Archives 2004
Working with faulty substrates (Ruminations as I rebuild the database yet again)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Hard disks are generally reliable technology. However, I have managed to have two IBM drives, both of which have had failure rates that would make a bed-wetting 6-year-old blush. The second was to replace the first... how wonderful now that it's off warranty. It makes me think, however, how much of my skill is actually ...
How do I manage to find so many holes in PostgreSQL? (You'd think I was doing something out-of-the-ordinary)
Written by
on
in
Snaking.
Am I just abusing this poor little PostgreSQL installation on Win32? Is it just the flaky disks? I mean, infinite running time for a simple select * from table and some freaky error with clogs getting started, remembered, but not retained... you don't really hear about this being the normal experience of PostgreSQL users. Of ...
And now it's working again (Argh, debugging is hard when the debugged thing stops failing...)
Written by
on
in
Snaking.
Looks as though they've continued migrating modems off the old CMTS, so cmon has dropped below whatever magical threshold was causing the weirdness with PostgreSQL. I really do need to get TwistedSNMP to the level where it can simulate an entire Cable plant if I'm going to be able to properly debug these things. Problem ...
Mind wandered for a few minutes (Cheap solar-powered dirigibles for virtual tourism)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
There's been a lot of interest lately in extremely efficient air and sea "glider" craft which can be extremely efficient by using differential buoyancy to let them travel in a vertical zig-zag pattern with very little energy used. I'm thinking, if one could reduce total cost for an aerial version to around $200CDN, it would ...
Patience sparrow, trust the code (If I'd just waited it would have been a less critical error...)
Written by
on
in
Snaking.
I'd forgotten that the manager process actually terminates hung scanning processes after a given period. Doesn't help with fixing the bug, but does at least mean the scanner can keep scanning everything else... though with a multi-hour glottal stop in the middle :( . The real thing it proves is that it's just scanning the ...
Ach, overslept! (Well, more like just couldn't get up...)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Wound up popping up and down for the first few hours of trying to sleep trying out new approaches to solving hanging problem. By the time noon came around I just couldn't get up (back, mostly, but the hands are trashed too). Last few hours of sleeping was all nightmares. Blah. Oh well, day is ...
Still no reservation... (Herding programmers and cats)
Written by
on
in
Vindaloo.
Realised that I couldn't book without first confirming with Shane that we're not going to try to find a place with triple-occupancy allowed. I'm seriously considering the hostel on the PyConForCheap page. It's almost the same price as splitting a $100/night room 3 ways, and I don't really need much from my hotel, just a ...
Think I need to take a real break (Writing blogs as I watch the scanner stall isn't helping...)
Written by
on
in
Snaking,
Vindaloo.
Obviously I'm just missing something obvious. Wish Lawrence didn't have a guest tonight so I could go get a snack, or even go on a walk. Though I already walked quite a bit today. Should work on the metaclass presentation... or more critically, rent a hotel room for PyCon!
Randian versus Liberal views in Programming (Joey points out debate+followup regarding the ethics of Open Source)
Written by
on
in
Snaking.
Back when I was in high-school, our "extended learning" course was given a "real world" demonstration of Randian versus Liberal ideology via an old party game. If everyone in the group is willing to accept a moderate reward, then everyone can simply have that moderate reward. If any one person gets greedy while everyone else ...
This isn't helping much... (Old (running) code is finally showing the cracks that made me replace it)
Written by
on
in
Snaking.
Have spent > 4 hours tracking down problems with the old scanner code. This code is entirely ripped out and replaced with TwistedSNMP in the new version, but the old version is what the customer is running at the moment. I was seriously tempted to just upgrade them to the new version.
Monthly archives
- February 2004
- March 2004
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- May 2004
- June 2004
- July 2004
- August 2004
- September 2004
- October 2004
- November 2004
- December 2004
Next year
Mike C. Fletcher, the VRPlumber, is a philosopher of design turned computer programmer based in Toronto, Canada. He works primarily in the Python programming language, and maintains a large number of Open Source software packages. You can reach him at: mcfletch@vrplumber.com.