the clueless american

Fixing Sound in Intrepid Ibex

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 23:46:52 -0600

Another one of those 'just-in-case-it-helps-someone-else' posts: Overnight I upgraded to the newest version of Ubuntu, and this morning I found that I have no sound. I toyed around with many of the proposed fixes (many of which I realize are out-of-date) before realizing that for some reason my system defaulted to the 2.6.25-386 kernel instead of the 2.6.27-generic. I manually edited grub's menu.lst to default to the newer kernel and rebooted. My sound came back right away! I then did something I always mean to do but never do: I went back and uninstalled all of the old kernels left over from previous updates. I got rid of ~500MB of space and am using the latest stable kernel. Yay!

A whole new 'dinner and a movie.'

Mon, 26 May 2008 18:13:14 -0600

This week I'm in Alaska for work, and I've been visiting all of the popular restaurants in town including Humpy's and The Moose's Tooth. Yesterday my buddy MS took me to the Bear Tooth Theatrepub. It's a movie theater run by the Moose's Tooth owners. In addition to standard movie fare, they have a full kitchen with sandwiches, appetizers and the famous Moose's Tooth Pizza. Inside every other row of seats has been replaced by tables. There's also a bar inside the downstairs area, while unaccompanied minors are restricted to the alcohol-free balcony. Yesterday we saw 10,000 BC there. It wasn't that great, but how can you beat a movie with a delicious pizza and locally-produced draft beer in front of you? I definitely should see about opening one of these at home!

Sounds of silence

Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:59:14 -0600

Did you know that you can buy silence for $0.89? Check out this album where Amazon helpfully offers to sell you all 60 silent, 4-second tracks from Lady Jane Grey's self-titled album for $0.89 a piece! That's 53.40 for 4 minutes of silence!

Stuck in upgrade hell!

Sat, 23 Feb 2008 21:08:06 -0600

I've always thought myself fairly knowledgeable on computers, but I'm starting to feel a little behind the times. It all started when I finally got around to unpacking my Windows box from Turkey and trying to set it up. What I initially thought was a little ding to the case turned out to be that the whole front of the case was smashed in. I decided to buy a replacement case since it seemed the case was not salvageable. The first case I ordered from Newegg arrived with the front panel completely sheared off. There were six little cylinders on the front panel that were supposed to snap in the metal part of the case, and they were all rolling around the inside of the case, having been neatly sheared off in transit. I asked Newegg if they'd just ship me a new front panel like they did the last time this happened, and after a few days they agreed. Much to my chagrin, the new panel arrived without any of the 6 posts that were supposed to connect it to the case. In other words, it was broken exactly like the one I already had. I got frustrated and completely returned the broken item to Newegg--on their dime much to Newegg's credit. After a 2-week pause where I was alternately too sick or working too much to work on the computer, I ordered another, sturdier-looking case from Newegg. The case arrived, but again due to work it was over a week before I had a chance to work on it. Now, to back up a second, when I discovered the damaged case I powered up the computer long enough to see that it did in fact work properly and the hard drives seemed ok. Jump back to the present, or at least a few days ago. I had some time to work on the box, so I carefully disassembled the old case, unplugging and unscrewing everything as I went along. I then carefully installed everything into the new case. I was impressed by some of its features but won't get into a review here. About 6 hours after I started, I fired up the computer for the first time and got...nothing. Turns out I forgot the video card had a power plugin. I fixed that and started again. The CD/DVD lights came on like a normal boot and then the computer just started clicking. The LED on the network card was blinking in time to the clicking and the power seemed to be dimming slightly with each click. No POST, nothing on the video... After much searching on the net, I decided my motherboard must be fried. I need a new one anyway because after I installed everything the CPU heatsink fell off because the plastic holding it on had also been damaged and gave way after I closed the case up. Not my day, you know? So, I started looking for a new motherboard. After a fair amount of searching I've determined that Socket 478 mobo's are all but gone. In addition, AGP video cards are likewise toast. Finding a board with both is near impossible. Fine, I said, I'll upgrade the mobo, processor and video card; been wanting to upgrade that old P4 3.0GHZ anyway. Guess what? The first 10 or so boards I checked out have only one IDE connector for my 4 drives!!! Now I'm willing to upgrade my mobo because it's broken anyway, the cpu because I must and the video card likewise, but I am not upgrading to SATA hard drives when my IDE ones are working just fine for me! So now I'm stuck looking through each type of board because for some reason IDE (PATA) isn't a search option on every motherboard page. I need to find a reasonably priced board that will work with everything I own except the processor and video card, and then I need to find those two items that will work with my board. I don't want to spend too much but don't want to fall too behind either. I don't really feel like going through every spec of the board and learning what the new terms mean, but I'm going to have to if I don't want to "upgrade" to a completely new system. Yikes!

Lookout I think I'm gonna narf!

Thu, 10 Jan 2008 21:21:28 -0600

Even after reading some bad things about it, we decided to give Lady in the Water a try tonight. I don't know what kind of crack M. Night Shyamalan was smoking when he wrote, directed, produced and once again made himself a central character in this film. Here's the secret revealed at the end of this movie: you just wasted almost 2 hours of your life! If Bob Balaban had lived through the whole movie, I'm sure he would have kept reading his lines to the audience to tell you what a bad film you just watched. Yuk!

Just in case you were wondering.

Thu, 27 Dec 2007 21:03:45 -0600

So congrats if you have a good enough education to understand the blog :-)

Back online!

Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:41:32 -0600

Not that I expect too many people read this blog, but I finally fixed the error that has been keeping me from posting to my blog for over 2 months. In case this winds up on someone's Google query and can be of help, I was getting the dreaded 'Statement has no result columns to bind' error that was preventing me from using my site. After much trial and error I came across a site recommending that I clean up the MySQL tables. I went to http://paulstamatiou.com/2006/05/31/how-to-quickie-repair-mysql-tables-in-phpmyadmin/ for tips on how to fix my tables using phpmyadmin. In my case repairing the tables with overhead didn't help but I noticed my mt.log and tbping tables reported "in use" and the associated MYI files were dated Oct 18th where everything else was Dec 19th. I repaired those two tables and so far everything seems to be working again. Yee-haw!

New Laptop (!)

Sun, 09 Sep 2007 08:50:00 -0600

I've been given the go-ahead to get a new laptop, partially because the house is under contract and hopefully will belong to someone else by the end of the month (yay!) and partially because my new job will likely keep me away from home a lot. I've always said that if I get a job with a lot of deploying then I needed to get a new laptop with all the built-in goodness my 7-year-old model does not possess. After over a year of e's iMac, I was set on a MacBook Pro and nearly bought one when we saw it on the shelf in Germany. Just when I was working up the nerve to spend that much $, I realized that if it were to be my travel computer I'd need to be able to do work on it and that means I'd need to use my CAC to check email and PureEdge viewer to fill out the various gov't forms we use. I was bummed for a while. I know there are solutions to run Windows on Mac, but the whole point is that I didn't want to run Windows. Still, I was resigned to getting a Windows laptop--got pretty close to laying out the cash for a Sony VAIO VGN-FZ180E/B--when I decided to do some more searching. It turns out I'm not the only federal employee who'd like to use another operating system. It didn't take too much looking around to find "CAC on a Mac," a technical paper written for the Naval Postgraduate School which describes how to get the Common Access Card certificate working on a Mac. I'd previously used the article to flash the gov't card reader, allowing it to work under Mac and Linux. I still needed an IMT solution, and the fact that e really wanted Windows for her two favorite traveling programs, AutoCAD and PhotoShop, wasn't making life easier. Then last night when I was ready to give in I found out that the gov't saved the day again. It seems there are a lot of government researchers who use other operating systems. When the grant application program went to the same PureEdge system used by the AF there was a mutiny because the researchers didn't want to buy new computers just to be able to fill out some forms. The government used its no doubt considerable leverage over IBM and convinced them to do what PureEdge had always refused to consider: develop an IMT viewer for the Mac. You can download it, appropriately enough, from grant.gov here. I'm hoping it's only a matter of time before someone ports the viewer to Linux. I'd really love a completely open-source laptop but I think that's not in the cards for me this time. Now, off to the Apple Store! Too bad they don't ship to APO addresses :-( Guess I'll have to wait until I'm up in Germany again or until we get back to the US.

Whar all mine be at?

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 20:34:23 -0600

Using AFN with MythTV

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 07:20:32 -0600

I wanted to get this post out there in case there's a MythTV user looking to see if it will work with AFN when you're stationed overseas. The short answer: yes it will. If you search for 'afn mythtv' you'll no doubt get a lot of results pointing to the same basic post where in Sep 2004 a fellow military member nicknamed "Smoking Gun" wrote a perl script to grab AFN listings data. I'm happy to report that such a script is no longer necessary. As of 2007 when I moved to Turkey, AFN is now part of the DataDirect lineup. It's available under many ZIP codes, but I happen to use 10101. All you need to do is create your lineup at Schedules Direct using 10101 and AFN Satellite. Assign this lineup to a video source and run mythfilldatabase as usual. You'll now have channels 1-10, AFN NPR on 24, Radio AFN on 25 and AFN Freedom on 26. If your base cable has a different lineup, no problem. Simply use the channel editor in mythtv-setup or the one in MythWeb to make the channels match your cable setup. If you have unscheduled channels like the Commander's Access Channel you want to view, simply add the channel in mythtv-setup. It won't have any guide information but the channel will be viewable in live TV.

For Sale

Sun, 12 Aug 2007 12:49:05 -0600

Welcome to your new house!

Location: Blue Springs

Come see this immaculate two story house on a great lot in a Swim/Tennis Subdivision. The huge Master Suite offers great privacy in the Master Bath! The large second bedroom could be used as a teen suite or your private office. Bright kitchen with all-white appliances opens on the spacious family room with gas fireplace. There is a separate formal dining room open to the formal living room. This house is a must see!

Information

Contact Information

Norine George

(404) 713-2029

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Pricing

Asking Price: $189,900.00

Flexibility: Firm

Property Location

707 Spring Ridge Ct
Kennesaw, GA 30144
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Features

Bedrooms: 4

Bathrooms: 2.5

Parking: Attached Garage

Year Built: 1999

Subdivision: Blue Springs

Lot Size: 1/2 up to 1 acre

Garage Size: 2-car

School District: Lewis, Awtrey, N. Cobb

Agent Name: Norine George

Broker: ReMax Integrity

MLS #: 3521523

Attributes

Appliances

Range/Oven

Dishwasher

Sink Disposal

Microwave

Satellite Dish

Interior Amenities

Fireplace

Security System

Photo Gallery

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Equal Housing Opportunity

VFLYER ID: 792838

Getting Older

Thu, 26 Jul 2007 13:10:13 -0600

According to http://www.timeanddate.com/date/duration.html I'm 13,503 days old today. I've got to tell you, it feels like at least 13,650! Even though Jack is doing a much better job of sleeping through the night, and even though I'm not the one who has to deal with him when he wakes up, I feel like I could sleep all day and all night. I'm sure stress has a lot to do with that. The latest word is that we'll be moving back to the US in October. It will be good to get Jack the therapy he needs, but stressful to get from here to there. Maybe I can get some good sleep in November :-)

After my own heart

Wed, 25 Jul 2007 22:20:38 -0600

Mmmm... Unexplained Bacon: Enable CAC card in Linux and Firefox Now, this person has comments turned off so I can't write them, but tell me honestly, is this my twin brother? Simpsons, Firefox, Linux, MythTV, DoD employee...I'm going to have to keep an eye on this page! As it turns out I've already flashed my CAC reader to make it work with e's iMac, which it does..sort of. It recognizes that the CAC is inserted, but when I try to access sites it allows me to choose only one of the 3 certificates, and of course it's not the one I need. Obviously there's still some work to be done, but it's nice to know that I'm one step closer to complete Windows freedom. I seriously almost bought a new Macbook laptop a few weeks ago when I was at the big BX up in Germany, but I stopped myself when I realized that I need a Windows laptop for webmail and other AF-specific items. Now if I can find an open-source way to edit XML IMTs...

Off we go...

Sat, 07 Jul 2007 16:30:58 -0600

Just to show it's not all bitterness and complaining, I offer you this video that I found on the USAF site. I 've been trying to locate the full version to use in briefings, etc but can't find anything bigger than their grainy one. It still gives me chills every time I see it.

Moneybags

Fri, 06 Jul 2007 11:44:02 -0600

One of my pet peeves is wearing diapers because someone else peed their pants. You know what I mean: an organization institutes a policy without guidance or consent of their leadership because they’re tired of dealing with the small percentage of fools who can’t do things right. I just came back from one of those. I’m trying to pay the USAF some money I owe them. First off, they can’t get it out of my paycheck, which is confusing to me because they’ve sucked money out in the past with no problems. So, I follow the rules. I’m supposed to go to the finance office to obtain some sort of code that says it’s ok to payback money. Let me interject here that I will never, ever, require a code from anyone who wishes to give me cash. Then I’m supposed to take this magic code 15 feet away to the cashier’s cage to pay my money. Recently, the cashier’s cage people changed their hours so that they could stop working 12-hour days. I’m down with that, but the change I don’t like is that they’re closed during lunch when most military people try to run errands. Hey, no big deal, I work in the same building so I’ll get the code now and come back later, right? Nope. “We don’t give out codes when the cashier’s cage is closed because too many people get the code and don’t pay right away, which screws up our system.” So now I’ve made a completely wasted trip to the finance section because of an unpublished policy. Again, no big deal for me since I work in the same building, but what about the 98% of the base who don’t work here? What about the guys who work literally 25 minutes away thanks to the ridiculously low speed limits on base? Ziiiip, riiiip, let me open up a diaper. I’m seriously considering getting the code and then coming back upstairs “because I forgot something” just to see if I can freak out the finance people.