The Comms Room

Dan

14:01

Got a replacement?

Cold T

14:11

afternoon all

what a long painful day

MikeyB

OH ORACLE YOU SO HELPFUL

SQL> startup
ORACLE instance started.

Total System Global Area 1.0689E+10 bytes
Fixed Size                  2237776 bytes
Variable Size            1577061040 bytes
Database Buffers         9093251072 bytes
Redo Buffers               16924672 bytes

1.0689E+10 bytes

Cold T

lol hate oracle

Dan

Why are we still measuring stuff in bytes

MikeyB

It hasn't yet bent me over enough times that I hate it. Plus I've only used it as a benchmark.

tombull89

GET IN MAH DESKTOP

Dan

14:23

Geek

MikeyB

Kevin Soviero

@MikeyB For the curious among you, it's 9.954907 Gibibytes.

Tanner

@KevinSoviero ty

not enough coffee; any number with an "e" in it can go straight to hell right now.

2

Kevin Soviero

@Tanner It's not my fault I'm bored... I blame physics.

TheCleaner

14:39

PS4 pre-ordered...never too old for video games.

Chris S

Anyone else think both new consoles are rather ugly?

Journeyman Geek

yes

Chris S

Also:

Jack Tretton, the president of Sony Computer Entertainment America, delivered his final crushing blows with the relish of a true showman: PlayStation 4 will not limit the exchange or selling on of its games and it will not require a daily internet connection.

::convinced::

Journeyman Geek

they belong in a trashcan

3

Adrian

@Dan Droid 4. I miss my physical keyboards.

Oh Crap. Just earwormed myself with Olivia Newton John. gak

Chris S

14:52

I have to give Apple kudos for style, though I'm not a fan of round computer objects.

Dan

@ChrisS Not seen PS4, but the XBox looks like a run of the mill mini-itx HTPC

Chris S

<-- PS4 XBO-->

Dan

Yep, no better

Chris S

Is it too much to ask for something that blends in with stereo equipment? (like HTPC cases typically do)

Tanner

@ChrisS yeah between those and the iAshtray I don't know where we're headed...

Journeyman Geek

14:56

@ChrisS: they took the one extremely flexible, standards compliant system, and turned it into a computer that won't even take a hard dirve ;p

I admit, it does looks slightly cool

TheCleaner

@JourneymanGeek The new Mac Pro demo on that site reminds me of the Star Trek movie scene where they are replacing those cylinder-thingies to make the beacon/dish on the Enterprise disconnect and float away.

Journeyman Geek

lol

TheCleaner

Someone is bound to make that Mac Pro look like a keg.

tombull89

Isn't there a redesigned 360 as well?

Dan

@tombull89 Really? What's the point

tombull89

15:00

@Dan to make it "look like" the One.

Dan

Strange

tombull89

...eh?

Dan

Pointless

Chris S

PS4 will allow "self publishing" - ie, you can get the SDK and write your own games without Sony's blessing or license fees (still need the license for printing physical media and all the typical stuff)

TheCleaner

►

Travis

15:09

anyone mess with analog fax lines any?

Chris S

We have a semi-analog fax line...

WesleyDavid

@MarkHenderson Wow, you dredged up an oldie from the Petri forums. BTW, the JoQwerty in that thread is the JoeQwerty over here too. Anyway, let me peruse that thread and see if I remember what happened.

@Cole NoDaddy. That place is like a noobtron star sucking in the unsuspecting and clueless.

@tombull89 GD as a company or the SSL certs specifically? I've never had trouble with their SSL certs. That's part of the trouble, their SSL certs are well trusted (and their support responds 24/7) so it's hard to warn people away from them.

tombull89

The awkward moment when one of the cleaners takes a look at what your doing before launching into a conversation about him having Windows 9 on his machine at home...

voretaq7

@Travis real analog, or VoIP that eventually talks to the telco when it leaves the building?

Dan

Oh man, conversations with utterly random people who try and befriend you. I hate that part of the job

TheCleaner

15:19

@Travis - you have to elaborate... :)

voretaq7

@TheCleaner I assume @Travis talking about an actual "I ATE YOUR PAPER! GIMMEH TONER!" fax, and has slit his own wrists in despair. (Suicide is never the answer -- unless you're supporting fax machines.)

2

Tanner

It weirds me out when I break a critical program and nobody calls...

Did I miss a holiday or something?

voretaq7

@Tanner shhhhhhhhhh

if nobody noticed, there was no outage...

Dan

@voretaq7 Words to live by

Tanner

Or they do notice and it's status quo >_>

WesleyDavid

15:28

I motion to rename "downtime" as "noticetime." Do I have a second...

Dan

One of our guys accidentally put a dev DHCP server on the production LAN today (The lines blur here, to be honest, given that we're a 10 man IT consultancy). When someone read out the DHCP IP address he admitted it outright and apologised. I admitted that I'd have just turned the box off and kept quiet :D

Tanner

hah

voretaq7

@WesleyDavid nay - we already have a definition of "notice time"

(most organizations casually ignore it, like stop signs, but it exists!)

WesleyDavid

@voretaq7 Mine doesn't have a space! Totally different.

voretaq7

@WesleyDavid "confusingly similar" like "Microsoft" and "Mike Rowe Soft"

WesleyDavid

15:32

@voretaq7 Bob Loblaw Law.

Nick M.

morning networking gurus

voretaq7

@NickM. wrong chat, you're looking for Network Engineering (or so they tell us) :P

hmm, did the name change?

Network Engineering

no, apparently I just can't type

Nathan C

@Dan When I was in college I was messing with PXE booting (we were building a beowulf cluster) and accidentally put a DHCP server on our school network. Needless to say, IT basically immediately noticed what was going on. It was kinda funny seeing some student machines booting debian :P

Adrian

@voretaq7 Mutinous Appendages.

@NathanC Rogue DHCP is always fun in thin-client terminal environments too.

voretaq7

@NathanC yes, it's always funny to see misconfigured machines PXE booting because they were told to

Adrian

15:39

I've been known to confiscate unauthorized access points and network widgets

Dan

@voretaq7 Lots of places have PXE as the default to allow contactless imaging etc

Nathan C

Yeah, we had a mix of terminals and desktops

voretaq7

@Dan We live in the land of IPMI-Everywhere now.

but I was referring to personal equipment

Dan

@voretaq7 What? On desktops? Not in my world.

Nathan C

We had a 6-machine cluster (was working with a friend on it) ...then the entire cart vanished from the classroom. All of our work :(

voretaq7

15:40

@Adrian I've been known to smash them.

Dan

@voretaq7 Me too?

Nathan C

So we had to rebuild with 2 machines.

Adrian

@voretaq7 Yeah, that would've probably got me fired.

voretaq7

@Dan why in the name of satan's pointy tail would you have PXE set up on your personal machine?

Security through... yeah, no security for you!

Travis

@voretaq7 @TheCleaner A real analog fax machine... Randomly one day the fax machine had a constant busy. When you tried to manually "hook" it you would get no dial tone. I went round and round with Lexmark. I can put a digital phone on it, plug it into a digital PBX port and make great phone calls on it. Hook an analog fax back into it and it goes back busy signal. Even tried changing to another analog port on the PBX

@voretaq7 @TheCleaner One thing I did notice. If I dial the number and let it "ring" and then plug the line into the analog port it will come "live" and have a little static on the line but not any more than the rest of them

ewwhite

15:42

@voretaq7 I was going to tell a story about how I got IPMI on my wife...

voretaq7

@Travis your fax machine's telco card is broken.

TheCleaner

Butt Set or wal-mart analog phone to test dial tone with?

Dan

@voretaq7 I'm not quite with you - he was on about "student" machines.

Travis

@voretaq7 Replaced the fax with a brand new one, different model and still the same. Plugged old fax in working fax line and it worked

@TheCleaner You want me to plug it into my butt? By butt did you mean cloud?

TheCleaner

Yes plug it into your butt...it's the only way to be sure

2

voretaq7

15:43

@Travis hmmm, "that's interesting" - what generates the analog dial tone? (telco line or PBX?)

Travis

@TheCleaner I didn't bother with the wal-mart analog phone since they would probably have a cow I spent $10 on an analog phone

@voretaq7 PBX

WesleyDavid

@TheCleaner No, plug it into my butt.

2

voretaq7

@Travis OK, new diagnosis: The PBX analog card (or that one specific line) is fried :)

WesleyDavid

BRO, DO YOU EVEN BUTT?!

Travis

@voretaq7 All the rest of the faxes on the card work. Plugged jumper wire into another card and same issue

TheCleaner

15:45

@WesleyDavid If you've got a butt he can borrow for testing, sure. If not, he might have to go buy a butt. Or possibly ask around...but I'm sure eventually someone will offer up a butt to him.

Jacob

Hi all

WesleyDavid

@ewwhite So you can remote-reboot her?

voretaq7

@Dan even if it's university equipment I'm not a fan of random PXE boot configurations. If you can't lock it down you wind up booting random shit over the network (I'm also the reason they stopped doing this at my alma mater...)

WesleyDavid

@TheCleaner My butt has many public service providers that should meet your needs.

Dan

@voretaq7 What's the alternative, though - get someone to go round hundreds of machines when you push an image?

voretaq7

15:46

@Travis hmmm, try a different wire (though I can't imagine a wire short would go unnoticed, or start working if there were [ring] voltage on the line

Travis

@voretaq7 I did a different wire from wall to fax and different jumper from panel to PBX.

Tanner

PXELinux + giant trollface. My class was not amused...

WesleyDavid

...aaand since we're on the topic:

►

voretaq7

@Dan PXE configured to only check/boot from specified hosts - Intel can do that IIRC

Travis

@voretaq7 Only other option is from PBX panel to other building panel or from panel to wall plate

voretaq7

15:47

@WesleyDavid Creepiest Video Ever.

TheCleaner

@WesleyDavid - now you're just being silly. Public service providers don't willingly offer up their butts to just anyone.

WesleyDavid

@voretaq7 You get numb to it after a while.

Dan

@voretaq7 Thats' a fair one, but I don't think I've seen many end devices with that ability

Adrian

@Travis Yeah, I've had a few padawans like that. Other way around in this case though, spent 30 staff-hours across two days replacing what they insisted was a bad cable and it was actually a bad capacitor on the mainboard that took out the onboard NIC.

voretaq7

@Dan then we're back to "do you want to sacrifice security for convenience"

Travis

15:48

@Adrian It works when I plugged it into another working fax line in the main building

Adrian

@Travis Padawan was so insistent that they wouldn't even take a line tester over to verify the cable.

WesleyDavid

@Adrian Go play with your Rubies.

Adrian

@Travis Yeah. I'm really not surprised.

Jacob

Jacob, why is my computer checking for jews? x_x

Travis

@voretaq7 @Adrian The odd thing about it was when Lexmark sent me their "unpublished" latest firmware it received 1 fax then went back to "F-U" mode

Adrian

15:50

@Travis ok, that's odd.

Travis

@Adrian Thta's why I pretty much ruled out any layer 1 issues

Adrian

@WesleyDavid Yeah, that's for later this morning. Need to spend most of today on it since I didn't touch it this weekend whatwith the chasing around of children and house chores.

Travis

Lunch time. My body rejects fat so it refuses to eat itself...

voretaq7

@Travis "Lexmark"

:-)

Travis

@voretaq7 Better than HP I think

voretaq7

15:53

and that's definitely fucked up -- does power-cycling the fax help at all?

could be the phone bits are getting stuck in off-hook mode

Travis

Nope

Power cycled that thing more than the Iraqi government in Baghdad

TheCleaner

@Travis - if you know the cable is good and the port on the PBX is fine, then short of grabbing a testing analog set to verify you can send/receive analog calls with good quality that's the best I've got...or call a telecom guy.

Adrian

FFS. Blasted recruiter calling me wanting to set me up with a graveyard shift NOC contract position for $18/hour.

Travis

@TheCleaner Probably going to call our telecom guy to come troubleshoot the line. Why would a digital line work on the same exact line but not analog? I would figure the digital would be more susceptible to interference

Adrian

I think I've had 3 calls from that guy in the past 2 weeks.

TheCleaner

15:56

@Travis - I was suspecting the port itself, but you said you switched it to another analog port and it worked, right?

@Travis and now I see Tom's feature request and realize that "butt set" was not the right term and I should have said "cloud set"

Jacob

Anybody have suggestions for GOOD windows monitoring?

Adrian

@Jacob genetically-engineered monkeys.

Nathan C

^ this

Jacob

@Adrian Other than that?

voretaq7

@Jacob 1280x1024

Adrian

16:00

@Jacob Hey, you didn't ask for GOOD suggestions.

Jacob

@voretaq7 NAWP my monitor is bigger

voretaq7

@Jacob my standard answer is intermapper. Cheap (not free), easy to set up, and it works pretty well.

Jacob

@Adrian :P

Adrian

@Jacob Accuracy is pointless without Precision.

I'm also an Asshole.

2

voretaq7

The micrometer we used to measure the pipe diameter is accurate to 1/2 µm.
Unfortunately instead of the cold water supply pipe we measured grandpa's tobacco pipe.

well now

THAT'S gonna confuse some Amazon people.

Jacob

16:08

Better Question: I'm thinking of using FreeNAS or Openfiler for a NAS. Anyone have stories to share?

Adrian

@Jacob There was this one time where a creepy guy in an old van pulled up next to me on the way home from school...

Jacob

@Adrian :(

Adrian

@Jacob Low Hanging Fruit. =)

voretaq7

@Adrian ...and sold you a Nexenta?

Jacob

@Adrian You need to find a hobby.

Adrian

16:14

@voretaq7 EXACTLY! How'd you know?

@Jacob I have hobbies. I need a job.

Travis

Why is my printer pulling a 168.x IP address?! That's not even my subnet!

Oh, sorry. Thought I was on super user

3

Tanner

@Travis HEY! You need more SO rep before you can use that excuse.

ewwhite

0

A: Are VMWare ESXi 5 patches cumulative?

This thread is a bit old, but I'm sure that it still gets a lot of hits, so I want to point you to the answer that I gave on my blog: http://www.v-front.de/2012/11/are-esxi-5x-patches-cumulative.html The short answer is YES, the long answer is a matrix of vib pacakages included in each patch bund...

Travis

@Tanner lol

Nathan C

heh, my proxy server's so slow >.<

@ewwhite Shameless self advertising that guy has lol

Kavi Siegel

16:24

If I had a question about AWS Ubuntu Images vs fresh a Ubuntu download, is that a question for askubuntu or serverfault?

Nathan C

@KaviSiegel Amazon's ubuntu images are basically ubuntu with the AWS tools packaged

and pre-configured to use their package mirrors

Travis

0

Q: Reinstalling a downgraded Windows XP

I need to plan downgrading from Windows 7 Professional to Windows XP Professional. I have gone through the links: http://www.microsoft.com/OEM/en/licensing/sblicensing/Pages/downgrade_rights.aspx#fbid=M8oYed8_Y3m and http://www.microsoft.com/OEM/en/licensing/sblicensing/Pages/what_to_do_downgrad...

Jacob

@Travis :(

Travis

Yeahhh....I'm drafting the answer now but it seems to me like he may be a SU :)

voretaq7

@Travis Is there an actual answer other than "Contact MS licensing support"?

and you know, "STOP FUCKING RUNNING XP, IT DIES IN LESS THAN A YEAR!"

Nathan C

16:31

@voretaq7 afaik, there's "downgrade rights" for older versions...but he can use XP Mode if he really needs it.

Travis

@voretaq7 Well with #2 the answer is yes. You can use an OEM disk to downgrade from Win 7 to XP BUT it is tied to that specific computer. So you can't use the OEM on 5 different computers.

tombull89

@Jacob Any reason you don't want to use NexentaStor? It's like FreeNAS, but better.

Travis

Just trying to pull the docs up that state that

Jacob

@tombull89 Nope I'm actually looking at that now

Travis

also for #1 I think the online activation will take care of it and if it doesn't then that is where he will get the code he needs

Dennis Kaarsemaker

16:34

@voretaq7 together with VMS? :)

Nathan C

@Travis I despise their automated phone system

Last time I used it it didn't understand me so I got to talk to someone with a really heavy accent.

voretaq7

@DennisKaarsemaker VMS is already dead

he has a few months left to say his goodbyes to Windows XP

Your organization realizes that Windows XP comes off extended support in August, right? Perhaps your time would be better spent planning a migration away from decade-old technology rather than clinging to this particular brick pretending it's a life preserver? — voretaq7 43 secs ago

(and that's all I have to say on that matter. Fucking 11 year old operating system!)

Nathan C

@voretaq7 Our company's running XP still in a lot of places...ugh.

Travis

@voretaq7 Yep...that's the other part.... We're still on XP

@NathanC Yeah, I'm not happy with them

tombull89

@voretaq7 nah, run XP unsupported. What can go wrong?

3

Nathan C

16:36

The receipt printers apparently don't play nice with 7

voretaq7

@NathanC @Travis Well I assume you're both under $$$$/yr Microsoft extended support contracts, and will be off XP by August.

Nathan C

@voretaq7 Nope...

All single licenses :(

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@voretaq7 nope, not until 2015

voretaq7

(otherwise I will personally hunt you both down and drown you like the runt puppies in the litter of MS admins)

Jacob

@tombull89 No USB install?

Travis

16:37

@voretaq7 Nope...no extended support contracts with MS.

voretaq7

@DennisKaarsemaker WHY. WON'T VMS DIE?!?!?!

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@voretaq7 because banks.

Nathan C

@voretaq7 But we are trying to push terminals in most places since they apparently work better with our printers (which are $1200 each ...pain)

voretaq7

@NathanC @Travis You are both horrible people. Drown yourselves right now.

2

@DennisKaarsemaker BANKS RUN OS/400 (in system 380 emulation mode!)

tombull89

@Jacob Not installable to USB, no. Thrashes the disk too much plus you need at least a 16GB USB.

Nathan C

16:38

I was hired into this environment ...:p

voretaq7

@NathanC HORRIBLE. PEOPLE.

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@NathanC that's not an excuse for not fixing it.

voretaq7

:P

Nathan C

:(

tombull89

If you want a "to USB" install, go to FreeNAS. If you've got a spare small disk (160GB) use NexentaStor.

Travis

16:38

@voretaq7 Did I mention we're still on FoxPro for our financial system? I can't get them to me buy new PC's and lifecycle our old Dell 210's "until they die" is what they say

Nathan C

I'm trying to heh. But not much I can do until next year's budget :P

Travis

@DennisKaarsemaker Different between "not fixing" and "not able" :)

Jacob

@tombull89 16GB USBs are cheap, but looks like I'm stuck with FreeNAS

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@Travis if you're not able to fix it, you're incompetent and shouldn't have been hired :P

tombull89

@Jacob I tried installing to USB and it was painfully painfully slow to install. I think I got to 58% after ~6 hours then I gave up, found a small HDD and mounted it in the CD drive bay.

Travis

16:41

@DennisKaarsemaker Incorrect assumption. Not able to fix meaning the powers that be will not release funds to fix the problem.

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@Travis ah, not allowed to fix.

Travis

@DennisKaarsemaker No, I'm allowed to fix it. I'm not able to fix it because I can't get the funds

Dennis Kaarsemaker

If you don't get money, you're not allowed to fix it

Tanner

@Travis Problem: XP is going off support; we shouldn't use it. Solution: Shut off all XP machines, await funding. :)

tombull89

We are aware of the risks, but we have a dedicated IT team and XP is quite stable without any issues well he seems confiDd3ennTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT error

2

Travis

16:46

@Tanner We have been running on a MS Visual FoxPro financial package since 2004. That is when they put it in and it was "new" to us. MS ended support in 2010 and will end extended support in 2015...we're still running it... and they won't spend the money to get a new, up to date system

voretaq7

and now that it has useful answers -- DUPE.

Travis

@tombull89 lol! XP is pretty stable. I don't worry about the stability, but I do worry about the bugs that are later found and exploited. I remember back in the "Warez" days the IRC channels were a buzz with very old FTP exploits working on Chinese FTP servers because they were never updated. Same thing will happen with XP

voretaq7

@Travis XP is relatively stable today

next year new hardware comes out and it stops working, and you're fucked.

tombull89

Will ServerFault still accept questions about XP when it's EOL?

Travis

Yep. Our plan right now is when we replace machines we get Win7...which will soon be replaced with 8

tombull89

16:49

Apart from the comments saying "You're running what?!, lol" I don't see much productive stuff coming up.

WesleyDavid

@tombull89 XP is stable, secure and capable of enlarging your manh00d buy V1agra your UPS package is delayed attached is an IRS audit complaint

4

Travis

lol

Dennis Kaarsemaker

@WesleyDavid but is it capable of buying a bike?

Travis

@DennisKaarsemaker Only when Firefox is installed

WesleyDavid

@DennisKaarsemaker NO THAT'S WHY I LIKE IT!

Tanner

16:50

I swear to god next user that CCs the CFO because they're pissy is getting lit on fire.

Travis

I wish my CFO had balls

Chris S

We're on Win7 now, have been for 2 years. Will roll on Win8.1 next summer.

Travis

All about the $$ here.. We're still using Office 2000....

Matt Bear

I'm still waiting for windows XP to prove itself before we upgrade, I'm not going to risk an unstable unproven technology

Chris S

We're running Office 2010 - will roll 2013 with Win8.1

I'm already on Win8 with O13, but nobody else is (yet)

Nick M.

16:54

@ChrisS Windows 8? how is that working out for you?

Chris S

@NickM. I dislike it.

Nick M.

@ChrisS what are the users saying?

Travis

I bought 2013 for the win7 machines (since XP wont run it) and use it on my machine and a few other test subjects

Chris S

@NickM. I'm the only one. I wont expose them to this monstrosity, hoping Win8.1 will be palatable.

Travis

Win8 another vista?! Say it ain't so

The CFO wants to go all Macs

Nick M.

16:56

@ChrisS I don't see any benefits in using windows 8 in a business environment

I may come to accept it as a consumer product but in a business I refuse it

Chris S

We have a Mac, as older versions of QuickBooks had different file formats for PC and Mac. Can't wait to throw it out the window.

tombull89

@Travis My boss went to a school for an interview. 400 Macs, all running Windows 7.

3

Travis

@tombull89 Yep...odd isn't it?

Nick M.

@tombull89 wtf.. thats the kind of stuff that gets me angry

Chris S

@NickM. It's necessary to use RSAT8 for Server 2012.

Travis

16:57

Plus the learning curve. Hell our users can barely find the start button here

tombull89

@NickM. Because SHINY SHINY APPLE!

Chris S

@tombull89 My in-laws have a Mac that I installed Win8 on. =]

Nick M.

@tombull89 What a waste

@ChrisS I didn't know that

Travis

I didn't either

Nick M.

@Travis seems a little dumb if you ask me

Chris S

16:59

RSAT7 works on some things, but not others. We're slowly upgrading servers to 2012, so I'm on Win8.

Travis

We just did 2008 ...still trying to kill off the only 2003 server we have left

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