Real Job Time?

So I have the iMac set to wake me using Awaken - it’s pretty snazzy, though I need a new wakeup playlist - I have the alarm set for 6:45am, should give me plenty of time to shave, shower, get dressed (in pants! omw!), and get out the door not in a hurry by 8am, slowly drive over across town, find a parking spot, find the building, and be ready to chit-chat job wise. The plan seems to of changed, originally it was a casual look around, now it’s a full on interview it seems, so I need to print a copy of the resume.

All in all I am more tired than excited or nervous, this past two weeks of migrations and moves has worn me out pretty good, but we’ll see how it goes, and I am sure I’ll post an update here or via twitter tomorrow - but once this is figured out, then a lot of things are going to fall into place, finances, new schedule, projects, etc. etc. etc. so change in general - but good things I think.

Anywhoo - I’d ramble on for hours, but for now I am going to drop a DVD in the player, turn it on and drift off into a dream world - more tomorrow, prayers appreciated!

Farewell Servers …. You will be missed!

The end of a big part of my life, that’s what it feels like! Tonight I shut down the core servers of TN/FH (the old ones) - I had been with this DC since the early days of TN, migrating from a oversold T1, to a “SDSL” line that boasted LARGER speeds (yet never delivered), faster connections, that was down for nearly a week - but TN made it’s way back, rose from the ashes, a little hurt for cash, but pushing forward.

The move to this DC was mainly because a side project I picked up, started using the company, back then a startup, a simple, but bold company ready to provide great service, insanely competitive pricing, and for me, the second big dive into server management, as a guy who always had a physical rack of servers in front of me, it was quite a change indeed, but you learn, friendly server monkeys from the DC would give pointers, it was a great company, but in the end they changed names, and got a little “bigger” but still the CEO kept things going, and as some past posts note like in the hurricane they bought extra fuel, staff stayed on-hand, network things were figured out ahead of time if line XYZ died, hot cut to ABC - it was awesome, amazing, and comforting.

Then about a year ago, they merged with another company - and if your a server admin and know some of the key players out there, you’ll know the two companies - the merger was rough, and I stuck with it, I re-vamped servers, got newer hardware, invested in some VPS tech, got tons of IP’s, found new contacts - but it was nothing like the first company, it was a money maker, and who can blame them, money has to be made somehow, and they started working towards it, and in some cases loosing that “personal” touch and going more towards the cold corporate penny picking, every little thing was a extra $2, or $10, or suddenly they’d determine they weren’t billing you for XYZ (which was originally free!) and without warning a $25-$50 monthly increase, things got sloppy.

I stayed for a year, exactly what I said I’d give them to straighten up a little, I know what it is like to re-organize, didn’t want to declare them dead just yet, but with horrible pricing, pushy sales folk, and bad communication and billing system, when the recent option came up, I took it, and I’d take it again - I have no true ill feelings for the company, they have to find their footing, and I am sure there are some out there with zero problems, but the move for me was also related to the upcoming position I may get come Friday, so reasons there as well.

But none the less, I feel a big chapter in my life is indeed closing, sort of makes me a little sad - granted I have 1 server there still, it’s a client server and it’ll probably move in the next month, getting my budget even more happy - but it’s been quite a ride, and I hope, that even with a new job, I can continue to manage and operate TN/FH for many years to come until the bargain hosts run me out of business, but I hope that day is a long long ways away.

Anywhoo - that was my trip down memory lane, a fun ride, more fun to come I hope. Thanks for reading, and again, mega thanks for everyone for their prayers over the past few weeks with the migrations, with only 6 tickets in the end across all the moves, I could not be happier, and now with a big chunk of money saved a month, and bigger hardware for the better price, I move forward, as I am trying to do with a lot of things, so here’s to a great 2008!

T-Mobile Hotspots + 802.1x + WPA2 Enterprise (10.5.1)

So I posted to a few sites about the common problem of the instructions for 802.1x auth over WPA2 Enterprise at Starbucks Hotspots (Provided by T-Mobile) - there were instructions but as of 10.5.1 it seems they were broken - so the other day I fiddled around and found the proper path - I’m posting parts of jayrcole’s instructions from MacOSX Hints and seeding in my tweaks:

1. Open Network Preferences, select AirPort, click Advanced.
2. In the Advanced section, click on the 802.1X pane, then click the “Domain” dropdown and choose “User”
3. Click the + and add in “T-Mobile” - really it can be anything.
4. In the username traditionally it’s your phone number, so fill that in and your password, on Network put in “tmobile1x”.
5. Under Authentication, check these: TTLS, PEAP, EAP-FAST, LEAP, and MD5.
6. Now click on TTLS, and choose “Configure…” and choose “PAP” and under Identity put in “anonymous”.
7. Under Network name, select Join Other Network; in Network Name enter tmobile1x, and under Security, select WPA2 Enterprise.
8. Finally, for 802.1X, select T-Mobile. And you’ll most likely need to re-enter your password (Didn’t save on my MBP).
9. Enjoy Hotspot goodness, and no more login pages, plus your browsing a tad more secure over WPA2, firewall is still a good idea.

So there you have it, if I get really energetic later I’ll install Skitch on the MBP and do some screen shots to go with the walk thru, but all in all this should get you rolling, I used it again today, just did “Join Network” and the tmobile1x was there put in my password and I was off on WPA2 Enterprise fun YMMV, who knows what 10.5.2 will do to us, but if it does change anything I’ll see what I can come up with.

Rest, Hotspot, Hot Drink, Long Day

So today is a long one, I have some final bits of code to make, the image manipulation stuff is bugging me, but I’ll get it sooner or later - it’s not a “MUST” but I wanted to simplify it for the customer, if that doesn’t work, in the browse for local file to upload section it’ll simply list sizes that can be uploaded - and I’ll have a fixed size for the listing - but none the less that’s only part of the day, I have a 2pm and a 4pm, both are tech related, so it should be fun to a point, a nice time away from a console would be nice.

Server wise, DNS flipped today, by Thursday I need to cancel the old hardware to avoid further billing - going to try and do it tomorrow so I can FOR SURE be off and not run any risk of pre-auth’s and such against my card and run into stupid issues like that, but I don’t foresee any problems, it is funny though to watch the old hardware - it’s all at a 0.00 load now, the average loads of 2-5 were always fun to watch, but now each server is running good, the drive array is running smooth - and so far spam is down! So tonight I’ll probably roll over FH/TN and get them live on their new server - but all in all it’s looking good.

As per the first thing I talked about above, the code is to be wrapped up tonight and probably some tid-bits in the AM, but at 2pm tomorrow I have a meeting at Starbucks to go over code, and get some cash, and also hopefully snag some more for a server, so pretty jazzed about that - so today I am heading to Starbucks to make sure my T-Mobile HotSpot access still works, I did the tip from MacOSXHints [the tip] - so I am hoping to go in, order my Hot White Chocolate Venti, maybe get crazy and snag a cinnamon roll, and sit down and test it out and have it work no issue, if not of course I’ll have the cell, see what I can do to get it rolling via support.

Anywhoo - there it is, the status of things, busy busy, I have a lot to do, hoping today too to get a new credit card from a few customers, been happy to see a lot paying the last 2 days as TN customers were just finally all migrated to the new billing system - so a good start, and more to come! Have a great Tuesday Folks!

Farewell Cable TV?

Why do I need TV? Oh the random entertainment, noise in the background, stay up on current events? I dunno, though with Cable modem + Cable TV, I have me a hefty bill - but with all the entertainment available do I really need it?

The options, things like Netflix, Hulu, Joost, Amazon, iTunes, Vongo, etc. various free to low cost monthly subscriptions, I mean even with the ones listed, say $8.95 for Netflix, Amazon.com $10.00 for Rentals, Vongo $10, so around $30 gets me lots of streamable/downloadable content, as well as a single DVD out at a time from Netflix, I mean it’s a lot of stuff for $30, all of which can be view via the media rig using DVI->LCD TV - which then leaves the question, short of Vongo, why do I need Windows again? I don’t write this to make Jake upset about my Mac/Linux love, just looking at options to eliminate a machine, I mean remove the one machine merge some hardware, less clutter.

But time to look at it seriously, if I take digital cable line-up out of my monthly budget, that’ll increase my monthly surplus greatly - any one have any other ideas?

Anywhoo - so far so good today, got assorted things finished up, DNS will hot-swap tonight, just need to migrate the FH/TN core DNS records over and its good to go, but right on schedule with a Wed. cancelation! very cool indeed. It’s all good - thanks for the continued prayers, this week is looking good! Eventually I’ll sleep…. eventually.

Good Morning!

So far so good - I crashed out and woke up at 1pm, so fair sleep, got some minor issues out the way, and on a whim installed Installatron on Trogdor, hit a snag, but the guys at Installatron were awesome and quickly got me a work-around, and now all friends on Trogdor will enjoy the benefits of this great auto-instaler, frequently updated, some nice scripts to choose from - a major enjoyment indeed. If the budget levels out, and once I get all these assorted cPanel lic. cleared, as well as various tid-bit bills I have officially phased out cleared off the books, I plan to install it across all servers.

Tonight will be a night to relax, possibly going and hanging out with Dan and the nephews, I hope my scrabble skills have not gone down-hill, as I am indeed out of practice. But this will be one of the last nights I imagine for relaxing as I head into things moving forward this week with a spot job, a coding discussion, and a job interview - but none the less I am hoping things all work out and move forward, for now though, I am going to hit the shower - and get dressed for a relaxing evening, one way or another.

Thanks to everyone for their prayers over these migrations! Much appreciated - always glad to know I have folks watching out for me even on something that to some may seem trivial like a server move, but every little bit of prayer helps! So again thanks a million, and now I will go forth, and become clean! More later.

With 20 minutes to spare!

So far so good! Even the move for some to MySQL5 as well - smooth! No burps I can detect. Monday I have some clean-up to do with things, I am aiming for Tuesday to shut things down, then that leaves me with some minor tweaks and changes, but nothing massive, then the move is 100% complete!

Looking forward to this next week - but for now, one last glance over of things, then sleep, might meet my 2am prediction at this rate! Night again!