Older blog entries for Mulad (starting at number 285)

Thinking that maybe I should start saying ``free and open software'' instead of ``open source software.'' Might be good, as ``free'' gets in there somewhere and strengthens ``open.'' However, the die-hard ``free software'' folks might feel it dilutes the word ``free.'' Hard to say.

Still wishing this week didn't exist. I want to get back to trying to have a life, rather than avoiding studying for finals and doing some projects.

This morning I realized that Sarah really brings out a part of me that I think has always been around, hiding beneath the surface. It's nothing fancy, just some of my silliness -- my imaginitive side that's been hiding for a long time. I think she helps me loosen up and bring that more to the front. Maybe that's why I like her so much. Hard to say.

One of my roommates graduated the other day, though he still has to take finals.

The joys of going to a huge school (what? 40,000? something like that..)

I shouldn't have come here, though I'm glad for friends I've made. I especially appreciate meeting Sarah, but it's still unlikely that will amount to anything.

Well, it's not like I can go and do it again. I just want to move forward, finish up classes this summer and clean up some somewhat loose ends at work. I just hope I can keep in touch with Sarah and other friends.

It'll be a huge load off when I get out of college. It's been too long.

I want this week to not exist. I don't want to take finals, or work on final projects. I'd rather be working at the job I have -- so much more rewarding to solve real problems..

Spending too much time avoiding some end-of-semester projects. Dunno how far I'll get with them.

Anyway, bigger news for me was discovering that the Sun StorEdge A1000 arrays we have are not exactly operating at peak efficiency.. 4MB/s is a little slow for a RAID array. Still trying to figure out why that's happening..

Man.. Sarah and I are just way too compatible. We keep agreeing on all these little things.. Naturally, she's still Josh's girlfriend.

I'm moving soon (end of the month), probably into a fraternity for the summer. They've got DSL, digital cable, etc., so it should be pretty nice. The place is basically laid out like a small dorm, though we each get our own fridge (or half a fridge, or something like that).

Saw an odd thing today -- an apparently Muslim woman walking down the street wearing a Calvin Klein headdress.. The assimilation has begun, I guess

Been doing lots of stuff at work lately. Got a new version of Netsaint running, and it's now keeping track of many more things (with many yet to be added). In case people don't know, Netsaint has been renamed to Nagios, and Ethan Galstad, the main developer, is going to be giving a talk on it on Saturday at the U of MN.

Also, I've been tapped to build another firewall or two. Apparently Nimda reared it's head in one of our computer labs. Sheesh. Linux is a swiss army knife, but should I really be using it like a Band-Aid to fix problems that could have been avoided in the first place?

Did you know that "In God We Trust" is the national motto of the USA? I thought it was just something we put on our currency.

Is it just me, or is there something wrong with this picture?

Hmm.. It's April. XFree86 4.2.0 was posted back in January, IIRC. Still no Debian package for it.. I know, I know, the dude's busy. However, I've been living with the VESA driver on my laptop for quite a while now.. It's usually not too bad, but occasionally I want to run an OpenGL app or watch a DVD or something, and I can't at the moment.. Moving big windows around is also pretty painful..

Anyway, I think it might be a weekend project

Phone rings
Me: Hello?
Female voice: Is Dan there?</em>
Me: No. (as I start walking to the whiteboard) Can I take a message?
Female voice: This is Sara (I pick up the marker) from Hillel (I put down the marker). We're having an event tomorrow for Israeli Independence Day. (The image of a riot comes to my head -- of course, there was one just the other week when we won a hockey game..) If he's interested, have him call me at 555-1234.
Me: (Pretending to take the message) ...1234. Okay, I'll pass that along..

Dan's actually an atheist (though he was raised a Jew), but someone got him on Hillel's mailing list. I've been instructed to throw out mailings from them, etc..

My mental imagery is probably out of line, but there has been a lot of chatter between the Israeli and palestinian/Arab communities on campus (as I'm sure has been the case all over the world lately).

It's just weird how the people in these communities interpret the words from those on the other side. Seems like they can't even agree on simple facts. Of course, the conversations are flooded with hearsay. It seems like you'd have to tear down everything -- all of the supposed `knowledge' that people have -- and go back through with independent historians to clear up all of the misconceptions.

We can have peace in the region.. It'll just take a hundred years or so of research...

Anyway..

I've been sleep-deprived along with others.. It gets to be really bad when I have homework that I've procrastinated on, and then I have to stay up really late working on it.. I don't think this would be a problem if I had a regular job and could leave work at work.. Of course, I'm also a person that requires more sleep than the average (well, that's been my experience, at least).

Not sure why, but I tend to need 9-10 hours, but maybe I have other problems that contribute to that. For instance, factor into that the fact that it usually takes me 30 minutes or more to fall asleep. I'm also a fairly light sleeper, so the diesel trucks and buses running by on University Ave. don't really make life any easier..

I tend to sleep really well when I go home. In my childhood, I'd only be awakened by the garbage trucks that came by once a week, weather, and people clanging around in the kitchen.. Now I have to deal with planes and trucks all of the time, plus roommates and neighbors that turn up the volume too much..

I guess it's good that I have to move -- I just hope I can find a place in a quieter neighborhood..

Had a hell of a day yesterday.. I was trying to figure out texture mapping for my computer graphics course, but it just didn't happen. I just wasn't able to figure out how to get the appropriate (u, v) coordinates of a texture from a pixel on the screen. I think I just have a fundamental non-understanding of the math involved at the moment..

The annoying thing is that I was avoiding the course for most of college, knowing that it involved math that I didn't like. Finally, I was trying to figure out my schedule for this semester, and it looked like a good choice at the time.. Maybe I should have gone for that real-time systems course, but that might have been even worse...

The next assignment is a ray-tracer, which I'll have to work on every free minute I have, I think..

I'm so disappointed with myself today..

Not really understanding the relationship between hotplug, cardmgr (PCMCIA), and usbmgr. Apparently, I can't use both cardmgr and hotplug at the same time. Okay, I can, but the kernel event daemon (keventd) and cardmgr will both start the networking scripts when I insert my wireless Ethernet card.

I haven't been able to get hotplug alone to work with my ethernet card, so I apparently have to run at least cardmgr. I guess this means that if I want to do USB stuff, I need to run usbmgr, which obviously doesn't try to start the networking scripts.. I guess it's good I don't have FireWire on my laptop, otherwise I'd have to see if there was a firemgr or similar program...

I suppose I probably just didn't properly set up hotplug..

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