Large broadband ISP called samart in Bangkok are currently installing new network cables for large hotels, and small business's. They require a software program to monitor network traffic so that they can assertain how long a customer has spent on the net and subsequently charge the customer for the use of the network. I have been asked to build the front end for this program, which shouldnt be to difficult. I have choosen to use a DNS/DHCP configured server, running an iptables firewall. We can then take all the packet information and load it into a small XML file so that it can be human readable and so forth printable.

Today is my first post for quite a while. Sorry. I thought i'de let you know whats happening with current dommestic affairs. I've settled in Koh samui (south of Thailand). I live in a typical Thai style wooden house, with every fruit tree imaginable in the garden. A fresh water river runs at the bottom of the garden , and the water comes from the mountain and the Namuang waterfall approx. 1km upstream.

Samui has alot to offer, 2million cocanuts exported to Bangkok every month, along with many other kinds of fruit, some of which I have never tasted befor. The weather is generaly always above 28 degree celcius. November - Febuary is the rian season and helps plant growth plus keeps to temperature to a tollerable state. I live in what I call the country side of samui so the evenings are pleasantly cool.

Working on many various types of physical projects at the momment. I have 25 rai (approx 12 acres) of land in the mountain that I want to develope, a bungalow to build with a friend also in the mountain, on top of that I would like to build some furniture and develope around my house. Additionaly I have the hardware and a network to maintain on a small but busy internet cafe. (free coffee supplied). Ive installed Linux on two of the workstations and im trying to convince the owner to switch over to linux power :)

I almost forgot! Every Sunday afternoon I teach english to the local Thai children. For the older generation I have plans to teach them basic computing (Linux I must strongly advise). Hopefully this with generate enough funds to purchase some machines to utilize in class for practical teaching. This also means that I would be encouraged to stay in Thailand on a long term period, which are my plans.

If you ever feel the urge to come and visit Thailand? Then drop me an e-mail greg@farratech.org I have a second house, big enough for two people to live in. I can arrange collection from the airport, and transport, and snorkeling trips, and site seeing excursions, etc, etc. Island hopping is a fantastic way to see thios side of Thailand. You can visit the Island where part of the film 'The Baech' with Leonaro de Caprio was shot.

Software Suspend

SWSUSP

Enable the possibilty of suspending machine. It doesn't need APM. You may suspend your machine by either pressing Sysrq-d or with 'swsusp' or 'shutdown -z <time> (patch for sysvinit needed). It creates an image which is saved in your active swaps. By the next booting the kernel detects the saved image, restores the memory from it and then it continues to run as before you've suspended. If you don't want the previous state to continue use the 'noresume' kernel option.

Right now you may boot without resuming and then later resume but cannot use those swap partitions/files which were involved in suspending. Also, there is a risk that buffers on disk won't match with saved ones (There is a code that revalidates buffers but currently disabled..) If you need such a facility you may give it a test.

Objective:

To take this code and the code needed to develope it so we can build our hardware device accordingly.

Example:

A gnome desktop configuration that user has configured to his/her personal envirnonment. Capture all the desktop settings, icons, applets, etc, and store it on some removable storage device. Take this device and place it into some other machine, `boot` into the envirnonment as you would your own into the last saved session.

Plans for the implimentation of of a new device has arrisen.

I've been thinking about my idea of a removable, bootable, device that holds a users settings and preferences form a previous session. There are many ideas about how to impliment this idea, but to start with the easyest way is to burn the image onto CD-RW but thats time consuming. So the most practical way would be to construct some sort of removable storage that the host system can boot from, and then into the users prefered envirnonment ie, the last session that the user was accustomed to.
I think its a great idea and hopefully will generate lots of interest throughout the comunity. Im going to set up a sourceforge account soon, followed by a homepage for the project. Only thing is I cant think of a name for the project - Any idea's please?

Well here I am again in sunny old Thailand - "The land of the free" and I mean what i say!

Landed in Bangkok on Monday 21st August after a rough stop over at Moscow (Russia) for three hours @ approx 04:30 local time. There were bodies sread out all over the floor so I endeavoured myself to catch some shuteye on the ever hardened polished marble looking floor. No way was I going to get to sleep so I just walked around alot starring at the unusual habbits of the humble human.

Finally got to bangkok at 21:00pm local time. The heat after stepping of the aircraft was tremendous, beads of sweat on the forhead rolling down my cheaks !!WOW!! One night in Bangkok is just about all I can handle, so right now im sat in this well conditioned net-cafe in Pattaya. Monday I leave for Koi Samui one of the native islands, its alot more chilling than the hectic streets full of cars, truck, bicycles, you name it! The so called Go-go girls are sight to see in Pattaya. Read below for details. Well cant think of much more to say other than im deffo not touching another cc of Thai whiskey NO WAY!!!! NO FRIGGIN WAY!! that stuff is evil. I have never in my whole life had an experience like that!

Im going scubba-diving on the island, and ive also started alittle Thai boxing to keep myself fit. You can certainly tone up in these hot country's I look at myself in the mirror and can see the deffinition comming through.

Ok i'll keep you posted about the rest of the holiday as it progresses. In the meantime - "stay cool"