to someone else makes it much easier on the surviving individuals who have to deal with accounts.
@JimB, yep, before the realtors got involved. There are some other benefits too, regarding public disclosure of sale price, and the tax assessor poking zer beak in. The list of required 'rentier' services and agencies is still long. Title insurance, survey, escrow agency, yadda yadda.
Seller did ask for proof of financial ability, which was prudent. No "option period" since there are no conditions to be met. Seller pays for the title work, which should be pretty simple. Land grant > timber company > subdivision developer > seller's parents. There might be a bit more between the land grant and the timber company, and I'm just assuming the timber, since all the area was in commercial timber. I guess we'll see.
n
xkcd: Alien Observers
https://xkcd.com/2572/
I never knew that it was so hard to be an alien observer.
Explained at:
https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2572:_Alien_Observers
Apparently plugs' only answer to the Bear shoving its' nose under the tent is war. McSpongeBrain is the worst.
from @Jenny:
And fantastic on the house, Nick. You can build more house, not so much more land.
Very true dat.
"12 Best Mathematical Science Fiction Books" by Dan Livingston
https://best-sci-fi-books.com/12-best-mathematical-science-fiction-books/
Zero for twelve here. And I have nothing to add.
Oh yes, “The Martian” is all about the math ! ! ! ! !
One of my neighbors in Greatwood just got Starlink for his house. He is getting 20 to 30 ms pings to 8.8.8.8.
All he did with the antenna was throw in on the ground in his backyard. No cats.
"12 Best Mathematical Science Fiction Books" by Dan Livingston
https://best-sci-fi-books.com/12-best-mathematical-science-fiction-books/
Flatland and Cryptonomicon–and The Martian.
Only two for twelve, myself, and I just barely remember Flatland. I'll have to try some of the others on that list someday.
Cryptonomicon is weird and hilarious. For example, one section has a silly but credible generic "business plan." Another section has a character stopping by a McDonald's where he "…pulls through its drive-through window, chooses n, where n is a random number between one and six, and asks for Value Meal n with super-size fries."
edited to add: And The Martian. I enjoyed both the book and the movie.
My friends in Russia, China, Brazil, and a few other world armpits are trying out the new security in our software again today. They used a University of Columbia student to trick me into providing a download over the weekend.
So far they are fairly stymied by the new encryption. So far.
I swear, these people are trying to put me out of business. Many of my former users outside the USA are using their cracked versions of our software and not paying me a penny. I even had one in Canada show up yesterday.
edited to add: And The Martian. I enjoyed both the book and the movie.
I loved The Martian (both book and movie). And the Hermes was freaking awesome.
https://archive.briankoberlein.com/2015/10/06/the-science-behind-the-martian-hermes-spacecraft/index.html
"Cryptonomicon" attempts to be my generation's "Gravity's Rainbow". At least, that was my take.
"Gravity's Rainbow" always kicks my a** any time I attempt it., however, and I've made it through "Cryptonomicon" multiple times. I even have a signed first edition.
Don't forget the Letter to Penthouse and the correct procedure for eating Captain Crunch cereal.
And the Haikus. The list goes on.
I never finished "Dodge in Hell", but friends claim that it drops something mindblowing about the entire universe Stephenson started in "Cryptonomicon".
Stephenson's new book does not take place in that universe. That book, “Termination Shock”, has some pretty good math too, but it isn't in the same league as his earlier works. The story seems unfinished, too, kinda like “Seveneves”.
What are the ping times on a cellular modem?
I suspect Starlink is a MVNO, using 4G/LTE/5G to supplement the satellites.
There is no excuse for not having read "Cryptonomicon".
If your concern is the occult implications of the title, rest assured there is no obvious mystical force involved in the plot save for one seemingly immortal individual named Enoch.
MVNO = mobile virtual network operator ???
There is no excuse for not having read "Cryptonomicon".
I think that I have Cryptonomicon in my SBR (strategic book reserve).
On my 5G phone, min 37ms, avg 64ms, max 94ms. 4G was a little higher
I don't believe Starlink would need an MVNO, after all if you're spending billions putting thousands of satellites up, your bet is on the sats and you wouldn't want to fall back to expensive cellular data.
Maybe you should let plugs know the Russkies are stealing your software. He can use it as leverage instead of launching Vipers and getting us in a shooting war.
"how the heck can I be willing to spend the money on this place after a day, and seeing it for only a couple of hours?"
Depends on whether you trust the seller or your realtor. In 2020, while EVERYTHING was locked down due to WuFlu, my wife found this house in San Antonio while we were still in Sacramento, CA. We did EVERYTHING online, and the first time we actually saw the place, rather than video and pictures, was when we drove up the driveway in our RV. She trusted the realtor, and it mostly worked out. It's amazing what you can accomplish with Zillow, Google Maps and Street View.
In other news, my Starlink terminal is supposed to be delivered on Thursday. I'll keep y'all posted. I have learned that the installation includes the flat panel receiver, a ground mount stand, 100 feet of cable, and a WiFi router. If you need to connect to something that requires a wire, you'll need to purchase an ethernet adapter, for $20. They have several other mounting systems. Some of those optional components aren't available immediately; the ethernet adapter won't be available until June. ALL of the optional devices are very reasonably priced.
Can anybody recommend a web/email hosting service? I've been on GoDaddy for quite a while, and they've gotten very expensive and arrogant. The only local email program they support is Outlook 365, and I'm not inclined to buy that.
I use RunBox and like them. Support is good. I'm pretty sure one of the founders of the company replies when something is legit broke. Those Norwegians take their privacy extremely seriously. If you're especially paranoid you can even open a ticket and ask that your stuff be hosted on a server that is physically present in Norway so seizing or searching it becomes a nightmare.
Yes. That would solve a lot of problems with regard to latency and bandwidth in urban areas.
How much software did your neighbor install on his PC to enable the service?
Let's see if Uncle Joe's sanctions on Mother Russia include oil…
https://www.argusmedia.com/en/news/2295153-mideast-would-struggle-to-cover-russian-oil-loss
I've used JustHost for my own stuff, and BlueHost for Dr. Pournelle's stuff (yes, I know they are the same parent company). Both have been good to work with, support is good, although uses chat, but usually the chat-peoples are helpful, resolving the issues.
Intro prices are good; unlimited domains (I have a lot of them), free SSL, unlimited file space (within limits) and unlimited databases. Free domain registration on initial signup. No issues; happy enough with them.
I also use GoDaddy for some of my domain registrations (the others are through JustHost). No issues there.
This place uses Dreamhost. I don't like them as much, as they don't have a real Control Panel for geeky stuff. But they work OK – and Barbara (Thompson – RBT's wife) is reluctant to change, even if I do all the work. (We tried to move this place to my JustHost account, but Barbara had trouble configuring her emails to the new host, so we gave up on that.)
Of course, YMMV. But JustHost/BlueHost for hosting has worked well for me the past 15-plus years.
Google just sent me an email and said hey freeloader, the free ride is over. I have been using the corporate version of gmail (and the other Google apps as needed) for about 20 years now.
I was one of the original beta testers of the service by moving my main domain MX record to gmail and pulling / posting all of our corporate email there. It has been a Godsend to us as the spam detection using the Postini honey pots has been excellent. And the Joe Jobs get rejected at the outer boundary of gmail rather than the email servers themselves. You have not lived until you are manually editing the email files of your email server and removing 10,000 email bounces using vi. Just another way that my friends in Russia, China, Brazil, Iran, etc have attacked us over the years.
So, I am going to start paying the $5 / user / month fee to continue using the service. I figure that I would be foolish not to. I just did not want to pay until they asked me to (yup, freeloader).
That's like my Ooma voip phone. I haven't paid a dime for it in 16 years. The equipment is bust, but I use the app on my phone. They tried to entice me to new free equipment a couple years ago, but I would then be a paying customer. No thanks. With the app I can still use the Ooma number on applications I don't want my cell on, but still can listen to VM and respond.
Thanks for the advice, Rick. I appreciate it.
"Cryptonomicon" is the first thing that popped into my head the moment Mike Myers' British General character started talking in "Inglorious Basterds".
Sadly, he did not say, "Woe-toe-hice", but Myers would be my first choice to play that character in the movie if someone is ever insane enough to attempt one. I gotta wonder if Tarantino read “Cryptonomicon” at some point.
I've used DreamHost since May 2002. That would be a few months after the local ISP went on vacation and the "fill in" guy simply knew better and renamed the mail server. Tell the customers? No. So my paul (or whatever) at isp . net address suddenly became paul (or whatever ) at mail.isp . net.
Oh. DreamHost gave me a lot more web space. The local ISP provided 2 Mb. DreamHost was a lot more, 10?, and a few months later raised it to 100 Mb. I think it's pretty much unlimited now.
Add on unlimited e-mail accounts and discussion/mailing lists, hey, I'm happy.
Well worth it.
As for knives, check a restaurant supply house. You can get chef quality knives there.
I purchased the "Amazon Basics 14-Piece Kitchen Knife Set, High-Carbon Stainless-Steel Blades with Pine Wood Knife Block" https://amzn.to/3tWW091 several months ago.
While not restaurant quality, they are 'good enough' for my occasional use at home. And were a reasonable cost at about $25.
I wash and dry them by hand before putting them in the included wood storage block.
@Lynn
What's the downside of providing a "special" version of your software for the unwashed? Like an unencrypted version "accidentally" posted in a backwater directory.
Nothing drastic along the lines of Seveso or Bhopal, just a few subroutines that result in sub-optimal efficiencies.
@RickH
"I wash and dry them by hand before putting them in the included wood storage block."
Very good. Add touching them up with a steel following by another rinse and dry, and even better.
https://www.amusingplanet.com/2022/01/the-koppetchells-effect.html
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/congresss-16-committee-claims-absolute
This article is worth reading top to bottom.
It is sickening proof that Democrats are absolute filth.
@Lynn
What's the downside of providing a "special" version of your software for the unwashed? Like an unencrypted version "accidentally" posted in a backwater directory.
Nothing drastic along the lines of Seveso or Bhopal, just a few subroutines that result in sub-optimal efficiencies.
I have thought about providing a version that allows five components and five unit modules for free. But, they would hack it immediately and release a full blown version for $35 on their website. Yes, they sell the cracked version of my software on their website.
The CIA tried to get me to release a special version for the Russians about 20 years ago. They wanted me to cut the calculated pipe thicknesses in half so that the pipeline would split in half when fully pressurized and kill everyone in sight. I threw the guy out of my office.
Cue the line from the old HBO series "Not Necessarily The News":
“The CIA”
“We're people you don't know, in places you've never heard of, doing things … well, you don't even want to think about.”
The only person I know even remotely who works for the CIA is a hardcore Prog.
The previous previous job had a manager who was an NSA burnout who then worked for Cisco for a while before getting canned and ending up at our place. Gotta wonder what got put into the routers.
The previous previous job had a manager who was an NSA burnout who then worked for Cisco for a while before getting canned and ending up at our place. Gotta wonder what got put into the routers.
Don't worry, the Chinese know.
I suppose that if one were to mention three or four clauses of the Constitution plus the Bill of Rights, their response would be "Are you serious?"
As for the reported claim that the Speech or Debate clause provides immunity to anything Congressvermin say or do, I'm pretty sure that's been found to apply only to open speeches on the floor of the House or Senate chambers, not to committee meetings or other private sessions. That whole "You can't charge me or sue me because I'm a Senator" line has been tried repeatedly, and has been shot down repeatedly.
re the CIA, I have nothing good to say about them, and I haven't knowingly dealt with any of them in almost 35 years. I can't imagine they've gotten better in that time, both from what I know of human and organizational behavior and what has been reported about their, shall we say, errors of judgment.
>> https://greenwald.substack.com/p/congresss-16-committee-claims-absolute
This article is worth reading top to bottom.
It is sickening proof that Democrats are absolute filth.
Will the committee even still be around come January 3, 2023?
>> re the CIA, I have nothing good to say about them, and I haven't knowingly dealt with any of them in almost 35 years. I can't imagine they've gotten better in that time, both from what I know of human and organizational behavior and what has been reported about their, shall we say, errors of judgment.
@SteveF…another entry in your file.
https://beckyleehanna.blogspot.com/2009/11/colonel-sam-flagg-cia.html
@lynn I was looking at your WinSim web site, and there is no pricing there. Is that by design? A potential buyer has to contact you directly to get a hint about the pricing for the products? The only info about pricing/purchasing was in your FAQ.
Curious. I'm not a purchaser, and probably wouldn't understand it if I did purchase. Was just wondering about costs for the products.
Liz Cheney will be gone and the committee disbanded.
The new leadership will clean house in the standing committees … if they are smart.
The list doesn't include the Flagg quote about working undercover as a showgirl in Vegas.
Given the current political and diplomatic environment, however, a list of Jack D. Ripper quotes would probably be more appropriate tonight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1KvgtEnABY
the story is slightly different:
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/kevindowneyjr/2022/01/25/woman-who-stopped-at-pa-lab-monkey-crash-site-is-now-sick-n1552703
The only good infected African monkey is a dead infected African monkey*
*or a backdoor visitor in Dr. Fauci's underwear.
@Greg Norton
"The list doesn't include the Flagg quote about working undercover as a showgirl in Vegas"
I was looking for video, but quit when I read the note in the link"
"i could only find one clip of him and it isnt funny"
Flagg and Otto (A Fish Called Wanda) were deliberately encouraged.
Cisco gear has several layers of software verification during startup. For the bios, the bootloader, and the actual router/switch software. They also randomly disassemble devices and check the code, in case someone figured out how to bypass the checks.
Doesn't stop crappy code making it into production though.
Before leaving the Death Star, I caught IBM running their entire network in China through the VPN client I developed for them to serve a single Linux desktop user.
They only called me because they didn't want the security failsafe triggered when the Chinese attempted to hijack the SSL session at the logical point the link exited the "Great Firewall".
Every Sunday at around 2 AM, the Chinese would "try the locks" and my VPN client would kill the tunnel as a precaution, wreaking havoc with IBM's TCP Tivoli connections.
The real kicker is that IBM never paid for the work porting to Linux.
@Greg Norton
"Liz Cheney will be gone and the committee disbanded."
Nothing to disband. It's likely that the "committee" will be found to be illegally constituted.
They put a cr*ppy LZS ASIC into production. It took a week of me staring at 1s and 0s to figure that out back in the day.
Ultimately, Cisco disabled LZS IPComp on a bunch of the routers because the ASIC was soldered onto the motherboard and couldn't be replaced in the field without a lot of time and expense. Ain't surface mount tech grand?
Gingrich has been making the rounds saying that the 1/6 Committee should go to prison.
He really needs to cut that out even if it is the plan. As things currently stand, the election will be ugly for the Dems.
And ugliest of all for Pelosi.
Closing in on 30 Rep(D)'s announcing retirement.
I've known a few that worked there and other TLAs. Hard workers. One told a hair-raising story about some time in Iran when the shah's government collapsed. It reminded me of the siege of Alesia. Strangely enough, I had worked with a guy that was part of the EDS team that rescued their employees from Iran at that time. He was in Turkey with a couple of suitcases full of cash to expedite getting people across the border and back to the US. The team in Iran was mostly EDS employees with military backgrounds – e.g. all their security guards were ex-MPs and carried 1911 45s.
@lynn I was looking at your WinSim web site, and there is no pricing there. Is that by design? A potential buyer has to contact you directly to get a hint about the pricing for the products? The only info about pricing/purchasing was in your FAQ.
Curious. I'm not a purchaser, and probably wouldn't understand it if I did purchase. Was just wondering about costs for the products.
Yes, by design. When a software product costs thousands of dollars, it is better to make people contact you.
Drop me an email and I will tell you if you want.
re the CIA, I have nothing good to say about them, and I haven't knowingly dealt with any of them in almost 35 years. I can't imagine they've gotten better in that time, both from what I know of human and organizational behavior and what has been reported about their, shall we say, errors of judgment.
Yes, they had something over me and tried to blackmail me with it. I voluntarily self reported after that and lost my export license to Iran that President Clinton gave to us.
I don't want to mention the blackmail item as it is one of the NSA watch list words. My agent in India sold a copy of our software to a banned entity and hid it from us. The entity violated the nuclear test ban treaty and brought down the CIA on a lot of people. Of course, now that entity probably uses a cracked version of our software that they bought in Russia. Along with the Iranians and many other banned entities.
Cryptonomicon was the only physical book I carried with me on tour for two years. I could drop it open to any page and start re-reading. I've got a couple of signed firsts, and a signed limited edition set of his Baroque Cycle and a signed limited edition of Crypto…
I think Anathem is a much more math heavy book though.
And I haven't read any of the others on the list.
—
did my pickups, got some good stuff for the kids and the household.
Urine neutralizer for 50c was a score.
WRT buying sight unseen, or in a big hurry, that's what the market requires at the moment. No stipulations or conditions either. Hot money is chasing property and it's making the prices go up and the demands for accommodation go down.
n
I was one of the original beta testers of the service by moving my main domain MX record to gmail and pulling / posting all of our corporate email there. It has been a Godsend to us as the spam detection using the Postini honey pots has been excellent.
Thanks for that. I never needed corporate email, but was sent an invitation early on by a friend who said I should try Gmail. I set up a test address and contacted him with it. Then I let it sit for a couple of years as I was not very interested in changing my email address. I was impressed that over that time period there was almost no spam that got through, and that was with default settings. Wow. I eventually moved my email operations to Gmail, and never looked back. Still serves me well. The only others that might be better cost $$ and probably require messing with settings, so I have never even tested them.
As confirmation, Leo Laporte has praised Gmail for years, and he has been pretty explicit in describing how he used it. I no longer listen to him except occasionally, but I still think he uses it. He also has used other email services, and has described his experience.
Jerry Pournelle IIRC did not use Gmail, but did have a spam problem. He had layers of complexity, as only he would put up with. I really feel for “famous” people who have more spam attractiveness than I do. I remember Jerry and RBT railing at spammers. Gmail is Good Enough for me. Good Enough that I would also pay for it if needed.
I have a godaddy domain and email for my "real" business email, and I was upset by their move to MS365 too. HOWEVER there is a way to get your mail without using 365. It's on their website and is simple although finding it, and knowing it's the right thing to do might not be simple. I did it and promptly forgot the details.
added– just checked the email box with the web page and it is some sort of MS nonsense, but I’m not paying anything for it.
I still have forwarding set up that works fine, from my godaddy email to my gmail account and on to my phone. Never touched that thru the changeover.
n
The markets in general are in a funk. How serious the funk is, that is the question. Personally, I think the institutions learned from the last couple of crashes, and they won't let this get serious enough to affect them. They will just use it to fleece retail traders, and then resume the march in artificially high stock prices.
I'll be interested to see what happens in the crypto world. It is also down, but I also think that is deliberate manipulation: panic some people into selling, than drive the price back up and sell right back to them. As an aside: While I'm not a huge believe in crypto, I do like the fact that some governments are upset about it. The current generation of cryptocurrencies aren't good enough, but I sure would like to see a fungible currency emerge outside of government control.
I know I've mentioned it before, but this is the great motivation behind turning software into SaaS: Running it on your own computers, and only giving people a web interface to the functionality. The guts stay the same, but the UI changes. I know that would be a difficult project for your software, but I think it would be worth exploring. Maybe a local college would be interested in trying to do a prototype?
If privacy is important, pick a European provider. They will be a bit more expensive, but are subject to European privacy laws. We have been with hostpoint.ch for years. I'm not sure what email program they use for their server, but it's not MS Exchange and it provides standard pop/imap interfaces. We use Thunderbird as our local client.