astroaztec: (Default)
Today's e-mail contains a plaintive cry from some database admin. After some decoding and much inference it seems that Oracle has been handing out a script that I wrote to enable cryptographic authentication of remote processes. But I have had to evolve the script in response to changes in ssh, and it is clear from the meagre information in the e-mail that Oracle has also modified the script from what I published.

There are two catches here.
the plaintive cry can really only mean that the admin does not understand the function of the eval command in a Bourne shell
I'm not prone to help there
I'm being sent pieces of something that is supposed to be a secure operation on somebody else's machine
I really don't want to know those details
I suppose I should be pleased that Oracle didn't strip out the comments with my name, but the whole point of publishing that was with the expectation of some assembly required.
astroaztec: (gumby)
The girls and I saw Ponyo today. I think we all needed a fairy tale. This was a good one -- one to just let wash over us as if we had instead gone to the beach to let the waves roll us.

H1N1

Aug. 29th, 2009 07:21 pm
astroaztec: (gumby)
School's back in. H1N1 has already affected folks where I work.

Tonite the girls are at a gymnastics sleepover. That includes dinner and breakfast.
Before the pizza boxes were opened they stopped the music and made a general announcement:
Wash your hands.

I'm not sure if that will prove efficacious when there's a gym full of kids all bouncing off the apparatus until midnite, with the final hour explicitly comprised of team construction efforts.
astroaztec: (should you eat that?)
Something about xkcd today leaves me reticent to go looking for the reference in the mouseover text.
astroaztec: (G'Kar)
This week some of the Lutherans were contemplating the status of gays, and the weather shifted. The response by one Christian author and blogger was a six point list interpreting the event.

I wonder what happened to 1 Kings 19:11
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind.
That doesn't motivate me toward desire in general, but also in specific, because I've been there.

When I was 5 years old I was playing outside on a clear day with my brother and mom. Mom suddenly noticed debris flying through the air, and she shooed us inside to run down to the basement. By the time she got to the door the wind was blowing too hard for her to pull it open; she was trapped outside.

She was well in the end, but the neighborhood was not. A large tree to the westsouthwest of our house had fallen. Across the river to the eastnortheast more trees and a structure in a park had fallen.

In the Minneapolis incident on Wednesday there was damage to surrounding buildings, and the steeple was broken and bent. At our house the TV antenna was bent.

To some extent any debate is moot, for among Piper's beliefs is a stance on free will which is so decorated with qualifications that it's not really possible to tell whether he believes in it. I suppose Piper omitted 1 Kings because the interpretation of that might be something like
I desire God because it feels so good when he stops sending tornados.
No, that really doesn't work for me. If it takes a tornado for folks to hear God, then we're all damned. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
astroaztec: (mirror)
There's a rather large fire burning west of Bonny Doon. The local AM radio station pre-empted its usual schedule in favor of running ongoing reports from folks near the scene. One lengthy item came from one of their own morning show hosts as she drove home toward Ben Lomond.

Right around 16:30 she waxed on and on about the San Lorenzo Valley, the color of the smoke, the little village of Felton, the PG&E trucks, the traffic, the fire trucks arriving from San Bernardino.

I myself later saw the fire trucks from Camp Pendleton arriving.

But somewhere in the midst of all that she remarked that Blade Runner 2 is to be filmed in Felton...

What?
astroaztec: (mostly harmless)
today's news:

Chronicle columnist finds odd google ad placements which leave him unsure whether marijuana is a gateway drug to Jesus or Scientology

Governor Palin is no longer on facebook. Gosh, Sarah, we hardly knew you, but a few words in all caps were enough to assuage the doubts of your friends.
astroaztec: (should you eat that?)
News item: two state beaches closed due to shark sighting.

Gosh, I sure am glad I live near the unregulated county beaches.
Those have no access controls, but the sharks would never come here.
astroaztec: (G'Kar)
that's Miz-ur-uh

New Jersey judge dismisses Deutsche Bank foreclosure

This story has been replicated all over the blogosphere. It's a fun story, in large part because it evokes memories of Mel Brooks' The Producers. German bank. Double-sold securities. Springtime for, uh, Godwin.

I have found nothing to corroborate this story. There are no details, names, places other than one bank...

and the lawyer whose blog it is.

This posting, the whole blog, shouts out: Hire me! I'll win your case.

As much as I'd like to believe it all, that one thing is the only certainty I can find
astroaztec: (ribbons bells)
The 2009 California Morris Ale
this year in Santa Cruz
Details of the public performances are at that website.

oh yeah, and please, please, please...
nobody tell the beer-swilling morris dancers that just the other side of the road the United Spirit Association has a summer camp full of cheerleaders
astroaztec: (mirror)
There are naked ladies in the back yard.

It is that time of year.
astroaztec: (should you eat that?)
The economy now seems to be satisfying one major prerequisite for the zombie apocalypse
astroaztec: (Default)
Mutt says "All mail clients suck. This one just sucks less." -me, circa 1995

the only way to be sure that the SMTP headers contain the fields and values you really want is to read RFC 822, 2821, 2822, etc., construct a message with the right content, and deliver it yourself
astroaztec: (mirror)
Matthew Crippen was arrested.

Things that you own may be used in ways that the manufacturer did not intend? Of course.

If the hardware he was modifying was paid for, then this application of the DMCA is wrong.
astroaztec: (mirror)
William Shatner's retake of Sarah Palin's farewell has stirred the pot of pop culture. In response David Sarno of the LA Times points out another Shatner performance. Some 30 years ago Shatner did Elton John's Rocket Man, and later that itself was parodied by Chris Elliot.
astroaztec: (mostly harmless)
Incredulity deserves to be shared

deep fried butter balls, recipe included

We should also be round?

No. I've seen what vials of blood look like as they cool after being drawn from someone who had just eaten a Burger King Whopper meal deal.

Bunny 1395

Jul. 21st, 2009 10:06 am
astroaztec: (mushroom)
Oh, wow.

Bunny has a tie-in with Questionable Content

This could have been me. Maybe it was.
astroaztec: (Default)
Last night I found that the Australians had re-inserted comments into one configuration file. I had removed them last month after I found that their Linux API chokes and dies if it encounters comments preceding the code. They had acknowledged the difficulty and said they would omit comments. I didn't get to proceed with the development cycle of my code.

They responded today asking why I was using those particular methods of their API. I pointed out they had suggested that method. I recalled the history of correspondence about instances where their API has not provided consistent results and does not have any means of signaling failures. They responded with a piece of code that I never would have expected.

Their solution is to connect to their server and then subscribe to an empty event list -- to subscribe to nothing.

The entire exchange is something I've read before, in one of the Technomage novels that filled in details which were omitted during the production of the Babylon 5 series.

Google has the page with that conversation.

Conjure nothing, for in so doing we get access to everything.

privacy

Jul. 15th, 2009 10:11 am
astroaztec: (Default)
I really like Schneier's presentation about keeping laptop data from customs authorities.

Now all I need is
  • a trustworthy correspondent
  • data that actually need protection
  • reason to use my passport
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