Diary of a Network Geek

Apparently, the Hello, Kitty Army is a little better armed than I suspected.
They now have an AR-15, Hello Kitty model.

Now, why doesn't GI Joe have one of these any more?

I don't think I've mentioned this before.

Some time ago, I was having problems with traffic on my network. Something, somewhere was apparently causing some issues with bandwidth on our Internet connection. Or, at least, that's what our ISP kept telling us. It was, I think, the excuse they were using to avoid dealing with an e-mail problem.
Regardless, I had to find a tool to monitor our network traffic. I ended up using Wireshark for that, but along the way, I discovered a number of OpenSource monitoring tools for various purposes. The one that impressed me the most was Nagios.

Nagios is, according to the opening paragraph on their website, "an Open Source host, service and network monitoring program." While I never did configure anything to monitor the network, per se, I did configure this to watch both local servers and third-party web and mail servers.
First of all, it's important to know that Nagios runs on Linux. So, to install the software, you first have to have an available Linux server on which to install it. I'm using an old workstation that I installed the latest version of Fedora, the free version of RedHat. Getting the initial install done wasn't very hard at all. In fact, there were RPMs available, so all I had to do was use RedHat's package manager to get the base install loaded on the machine.

After the initial software load, I mainly followed the Quick Install instructions that they link to on the first page. Then, since I was mainly monitoring Windows servers and workstations, I found the cleverly titled help page, "Monitoring Windows Machines", and followed that. This page ran me through the basics of installing the NSClient++ on a Windows machine and configuring Nagios to connect to and monitor that client. One thing that I had to find out the hard way was that the entries for the monitored systems have to be duplicated for each host. In other words, there is no way to just list all the Windows systems you want to monitor. You have to created entries describing each host individually. That's not a big deal, honestly, since you can open the configuration files in a text editor and just copy, paste and edit the required entries.
I did have a few false starts here, until I figured out the correct syntax and the fact that every host has to be part of a previously defined group. But, other than that little glitch, configuration was fairly simple.

It took a little more digging, but I later found instructions for passively monitoring services running on servers without a client. I now use my private installation of Nagios to monitor our company webserver, both POP3 and SMTP on our hosted e-mail server, as well as my two Windows 2003 servers. I can even check on the Microsoft SQL database, thanks to information I got from this post on the OSdir mailarchive. And, did I mention that all this software was free? Yeah, the documentation wasn't the best and it took me a little while to figure out the install and config, but it was far easier than the other monitoring software I played with and I can let anyone who has the username and password check these stats from their own workstation via a web browser. How cool is that? Oh, and did I mention that this can be used to monitor Linux/Unix systems, Windows systems and even Netware systems? Nagios pretty well covers it all!
(Oh, and as a side note, if you're messing around with the configuration and want to reset the statistics, just stop the service and delete /usr/local/nagios/var/status.dat, then restart the service. All your counts will zero and all the checks will start fresh.)
In short, if you're looking for a low-cost but versatile monitoring system and aren't afraid to read the documentation, I highly recommend investigating Nagios.

I have a moral dilemma to pose for my readers.

Now, before I get too far, yes, this is directly applicable to my life, but, no, I'm not going into details on that. I've generalized the scenario to protect the innocent, and me.

Okay, so, here's the scenario...
Say you've given up on the on-line dating thing because it's too easy to find reasons to eliminate people based on silly criteria, like height and what book they last read, right? And, naturally, all the people you know are married or at least involved with someone. Well, except for that one person. Now, let's assume that you know for sure that they like you and would go out with you if you asked. But, there's a catch. It would make things socially uncomfortable for you and others to actually date, no matter how things worked out. Maybe it's because that person is a friend's ex, or just someone that a good friend really, really doesn't like, it doesn't matter. What matters is that it would be hard for you to date them because of your social circumstances.
Now, do you tell your friends to "get over it" and go ahead and date them? Or, do you let your co-dependence with your friends keep you from pursuing your potential happiness? And, is it fair to that person you want to date to put them in that position? I mean, if they're your friends, they'd cope, right? And, if the person you want to date really is into you, they'd be willing to take the heat, right? But, is that how it would really go down?

So, what do you think?

When I read that title on Australian IT News, I hope I'm not the only one who suddenly pictured a man in a business suit being chased through the jungle by big game hunters.

Actually, come to think of it, that wouldn't make a bad video game. I bet it would sell to a lot of mailroom and IT guys!

A couple of months ago, Wired Magazine ran an article on How To Make Your Own Glowstick. What strikes me about this is that, since you're making it yourself, you could pour it into any shaped, sealable container. So, you could pour it into, say, spheres or an empty honey bear.
It looks like so much fun, I might just try it myself.

As a result of my ranking in Google, I occasionally get silly spam.

This morning, for instance, I got this e-mail:

Let me know if you're looking to get a higher listing with search engines. I can send you the details first, just let me know how you would like to communicate.
Sincerely,
(insert marketer's name here.)

I responded with:

Higher than what? I'm already the number one hit on Google for Network Geek. After all, how was it that you found me to try and sell to me?

No, thank you, but I enjoy doing it myself.

Sincerely,
Jim Hoffman

I mean, really, half the fun of having this site and doing this blog is that I use it to manipulate one of the biggest search engines ever!  Ah, well, maybe if he'd actually read my blog, he'd know that I made most of the money I paid my divorce lawyer back optimizing his site for the search engines and getting him connected with an URL submission service.

Silly spammers.

So, I figured it was about time for another hardcore geek post.

I've been using the Linux-based imaging solution that I detailed here and here for quite a few weeks now. Mostly, it's been going very well.
Okay, once I figured out it was better to start with a small drive partition as my base system, from which I created the standard image, the process got easier. The thing is, it's always easier to start with a small partition and then use tools built into the Knoppix live cd to grow the partition larger than to try and shoe-horn a big disk partition onto a small disk. And, by "easier", I mean it's the only way to do it. I spent quite a bit of time trying to make it work the other way, but I never did. On the other hand, starting with an image based on a 30 gigabyte or less partition then expanding it to fit a 150 gigabyte hard drive has worked just fine.
Incidentally, I used a bootable gparted cd to make that change.

Also, I had a small problem with a particular Intel motherboard chipset. Specifically, it was the Intel 965 chipset, and the problem may effect other motherboards. In short, the problem was that Knoppix didn't see the SATA drive to mount it. If Knoppix can't see the drive, it can't image it or take an image from it. Luckily, there is a work around. If you're using my method to image WindowsXP machines running the Intel 965 chipset, ensure the BIOS is set to AHCI. To do that, get into your system's BIOS and go to Advanced > Drive configuration > Configure SATA as AHCI. Then, when booting into Knoppix, hit F2 and use the following command-line to boot:
knoppix 2 all-generic-ide pci=nommconf
This will start Knoppix in text-only mode, so you can run everything from there instead of opening up a terminal session.
After you put the image on the fresh machine, you need to ensure the BIOS is NO LONGER set to AHCI. To do that, get back into your system's BIOS and go to Advanced > Drive configuration > Configure SATA as IDE. After reconfiguring the BIOS, you can boot into the new Windows XP clone and proceed as I've already described in the other posts.

Oh, one last thing on this...
I kind of cheated on reimaging machines in text mode with that Intel 965 chipset.  Because the tools I used to resize NTFS disk partitions were all GUI based and XWindows was having a problem running on those Intel 965 boards, I installed one machine from scratch and just grabbed the larger partition table and master boot record.  Then, when I made the new machines, I just used the larger partition and MBR images to get everything out of the disk.  I still used the smaller data disk partition images, but I used NTFSResize to expand the NTFS partition to fill the disk.  Worked like a charm.

Anyway, I apologize to my non-geek readers, but, hey, I am a professional network geek and I love this stuff.  I think I strutted around for a full five minutes after figuring out that set of little tricks the same afternoon.  Of course, it wasn't long before some other stupid thing brought me right back to reality, but that couple of minutes where I was the king of the world, network geek genius extraordinaire, made it all worthwhile.

No.

At least, not according to Bruce Schneier:

Q: All ethics aside, do you think you could make more money obtaining sensitive information about high net worth individuals and using blackmail/extortion to get money from them, instead of writing books, founding companies, etc.?

A: Basically, you’re asking if crime pays. Most of the time, it doesn’t, and the problem is the different risk characteristics. If I make a computer security mistake — in a book, for a consulting client, at BT — it’s a mistake. It might be expensive, but I learn from it and move on. As a criminal, a mistake likely means jail time — time I can’t spend earning my criminal living. For this reason, it’s hard to improve as a criminal. And this is why there are more criminal masterminds in the movies than in real life.

That has to be the best summarization of why I'm not a criminal that I've ever read. And, that's not all he had to say. You can read the rest of the article at the New York Times "Freakonomics" blog.

I have learned to accept certain things about my life.

I accept that I will never have children of my own.
I very much wanted them and I know I would have made a good father, but it just doesn't seem to be in the cards for me. So, I'll be Uncle Jim to all my friends' kids. I'll have toys at my house and be the cool, pseudo-uncle that they all love to come visit. And, until they breed, I'll be the best uncle I can be to my own niece and nephews.

I accept that I will probably die alone.
In the end, don't we all? I mean, even if there's someone there with us, we really still die alone. Thanks to the same cancer treatment that sterilized me, I'll live more than long enough to get my affairs in order, to get out of debt and pre-pay for my funeral and cremation. Hell, I may even get one of those Star Trek urns to be buried in.
I try to keep hope alive and an open mind and all that, but, really, I just have a hard time seeing myself with anyone. I have a hard time picturing anyone who's interested in being with me. My last hope of possibly starting something with the cute, red-headed federal parole officer pretty well died last night. I overheard part of something that I shouldn't have and it sounded an awful lot like someone saying "she" wasn't interested in "him". And, yes, while that doesn't mean much, I took it as significant that the two people stopped talking when I walked up and wouldn't explain further when I asked. I'll grant that the world doesn't revolve around me, but, well, sometimes it's not my ego talking, you know? I don't think it was in this case.
So, anyway, my point is, if not her, then who? There just isn't anyone else even on my radar and I got so tired of the bullshit with Match.com that I canceled that last week. I don't know. I suppose I can always hope for that miracle to happen.

I accept that I'll never be a famous author.
Sure, I might be the number one hit on Google for Network Geek, but that's not really fame, is it? And, is this blog even really writing? I may write fiction and even publish it, but I just don't see myself ever being famous or winning awards. Maybe it's just the antibiotics and blood thinners talking, but I definitely see myself living a modest life of obscurity. Not that there's anything wrong with that! Hell, most people don't get more than that and damn few get that far. At least, at the level of comfort that I enjoy. And, as I sit here typing this on a laptop with my feet propped up next to my digital camera looking at a Japanese sci-fi movie on my HDTV, I am more than aware of just how comfortable I am.

It's a good life.
It may not be what I imagined or what I dreamed of, but it's a damn good life and I've lived far better than I had any right to expect. I'm lucky, really, to be alive at all.
It really is a good life.

No, not ghosts, spirits.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that my new medicine really should preclude me from drinking, but when I saw this article about a Japanese single-malt whiskey distiller, I was fascinated. Check out that, and the website it appeared on, Nonjatta. It's like Scotch, with all the same anal-retentive attention to detail, but from Japan.