Initial import

brought over all the files from the Jekyll version, fixed categories,
reformatted for different markdown processor

source/_posts/2004/a-cry-for-help.md

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: A Cry for Help
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-07 00:00:38
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: The difficulties of downloading things when the network doesn't work
+---
+
+I tried a few other things to make that module work, but nothing seemed to help. It's also very difficult to download and try new things when you can't get to the Internet to download them. I also posted a message to the WBEL user's list, and rather than go into that detail, that message can be found [here][].
+
+
+[here]: //beau.org/pipermail/whitebox-users/2004-July/002344.html

source/_posts/2004/a-foray-into-c-plus-plus.md

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "A Foray into C++"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-17 00:00:48
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Programming, C++ ]
+summary: A bit of C++ knowledge should help when compiling programs for Linux
+---
+
+Compiling my own versions of programs when trying to get DVD stuff working intrigued me. I've tried a couple of times to teach myself C++, but hadn't really gotten that far. My understanding of some of the concepts has improved some, and I've also found a good set of tutorials on [C Programming][]'s web site. I went though the tutorials, and got some interesting things working. This was PC-based, using the [CygWin][] Linux emulator. I actually understood everything I wrote, which is a very nice feeling! This knowledge should come in handy if I ever have trouble compiling something...
+
+
+[C Programming]: //www.cprogramming.com/tutorial.html
+[CygWin]:        //www.cygwin.com

source/_posts/2004/a-month-in-summary.md

@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: A Month in Summary
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-08-31 00:00:12
+categories:
+- [ Databases, MySQL ]
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Web Servers, Apache ]
+- [ Web Servers, IIS ]
+summary: Progress over the past month
+---
+
+Well, the last month has been interesting. I was able to get my Windows and Linux installations synchronized by creating a mount point for my second drive under <tt>/mnt/drive\_d</tt>. Under that, I created a directory called /thunderbird for my e-mail, and moved my e-mail and newsgroup folders over there. (The first time, I missed the "newsrc" file, which is important - it tells what newsgroups you've subscribed to and which messages you've read.) Under Windows, I pointed it to <tt>D:\thunderbird\pop3.knology.net</tt>, and under Linux, it was configured to <tt>/mnt/drive\_d/thunderbird/pop3.knology.net</tt>. I then moved the <tt>wwwroot</tt> directory from <tt>C:\Inetpub</tt> to drive D:, and pointed IIS to the new location. Under Linux, I did something a little different. As "root", I deleted the directory <tt>/var/www/html</tt>, and instead created <tt>/var/www/html</tt> as a symbolic link to <tt>/mnt/drive\_d/wwwroot</tt> (the actual command is <tt>ln -s /mnt/drive\_d/wwwroot /var/www/html</tt>). That worked great as well.
+
+MySQL was more complicated, but I was eventually able to get it working as well. I created the directory <tt>D:\mysql\data</tt> for the data, then configured <tt>/etc/my.cnf</tt> under Linux to look at <tt>/mnt/drive\_d/mysql/data</tt>. I kept getting "Could not connect to server using socket /var/lib/mysql/mysql.sock". After some digging, it appeared to be a permissions problem. All the documentation said that the default socket was /tmp/mysql.sock, so I changed my.cnf to point there instead, restarted mysqld, and it worked! So, I have no idea what a Unix socket it, but I know that now I have one! :)
+
+I was also able to get DVDs playing using xine, compiling it myself, and using [libdvdcss][], I can even watch commercial DVDs. I'm really impressed with xine - it handles all kinds of media out of the box, including DivX and up to version 8 of WMV files. You can add codecs to it as well, to support almost anything you want to do from an audio or video perspective. Compiling the player took around 20 minutes, and compiling the front end took another 5. And, it was simple - download the .tar.gz file, do <tt>tar xvfz [name].tar.gz</tt>, <tt>cd [name]</tt>, <tt>./configure</tt>, <tt>make install</tt>. The <tt>./configure</tt> script is the key in the whole process - it looks at what you have installed, and creates make files that will work with your compiler.
+
+Everything started going south, though, when I started having freezes. Eventually, I got to where I could not boot without a kernel panic, and then boot errors (which I detailed in [this e-mail to the WBEL user's list][email]. Encouraged by my success over the past month, I decided to return to WBEL - it's supposed to be more stable than FC2, and I bet that I can get ndiswrapper, the dual-booting web server, the common e-mail, and maybe even some other stuff working again.
+
+
+[libdvdcss]: //developers.videolan.org/libdvdcss/
+[email]:     //beau.org/pipermail/whitebox-users/2004-August/003197.html

source/_posts/2004/apache-and-mysql-are-back.md

@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Apache and MySQL Are Back
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-08 00:01:50
+categories:
+- [ Databases, MySQL ]
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Web Servers, Apache ]
+summary: Apache and MySQL work on both sides of the dual-booted computer now
+---
+
+I was finally able to resolve my problems with Apache and MySQL. When I decided to mount my FAT32 drive under <tt>/home/summersd</tt>, I inadvertently caused myself some problems. From talking to a Linux guy at work, I found that no processes that weren't running under my user ID could access those files. The reason is that Linux looks up the entire diretory tree, back to /, to determine if you can access the file. So, although I had <tt>-rwxrwxrwx summersd summersd</tt> on every file, <tt>/home/summersd</tt> was <tt>drwx------ summersd summersd</tt>, and <tt>/home</tt> was <tt>drwxr-xr-x</tt>. The permissions on <tt>/home/summersd</tt> was keeping Apache from seeing <tt>/home/summersd/drive\_d/wwwroot</tt>, and MySQL from seeing or writing to <tt>/home/summersd/drive\_d/mysql/data</tt>. I moved the drive to <tt>/mnt/drive\_d</tt>, with the mount point being owned by "root", still mounting the drive with my user name, and everything worked.
+
+In the process of reconfiguring Thunderbird, I believe I may have found out how to share the address book across operating systems. The file <tt>~/.thunderbird/default.[something]/prefs.js</tt> has a listing of all the preferences and settings. I modified this file to change the location of my mail files, and there is a setting there for an address book (which isn't shown in the configuration dialog - after all, it is 0.7.3...) I'll play with that later - right now I'm just elated to have Apache and MySQL working again.

source/_posts/2004/attack-of-the-quadruplicate-messages.md

@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Attack of the Quadruplicate Messages
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-30 00:00:42
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: I don't think I'm supposed to get every e-mail 4 times...
+---
+
+When I left for choir practice this evening, I had 2 messages in my inbox. When I returned, I had over 600! Remember way back when I said that I removed that setting that left a copy of the e-mail on the server? Turns out in Ximian Evolution, "Close" is the equivalent of "Cancel" in most apps, and my change did not take. It looks like my ISP's mail server, in an effort to alert me that I was over my limit, started clearing whatever status was on these messages, which caused them to be downloaded multiple times, every 10 minutes. I made sure the setting was set, then went into my ISP's web mail service and deleted every message in my inbox. I deleted all the dupes out of my main inbox tonight, and I'll delete the dupes from the other folders tomorrow.

source/_posts/2004/back-to-wbel.md

@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Back to WBEL
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-04 00:00:02
+categories:
+- [ Databases, MySQL ]
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: WBEL has been reinstalled
+---
+
+Today, I reinstalled WBEL 3.0. I was able to compile ndiswrapper (as I kept that on my FAT32 drive), and get the network card working smoothly very quickly. (In fact, it seems to be more reliable under Linux than WXP!) With the network up, it was easy to download Firefox, Thunderbird, and OpenOffice, and installing them was a breeze. (I decided to put them under /opt this time, trying to stick with the FHS.) I decided to mount my FAT32 drive under my home directory, as `/home/summersd/drive_d`. E-mail works fine, but Apache gives me a 403 (Permission Denied) error. MySQL doesn't seem to be working either - I'll have to play with that later.

source/_posts/2004/downloading-wine.md

@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Downloading Wine
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-01 00:00:08
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Downloading is the first step for installing
+---
+
+Today I didn't do a whole lot - I deleted the dupes out of my inbox subfolders, and I downloaded wine. I'll install it tomorrow.

source/_posts/2004/dvds-are-back-and-conflicting-wireless-networks.md

@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "DVDs Are Back & Conflicting Wireless Networks"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-05 00:00:15
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Resolving two minor issues
+---
+
+I downloaded xine and xine-ui again, just to get the freshest stuff. Compiled first time, worked first time. I must be learning how to do this stuff! I also did a "yum update" to get the most recent version of everything, and I upgraded ndiswrapper from .8 to .10.
+
+I moved the computer into another room, and found that I was now getting conflicts on my wireless card. After some research, it appears that I'm picking up my next-door-neighbor's wireless signal as well. I renamed our wireless network, and configured the cards to use only that network, and those conflicts went away.

source/_posts/2004/fedora-core-2-in-the-can.md

@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Fedora Core 2 in the Can
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-24 00:00:09
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Fedora Core 2 has been downloaded and is ready to install
+---
+
+In an effort to cleanse my wife's computer of the spyware that dogged it so, I removed all the Linux partitions from my computer to make space for files. I got her computer rebuilt, and I'll be starting from scratch when I get back into it. No worries, though - if I'm going to get any good at setting it up... Kind of reminds me of a joke - a guy in New York asks an old man on the street, "Hey, how do you get to Radio City Music Hall?" The old guy responds, "Practice, practice, practice!"
+
+In looking toward renewed Linux experimentation, I downloaded the .ISO files for FC2. I'm going to start with that, and see if I have any better luck getting my network card to work.

source/_posts/2004/foobar2000-with-wine.md

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: foobar2000 with Wine
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-08 00:00:47
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: A nice, lightweight Windows audio player working under wine
+---
+
+[foobar2000][] is about the best, most organized audio player I've found. However, it is a Windows application, and according to what I've read, very reliant on Microsoft C++ extensions. I decided to give it a shot under wine, and it works great! There is a repaint problem - sometimes the playlist doesn't refresh as it should. But, it's pretty much a start-and-minimize sort of application, so that's acceptable.
+
+
+[foobar2000]: //www.foobar2000.org

source/_posts/2004/linux-play-on-pause.md

@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Linux Play on Pause
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-10 00:00:18
+categories:
+- General Info
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Resignation to running Windows XP for a while
+---
+
+With my inability to get my network working, I have resigned myself to running WXP. Work is starting to get really busy, and my personal life is as well. Maybe at some point in the future I can fire things back up and play some more.

source/_posts/2004/ndiswrapper-may-have-issues.md

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: ndiswrapper May Have Issues
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-07 00:00:49
+categories:
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Wireless drivers don't handle the lack of a wireless network very gracefully
+---
+
+We're speedily working towards a Friday deadline at work, so tonight I had some analysis work to do on some COBOL code. Great, I thought, I can use my VSlick setup under wine. I moved my computer from the living room back to our now-empty bedroom (soon to be nursery), and booted it up. Kernel panics galore - never got past the network stuff. When I booted to Windows, I found that the wireless network didn't reach that far, and I'm guessing that the ndiswrapper folks haven't tried their driver a lot with a wireless card, but no wireless network. Once I get past that, I may grab the dumps from these kernel panics and see if the developers need them to see what went wrong. So, for tonight, I had to use WXP (in which I actually had to disable the wireless connection - seems Windows doesn't handle a barely-there wireless connection much better than Linux).
+
+The diagnostics I ran last night never found anything - they ran for about 10 hours. I suppose I'll just have to wait until I have problems again, then run it right then. Another person from the WBEL users list suggested I check the way I have my hard drives set up; he thinks that a 2GB drive slaved to a 20GB drive may be causing conflicts, which would cause freezes or panics.

source/_posts/2004/next-generation-open-source-internet-apps.md

@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Next-Generation Open Source Internet Apps
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-12 00:00:11
+categories:
+- Windows Open Source
+summary: Firefox and Thunderbird
+---
+
+In setting up my "I'm gonna use this for a while" environment on WXP, I've stumbled across what I feel are two gems. These are the [FireFox][] browser (which I've been using for a while now) and the [Thunderbird][] mail program. Thunderbird is not as fully featured as Ximian Evolution, but I prefer it's interface to that of Mozilla Mail. I also think that once I get back on Linux on a regular basis, I'll install the same version there, and see if I can get my mail to use the same data files whether I'm using Linux or WXP.
+
+
+[FireFox]:     //www.mozilla.org/products/firefox
+[Thunderbird]: //www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird

source/_posts/2004/non-alcoholic-wine-experiments.md

@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Non-Alcoholic Wine Experiments
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-02 00:00:27
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: First efforts with wine leave me unimpressed
+---
+
+Wine is not getting me drunk. I installed it, downloaded and installed [WineSetupTK][] to assist with configuration. I then ran the setup program (through wine) for _Thomas the Tank Engine: The Great Festival Adventure_. Once that completed, I tried to run the program (by entering `wine "C:\Program Files\Hasbro Interactive\The Great Festival Adventure\thomas.exe"`) and got a message box saying "CD check path not found." I searched the web for this message, and didn't find anything - it may be a message from the game, and not wine. I'll do some digging later.
+
+You may remember the problems I had with the Folding@Home client. So, I decided to try to run the Windows version through wine. I downloaded it, and ran it through wine. It took about 2 minutes to lock my machine up. I'm not being too hard on wine for this stuff - an emulator isn't going to be 100%. I am concerned that I don't seem to be able to run any sort of Folding@Home client, and since it's not open-source, I can't try compiling on this computer.
+
+I uninstalled the OpenOffice.org suite from the /root directory, and installed it in `/usr/local/OpenOffice.org1.1.2` (which was where it suggested). Now, it works for normal users. I still haven't been able to resolve my printing problems, but I sent a question today to the WBEL users list - they came through quickly for helping me resolve my mail importing issues.
+
+
+[WineSetupTK]: //sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=6241&package_id=77479&release_id=161192

source/_posts/2004/power-at-last.md

@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Power at Last!
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-25 00:00:33
+categories:
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: The power supply arrives, but a background program is locking the machine up hard
+---
+
+Upon returning from vacation, I found that the power supply was finally here. After installing it, I fired up the computer, and it works! I fired up my e-mail client (to pull all the mail off the server that I had received for the past few weeks), and downloaded the [Folding@Home][] (F@H) client for Linux. I've been running that on a couple of other computers (user name LX_i, team #37825), and I'll probably write more about it in particular in my regular blog. Anyway, once I got that started, I started reading the e-mail I had missed. Then, the machine locked up!
+
+I reset the machine, and repeated the steps (started Evolution, started F@H), and before long, it happened again. I restarted them both again, but it's getting late - I'll have to continue this tomorrow.
+
+
+[Folding@Home]: //www.stanford.edu/group/pandegroup/folding/

source/_posts/2004/power-on-order-vacation-pending.md

@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "Power on Order / Vacation Pending"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-16 00:00:32
+categories:
+- General Info
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Power supply inbound
+---
+
+The power supply has been ordered, but I'm going out of town between the 19th and the 26th, so it probably won't make it here before I leave. This adventure will have to resume at that point.

source/_posts/2004/printing-woes-and-e-mail-happiness.md

@@ -0,0 +1,28 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "Printing Woes & E-mail Happiness"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-29 00:00:42
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Printing is a challenge, but e-mail is working great
+---
+
+Printing is proving to be a challenge. Using [samba][] (the Linux [SMB][] libraries) and [cups][], I was able to configure my networked printer. However, I don't have a driver on my computer for it. I tried using some drivers that were close, but they didn't work - they just caused the printer to eject a blank page. I was creating the documents using [OpenOffice.org][]'s Writer, which has a "one-click PDF conversion" feature. When I went to use that feature, I found that I was on version 1.0, which didn't have the PDF stuff.
+
+I downloaded the Linux install for version 1.1.2, and remembering that you need to use the "root" user to do most installs, did an [su][], and ran the install. I then launched the new writer and exported the PDF. Using samba, I copied the file over to the other computer, and was able to print it. However, since I installed it as root, it installed under /root, which meant that my normal user couldn't access it. At some point, I'll uninstall it and reinstall it in a public directory.
+
+On another note, I posted a message about my inability to import mail from Netscape into Evolution to the WBEL user's list, and the response I got worked! Netscape actually stores the e-mail in the same format as many other Linux e-mail programs (a format called [mbox][] format). Using samba, I copied the files from "C:\Documents and Settings\Daniel\ApplicationData\Mozilla\Profiles\default\{somthing}.slt\Mail\Local Folders" - under this folder, there was a separate folder for each [POP3][] account, and within that folder, the file called "inbox" was my inbox. On some systems, the file is named "mbox", and it's in a folder with the name of the folder it represents (i.e., "Inbox/mbox"). Once these files were copied, I used Evolution's import utility - it prompted me for a file to import (whose type it determined automatically), and a location for the messages to go. I now have all my e-mail from my old setup!
+
+One part of Unix/Linux of which I'm quickly becoming a fan is its adherance to the [Filesystem Hierarchy Standard][fhs] (FHS). The FHS defines where files should be found, and it represents all available files under a single directory, known as "/". No matter how many drives or network shares that are [mounted][], they're all under this directory. What this gives you is a system-wide view of your files, instead of the normal DOS-imposed separate drive specifications. The FHS also says what files are supposed to be in what directories, so no matter what Unix/Linux system you're using, once you know the FHS, you know exactly where to look for things.
+
+
+[samba]:          //us1.samba.org/samba/samba.html
+[SMB]:            //www.computerhope.com/jargon/s/smb.htm
+[cups]:           //www.cups.org
+[OpenOffice.org]: //www.openoffice.org
+[su]:             //hegel.ittc.ukans.edu/topics/linux/man-pages/man1/su.1.html
+[mbox]:           //email.about.com/cs/standards/a/mbox_format.htm
+[POP3]:           //www.computerhope.com/jargon/p/pop.htm
+[fhs]:            //www.pathname.com/fhs/
+[mounted]:        //www.computerhope.com/jargon/m/mount.htm

source/_posts/2004/programming-like-a-banshee.md

@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Programming Like a Banshee
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-27 00:00:32
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Programming, PHP ]
+sumary: Programming work has been distracting from Linux adventures
+---
+
+Despite being ill early in the day (which caused me to miss Sunday School and church), the day on the computer went pretty well. I made a lot more progress on TMTS, although I ran into a problem - it appears that the [PHP][] that came with WBEL may not have [MySQL][] support enabled. Rather than get sidelined with this right now, I'm going to continue converting pages on the application, and work this issue as part of unit testing.
+
+I also managed to catch up on comp.lang.cobol and comp.sys.unisys, two newsgroups in which I participate. I was able to play a file off a DVD (although I still can't play the disc itself).
+
+
+[PHP]:   //www.php.net
+[MySQL]: //www.mysql.com

source/_posts/2004/running-out-of-browsers.md

@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Running Out of Browsers...
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-26 00:00:01
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Programming, PHP ]
+summary: Browser lock-ups are leaving them in an unusable state
+---
+
+When I moved the mouse to try to get the screen to unblank this morning, nothing happened. It was locked up once again. I decided to only run one process, to see if I could isolate which one was causing me problems. I started with the F@H client. I started it before we left for breakfast, and when we got back, the computer was still running okay. I started using the computer actively, and found another problem - my profile for Firefox now thinks it's still in use, because I was using it when the machine crashed.
+
+Now, anyone who has ever used Linux will know that one browser is much less severe than, for example, IE becoming unusable in a Windows evironment. I switched to using Mozilla, and was doing some research on Linux crashes when the machine locked up again. This time, when I restarted, both Firefox _and_ Mozilla thought they were still in use. I fired up the only other currently-installed browser, Konqueror, and surfed out to [LinuxQuestions.org][] and posted a message asking how to tell these browsers that they're not in use.
+
+A few hours later, an answer appeared. For Firefox, the file is ~/.mozilla/firefox/default.lz7/lock, and for Mozilla, the file is ~/.mozilla/default/{something}.slt/lock. Both these are symbolic links to a process PID - deleting them freed up the default profiles so these browsers could be used again.
+
+In the mean time, I have not restarted F@H, but I've had Evolution running in the background without incident. It seems that it may be the F@H client. That bugs me, because I was really looking forward to using this machine to help with the project. I may try to run the Windows version under [wine][], a Windows emulator for Linux.
+
+Some folks have also expressed interest in the Tournament and Membership Tracking System (TMTS), which is a web application I coded to track membership and golf tournaments for a local golfing organization. They're interested in the PHP version, for which I no longer have the source code (it was on a laptop that was stolen). So, much of my computing effort over the next few days will be trying to get this recreated. Today, I was able to get the database rebuilt, and the first few pages converted.
+
+
+[LinuxQuestions.org]: //www.linuxquestions.org
+[wine]:               //www.winehq.com

source/_posts/2004/satisfying-a-lust-for-power.md

@@ -0,0 +1,20 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Satisfying a Lust for Power
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-15 00:00:48
+categories:
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: A new (inexpensive) power supply has been found
+---
+
+Searching for power supplies was very interesting. I determined that I needed at least a 300W supply, and considered upgrading case and all. Some of the bigger stores, such as [Best Buy][], [Office Depot][], and [OfficeMax][], revealed nothing under $30 (just for the power supply). I checked some other sites, such as [Tiger Direct][] and [TCWO][], and found one for $17 on Tiger Direct. I thought that was pretty good, and was planning on ordering it, when a friend (the person I bought the computer from) found one on [PC Direct Source][] for $10. I'll probably order it tomorrow.
+
+
+[Best Buy]:         //www.bestbuy.com
+[Office Depot]:     //www.officedepot.com
+[OfficeMax]:        //www.officemax.com
+[Tiger Direct]:     //www.tigerdirect.com
+[TCWO]:             //www.tcwo.com
+[PC Direct Source]: //www.pcdirectsource.com

source/_posts/2004/sour-milk-is-right.md

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "Sour Milk Is Right!"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-08 00:00:09
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: A lead on a wireless driver doesn't work on my kernel
+---
+
+A user wrote back and suggested that I try a driver from [SourMilk.net][], which is an "adm8211" driver project for Linux. When I downloaded it and started to compile it, I quickly became aware that it hoped I was on the 2.6 family of kernels (which is what the Fedora Project, and several of the newer distributions, are now using). WBEL 3.0 uses the 2.4 kernel, which is more established, but is beginning to drop off as most folks start developing for 2.6. Anyway, there was a 2.4 make file, but it was labeled "experimental."
+
+That pretty much describes how I spent my time this evening - experimenting. I have virtually no experience with large-scale C projects, and I got many, many compile errors. I tried tweaking the make file, to no avail. I don't fault the driver, as it said up front that it is really targeted to 2.6. I may end up downloading a 2.6 distribution and trying it out.
+
+
+[SourMilk.net]: //aluminum.sourmilk.net/adm8211/

source/_posts/2004/success-with-wine-and-diagnostics.md

@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: "Success with Wine & Diagnostics"
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-05 00:01:51
+categories:
+- [ Databases, MySQL ]
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Web Servers, Apache ]
+summary: Some success and more troubleshooting
+---
+
+At work, we use an editor called [Visual SlickEdit][] (VSlick). It's got a lot of features, and supports color-coding for many different languages. I decided that I'd give wine another shot, as we only have the Windows version of this program. I installed wine and winesetuptk, used winesetuptk to configure the installation, then ran the installation program. Everything installed, and the program ran up to a point, when it started complaining about a missing DLL. I booted to WXP, found the DLL, copied it to the FAT32 drive, rebooted to Linux, and copied the DLL into the "fake windows" system directory. Soon, it was working great! I can't believe it - success with wine!
+
+I also have made little headway towards getting Apache and MySQL to working. I changed the process that Apache uses to run as "summersd", and I was able to see pages (although any pages that relied on a database didn't work). I still haven't figured this one out yet...
+
+I'm still getting kernel panics from time to time, and it seems to be whenever I access networking. A suggestion from one of the folks on the WBEL users list was to download the [Ultimate Boot CD][ubcd], filled with diagnostic programs. I downloaded it, burned it, and ran some memory checks. Those checked out, so I'm going to run a "CPU Burn-In" program to see if it can detect errors from the CPU. It runs for up to 7 days, but I think I'll just run it overnight - folding@home didn't take nearly that long to crash it before.
+
+
+[Visual SlickEdit]: //www.slickedit.com
+[ubcd]:             //www.ultimatebootcd.com

source/_posts/2004/webshots-wine-strikes-again.md

@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Webshots - Wine Strikes Again!
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-09-10 00:00:29
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: Using wine to use Webshots
+---
+
+When I ran Windows as my desktop, I had a program called [WebShots][] that I used to set my desktop wallpaper, and cycle it. They have Windows and Mac versions, but no Linux version yet. They still send me e-mails each week, showing the daily picture selections for each day in the past week. I decided to download the Windows version, and install in under wine to see if it would work. I moved `websamp.exe` to `/home/summersd/.wine/fake_windows`, then ran `wine C:\\websamp.exe` to install the program. `wine "C:\\Program Files\\Webshots\\Launcher.exe"` then started the desktop control. I used that to disable the tray icon (wine has one, but you can't see it), and I disabled almost every other "auto update" feature.
+
+I had downloaded a ".wbz" file (which is what is imported into WebShots), and I finally figured out how to import it. Running the launcher program, and following it with the name of the .wbz file, imports it. I may figure out a way to automate that, but for now, I know how to do it.
+
+_(Note: This is the end of the "My Linux Adventure" series of posts. After this, I ended up going back to Windows XP, just because it worked and I didn't have hobbyist time. As of May 2007, I'm running Ubuntu 7.04 on one computer, and Windows Vista on my laptop, which is currently out of commission.)_
+
+
+[WebShots]: //www.webshots.com

source/_posts/2004/when-hardware-attacks.md

@@ -0,0 +1,12 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: When Hardware Attacks
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-14 00:00:22
+categories:
+- Hardware
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: A bad power supply interrupts our plans
+---
+
+I fired up the computer today while I was at home for lunch. I booted it into Windows so my younger son could play a game. When I came home from work, I noticed that the computer was off. Seems that it just completely shut down while he was in the middle of the game. After some hardware troubleshooting, I narrowed the problem down to the power supply. Time to go power-supply hunting...

source/_posts/2004/wireless-woes.md

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Wireless Woes
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-07-06 00:00:19
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: First attempts at a wireless adapter fail spectacularly
+---
+
+My wife bought me a wireless network card, so I could move the second computer out of the living room (or, as she calls it, "not a computer lab!"). :) Everything works okay under WXP, but when I boot to Linux, no joy. (I sort of expected that, at this point...) I downloaded the Red Hat 8 drivers from [iBlitzz's website][ib], but the interface for a network card is what's called a "kernel module," which is, as best I can tell, a highly-specialized object module that tells the kernel all the details of the hardware. At any rate, the kernel module is very much tied to a particular version of kernel, so the RH8 doesn't seem to be working. Oh well - time to play with my new toy - WXP for now.
+
+
+[ib]: //www.iblitzz.com

source/_posts/2004/wow.md

@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: Wow
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-08-01 00:00:34
+categories:
+- [ Databases, MySQL ]
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+- [ Programming, PHP ]
+- [ Web Servers, Apache ]
+- [ Web Servers, IIS ]
+summary: Fedora Core 2 makes a nice first impression
+---
+
+Today I installed Fedora Core 2. This thing is slick! WBEL looked a lot like RH8, which I had seen before my renewed Linux learning began. FC2 has a graphical loader that hides a lot of the background stuff (unless an error occurs) - that's cool. During the install, I skipped OpenOffice.org and MySQL, although I installed PHP with MySQL support. The reason for that is that I wanted to get the latest and greatest versions of those two products. We'll see if this proves to be a good decision or not.
+
+The wireless network card still wasn't recognized (phooey). I did some more searching, armed with the knowledge that I have an adm8211 chipset. One of the first hits under Google's Linux search for "adm8211" pointed me to a project called [NDISwrapper][]. This is a "wrapper" that uses the vendor's Windows DLL file, and converts the hooks from Windows to Linux. Doing this, this driver can (in theory) support most any network card, especially those that aren't in the Linux Hardware Compatibility List (HCL). I downloaded it, compiled it, and followed the directions to install my driver under it. I still wasn't able to create a connection, but on a hunch, I restarted the computer. NDISwrapper is also a kernel module, and I know that often those are only read at startup. Once the computer was restarted, I was able to create a connection, and now my network card works! YEA!!! (And it was only one night's worth of work - much better.)
+
+Now that I have networking working under both operating systems, I plan to try to get four things working the same, whether I'm booted to WXP or Linux - E-mail (using Mozilla Thunderbird), PHP (using Apache on Linux, IIS on WXP), MySQL (using the exact same version on both), and a web server that uses the same html root directory (again, Apache on Linux, IIS on WXP). If I didn't already have IIS up, running, and configured under WXP, I'd probably just do Apache on both, but this will be interesting - it should work, as I don't have many creative permission rules.
+
+
+[NDISwrapper]: //ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net

source/_posts/2004/yum-yum-yum.md

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+---
+layout: post
+title: yum yum yum
+author: Daniel
+date: 2004-06-28 00:00:06
+categories:
+- [ Linux, My Linux Adventure ]
+summary: 'The "yum" updater works nicely'
+---
+
+I wasn't able to sleep very well last night, so I didn't do much tonight. One thing I did do, though, was run [yum][], which is, at a high-level, similar to Windows Update. WBEL recently released "Respin 1" (that's re-spin, not a new name - it's code name is still "Liberation"), and running yum with no options will update every available package. After about 30 minutes of watching it download stuff, I went to bed - I'll have to verify the results tomorrow.
+
+
+[yum]: //linux.duke.edu/projects/yum/