[TechLife] Run GNU/Linux from a USB pen drive

You can carry GNU/Linux in your pocket with a functional, quick, and useful USB pen drive distribution. Pen drives are faster than CDs, and the small distros that fit on them don't require huge amounts of memory for the operating system and applications.

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Posted by TJ to TechLife at 7/20/2005 07:38:41 PM

More Pictures

Car Accident

Well I was in an accident this past Wednesday, this guy was running from the cops and I just happened to be in his way. I was trying to turn left onto a street when the guy came from the left side and slammed into me. He hit right in front of my door and then my car kind of spun and the back of my car hit his car too. Then both of our cars kind of went in opposite directions. Everyone in my car only received at the most bumps, bruises and cuts (My son didn't have any, and my girlfriend had a bunch of bruises). I got the most though, I had cuts in my head, ear, mouth, and back. I had migraines up till this morning but they have pretty much gone away now. The driver of the other car broke his leg and some other stuff, his passenger wasn't hurt I guess but he went to jail because he had a warrant for his arrest. I'm not sure what is going to happen but the police were apparently chasing him but there were no lights or sirens from what my girlfriend and I remember. When I get the report I'll figure out what the next steps are from here. Pictures uploaded as well of both cars, mine is the maroon one.

Its Been a Long Time

Well there have definitely been a lot of things happening since I last posted in April. On the Army Reserve front I've had it in the back of my mind that I was definitely getting out and being done with all of this before my unit deploys in Sept, but it doesn't appear that I'll be getting out as I hoped. I've had a few episodes of Atrial Fibrillation which makes my heart do some unnatural rhythms, I'm pretty much healthy for the most part except for the fact that it could or could not happen again in the future. So most of this year I have been on a permanent profile for that and I've pretty much thought I had a lock on not getting deployed. This was before they asked for my medical records and what my current heart status was. So I sent them all of my medical records with all the info I had on my incidents but of course I didnt have any current stuff which is what they really wanted. I figured I could go to the doctor and just tell them I didn't want to go to Iraq and bam they'll just tell the Army that it would be too stressful or whatever. The doctor thought otherwise and let me know that my heart will not get me out the Army because I was ok. So now I'll just have to wait and see if they'll get mad because I didn't send the current stuff before the deadline. I guess whatever way it goes I'll be getting ready to deploy, I've been trying to get together lists of things I may need when we go. I know if I do go I would be on point with everything but I just don't want to go. After my 3-week AT in South Dakota last month I was pretty much done with Army crap. It wasn't the fact that I got picked to go back to South Dakota again after last year was crap, or the fact that we got shitted on by the units we were attached to, or the fact that there was NOTHING as far as work for us to do, it was the fact that I had a retarded NCOIC that was a kiss ass with the other units so he helped shit on us. Then he would turn around and lie to our faces about stuff, so I'm sitting there thinking that I do not want to be over in a war zone with this man. I dunno, I guess I'll just have to wait and see how these next 2 months turn out.

On the work front my business manager got fired, apparently while I was gone to South Dakota she mounted some kind of offensive to try to get me fired. The details are slim but apparently she was fired in the process. She really couldnt give anybody any real reasons why she should fire me so that probably helped. Now work is relatively calm without her there, if I was making more it would be great.

[TechLife] So much to do, So little time

I seem to have slacked off big time in my updating here.

First off, the new job is getting a bit tiresome thanks to management but I can deal. The work is still proving to be interesting though. I have been trying to keep up my skills on the side as well. I'm currently trying to up my skills in Linux by doing a Stage 1 installation of Gentoo, which is pretty much starting with very little and trying to build up a system from it. I'm currently doing this on my laptop which is not very fast, so it will probably take me a few weeks to finally get it done. Not because it's that slow but I seem to need some extra steps in between all the slow steps that are dragging things out. I have a system at work that is Gentoo so that is the main reason why I'm doing this, it doesn't work right now and I'm trying to get a better background in Gentoo to try and fix it. After Gentoo I'll probably try to get into some LiveCDs and the eventually LFS (Linux From Scratch)

To all who know me its definitely no secret that I prefer using linux over windows, but at work that's pretty much most of my job. I'm pretty much getting everything down since I really didnt have much background in administration within a windows environment, but I think I can hold my own with Exchange and Active Directory now. I'm really into the scripting now, since I know you can script just about everything I'm trying to build an admin console for myself that will house some of my most used scripts.

Idea Bin:
Net Admin LiveCD (WMI scripting, Nagios monitoring, blah blah, ...and other stuff)
Custom Linux Distro
Office solution for small/med sized businesses (Computers, Phones, Software, pretty much all the basics)

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Posted by TJ to TechLife at 4/25/2005 02:53:00 PM

The Forgotten

There are so many things that we forget through out the course of our lives, events, places, people, etc....blah blah blah. I guess I would try to combat that on a certain level by writing a whole lot (yea, I'm slippin), with pictures or whatever. I'm not really sure why I thought of this though today but I can't seem to write in cursive anymore!!!! Yea, I know that thanks to the computer most of the stuff that I write is typed into the computer and when I do write on paper its in print. You could argue that there is really no use for me to remember that fancy art of writing, but man..... I was sitting there struggling to try and write a whole sentence. It didnt help that I had to look up how to write a cursive Z. I'm not gonna spend too much time on this but it really has me goin for the moment.

Plate is Full

Man, things just seem to get crazier and crazier by the minute. Since I started this new job I seem to be working with less time or something. I just can't seem to put everything into its correct place, even at work I'm kinda zoning out. It's not really because of the lack of work I seem to be working on things constantly, just not enough time to do them. I have a solution for Spam that I'm supposed to have working by Friday but right now I can't even get the machine its on to boot up. Not to mention that fact that this same Spam solution is going to go into production pretty soon. It probably would have been easier if I would have made up the thing but it was left by a previous employee with very little instructions. I guess it's the projects like that which seem to make time tick a little faster.




irwiwtotmiwkwtd

[TechLife] Maybe it is working

Well it appears as if this freaking thing is working, so I should now be able to better categorize my posts

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Posted by TJ to TechLife at 3/31/2005 08:53:00 PM

[TechLife] this freaking thing isnt working

this isnt working

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Posted by TJ to TechLife at 3/31/2005 07:29:00 AM

Whistle While You Work

Work is going pretty well (I guess) I am definitely getting the opportunity to work on a variety of new things that I wasn't before. My job is alot more intense than before but I think that will eventually equalize out and I should be good. They sent me to the Dayton Information Security Conference which started today and lasts till tomorrow, going to that has definitely opened my eyes on some stuff and that's just from talking with people there. Things are a little busy right now but I'll add more later.

Development

Well the first week and a half of work have been going pretty well with a lot of work to keep me busy. I now seem to be doing a lot of R&D work so I do a lot of searching for products or solutions to problems a customer may have and they all seem to vary widely with custom needs. So I think for all of those things I'm definitely looking into open source solutions just because I feel I could get very specialized solutions from them without alot of financial burden.

One of the first things I was looking for was a Crystal Reports type application, I found JasperReports which seems to be what I was looking for but they don't have any freakin installation information so I'll have to see whats gonna happen with that. I'm also going to a customer site to recommend NetOffice, since they were looking at a project management type solution.

So that's my time at work in a very brief nutshell, I'm gonna end this and try to find some more stuff on installing JasperReports.

First Week

Well I can definitely say that wherever I see my career going in the future, I can definitely start out in the right direction from where I'm at now. My revised title for my new job is now Network Cosultant / Developer. I pretty much handle in-house network administration, Web design/development, Application development, Linux consulting, and pretty much whatever I need to do to get the job done at a customer site.

I currently have a Error 721 issue with a VPN that needs to be resolved. I just got done with correcting a half done setup with Exchange & Outlook Web Access. That's just a little bit of what went on during this busy week. I'll post more technical stuff later on the Tech Life side.

Bookmarks Synchronizer

I've been using the Bookmarks Synchronizer for Firefox for about a week now and I have to say that I really like it. I have a bunch of different sets of bookmarks and this pretty much helped me to condense them to just one list at work and at home. So if you have Firefox you should grab it, if you don't have Firefox you should get it.... You'll more than likely like it.

Spread Firefox

Burning Bridges

My current employer didn't really take too kindly to the short notice of 2 weeks notice. I guess technically it was only a few days notice since I was gonna be on vacation during the majority of my last 2 weeks. So now things aren't so hot in the office place. On the good side of things I did go to my new job today and do some work. They told me I was gonna go with them to do an initial talk with a customer on terminal services. When I got there I found out that they were actually trying to secure the contract to do the work, which kind of suprised me. I went along with it and wasn't too nervous about it all because everything we talked about I was looking forward to doing. So hopefully we'll get this client because from the start I'll be the lead on that site, so that's cool.

DIY Home Theater Projector

A DIY Projector is definitely in my near future, this is as good as link as any to start with.

Sub $300 Home Theater Projector
Sub $300 Home Theater Projector II

Free Ringtones

For those of you that love putting ringtones on your phone, this is definitely a site for you. Downloading ringtones is cool.... downloading free ringtones is better. smashTheTONES

Cellphone Carriers Available:
AT&T
Cingular
Verizon
Nextel
T-mobile
Sprint
Alltel
HickoryTech
Qwest
SureWest
Telus
Rogers Wireless
Bell Mobility
Fido

I haven't had the chance to try it yet, but with the promise of free ringtones I'll give it a shot.

Crack Open The Books

Well I start my new job on the 21st and its pretty much the job that I've always wanted. Just about everything I've ever been interested in relationg to computers and technology I'll more than likely be doing it at my new job. On top of that they're paying me to learn, as well as upgrades in pay for every time I upgrade my knowledge (Certifications). So it really is a good deal and I'm so very pleased that it has come along.

Now as for what I'll need to brush up on:
Macromedia Studio MX (Web design as a whole)
Visual Basic .Net / 6
Perl / Other scripting languages
Linux
EDI (What I do now)
System / Network Administration
Cisco
Oracle

For the administration stuff, I know alot about the systems and networks in themselves but I haven't had that workplace experience doing it. So I'll start seeing more problems typical of regular office type problems. Like I said its a great opportunity, great learning experience, and a definite change for the better. So like I said before I'll probably have alot more tech posts relating to alot of the stuff I'm working on. I know starting off I'll have to figure out why one of their servers scsi hard drives keep crashing. I'll also have to work on a new website for the company and figure out some network problems that one of their clients is having. :D Good Fun

Toolbars

I don't really use any of the toolbars/desktop utilities that are out right now, I usually just google everything from the main page and all my popups are blocked thanks to Firefox. Now with everyone fighting for a place on your desktop and web browser with a search bar I may just have to try them out to see if any are of any use.

Microsoft
MSN Toolbar - I'm definitely not a windows guy but I'll still try this out to what it offers.
Microsoft Desktop - Oh wait.... that's built in, Let's see how it compares :)

Yahoo
Yahoo Toolbar - I think I've used this one before but I'll install it again
Yahoo Desktop - "Requires Windows XP or Windows 2000 SP 3+" .... yea, ok

Google
Google Toolbar - Just Google it
Google Desktop - Haven't tried this but I'll give it a shot

Network Administrator/Developer

That boy is in there!!!! :D

Network Administrator....... We'll see.....

Well I had an interview today that I can honestly say was pretty damn good, the job itself should be one great learning experience. Everything I could as for technically in a job is in this one, I was supposed to have a 2nd interview next week but the called me and asked me to come back tomorrow. So I hope all goes well :D If I get this job I'll definitely have more tech to talk about.

On the technology front I just started working with a guy on an EDI module for perl. Pretty much you'll be able to translate your documents from EDI to XML. That in itself may not seem like a big deal but it can become one when you start incorporating that functionality into open source translating software. Now there are some open source EDI translators out there that I would like to try out, with BIE being number one on my list and probably followed by OBOE or MEC Eagle.