Isaac Whatever

If you have the choice to buy normal, dirty energy at the standard rate, or clean, renewable energy at twice the cost, which would you choose?

The sad truth is the most people would choose dirty energy. It just isn't bad enough for most people to care. The average person's pollution from energy usage isn't all that much. It's only when you account for the entire population as a whole do you realize how much pollution we're creating. Even then, most people don't feel personally responsible - and what little guilt they do feel isn't enough to make them pay more for clean alternatives.

On the other hand, sunlight is a great source of energy and it pours freely onto our planet every single day. Almost all of our fuel sources come eventually from the sun. Wind power is really sun power, because the sun powers the forces that create the wind. So then, is wave power. Oil and coal come from organisms that were once dependant on the sun for energy - or ate other organisms who were.

We can already harness solar power, but it's prohibitively expensive, and people won't willingly pay for it. Soon, hopefully, this will no longer be the case.

This article by the Telegraph UK, highlights a new solar cell technology that will be cheaper than getting energy from fossil fuels.

So, very soon now, we will be faced with a new choice. Choose existing dirty energy sources, or switch to new clean energy that will cost less?

Once again, technology saves the day. I think.

Tree-hugging aside, solar energy appeals to me because it's the simple, logical choice. Burning fossil fuels while this free energy pours down upon our heads seems stupid.

Looking forward to the future.

Labels: economy, energy, environment, money, solar, solar energy, telegraph

Gentoo linux forms the base of my "networked inventory control appliance", so I've been installing Gentoo on a number of older PCs we have lying around.

Older PCs are great for this project because it doesn't require much in the way of computing power, and they're cheap and generally well-supported in linux.

I expected that installing Gentoo on an old Dell Dimension 2100 would be a simple process, but this dell has a network card that has been causing me some trouble.

Lspci reports the card as "Ethernet controller: Davicom Semiconductor, Inc. 21x4x DEC-Tulip compatible 10/100 Ethernet (rev 31)". The Gentoo boot disc loads both the tulip and dmfe modules, and seems to work perfectly fine.

When configuring the kernel myself I chose the driver which corresponded to the tulip module, listed in menuconfig as "DECchip Tulip (dc2114x) PCI support". I thought that since the lspci showed the card as 21x4x that "2114x" would probably work, and the Gentoo boot/install disc is usually spot on in its driver choices.

And it did, for about 30 seconds after a reboot. Then it quit. I could get it working for another 30 second spurt by unplugging the LAN cable and plugging it back in.

I started the Google-Fu and found this thread on the ubuntu forums where they advised blacklisting the tulip module and loading only the dmfe.

Going back through menuconfig I turned off my earlier option (DECchip Tulip (dc2114x) PCI support) and instead picked "Davicom DM910x/DM980x support". This choice corresponds to the dmfe module. Then I recompiled the kernel and rebooted.

Did it work? Well, partially. I lost my connection for a bit after a reboot, but it does work fine most of the time now. I suppose I'll use it as a testing machine and keep my eye out for a salvageable NIC.

To recap, for anyone who finds this site looking for the solution to the same problem...
System:

• Dell Dimension 2100
• Gentoo Linux 2006.1
• kernel version: 2.6.19-gentoo-r5
  
• lspci output: Ethernet controller: Davicom Semiconductor, Inc. 21x4x DEC-Tulip compatible 10/100 Ethernet (rev 31)

Problem:

• Loss of network connectivity approx. 30 seconds after reboot.
• DHCP works fine at boot - can be misleading.

Solution (for those like me, who want the driver in the kernel, not a module):

1. In menuconfig, deselect the other tulip related drivers.
2. Use the option for "Davicom DM910x/DM980x support".
3. make && make modules_install
4. cp arch/i386/boot/bzimage to /boot/{your kernel}
5. adjust grub if necessary
   
6. reboot

Of course, if you'd like it as a module, use the excellent howto on the ubuntu forums . And remember, you might need to unload and reload that module twice for it to work.

Really, you should probably just go get a new NIC.

Labels: drivers, gentoo, irritation, linux

I'm so tired of Windows.

I'm an IT guy. I fix computers and handle problems. Today I was standing behind a user, having a conversation with him, when his computer crapped out.

I think he had outlook open. I'm not sure. What I do remember, very clearly, is that his hands were nowhere near the computer when the Blue Screen of Death appeared, and it had been idle for a while.

Startup failed. Then on rebooting in safe mode we got the dreaded Mup.sys error. Which doesn't really have anything to do with Mup.sys. After loading Mup.sys windows does a ton of different things, but "Loading Mup.sys" is the last message displayed.

I feel a sort of pity for the creator of Mup.sys. I imagine him traveling from town to town, an outcast, haunted by the Mup.sys error that actually has nothing to do with him.

This is my third dreaded Mup.sys error, and I've never successfully solved any of them. I tried the USB peripheral switching fix and then gave up and popped in Knoppix and started backing up his files. I won't even try the other fixes anymore - they're time consuming and they didn't work before - I just put the computer out of its misery.

(We could talk about backups here. I don't feel like it. We don't do backups on salesguy computers. The DB barely gets backed up. An argument for another day.)

There's the reformat, the reinstall, the driver hunt, updates, antivirus, office, outlook, configuring the VPN, reconfiguring outlook (it never seems to take the first time. I don't do anything different the second time), then favorites, documents, and pictures.

The new version of Office deleted the printer drivers when it installed. So I had to install them again, minutes after installing them the first time. Then a few minutes later, after a reboot, the original printer drivers were back. Great. I deleted the extra ones and soldiered on. Finally I was finished. Now the user is back to exactly where he was before his computer crapped out on him for no reason at all.

This is one of my best users. He didn't blame me, and he even listened to my Mup.sys explanation. Then he asked me - and this really kills me - what he could do to avoid this problem. And I had nothing to tell him.

Damn windows.

When one of my personal computers has a problem now I just turn it off. I ran off Knoppix for a week to avoid even trying to figure out why my burner was making coasters - they burned flawlessly in Knoppix. I only went back to windows because Knoppix locked up. And I was done burning CDs. My curiosity kicked in later and I found that I had installed rival cd-burning programs, which were engaged a war of attrition over my burner.

I'm tired of this. I'm getting close to buying a Mac again. The first time I did it I loved it - until I had to pay for it, and pay for support. Then I swore I wouldn't do it again unless I was rich. But maybe, just maybe, it is time.

I miss it. Especially Mail.app.

Labels: apple, crash, irritation, IT, mup.sys, windows, work