Diary of a Network Geek

They’ve been waiting for me.
I can tell that the folks at my company have been waiting for a guy like me to show up. Today, I had three different persona PCs from three different employees in my cube. Mind, I mean three machines that they brought from home to have me look at for them, not machines from the office. Mostly, they just needed to be defragged and have their anti-virus files updated, but, c’mon, three? Obviously, these people have just been waiting for a “real” computer person to show up so that they can get me to do basic maintenance for them. Actually, come to think of it, I need to update my anti-virus signatures myself!
But, that doesn’t mean I have any less work that’s work related, either. Just this morning I was setting up a PC for yet another person from New Orleans. Which is a good thing, I guess, when you consider some of the alternatives. Of course, it would have been nice if they hadn’t promised that same cube to two different people without telling anyone. I was about to try and move his e-mail from the Windows 2000 machine he had in the office to his G4 Powerbook, but then we decided to take a “wait-and-see” stance instead. With all the miscommunication flying back and forth, we thought that was better. The chaos from Katrina has everyone sort of “runnin’ and gunnin'”, if you take my meaning, and that makes things extra challenging sometimes.
So, with all this craziness going on at the office, I find myself asking, “Should I be doing all this for people?” I mean, it’s not really my job, but the folks asking me to do this for them are the top-level managers. Should I be telling them “no”? I’d really rather not do that, since everyone seems to like me and the work I do for them. Granted, I’m not sure that most of them have any idea what I actually do on a day-to-day basis, but still, they seem pleased, so I’d rather not rock the boat.
Oh, and in recent updates, I did finally manage to get the satellite phone working, but now, since it took so long, we’re trying to return one. Not sure if we can do that at this point, but we’re trying. And, I’ve been messing around with all kinds of Windows 2000, NT and XP issues on the network. Getting all the folks from both offices working has been a bit of a challenge. In fact, if not for the DMZ port on my firewall, I’m not sure I could have had the two domains working together, since they’re named the same. I’m sure that would have caused problems if they’d seen each other on the network.
And, I really should be looking more closely at the version of Linux I want to run on that mythical server that I should be getting spec on. I’m leaning toward either Red Hat or SuSE, possibly even SuSE with all the Novell Open Enterprise Server stuff on it. I have to admit, if I were to get good install media, that could be really cool. All the stability and flexibility of Linux with the way cool administration tools from Novell. Those tools are, after all, what they’re known for developing. It’s the best “value added” product for Linux that I’ve seen so far.
Well, I guess I have some time before we’re really ready to do all that, so, while I wait, I’ll probably just read Sams Teach Yourself UNIX System Administration in 24 Hours, so that my skills are sharp when the time comes. But, now, I’m tired, so I think I’ll just go to bed.

Linux in your car.
Hey, why not? This guy did it and documented it at his website. Again, this might not be everyone’s idea of fun, but I am, after all, a network geek! I love the idea of having a built-in PC so that I could go war driving to the extreme. I mean, that would really redefine war driving, wouldn’t it? To have the PC running off the car, built-in and scanning literally as I drove to or from work would be so cool. Geeky as all get out, but cool to me.
Heck there’s even a book about doing that kind of thing, including the PC, called Geek My Ride. And, yes, I own it already.
God, help me, I am such a geek.

Well, anyway, if you’re feeling secure in your geek-hood, click the link and have some fun this weekend.

Hmm, this could be fun…
Lately, IBM has been really supportive of Linux. In fact, they have a whole section on their site dedicated to cool things you can accomplish with Linux. The latest of these is an article about how to use Linux to set up a wireless ISP. They suggest setting this up for a neighborhood or office, but I’m sure there are applications far beyond that. They take you through the basics, but, after skimming the article, I sure wouldn’t reccomend this for the Linux neophyte. The article does cover, in brief, all the aspects of this project, including hardware choices, but it focuses on a series of bash scripts written by the author to help you manage your WISP. That’s all well and good, but, of course, limited in scope.
So, why not add all that functionality to a backpack and make yourself a walking “hotspot”. Yeah, that’s not a joke. A guy actually took a backpack with solar panels built into it, added some wireless hardware, and made himself into a roving hotspot.

Now, that’s entertainment! And perfect for a fun, freaky Friday link.

Hmm, I’m wondering who has the real advantage here…
Well, if you read Slashdot, you’ve already seen this story about a Linux guy using wine to update a WGA game successfully. Apparently, he’d been running this game on wine quite well for a while, but it needed some kind of update. So, he used the update feature from within the game, while on Linux running the wine Windows emulator, and he was prompted for his Windows Genuine Advantage code. He put it in and the Microsoft website proceeded to tell him he was running “Genuine Windows” and update his game. So, what was that advantage again?

Oh, and it looks like I’ll be on the road tomorrow, just for the day. Off to Bellechasse, Louisiana to install a couple of desktops. Three, actually, in one day and transfer data and settings on two. It’s going to be a long, long day. At least the boss will be flying me, so I won’t have to hassle with airports! (Don’t worry Diary of a Network Geek junkies! I’ll post something before I leave.)

It’s a quiz on Beliefnet of all places!
When I took the “What’s your Potter Personality“, I was, at my best Albus Dumbledore. Obviously, I was pleased with that result, since I often think of myself as the Old Wizard, who makes things happen that other people don’t quite get. Well, with computers, anyway. Unfortunately, at my worst, I’m closest to Luna Lovegood. Luckily, I don’t believe in crazy conspiracy theories, so I must be more Dumbledore than Lovegood. At least, that’s my story and I’m sticking with it!
Well, either way, it was a fun quiz.

So, this is my roundabout way of saying I finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince yesterday. I liked it. Honestly, I’m surprised that this series grabbed me the way it did. Originally, I started reading it to give me more to talk to my step-daughter about, but then I got all caught up in the very complicated, multi-layered plot. It’s quite well done. Now, how do I talk about this without revealing any significant plot points…
I know it may have been too obvious, but I thought the Half-Blood Prince of the title was Voldemort right up until the real answer was revealed. It was, I have to admit, a bit of a surprise. And, frankly, with all the reading I’ve done over the years, I’m not often surprised by a plot twist. The other thing that seemed, well, a bit off to me was who Harry hooked up with in the book. Though, in a way, it does make sense, and I almost expect a wedding in the next book, if everyone involved survives. Speaking of survival, I’m not convinced that the character who died will remain dead in the final book. He’s too important. Personally, I think he’ll be reborn, in some way, into something that will be significant in killing Voldemort. And, I think Fudge will end up being the Minister of Magic again, after the dust clears.
Yeah, that’s about all I can say without giving anything away. It’s a good book and a good series. Of course, it is important to remember that this is really children’s literature that has wider appeal. For a kid’s series, it has a horribly complicated plot and mesh of sub-plots. Not to mention the unusually deep characterization and sophistication of the fantasy elements of this created world. I’ll have to reaquire the first five books and re-read the entire series before book seven comes out. (Yes, they’re that good!)

Now, I just have to pick the next book to read. Hmm, should it be The Napoleon of Crime : The Life and Times of Adam Worth, Master Thief or Linux Server Security, or I Heard You Paint Houses : Frank \”The Irishman\” Sheeran and the Inside Story of the Mafia, the Teamsters, and the Final Ride of Jimmy Hoffa, or Linux Firewalls (2nd Edition), or Jesus in Blue Jeans : A Practical Guide to Everyday Spirituality, or Cities of the Red Night : A Novel. So much to read and so little time.

That’s Novell’s SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9 for the acronym impaired.
Well, I’m evaluating flavors of Linux to replace our antique Windows NT server, in my copious spare time, at work. Of course, my first choice was to go to Novell’s site and download the free demo of SLES 9. It took the better part of a day and night to download the ISOs and burn them, but, again, I did that in the background.
First of all, the install was quite simple and found even the junky, old hardware that I scrounged together for a test machine. Though, I have to admit that I found it rather annoying that I only used three of the six CDs I burned to do the install. And, I only used the third of those because I was installing a SAMBA server to minimize my client-side changes. (Yes, I know to block all SAMBA traffic out to the ‘net. Thanks for worrying about me though.) If I get the time, I’ll go back and try to figure out what was on those last three disks. I figure it was documenation and source-code, mainly, but that’s only a slightly educated guess.
Now, I’ve never actually used SUSE before, so it was a little new to me. Bascially, it’s standard Linux and X-Windows, but what’s installed by default and the assorted management programs are a little different than what I’ve gotten used to on RedHat. But, once I got the hang of YaST, it wasn’t a problem. In fact, reconfiguring the server via YaST was how I got the SAMBA server installed, configured and running. I should point out that I did this all without the benefit of reading any documenation and it still only took me about five minutes. Very easy to use, even for a relativel newbie.
Mostly, it’s what I’ve come to expect from the modern distributions of Linux. It was easy to install, simple to configure, and pretty to look at while doing both. Oh, and on the old PII with 512Meg of RAM, it ran really well. Nice and smooth. I was able to connect to the SAMBA server, map a drive and copy a file without any issues or having to set it up as a PDC or BDC (that’s Primary Domain Controller and Backup Domain Controller, again for the acronym impaired). I haven’t done any security testing against it, but it’s tucked safely behind our new firewall, so I’m not too worried.
The one thing I noticed that I really liked was the fact that you had to enter a password to reboot the machine. In RedHat, at least the RedHat AS 2.1 I used, anyone who had physical access to the server could simply click the reboot button and it would. With SLES 9, after clicking that button, I was prompted for a password. Only after I supplied the root password did the machine actually reboot. Nice feature, that.

So, over all, nothing spectacular, but a good, solid offering from the newest Novell group, SUSE.

Why does this not surprise me?
According to this article on Groklaw, SCO had statements from an expert indicating that there was no infringing use of SCO proprietary code in Linux. Is this really a revelation? No, not really, but it is a little surprising to me that they would go ahead on their plan to attack Linux anyway. Apparently, they had the documents in which this information was discussed sealed so they could go on with their pointless lawsuits. Well, I guess they’d have had more of a point if they’d been successful. Of course, SCO did scare enough people running Linux that they bought, essentially, insurance policies to “protect” themselves from litigation. In light of this information, that seems like wasted money. Which, incidentally, is what I said from the very begining. I was asked by several people about this issue, in both my professional and personal life, and my response was the same. SCO’s alleged license infringement looked totally bogus and unwarranted, not to mention unprovable, so it wasn’t worth spending any money to “legalize” anything with them until the lawsuits had played out.
Gee, it’s nice to know I actually knew what I was talking about, isn’t it?

Man, I hate to admit this…
But, my home network is illin’, yo. I have run Netware at home for years. My firewall has been Bordermanager, because who the heck knows enough about it, besides me and the guys at Novell, to crack it? Yeah, yeah, I know, security through obscurity is a Bad Thing, but sometimes it does work. Anyway, I have one Netware server that crashes hard with the slightest power fluctuation, even with line conditioners in place. Just the littlest bit of power blip makes it shutdown. Not reboot, mind, but shutdown. And, several weeks ago when it did that, the data volume took a dump and never came back. I have no idea how much data I lost there, or how mad my wife is going to be because of the data she lost there, but I don’t think it’s coming back this time.
So, that got me thinking… Why should I stick with Netware? I’m more of a Linux guy now anyway, so maybe it’s time to look into Linux firewalls.
Any suggestions? And, anyone have any suggestions for ways to try and recover that crashed Netware data volume?

Linux Distro, that is.
What else would I have meant, you children of the “Summer of Love”? Yeah, like anyone besides me reading this has any idea what the “Summer of Love” was.
Anyway, for those of you who are geeks and not flower-children, or, at least, those who are both, if you’ve ever dreamed of having your very own Linux distribution floating around out there, now you have help. From Big Blue, ironically. No, really! IBM has a page called How to Build Your Own Linux Distribution.
This is a little better than the infamous Linux From Scratch, and, in fact, includes links to that very site. But, it also has some thoughts about what to put into a distro and why. It’s a starting point at most, but I think the article presents a fairly good first look at what you need to consider before trying to “roll your own”.

Now, put the “doobie” down and spark up your mind instead of melting it. Go forth and spread the the word: Linux!
Hey, if you’re a network geek like me, this is your idea of Friday Fun! (Man, I need to get out more…)

Just a random collection of thoughts.
Earlier this week, Frank Gorshin, the original “Riddler” died. He was always my favorite character. So wild, so creative, and always the mad genius who seemed one step ahead of the Batman. Yet, somehow, the writers always managed to make him trip up in the end. Never did figure that part out. And, interestingly enough, the Batman cartoon, which is the only reason I wake up before noon on Saturdays, featured a new villian today. You guessed it, the Riddler. He was good, but, he was no Frank Gorshin.

Thanks to a faithful reader, BleuCube, I took a quiz this morning. (My apologies, incidentally, for not spelling your site’s name correctly all this time! My very English oriented mind simply “corrected” the exotic French spelling on the fly.)

You scored as Cultural Creative. Cultural Creatives are probably the newest group to enter this realm. You are a modern thinker who tends to shy away from organized religion but still feels as if there is something greater than ourselves. You are very spiritual, even if you are not religious. Life has a meaning outside of the rational. Cultural Creative 94% Idealist 75% Romanticist 56% Postmodernist 56% Existentialist 50% Fundamentalist 38% Materialist 31% Modernist 6%

What is Your World View? (corrected…again)
created with QuizFarm.com

And, finally, in security geek news, there’s a new version of nmap. The new version is not only faster, but uses a less invasive technique for scanning networks that leaves no trace. In other words, for you WinDoze admins who leave IIS out on the network, exposed, this bad boy can do a port scan on your network and you wouldn’t know it by reading the logs. Oh, but good news for you, there is a WinDoze version, so you can test your own network and try to plug the holes. If you can manage it between applying patchs, fixes and anti-virus updates. I’m so glad we’ll be moving to Linux soon at my office!

Well, it’s time to go play with my dog. It’s a nice sunny day here in Houston, and the grass seed I planted is starting to grow, so I’m off to water, feed the fish, and play some fetch with Hilda. Maybe I can finally get her to drop the ball when she brings it back…