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Trying a new tool… lets see how this works…

Because it’s not nearly as gaudy as myspace and doesn’t have horrible music playing in the background. I figure if I’m gonna get roped into one or the other, it might as well be the one that annoys me the least.

So Unicron has now taken over the last of the webservices- smtp and imap. There’s still some tinkering to do, but I felt confident enough about it to move Unicron onto the UPS and p-nut off.

Over the next week I’ll be making sure everything is backed up, but I think it’s now permanent.

Hurray!

I migrated the websites from p-nut to unicron- this was one of the big projects in this migration.
if you get a chance, check the following sites out and look for bad links/images.
* morgajel.com
* www.morgajel.com

* morgajel.net
* www.morgajel.net

* ianhawthorn.com
* www.ianhawthorn.com

* myjaxon.com
* www.myjaxon.com
* blog.myjaxon.com

This will be a short review; buy it.

What do you need to know about it? It’s a Zelda game, so the standard running around and stabbing things applies. You collect new items, piece together an artifact, and kill the bad guy. I haven’t gotten all the way though the game, but I have put in enough time to realize it’s pretty big.

The controls make good use of the wii remote and nunchuck. They get bonus points for the fishing controls- the remote is the pole and the nunchuck as the reel handle. The remote even makes the reel sound with the little speaker.

Overall the important thing is it’s a fun game, and it’s one every wii owner should get.

This was one of the articles I never posted for whatever reason…

So I’m switching over to Kubuntu on my main workstation. The following is a list of things I had to tweak to get kubuntu working as I wanted as well as a rage meter displaying how annoying it was to configure.

Unfortunately I don’t remember what else I changed on it, so overall this is much less than there should be.

This article was originally written for draccus.net, then moved to morgajel.com. I’ve updated it a bit here to make it a bit more modern before posting it to my employers bbs.

Apt-get is a great package management utility created for the Debian Linux distribution. It can be found on children distributions like Ubuntu, Linspire, and mepis. For those who are not familiar with it, let me give you a quick run down.

apt-get update
Apt-get works by maintaining a list of packages located on each site. To make sure you have the latest package list, you would run:
woof:~# apt-get update

Apt-get will then go to each site listed in the /etc/apt/sources.list file and get the newest list of packages stored at it’s site. After downloading each list, it will update it’s own internal database. It’s important to run this command before installing or searching for any new packages. It also lets apt-get know when new packages are out to replace older ones on your system. If you plan on installing several packages in the same day, you only have to run this once.

apt-get upgrade
Apt-get upgrade automatically updates any packages on your system to the newest known package. This is why it is important to run apt-get update before running apt-get upgrade. When newer packages are found, it asks if you wish to upgrade. These updates could be newer versions of the program, or the same version with security fixes included.

It’s a general rule of thumb to make sure you keep the packages updated as much as possible. I generally use the combination of apt-get update/apt-get upgrade on my systems once or twice a week; however, DO NOT automate this process. Apt-get has been known to have problems in the past, and the last thing you want is to have your entire network upgrade at 4am and have every single machine die at the same time. Like most upgrades, make sure there’s a live person there to troubleshoot and answer installation questions.

apt-get dist-upgrade
Apt-get dist-upgrade is very similar to apt-get upgrade, except it has the power to make MAJOR upgrades- things that you might not want to do right away. An example would be the leap from KDE 2.2 to KDE 3.1, or from Debian 2.6 to Debian 3.0. You should consider very carefully before doing this. I usually check for a “distribution-upgrade” once a month. Again, this is NOT something you should automate.

apt-get install
Apt-get install is the function you’ll probably use the most. By specifying the name of the package, you can tell apt-get to automatically download and install the package and any dependencies it might have. Let’s take the program xjewel for example. It is a puzzle game that is a clone of the popular arcade game Columns.

woof:~# apt-get install xjewel
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
xjewel
0 packages upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 2 not upgraded.
Need to get 28.4kB of archives. After unpacking 135kB will be used.


Apt-get checks it’s database to make sure that the package exists, then heads to it’s source site to download the game, grabbing any needed packages along the way.
Installing packages can be a little more difficult. A good example is the package bsdgames-nonfree. I currently have the package bsdgames installed, however when I try to install bsdgames-nonfree, I get the following message:

woof:~# apt-get install bsdgames-nonfree
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
bsdgames
The following NEW packages will be installed:
bsdgames-nonfree
0 packages upgraded, 1 newly installed, 1 to remove and 2 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B/226kB of archives. After unpacking 1864kB will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n]

These packages have a “conflict,” and cannot be installed at the same time. This is very common for packages that are almost the same, but slightly different- such as different versions of the same program. The default action is to ask you if you want to remove the conflicting programs and any programs that are dependent on it.

Apt-get install has many helpful flags you can use for different circumstances. Here is a short list:

• -f fixes broken dependencies. In case of emergency, try this.
• –fix-missing downloads and installs any missing or broken packages.
• -y yes to all questions. useful for scripting, but you better know exactly what it will do.
• –build compiles packages that were downloaded as source.
• –reinstall reinstalls a currently installed program

it’s important you get comfortable with -f, –fix-missing, and –reinstall. They can provide valuable help when troubleshooting a broken package. More flags can be found by reading the manpage of apt-get.

apt-get remove
Apt-get remove is the exact opposite of apt-get install. It removes the packages listed if they exist as well as packages dependent on the one you wish to remove. This will remove the program, but not the config files. If you wish to remove config files and any other related data, you can use the –purge flag.

apt-get source
I have only used apt-get source once, so I may not know about all of it’s features. From what I’ve seen, it works similarly to apt-get install, but instead downloads the source files, allowing you to make modifications to the software before installing it. This will only be useful to a few people, and is generally not used by the average person.

apt-get build-dep
Used with apt-get source, apt-get build-dep downloads and installs dependencies for the programs downloaded by apt-get source. Haven’t really used this feature much either, so my knowledge is rather limited.

and that about sums it up- there are many more features like pinning that I just don’t feel like going into, but feel free to leave extra help in the comments and I’ll tack it on to this.

So Ian was born at 5:02am on monday (Fed 26, 2007). 7lbs, 15oz, 20.5 inches long.

He is already carrying on the fine Morgan tradition of being an asshole.

So for those who have not been initiated, the Wii is the new Nintendo console. The cool thing about this console that makes it stand out is the motion sensitive controller. It adds a whole new dimension to gaming.

I stopped being a big console player after the failure of the Atari Jaguar around 1994- it was a big disappointment for me. The next console I got was a PS2 in 2001 or so- I even waited an extra year to make sure it wouldn’t be a failure. The Wii however, has gotten me excited about gaming in a way I haven’t been in a while.

The launch of the Wii dominated the PS3- it was perfectly marketed, had twice as many units as the PS3, and has been sold out for 2 months. Last weekend Target, Circuit City, Best Buy and the like all got new shipments of the Wiis in, and put them out on a Sunday. Within two hours they were all sold out. Jackie and I got to Target 5 minutes after opening and were 39th in line for 55 Wiis. We picked up a Wii, a classic controller, and two games- Rayman Raving Rabbids and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. I’ve been playing them both for about a week and they’re both pretty fun.

I started looking into what other games were available for the Wii and was shocked by the number of games that will be released in the next year that look interesting.

• Metal Slug anthology
• Excite Truck
• Super Paper Mario
• Mario Party 8
• SSX Blur
• Wii Play
• Wii Music
• Warioware Smooth Moves
• Super Mario Galaxy
• Spore (if it makes it to the wii)
• Red Steel
• Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
• Dragon Quest Swords
• Devil Kings

I’m not sure how many I’ll actually get, but it’s good to have options- it reminds me of the good old days of the super nintendo. The price is good (250), it has a lot of interesting and fun titles, free online play, and will give you a good workout with it’s motion-sensitive controller. Go buy one (if you can find one).

Doing another annual recap this year like I did last year.

2006 was a pretty rough year- move from DC Metro back to Grand Rapids, got a crappy job, found out jackie was pregnant, got laid off from crappy job, spent 3 months unemployed, and at the end of November was offered an awesome new job in Troy, MI (the other side of the state). Other than Ian, and the new job, the best good news is we finally have a decent couch- two of them, actually.

Employment

I enjoyed working at CSX a lot, but Virginia started getting to me- a guy threw himself in front of the orange line and it was on the news down there, and I realized I could sorta understand why he did it… that was my hint that I needed to get out of there. The result was taking the first job that could get me back to Michigan.

I ended up taking a contract-to-hire job back in Grand Rapids that paid poorly, treated me like crap, and generally made me come home and curl up in the fetal position. Part of the agreement to even get close to the payrange I was looking for was I had to work 55 hours a week. The problem was I spent all 55 hours each week for 3 months putting out fires and stressed myself so badly that the doctor told me I had to cut back. Five months(August) into the 3 month contract (oh, it was open ended, didn’t you know that?) I was laid off. No severance, just a boot out the door. I wasn’t the only one laid off since the company is apparently not doing as well as they thought they were, but there’s still a lot of bitterness there.

The recruiter flat out lied when he said the Grand Rapids job market had improved- the unemployment rate is still 7% and companies are closing down left and right. I spent 3 months searching for a job in the area when our friend Chris P. offered to hand my resume off to a friend of his who was looking for a linux admin. Three interviews later, they offered me the job for a decent amount of money and benefits. The down side was it’s in Troy, so we’re moving again. This place seems great tho, and I don’t have any of the doubts or negative feelings I had initially about the job in GR.

Family

In July, Jackie and I found out we were going to have a child. It’s a boy, and he’s due on March 10th. We’ve decided on Ian Hawthorn for a name. We’re really excited about it, but to be honest it didn’t help the stress level when I was laid off a month after finding out. We’re looking forward to it, but the new job is complicating issues like lamaz classes and doctor changes.

My brother Jamie is off being a park ranger/professional bum, Brian is still in school, parents are doing good, inlaws are good, grandparents are all doing well and the cats still haven’t been set on fire- can’t ask for more than that.

Hobbies

I finally finished my chainmail shirt. The age difference between rings resulted in some bad discoloration which I tried to fix by treating with vinegar- Unfortunately that completely removed the zinc coating on some resulting in rusting- once I get the cash I plan on rolling it in a bucket of sand to remove the rust, oiling it, and then putting it in a tupperware container.

I played with my guitar quite a bit early in the year, but slacked off later on. I also realized that learning to play the keyboard is going to require more than 25 keys, so I’ve put it off until I have the time and money to get a real keyboard and take lessons. I did manage to pick up a trumpet and restring my violin- I can play a scale on the violin (barely) and can annoy the neighbors with the trumpet. I also bought some new reeds for Jackie’s clarinet and learned how to play a scale.

I got back into ruby and finally checked out this whole rails thing- it’s very cool. I wish I would have kept up with ruby way back when and ignored the nay-sayers.

I’ve also taken up walking- yes, walking. I’ve been walking about 3 miles every other day since we moved back to Grand Rapids- once around the block. Now that we’ve moved, that’ll probably go by the wayside due to the lack of walking partners and Jackie’s general roundness (from Ian).

Hopefully 2007 will see us getting back to where we were last year this time.