The Time Sink

Back to work to recover from the weekend! Yep, Sunday was one heck of a working day; Shelley and I both moved more stuff around than either of us thought possible. By the time night hit, Shelley had re-packed all the CDs, tapes and books I'd emptied out of the library on round one. That was forty boxes at last count. ...and Bradley, Daniel and I had filled our trash toter (and the neighbors) to the top with things that couldn't be kept, weren't salable, or aren't going to charity.

Since we decided to go with the yard sale option, I concentrated on moving things from the attic and the library that were high cubage and will likely sell. ...and things like the old 286 and 386 cases went into the trash. ...followed by every 5.25 floppy I ran across! This week I'll follow up by trying to get to as many boxes of previously stashed stuff as I can; if I haven't used it or seen since we moved in, it better have a good reason to stay around.

Late, late, late... Yeah, Shelley got a call to sub at 0530 this morning. ...and the day went sideways from there. I thought I had it covered once I fell back asleep; I mean, the boys didn't even argue before school (yes, marked on the calendar!) and I had hopes. ...until I realized the pool jets sounded strange.

Yes, strange, like air injection on a hot tub. Hmmm.. Usually, that just means the pool sweep broached and sucked some air in and it will clear in a minute or two... Nope, still going. Darn.

Hey, an easy one: a pool toy (water ball) sticking the skimmer flap in the up position. Great. I'll deal with the miscreants later. No, wait; they may have saved a life here. Yeah, looky here, there's a froglet stuck in the skimmer; if it had been pulling full flow, he'd be long gone...

Okay, all I need is to get him out. Ah, not an easy one: he's quick and his IFF doesn't recognize me. Great. Now we're headed into The Late Zone... Filter off; prop things so he can get into the pool; skimmer access cover off; hope he can figure it out. Kids to get to school; me to get to work; Shelley to not mention this one to...

I spent some time the last two days bouncing ideas off Dave pretty much just to force myself to think 'out loud'. ...and the fact that he knows way more than me <g>!

Basically, I'm spoiled. I'm used to having a dedicated file server available for downloads, camera dumps and local web serving. ...and I like the luxury/necessity of a dedicated router. With those pieces in place, I can get away with using test beds as production machines. ...and if I crash and burn one, my files and connectivity aren't affected.

Where the computers have been living, space hasn't been a problem. ...and machines, especially obsolete machines, are legion. Heck, Janus, the file server, is a P-100 that wouldn't recognize a HDD > 8.4 meg if you slapped him with a patch. ...and at one point, a P-90 under Mandrake ran the connectivity 'twixt the household and the world.

So, what to do when space is now headed toward a premium? I think I have one solution. Remember those pen-based machines I spoke about way back when? Yeah, the Fujitsu 1200 series. I ended up with some "broken" ones when we transitioned to newer units. "Broken" in this case meaning anything from 'won't boot' to a severed power pigtail. Okay, I still remember which end of the soldering iron not to hold...

How's this sound? One P-120 with about 32meg of RAM running a firewall Linux (Seattle, Coyote, Freesco or some such) on a 128meg flash card configured as as HDD. No fan, no moving parts at all, drill out the case for extra air flow...

...and add in a PCMCIA NIC for the 100 base portion of the network, maybe a PCMCIA wireless NIC for the remotes, hang a modem off the serial port, and that unit could even live in the bedroom. We're talking the foot print of a sheet of paper. ...and a height of less than a ream of that paper. Oh, and a few wires <g>...

Still thinking our loud... I guess I really don't need much in the way of NICs for that router; after all, the limiting factor is the dial-up. So, I think I'll hang on to any PCMCIA stuff I find as I clean. ...and I'll have to think about using the router as a bridge to the wireless or hang the access point off the network. Okay, I'll map that one out...

...and if I take another of the Fujitsus and put a 4 gig HDD in it, I have my file server, -neh? Give it at least 32meg of ram (I think I can manage up to 80 on the one model), a NIC (100 base) and let it handle the chores of picture dumps, download storage and web site service. I don't even need to run much for overhead; Apache comes to mind, but the list is short after that. SSH, sure... What else... Perl. Ah, a great place to put a Moveable Type installation to play with. Cool...

...and I got to thinking yesterday about what else has been living quietly in the library just doing its job: the home automation controller. Yeah. I need that where I can get to it with a serial cable. ...and a DOS-based program. Ewww... Okay. Shift another paradigm. Perhaps the file server or even a third pen-based unit (sans pen) running MisterHouse! Oh, yeah. Man, that install comes with voice recognition and all sorts of goodies...

A little housekeeping is in order after a few e-mails yesterday... Yep, that was a total goof-up to not include the links to things like one guy who uses Linux on Fujitsu 1200s. ...or the BBS for the I-appliance crowd. ...or even to MisterHouse. My apologies, especially for those who had to search for links...

Those links, and more of the off the wall types of things I like to reference, are available over on Whitenoise. I don't have a search function built into that page; <Ctrl+F> seems to work well enough <g>. ...and hey, if you find a dead link, please let me know; I'll track it down.

Today is a day off. Not one of rest by any means; in two words: yard sale. Yeah, more attic work, and then a pull from storage. ...and then Miller time.

Hey, we're gonna' have a yard sale! Yeah, next week! Ummm... Today's? Yeah, it's on as scheduled...

Yeah... A minor problem cropped up as I hauled stuff down from the attic and Shelley marked it up. ...and I hauled stuff home from storage and Shelley marked it up. ...and I took the stuff out of the shed and Shelley marked it up. Well, two things really: Shelley ran out of labels (she only started with 300 or so) and I ran out of space. The one half of the garage is full and would mirror nicely onto the driveway; but there's stuff in the side yard and that still doesn't address those fifty or sixty boxes in the living room...

So, we're going for it today. ...and we'll continue the saga with more Trash and Treasure hunting on Monday and Friday. ...and hit things again Saturday. Oh, my aching back...

Yeah, Saturday was a long, long day... Up at 0500, Starbucks by 0530, move stuff out and people there by the dawn's early light...

...and these weren't the first people. ...but they bought something like 45 CDs.

Hey, remember Heathkit? Yeah, a bunch of my older audiophile stuff made the move. That box on the left held an unopened kit for a crystal controlled scanner...