/dev/zero » Andrew

When you love without limits…

Andrew — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 06:28:20 +0000

Best line I’ve heard all week:

When you love without limits, unconditionally,
when you love without fear,
then you shall be free.

Email message receipts

Andrew — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 14:51:21 +0000

Technorati Tags: customer support,computer user,email,outlook

Dear Customer,

Expecting our secure message receipts to behave exactly like Outlook message receipts is just plain silly. Here’s a tip: our application is NOT OUTLOOK. No, receipts returned by our mail encryption system do not use Outlook-specific properties like "OutlookMessageClass". Since our receipt is just an email message, it’s up to Outlook to decide what message class it is. If it doesn’t set it to the same "class" as the return receipts generated BY Outlook, well, we have no control over that.

(Tip number 2: Yes, Outlook/Exchange dominate the business email market. However they do NOT define how email works. Please stop expecting everything on the Internet to conform to the Microsoft Way.)

Testing out Windows Live Writer

Andrew — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 19:49:03 +0000

Just messing around with the Windows Live blog client.

Not really a big fan of MS freebie "non-commercial" tools, but Windows Live Mail is a big step up from Outlook Express. Just kind of curious how this works.

Dear Computer User,

Andrew — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 15:21:21 +0000

When emailing tech support about an issue with a user’s account, please keep in mind we don’t know who “Joan Smith” is. If you want us to do something for her email address, include her email address!

Oh, I’m sorry, did you need me to interpret that error message for you?

Andrew — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 00:45:53 +0000

Dear Computer User,

When sending an error message to Tech Support, it’s generally helpful to say something about the message you are forwarding. We are not mind readers. Something like “I was doing X and clicked Y and this error message appeared” goes a long way to diagnosing the problem. While we’re at it, if the error message clearly says what the problem is, and it’s not something we can fix for you, but rather you need to fix for yourself, why waste our, and your, time?
To wit: forwarding us an email bounce message (and ONLY the bounce message!), when the bounce says:

The mail system

: host mail1.company.com[IP.AD.DR.ESS]
said: 550 5.1.1 : Recipient address
rejected: User unknown in virtual mailbox table (in reply to RCPT TO
command)

Says exactly what it means: User unknown. Forwarding this message to tech support of the sending mail server (without even saying why you’re sending it to them) is like dialing a phone number, getting a “number has been disconnected or is no longer in service” message, recording it, then dialing 411 and just playing the recording back to them. If you’re expecting the operator at the phone company to just figure out what you REALLY meant is “Why is my friend not answering the phone?” is rather silly. Expecting them to give you an answer more informative than “that number is out of service” is only marginally less silly.

Regards,

Every Technical Support Representative on the planet

Office annoyances

Andrew — Thu, 19 May 2011 20:06:08 +0000

Dear Coworker,

You have a private office. This office has a door. Please close said door when you’re going to use speaker phone for extended periods.

Info, please?

Andrew — Wed, 18 May 2011 17:30:51 +0000

Dear Computer User,

Sending tickets to Support with a subject line of just “Help” (even when spelled correctly!) is not very helpful for the poor techs who are staring at a screen full of tickets, trying to prioritize which one’s need immediate assistance and who can wait.

This falls in the “It’s broken. Fix it.” category. Help me help you.

Thank you,

Your friendly neighborhood support technician

Dear Computer User,

Andrew — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 14:29:56 +0000

“Intranet Explorer”? Seriously?

Dear Computer User,

Andrew — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 14:17:02 +0000

Dear Computer User,

Do you call your doctor and say “I don’t feel well”?
Do you call your mechanic and say “My car isn’t working right”?
Then why in God’s name do you email tech support and say “it isn’t working”? We can’t help you fix it if you don’t tell us WHAT is wrong?

More Geocaching

Andrew — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 20:24:31 +0000

Heading out for an afternoon of geocaching with Kem.
We’re going to try to hit 10 caches in one day!

Mail and Network admins

Andrew — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 15:59:09 +0000

I am so tired of dealing with mail, and network admins who haven’t the slightest clue about DNS. I hate having to waste half an hour explaining PTR records to people should already understand this basic stuff.

Swype

Andrew — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 21:38:21 +0000

I got a new Android phone the other day (Tmobile Vibrant /Samsung Galaxy S) that comes pre-installed with Swype. I’m not as fast or proficient as the guy in the demo videos yet, but it’s a hell of a lot faster than taping.
Anyone else have it, and what do you think of it?

Manipulating maildirs at the filesystem level

Andrew — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 21:26:16 +0000

Let’s here it for being able to manipulate you mail directory structure at the file system level and still be able to access it through Thunderbird.

DJBDNS and IPv6

Andrew — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 19:51:12 +0000

Tip: When patching DJB’s “dnscache” for IPv6, you can’t just tell it to bind to both the IPv4 and IPv6 addresses. You will need to run two separate instances, one binding to the IPv4 address, one binding to the IPv6 address.
I haven’t checked, but I’m betting my tinydns instance is also not binding to both addresses and will have to be run as two separate instances as well.

Andrew — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 21:41:30 +0000

The AT&T tech just finished installing the Uverse modem and I just completed the “registration”. First thing I did was hit speedtest.net of course.

Not bad. Not bad at all, when I was quoted “12Mbps”. 10MBPs actual is pretty good.

Fixing Vmware virtual disks

Andrew — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 23:57:39 +0000

Having hosed a Gentoo guest on a VMware ESXi host by filling the partition (which VMware really doesn’t like) then attempting to fix it by mounting the partition in anther guest and fsck’ing it first, I got the error message “the parent virtual disk has been modified since the child was created” when I tried to boot the original Gentoo guest.
Googling pointed me to a nice post at Recovering VMware snapshot after parent changed.
Step two lists the following caveat:

“Look at the size of the snapshot virtual hard disk. If it is more than 2GB and you’re running a 32-bit OS, or it is more than the amount of memory that you have available, the following method will probably not work. You’re welcome to try though.”

I found this wasn’t an issue as it appears (at least as of ESXi 4.x) VMware has separated the vmdk “header” and “data”, putting the “header” in the “hostname.vmdk” file and the actual data in “hostname-flat.vmdk”. The original vmdk is now only a couple of hundred bytes and easily edited in vi. Grabbing the CID from the Gentoo.vmdk and modifying parentCID in Gentoo000001.vmdk had me back up and running (at least to the point that I could now boot the Gentoo guest, using an Ubuntu ISO so I could access the file system and clean it up. I moved /home to a new partition, fixing the space issue).
Next time, I’ll just be smart and build all systems with LVM, then I can just add more physical extents when I need more space.

Twitter Updates for 2009-11-22

Andrew — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Back from honeymoon, just opened wedding gifts. #

Google’s Holiday Gift: Free Wi-Fi at Airports

Andrew — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:35:40 +0000

Cool. Now why couldn’t they have done this YESTERDAY, when it was useful to me?

Google’s Holiday Gift: Free Wi-Fi at Airports.

Twitter Updates for 2009-11-06

Andrew — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

RT @feather802 Currently fulfilling my primary purpose in life: Cat Bed – We were doing that this morning, to. #

Twitter Updates for 2009-11-05

Andrew — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Rep. McCaul is an idiot making any such statemtns without more informtion. #FtHoodShootings #

Twitter Updates for 2009-11-03

Andrew — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

RT @tomservo79 Marriage is a Lovecraftian ritual meant to summon Yogsothoth. Gay marriages are all about Cthulu. The divide is pretty clear. #
RT @choochoobear It might be a little longer before the drippy faucet in my tub is fixed. – I hear they have pills for that now. #

Twitter Updates for 2009-11-02

Andrew — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

RT @nprpolitics Tech alert: The @nprtechteam is live-tweeting NPR.org's switch from Oracle to MySQL tonight. #
RT @BrentSpiner the only rolls I regret have complex carbs. — now there's an actor who knows where his bread is buttered. #
RT @martinbogo @strongbow Heh, and Mr. Spiner is looking a bit like you and me these days … – now be nice! #

Twitter Updates for 2009-10-31

Andrew — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:00:00 +0000

Who wants a Google Wave invite? #

Twitter Updates for 2009-10-29

Andrew — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 01:00:00 +0000

#tmh20 OK, get on with the zombie gag already. #
Obviously: there's a Black Lantern controlling them. #tmh20 #
#tmh20 don't break the 4th wall, guys! #
It's a 20 yo Mercedes. Hotwire the damn thing. #tmh20 #
I hope you have some sanitizer. #tmh20 #
Zombies and "your moma" cracks? #tmh20 #
He's eating cat and rat brains, not lamb and human brain. #tmh20 #
No! Don't let him get behind you! #tmh20 #

Seen on Facebook

Andrew — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 01:48:57 +0000

“In a survey done several years ago George Barna asked American people if they pray and if they believe in God. The results were this, 97% of people pray only 92% of Americans believe in the existence of God. Did you catch that? More people pray than believe in God…”

I suspect only Christians, and to a lesser extent, Jews and Muslims would find anything odd about this. “Do you believe in God?” probably implies the “god” of Abraham to most folks.