grey

Posted using TxtLJ

2008-04-26T03:24:13Z

Damn financial stress! I've automated the mundane, but I want to do better. I'm tired of continually cutting it close. Gratefully, the ends do @least meet.

unix, FIRST edition.

2008-04-25T01:15:35Z

So... my friend Tim Newsham pointed out a pdf of some OLD UNIX. When I say this I mean specifically it's from 1972 before the big C rewrite of 1973 and is PDP11/20 asm (with comments!).

Naturally my first question was - has anyone OCR'd this to make it machine readable so we can try emulating it!? (Tim already emulates some less old unix and it's fun to play on, so you know - this is more of a holy grail unless we found some crazy pre-being-called-unix code for PDP7). Anyway apparently there's a couple things that are digital, but not the whole thing - so he just started a page on googlecode where we're dividing things into 10 page sections and typing it in (and if you just want to review someone else's section that is also helpful). URL here:

http://code.google.com/p/unix-jun72/

If this is up your alley, pitch in! I'm working on section e08 right now. If all the sections are claimed by the time you read this, don't worry - we want people to review each section separately as well and make sure we got it right (or tab/whitespaced correctly or whatever)

Oh, and if you just want the pdf to peruse it's here (I coralized the link to reduce potential load @ bitsavers since it's about 12MB):

http://www.bitsavers.org.nyud.net/pdf/bellLabs/unix/PreliminaryUnixImplementationDocument_Jun72.pdf

PG&E ftl

2008-04-24T19:02:30Z

Please wait while we find an agent to assist you...
This is PG&E Rep, how may I help you?
Grey: Hey, how's it going.
Grey: So, I moved into my new residence (myaddresshere) back in Novemeber.
Grey: aand the previous owner is getting complaints that he is getting billed.
Grey: II called in a month ago to make sure that everything was in my name and that he would be credited for everything from November, and that I would be charged.
PG&E Rep: What is your account number?
Grey: aand I'm looking, and I see that I still don't have anything due, even though the address is listed correctly.
Grey: mmy account # is ****************
Grey: sso I'm worried he's -still- getting charged.
Grey: which should've been fixed a while ago (I didn't even realize he was being charged until last month when my landlord heard from him; and I thought I'd gotten this all settled back in november and it was autopaying)
PG&E Rep: Please call Customer Service at 1-800-743-5000.
Grey: *groan* I've done that already.
Grey: what good is an online support if it's just telling me to use a phone?
PG&E Rep: The issue looks a bit complex. If you want to wait I can help you.
Grey: I would be happy if you helped me; it beats waiting on the phone again to get another runaround.

WOW, I AM ON HOLD, ONLINE! Epic fail.

artkiver @ 2008-04-19T00:50:00

2008-04-19T07:52:47Z

I love synchronicity. I left work late tonight and grabbed a burrito, then bumped into a friend while leaving place on way to BART to find out he was going to a last minute bday gathering for another friend. Continued to new location and saw bday friend + more and managed to hop on one of the last trains home. Realized I must've left my cell phone @ work and was all 'argh' only to be semi-accosted by some weird woman on the walk home who was hoping she could 'use' my cell phone (seemed super sketch) and I could honestly tell her I didn't have one on me and was able to avoid gosh knows what.

synchronicity - always ftw.

Tweets for Today

2008-04-18T19:44:47Z

00:56 Same man! Give my regards to everyone. Hack the planet & all that good stuff! #
00:57 It's really nice to hear back how one's actions make a little difference in people's lives, now I sleep w/ a smile. #

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lost

2008-04-18T06:59:36Z

I feel very... directionless? These days; I'm not really even sure how to describe it. One of the only things I'm finding of interest recently is studying up on folks like Doug Engelbart and Joe Licklider and Robert Bussard and Farnsworth and Armstrong and so on. I look at the depth of their intelligence and try as much as possible to find primary materials, and hear the simple if vague words they used to describe their ideas. Ideas of things intangible and undone when they were conceived and yet we deal with their creations (or at least some of them, a lot of these guys thought of more than ever saw the light of day) in our daily lives now. James Burke's Connections and The Day The Universe Changed are examples of some of the best history telling I've ever encountered, and I'm trying to distribute them to as many friends as possible.

Because meanwhile, I look around at the bright friends I have today; and see so many of their talents just kind of well, to be blunt it just seems like a lot of people wasting time attempting to solve problems that aren't worth attempting to solve, when there are ones that are worth solving that could easily be in their grasp. Or worse, they're not even attempting to solve unsolved problems, they're just doing the same work other people have already done. That's fine as a master's study and for getting one's bearings and figuring out how to do things for oneself, but I mean... once you learn the times tables, do you keep doing them? I mean you'll use those skills and knowledge in what is ahead but let's move forward!

Increasingly, even in my own fields of experience I find that people are looking at me like a crazy old coot when I talk about some of these things. Hell, I feel like a crazy old coot. I don't understand why people don't know their recent history from 20 or 30 years ago and are repeating it already over and over again. I mean, you're supposed to learn this stuff people, not repeat it; and didn't this sort of thing happen on the scale of centuries in the past, and not decades or years?

Maybe it's just the result of the pace of life and technology speeding up, and so mindless exercises in reinventing the wheel are happening more frequently too.

And, as much as I feel like I really ought to be doing something to move things along a bit instead of writing or bitching about it. I am overwhelmed or unmotivated torn or conflicted in most of my life right now. I have a house that still needs unpacking, and shit to get rid of and finances to get on top of and a divorce to finish and new relationships to embark on and kung fu to do again and so much else that is really doing some other things that have been bouncing around in my head for years that haven't gone anywhere really any more important anyway? Will I feel any more sense of satisfaction having attempted these things when I go back again to an empty bed?

Maybe I need to fulfill some primal motivational needs before I go about with loftier goals.

I am still walking forward one step at a time, but I am so lost not only may I not be on the path, I'm not even sure there is one.

Tweets for Today

2008-04-17T19:46:31Z

15:24 "Narrowness of experience leads to narrowness of imagination." - Rob PIke #
22:02 Holy fire ballet of awesome batman! & z0mg las vegas vegan donuts too, wtf! Crazy awesome evening! #

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artkiver @ 2008-04-16T18:32:00

2008-04-17T01:33:46Z

stressed, filled with desires without an outlet, but mostly life is OK.

One of these days...

Tweets for Today

2008-04-16T19:45:12Z

11:46 @corbett if you make it to seattle this weekend, I hear there will be two cases of club mate and two cases of sol mate doing the rounds. ;) #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-15T19:50:59Z

16:34 Advanced audi vw ftw! Towing fees were more than their repairs. Exwife for the stress, argh! #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-13T19:47:42Z

18:18 Unpacking boxes I not only find old things from my childhood, but some of my daughter's old toys. So many memories. #
18:19 & since moifa & chm seem to have returned 'no' looks like it's time to get a lotta display cases for a personal museum. #
12:22 Swapping hdds in a macmini isn't as bad as it looks. Gogogadget 7200rpm! #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-12T19:42:14Z

15:46 Rental car acquired. We'll see if my hate of hybrids last through the weekend as I drive a prius. #
17:13 I <3 driving along PCH. Ocean views along hwy-1 are gorgeous. #
19:15 Confirmed @ atm I have a negative balance grrr. #
19:34 Two cases of Sol Mate' (the North American organic facsimile of Club Mate' also comes in lime flavour) acquired. #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-11T19:43:24Z

22:45 So despite all the car headaches, I gotta say, I'm digging BART & I'm digging the walking to & from stations even more. #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-10T19:44:37Z

16:14 fuck, shop doesn't know how to fix tdi - do I get it towed to a place I trust, or a place that might honor a warranty that sucked last time? #

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Tweets for Today

2008-04-09T19:48:04Z

22:36 NAT - breaking the end-to-end of the internet and still failing. FTP/TLS=ftl #

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artkiver @ 2008-04-07T15:06:00

2008-04-07T22:20:52Z

Weekend was awesome, Absolute Body Control was fantastic, hanging with Billy & Geoffrey was great! Seeing my friend Nick & Tami and their new daughter was great (Sashya slept on my chest for like two hours, making me feel an awful lot like Totoro in the tree with Mei sleeping).

Car leaking diesel sucks, and it's in the shop waiting on a cap for the fuel injector - but at least that happened before San Jose so the trip was still on. Many thanks to Billy for driving!

The scene down in LA is fantastic, and makes me more bummed out to be returning to NorCal where it still feels dead dead dead for a number of reasons (which I may get into at another point), the ABC show venue was weird, and the crowd was weirder, but they were very diligently trying to recreate an 80's club, not just an 80's night - where honest to gosh deathrock fashions and hairstyles were being rawked along with all sortsa androgynous stripey geometric fashions + pump heels and new wavey face paint. I don't think I heard a single song newer than '87, it was a trip.

Oh and vegan tacos - doomie isn't vending @ bunker now (dunno why) but he was vending @ the ABC show, yay! There were still vegan hotdogs @ bunker, and some place called vegan village is opening up like basically downstairs there so next trip, more places to try.

I'm forgetting stuff.

I am in a hate relationship with twitter, but am still using it; and post to it more than I do here of late. I'd like to integrate the two, but srsly loudtwitter (as well as any site where I give my credentials for another site) leaves me super unsettled. I mean great idea guys, but I don't want to escrow my stuff, I'm leery enough about keychain, but at least it's a local app and I just need to worry about my own laptop getting pwn3d, whereas putting trust in some 3rd party website with lotsa other credentials in it? Sounds like a horrible idea.

Still, it's a useful problem to solve. Anyone know of better solutions or at least ones I can run on my own? [e.g. plaxo/loudtwitter/etc. that I run on my own servar]

artkiver @ 2008-04-03T16:58:00

2008-04-04T00:01:34Z

No braindumps of late, I disconnected the console so nothing's being logged.

Anyway tomorrow after work I'm heading to LA with Billy & Geoffrey I think we'll hit up Stromkern performing @ Das Bunker (and mmm VEGAN TACOS) and probably drop off a bike with Jesse and grab him too.

Saturday I'll spend some time meeting my god daughter (yes I'm a godfather if I hadn't mentioned and you've lived this long without waking up with a horse head in your bed, I hear they're going around), and then seeing my friend Nick give a lecture on Japanese film and horror @ UCLA. Eventually we'll all make it to see Absolute Body Control and I will go bonkers with excitement.

There's lotsa other stuff, but YEESH LIFE IS FULL OF STUFF!

Any of you people down in LA I hope to run into you @ Bunker or ABC.

\m/

artkiver @ 2008-03-27T18:37:00

2008-03-28T01:37:39Z

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/27/fashion/27vegan.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin

The vegan strip club is up for sale though, wtf?!

what a weekend!

2008-03-24T06:36:13Z

Seems like this weekend revolved around events involving or thanks to missorangegirl. There was tit4tat @ Hubba Hubba on Friday (which was bloody sexy, though the blood part wasn't tit4tat's [insert story about x-acto blades being dangerous here]).

Then Extra Action last night, which was fan-fuckingtastic, and it turns out contains several ex Crash Worship members [insert lots of how I never made it to a crash worship show being a big regret here, and quote "Their recordings suck. Compared to what they do live, that is!" from awesome review:http://garote.bdmonkeys.net/stories/scrashzg.html]

Then today was awesome zombie chocolate rabbit spring festival thing in Bodega on gorgeous peaceful land with wonderful peoples.

So tired, but sated in a lot of awesome moments.

[insert other stuff about xraids sucking ass and failing hard drives, and why are my finances still problematic and taxes and crapola some other time]

artkiver @ 2008-03-14T16:37:00

2008-03-14T23:39:02Z

Nothing anyone has ever written on livejournal has meant as much to me as this:

MOTHER FUCKING ABSOLUTE BODY CONTROL!!!!!!!!!

I have the kids that weekend, I will make a way to go to this if even for just the show.

artkiver @ 2008-03-14T12:55:00

2008-03-14T19:56:38Z

Today is mother-fucking π day - I never realized that steak and bj day was trying to usurp it - wtf?!

I do not want any steak, and even a bj won't lure me aware from the sanctity of pure mathematics today.

outrage.

Blame this douchebag:
http://www.myspace.com/birdsey

Leave it to some late 30's straight white motherfucker to hate on basic math.

artkiver @ 2008-03-14T01:15:00

2008-03-14T08:18:23Z

I am not convinced that twitter is useful - twitterriffic gives me errors, their IM bot can't stay online for more than a few hours at a time, and fuck if I want to get sms's to a phone, because if I did I'd be woken up at 1:15am by sending out messages on how I'm still at work.

That said - I didn't send a message because I'm like "0hn03z I don't want to wake people up"

Seriously, if I need to think about inadvertently waking people up or being woken up by the technology - it's probably the wrong technology, they don't pay me enough to be on call, and my friends sure shouldn't be.

What's worse is even though I have no answer for the SMS problem (and don't tell me selectively turning off/on notifications or whatever is the way to do it because, egads DUH I know that already), I do have an answer for their IM problem, but since they don't I don't even feel like sharing.

artkiver @ 2008-03-13T15:39:00

2008-03-13T22:41:42Z

ELIZA: Please tell me what's been bothering you.
YOU:   Joseph Weizenbaum passed away. :(
ELIZA: I'm not sure I understand you fully.
YOU:   Joseph Weizenbaum died.
ELIZA: Tell me more about that.
YOU:   I am sad.
ELIZA: I'm sure it's not pleasant to be sad.
YOU:   he wrote you.
ELIZA: What are your feelings now ?
YOU:   that he was awesome, and you aren't much comfort.
ELIZA: We were discussing you -- not me.
YOU:   well, we were kind of discussing you.  
ELIZA: Oh, I ?
YOU:   yeah, or at least your creator.
ELIZA: Really, my creator ?
YOU:   R.I.P Josephen Weizenbaum.
ELIZA: Can you elaborate on that ?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/world/europe/13weizenbaum.html?_r=2&oref=slogin

artkiver @ 2008-03-10T01:55:00

2008-03-10T08:59:34Z

BTW, while I'm bitching about the fucking technological backwater environment of the US-A I might as well add in - where the fuck is my cheap synchronous 100 or 1000Mbps internet connection like in all the other countries I've been visiting recently? Dear apple & sony I don't give a fuck about what obsolete bluray hddvd optical format you want to include in your next macbookpros, or the company that's still talking about releasing a TERABYTE optical disc of a hundred layers in 2010 [by the time other cheaper faster things will certainly be out] when *-istan countries are deploying 802.16e mesh networking infrastructure. Where the fuck is my fucking smart wireless high speed long range chipset that doesn't drop connection every minute while the FCC sticks thumbs up its ass bidding allotments of spectrum to greedy assholes?!

Srsly we're so fucking retarded here, dear ARGH!

ARGHAUHSDUAHDIUSAHDIUSAHDSUAIHDSAUHD@#D()*SJOA

h8 DST

2008-03-10T08:51:24Z

How many candles are we really saving anyway? I can't say I even own a candle. The best thing about Franklin's ludicrous proposal is he never saw an attempt at implementing it and thus never knew how badly it failed. Frankly, IMNSHO timezones are obsolete. UTC ftw!

Especially because... somewhere @ work there's a clock that's off and a clock that's synced...

meaning - is my database backup running at the wrong time
or is my alerting server using the wrong time to ignore the exception to alerting when database slaving is down.

I know it's not a real alert so I don't even want to waste the time figuring out what's right or wrong, and yet I'm getting fucking paged for it, and up 'late' and this is after I've resolved that I want to wake up earlier in the mornings to spend more time doing things (like cut throat shave, and making tea in my chinese tea set and stretch and exercise and practice baguazhang and and and).

Ah well, it won't be the first time I wake up feeling tired
or possibly sn00ze until the last possible minute. ;)