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11:00 PM
they all seem to go to netgear, ask for the cheapest product available and say "Ok, now can you recompile the kernal with the "EnableRandomAnnoyingErrors" switch enabled"
 
@RobMoir This is exactly my problem. When the service works, it's good. When it breaks, or you actually try to do anything useful with it, they're worse than a bunch of confused badgers blinded by meths.
 
0
A: Renting a IPv4 address block

JacobExpanding on Zoredache's comment, the only way you're going to get any sort of space in a broker is to DIY it with a VPN/tunnel. A /25 is 128 IPv4 addresses which are a highly valued commodity these days that you are going to pay out the roof for.( Expect 1-2 dollars IP per month atleast) For a ...

 
It's a clever business model, because most people only care about how good it is when it does work, and not about how crappy their experience is when it doesn't.
 
Must lobotomize all the network things...
 
I took the bait and went for it... Comments?
 
11:02 PM
I have to be honest, my service is great by and large. I'm trying to upload a terabyte of data to crashplan at full speed, which is a bit of an edge case compared to their normal users, so as annoyed by the router choking as I am, I can see that its not something they're likely to anticipate and test
 
@Jacob I think OP is insane, personally. Having said that though, that's the only way I can see it working: Host a box in a DC and build your own tunnel.
 
I don't think that OP is insane, just totally unaware of the implications of what they've asked for...
 
@voretaq7 Why I spent half the post about logistics of that many IPs for BS.... instead of how to do the tunnel
 
why they would do that instead of just filling out some damn forms and getting the v4 space from the school (which probably has a /8 or a /16, and would probably allocate the space for FREE) is beyond me...
 
i've got two /24s I'm hardly using at work, tbh.
 
11:06 PM
@RobMoir Likewise.
 
@RobMoir they're doing this at a university, for whatever reason -- why the hell would they not just call university IT up and say "Look, I need a /24 for a semester. Gimmie."?
 
@Jacob I think it is basically a shopping question and voted to close. Your answer is probably the best he is going to get though.
 
that's the bit that confuses me voretaq, even a small college like mine can handle that.
 
@voretaq7 His age is listed as 17, are you sure it is a university?
 
we had a /8 at the uni I used to work at, too.
 
11:07 PM
@Zoredache could be a young frosh. I assume something that complex wouldn't be a HS project...
(and if it were I'd wonder how rich his parents are that he's gonna pay an ISP to rent a netblock...)
 
@voretaq7 Mine pay to rent a /28 :)
 
@voretaq7 Schools around here require a senior project, the student can choose whatever they like. If that is the case, he may not have looked at the pricing, and is just hoping it is going to be cheap.
 
@Jacob I pay to rent a /32 and some rack space every month. But if I just needed it temporary-like for a project? Hellz no!
 
I guess part of learning how to do projects is learning that just because something sounds cheap and easy in your head that doesn't mean that it actually is
 
Morning ladies
Let's get Tom O'Conner his second gold badge
-10
Q: Display all records from a table

sharatI'm new to PostgreSQL. I don't know how to display all records from the table. I tried with this CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION display_rec() RETURNS SETOF abc AS $BODY$ DECLARE rec record; BEGIN FOR rec IN (SELECT "name" FROM abc) LOOP RETURN NEXT rec; END LOOP; END; $BODY$ LANG...

 
11:10 PM
I probably have a spare /25 worth of address space, but there is no way I could get it too him.
 
hell there are plenty of people in the "real world" who still haven't learnt that lesson yet
 
He needs 4 more upvotes for a Reversal badge
 
@voretaq7 You have one box somewhere?
 
@Zoredache I could see this as a senior project, but honestly I'd expect a little more from a kid who came up with the idea (like an understanding that we're out of IPv4 space :)
@Jacob ayup, have since like forever ago :P
 
My 93% accept rate would be higher if some of my questions weren't unanswered mothballs :(
 
11:11 PM
@voretaq7 it do any cool stuff?
 
(same box too - I'mma replace it early next year)
 
I think he has a vague idea, which is why he wanted to do this project.
 
btw @MarkHenderson - that question. boggle.
 
it serves that page.
which I change whenever I feel like it.
 
11:12 PM
@RobMoir Fuckin aye
 
( Understanding rep begging us frowned upon) I need 8 more up-votes...
 
And are will still out. Did ARIN give out all their address space? I know IANA is out, but the RIRs still have some.
 
@Jacob Meh, if rep begging was the only thing that went on I'd be a happy guy ;)
 
@voretaq7 I.... Just... Died a little
 
@Zoredache IDK if ARIN has any left
@Jacob It's also the box I leave connected for AIM but it's developed a power supply problem and reboots itself randomly now, so no AIM ghost until it gets replaced.
 
11:13 PM
@Zoredache Nope they say they still have 5.63 /8s left
 
I didn't think any of the registries were exhausted yet
 
@voretaq7 AIM?
 
@Jacob and they'll have it forever because ARIN won't give you a /32 if you can't prove that your grandmother is dying and needs the IP to live
 
Is there some santa hat avatar thing going on I didn't get a memo about?
 
@voretaq7 Yeah, we need IPv6 NOW
 
11:14 PM
@Jacob AOL IM
@growse there's a meta about it
 
22
Q: It's Santa Time!

HolocrypticLet's do this. What with the DramaLlama being out in full force, I think it's time to take a breather and bring the funny back. To wit: I propose the Santification of your gravatars till after the new year. Some of us have already gotten started. You can use the image as your baseline. or ...

 
^^
yeah, that one.
 
@Jacob There's only ONE ISP in Australia that offers native dual-stack, and it's opt-in only :(
 
Wow, there's literally a memo
 
@growse I must inform you that you are required to have a hat to be in this chat.
 
11:16 PM
I'm right on it
getting into bed, where all the santa magic happens
 
@MarkHenderson Verizon is "opt-in" but I can't figure out how the hell to opt in
6 more....
 
@Jacob we needed IPv6 like 12 years ago when I first played around with it on 6bone. Now we can't live without IPv6
@Jacob badge whore :P
 
@voretaq7 Can't live?
@voretaq7 No I really want to join the close Q "group" :P
 
@Jacob Possibly. Back in my Cisco days there was a huge problem where a Cisco router had crashed and it just happened to be reporting the status of a bunch of ventilators in ICU. Needless to say one of the ventilators stopped working and the person died
And no alerts went out because the router stopped working
Of course, that's not Cisco's fault - you don't put your life saving equipment on a non redudant network
But it was a wakeup call
(my wife who is nurse informs me that the ventilator would have been beeping like crazy and alarms would have gone off, so there was something more going on there that we weren't todl about. They also have battery backups in them.)
 
I really wish ARIN would give me some v6 space :(, I told them I would even pay for the AS
 
11:20 PM
@Jacob Why wouldn't they give it?
 
well, I'll give you a nice real-world example. The device my company sells detects coronary ischemia (usually due to eating too many bacon-triple-cheeseburgers with extra lard fries).
The diagnosis half of the system is on servers here in NY. Data has to come over the internet to us, and doctors have to be able to connect to our website to retrieve the results.
@MarkHenderson he doesn't have a v4 block and can't demonstrate commercial need is my guess
 
@MarkHenderson I'll find the email
@voretaq7 but it's like Air, it's almost endless...
 
Using actual Photoshop for adding a santa hat feels a little overkill
4
 
@growse Well, otherwise you end up with a hat like Jacobs ;)
 
@MarkHenderson :(
 
11:22 PM
@Jacob I was going to fix it for you but I ran out of time
 
@MarkHenderson I used mac paint
 
@Jacob THAT'S WHAT THEY SAID ABOUT v4 SPACE! WE'RE NOT MAKING THAT MISTAKE AGAIN! YOU WON'T STEAL OUR PRECIOUSES!
:P
 
when i wonder if photoshop is worth the bother I think of the miracle that is the magnetic lasso tool
 
@growse pixlr.com
 
@RobMoir You don't need that for the hat. Just use the magic wand to select all the whitespace, and then control+shift+i
Bam, one hat cutout
 
11:23 PM
0
Q: How do cloud storage providers like Amazon Web Services provide “unlimited” storage capacity?

MattHow do cloud storage providers like Amazon (Amazon Web Services S3 and EBS) provide “unlimited” storage capacity? I put unlimited in quotes because it’s really just the appearance of unlimited storage but nonetheless the amount of storage available for customers is massive*. I see cloud storage...

 
good idea. Just goes to show that just 'cos I have photoshop it doesn't mean I know how to use it
 
The real question is - how many of us actually paid for our copies of photoshop
 
Hm should I take this one...
 
@MarkHenderson DID YOU!?!?
 
11:24 PM
Thats subjective
 
go on
 
Nobody except Amazon really knows
@Jacob Yes. We rent Adobe CS5 Creative Suite for our developers and I'm 75% developer, 25% sysadmin
 
@MarkHenderson You should just kill it with mod Fire.
 
My employer paid for mine - and I am allowed to run it at home legitimately
 
I don't have PS, because I dislike the idea of a 3AM Law enforcement raid...
(ok no not really, but I have zero art skills)
 
11:26 PM
@MarkHenderson mine belongs to my employer
 
paint.net and gimp are both good and free
 
So I didn't pay for it
 
good night folks!
 
@TomOConnor only needs ONE MORE VOTE, c'mon all! serverfault.com/a/342319/7709
BAM done
 
@MarkHenderson done, I need 1 also cough
 
11:28 PM
Second user to get a Reversal badge (during the next badge calculation anyway)
@Jacob Thar you go
I forget what you get at 3k
 
@MarkHenderson Close and open votes
 
@Jacob Useful!
Although open votes are almost never used
 
@MarkHenderson can you delete the question now ? it should have gone some time ago really :(
 
@MarkHenderson you bastard - I was typing a nice answer to the Amazon storage guy :P
Now I had to make it fit into a comment
 
@Iain haha well, maybe it needs to hang around in case we have a question of the year wards...
 
11:29 PM
I think that is 3K in one year, I think I found SF about this time last year
 
@Jacob go to /reputation, it'll show how much you gained in the year
 
@Jacob I think it took me about a year to hit 10k, and then it took 18 months to get my next 10k
earned 0 reputation out of a maximum of 1000 from suggested edits :(
I have one of the highest edit counts on the site too
I also have a really shit flag weight
 
@MarkHenderson A lot of us went great-guns at the beginning of the year trying to make sure we hit @nonapeptide's 10k challenge thenubbyadmin.com/2011/01/04/…
 
@voretaq7 Ohh i didn't know about that
 
@MarkHenderson you're a mod - nobody cares about your flag weight :P
the flag-weight e-peen means a lot less when you're blue
 
11:32 PM
Well, being a junior admin at best, 3K is good IMO
 
heh I recalc'd myself end gained 2 rep. First time I ever gained rep from a recalc
 
I actually hate that flag weight, because it means that we're always getting bitching when we decline a flag, because people are trying to get a badge out of it
2
The number of flag declined questions on MSO pretty much dwarf most other topics
 
@MarkHenderson . . . people realize that Joel & Jeff don't actually mail you a real badge right?
 
@voretaq7 Ah, but it's a game you see
 
Mine are all real
 
11:34 PM
Somebody should make real badges
 
in a glass display case
 
it's all a game and they keep adding new levels
 
Preferably knitted
 
@MarkHenderson ohhh, like that 6cube thing all the kids are doing so their stalkers know where they are?
 
@voretaq7 wtf is 6cube?
 
11:34 PM
@voretaq7 I thought that was foursquare?
 
@Jacob wtf is foursquare?
I feel old
 
Wouldn't it be 8cube?
 
@MarkHenderson it's like 4square, but we add the elevation to every checkin so you can properly launch a missile ;-)
 
or 12cube, maybe
 
"World of GeekCraft" - I'm a level 80 Inhuman Hunter with a pet kitten called Necromancer
 
11:35 PM
@growse cubes have 6 sides^Wfaces.
 
well, technically, a square only has 2
 
@Chopper3 WHOOO CHOPPER3
 
@voretaq7 12
 
a frontside
 
I didnt see you come in
 
11:35 PM
and a backside
 
Woo.
Reversal!
 
@MarkHenderson I have a pay stub from a k12 institution qualifying me for academic prices.
 
@Chopper3 my cubes are solid
 
well, if it's edges, it'd be 12cube
 
@MarkHenderson we all look the same
 
11:36 PM
if it's corners, it's 8cube
 
@Chopper3 It hurts more when you throw it at someone
 
if it's faces, it can only be 2square
 
@Chopper3 Racist
Im a kitty
I do not look the same as everyone else
 
@voretaq7 more still when it's a fragmentation cube
 
@Chopper3 I draw the line at checking in to fractals.
@growse I suppose that's true... how do I raise a geometry bug?
 
11:37 PM
Do what everyone else does. File some nonsensicle dribble on launchpad.net and wait for the WONTFIX flag.
Oh, was I just inappropriately bitchy about Ubuntu?
 
@growse you can tell who's worked in 3D CGI can't you with that question ;)
 
@growse no. Ubuntu sucks.
Ubuntu is the Swahili word for "Sucks"
 
0
Q: Site Traffic and Server Details

Mike FlynnIs there something online where I can figure out what hardware would be beneficial for certain traffic? I would like to give recommendations on what hardware/server a client needs for their given traffic, and concurrent users.

 
@voretaq7 it might suck, but it's useful for proving various points
 
11:40 PM
@voretaq7: as far as the server version goes, its debian for less ideologically pure people. The desktop version... they keep fiddling with the darn thing, one reason i go for one of the official forks.
unless of course, you hate linux in general
 
Ubuntu is the Hyundai of OS's - cheap, pretty enough, does fine for povo's getting from A to B but little else and certainly would get laughed out of a corporate environment
 
@voretaq7 - hah you got owned. Good news is that I'm re-opening that question once he edits it.
@Chopper3 You just made me die a little bit inside. We use ubuntu for our zabbix proxies :'(
But we also use Zabbix instead if Nagios, so meh
(nagios made my head hurt)
 
@MarkHenderson I never once found anyone who got Zabbix to work properly
So, congratulations, I guess...
:p
 
@MarkHenderson I'm sure plenty of Hyundai owners choose to eat at Taco Bell too
 
I think thats precisely the point of it, really
 
11:44 PM
Indeed.
 
notes i have to wrap my head around red hat style distros at some point
 
@growse I fsking love it. We have some huge TV's showing all our vital stats and it took me about a day from beginning to end to get configure for about 100 servers
 
@MarkHenderson I served him back -- perils of making an answer into a comment :)
 
@MarkHenderson You use Zabbix? I'm deciding on that vs Zenoss, but as @Journeyman said I never got it to work
 
I mean the point of ubuntu ;p
 
11:46 PM
@growse I've never found anyone who got Nagios to work properly
 
@MarkHenderson I found that it works at first, and then endpoints start randomly going quiet and not checking in, for no reason at all
 
Zabbix suffers from the problem that configuring it anything other than manually, is a massive ballache
 
(my definition of "properly" being "my phone doesn't ring every 30 seconds because a gnat farted in the underfloor")
 
@JourneymanGeek Scientific Linux is the one to start with, it has a future and is free - I'm seriously impressed
 
@voretaq7 80% of my job is admin'ing Ubuntu and that's STILL funny.
 
11:47 PM
@voretaq7 Nagios and 'working' isn't a boolean state, I find
 
@AdrianK about 30% of my job (with spikes up to 90 occasionally) is Ubuntu. For me it's not funny, and I despise the distribution, maintainers, and Linux community in general for all the headaches it causes.
 
@growse Hmm, ok. I haven't had that at all. We have one machine on a high latency link that had that issue, but I threw in a Zabbix Proxy at that site and now it reports to the proxy and the proxy reports to the main site, so the data is delayed but complete
 
I really do wish that someone would make a decent, non-sucky Linux distribution. Ubuntu just has the lowest suck quotient (or at least the one most orthogonal to my use cases)
 
@Chopper3: I'll probably give it a try my next 'server' rebuild
 
@growse Oh it works. That's the pro.... excuse me I have to go throw my phone in a volcano to shut this alert up...
 
11:48 PM
define non sucky ._.
 
@MarkHenderson Zabbix graphs as well, does it not?
 
I'm gonna test out Mint when i rebuild this laptop.
 
@TomOConnor I've heard good things about mint
 
@JourneymanGeek honestly I'm over the moon with it
 
@voretaq7 Aye. so have I
 
11:49 PM
@voretaq7 yes, there's no good mechanism to say "only alert me if this is a problem 5 checks in a row"
Mint sounds good from here too
 
@growse my current system (intermapper) doesn't have that. but it does have "wait N polling cycles and alert me if it's still broken" which is close.
 
@growse It does, but it lacks in the reporting a bit
 
@MarkHenderson does it dump stuff into SQL or RRD so I can do my own reports?
 
@voretaq7 MySQL
 
11:51 PM
@MarkHenderson HATE
 
@voretaq7 I get in every morning to a flurry of emails, because the nightly SQL backup caused the SQL performance counters to go a little mental
 
@Chopper3: right now i'm moving stuff over to a VPS. We're losing the office i 'work' in in september so i need to get it done by then. Then i will can look at new distros ;p
 
@MarkHenderson ah, that's the other thing I hated about it
I ban MySQL
 
@voretaq7 For infrastructure stuff, I've been less than happy with them. And their default security blows. But for our users LTSP terminals working right out of the box, they certainly couldn't be beat.
 
11:51 PM
I always loved Cacti for graphs, but now considering Graphite.
 
@growse Intermapper lets me disable notifier groups by time, so I just put that stuff in a group that doesn't send out messages between 2300 and 0300 :-)
 
@growse: what do you use? posgres?
 
@MarkHenderson Question for you that doesn't deserve to go on the site. Can I use WDS with a bunch of random desktops or would I have to image them all or something silly. (I work for a Small bussiness that used to buy a Workstation whenever they needed one at the best price.)
 
@Jacob Yeah, WDS can work on random desktops. Windows 7 is packaged the same in WDS as in normal install, so you can deploy a raw Windows 7 image, or a pre-configured one that's been sysprepped
 
my problem is I have to give it to users (so I need user-friendly tools), but I also need to lock it down so they don't break it.
The intersection of those two requirements is a freakin' black hole
 
11:52 PM
Biggest issue is making sure that the PXE environment has the appropriate drivers so that the install can boostrap itself
 
@MarkHenderson Cool, can vista do the same? I want to cheat and upgrade from XP->vista->7.
 
@Jacob You can't upgrade via WDS I don't think, it's fresh install only
 
pxe environment? I've heard of such things.
I cal lit "neverland" - as in "I'm never gonna have enough time to make that land in a workable configuration"
 
Also, we skipped vista, so i don't nkow
 
@MarkHenderson smart man.
 
11:54 PM
@voretaq7 PXE works right out of the box with Ubuntu & LTSP on the Alternate install CD. I hammered down a 75 step deployment process that even a padawan can do in 6 hours.
 
@voretaq7 Occasionally I get things right
 
@MarkHenderson If I can reinstall all they programs they need with GP, I'll most likely do a fresh install
 
@MarkHenderson i'd be happy if I could manage "occasionally"
 
@Jacob Fresh installs are best. In-place upgrades are the devils work as far as I'm concerned
Maybe things have changed now, but it's just not worth the effort
 
@AdrianK meh, I don't care about Linux. I want to PXE install my FreeBSD servers :)
 
11:55 PM
@voretaq7 we stick to single model configurations for >12months at a time so we can always get a range of pxe'able images - but you do have to be dogmatic about not varying from that kit
 
@voretaq7 Debian close enough? =D
 
@AdrianK Debian GNU/Freetard/Linux? NoThx :P
 
for production stuff we're like 99.9% HP BL460 G-whatever with the odd DL580 for devs and 980's for 'big stuff' and that's it
 
I prefer my software projects to innovate on the software rather than jump up and down wailing about free versus non-free versus pay-for versus linux versus gnu versus...
 
@voretaq7 Our database folks prefer Debian. But I can never get them to test out new versions anyway, so upgrades aren't ever a problem.
 
11:57 PM
@AdrianK Postgres prefers FreeBSD - the elephant and I are of one mind on this, and upgrades are never a problem :)
 
@voretaq7 for us, free is making a virtue of a necessity.
 
@AdrianK our 'support' people remove gcc/cc as that makes things 'more secure' apparently, doesn't just make changes a massive pisser of course no
 
@AdrianK free/cost or Free/If you aren't using the GPL you're terrible person who eats live kittens?
@Chopper3 Remove the compiler and Unix may as well be Eunuchs
 
The guy in this question works at a company in my greater metro area. I can be at his office in 40 minutes. Any suggestions?
0
Q: Site Traffic and Server Details

Mike FlynnIs there something online where I can figure out what hardware would be beneficial for certain traffic? I would like to give recommendations on what hardware/server a client needs for their given traffic, and concurrent users.

 
@voretaq7 latter the virtue of the necessity of the former.
 
11:59 PM
I do understand and empathize with the "more secure" argument, but seriously?
 
@JourneymanGeek postgres / mssql at work
 

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