Ben Ruset Sysadmin, etc.

Ides of March (2008) Update

My last post on this blag was on February 21st, about my new VPS hosting. While I am happy to report that I am still happy with them, I am dismayed at my lack of inspiration for updating here. Granted there are only a few people who read here - and perhaps none anymore - I am to be excused, but I have always found writing for the sake of writing to be therapeutic, and I am in need of therapy.

So, rather than make one big update, here's a bunch of little ones. If you squint your eyes, it sort of looks like one big post.

1) New Jeep - on Presidents Day I went out and leased (ick) a 2008 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon Unlimited. This is the first vehicle I have ever owned that has four nouns to describe it. In keeping with my theme of buying obnoxiously yellow Wranglers, this one is "Detonator Yellow." Why did I buy it? Because my old Grand Cherokee needed a lot of work, and given that my ability to collect a paycheck hinges on my 5h round trip commute, I need a reliable car.

The new Jeep.

 

The Grand Cherokee I traded in. I also called it "vehicle of impending doom." At least it looked good.

 

My much older 2004 Wrangler Rubicon, in "Solar Yellow."

 

It's a very nice Jeep. I don't think it's as good off-road as the '04 Rubicon I had, but it's far more comfortable on-road. I recently bought the MyGig navigation radio off eBay, which adds navigation as well as a 20GB hard drive for storing mp3's. This has cut down on my use of my iPhone as my primary music device (and my poor 30gb iPod video sits uncharged and unloved now.) So, now I'm car poor again. :/

2) VMWare Servers: I'm pretty amazed with the number of hits and comments to my VMWare Server blag. Thankfully it seems nobody is coming here for information on HPUX, which is relieving. Or, it could be that I'm the only person left in the world that has to use it. We're adding another 10 VMWare Servers to the mix. I've made up a nice kickstart to install CentOS 4.6, VMWare Server, VMWare MUI, and install the Dell OpenManage yum repository on the box. I'll probably post that soon.

3) Datacenter Migration: About two years ago we moved a bunch of gear from a colo to our new corporate headquarters. We built a (roughly) 25x25' room in which to store all of our server gear. We left a 1/2 rack at the colo to hold our DNS server and some other odds and ends, because we had a good deal on it. Fast forward a year -- the new server room is full, is drawing close to 200a of power, the a/c is tragically overutilized, one of our portable a/c units committed suicide, and the 1/2 rack at the colo has bloomed to a full rack of gear that is largely powered off. Since the old colo is out of space (and apparently getting out of the colo business anyway) we're moving to a new colo in Manhattan. This is a process that has been in the works for almost four months now, held up by ceaceless negotiations, a director level position above me being created, then the guy who filled it got fired, then we hired someone else, problems with leasing companies, arguments with how to transport gear to the new place, etc.  Is it any wonder why I am jealous of the perl programmers we have now?

4) Philosophy: My new boss and I have some differing views of how the world and business works. It's a friendly disagreement. He lent me some Ayn Rand to read this weekend. I've heard plenty about her, but never got around to reading any yet. I'm sure I'll disagree. There's talk about starting an office book club. I think my first contribution to that will be some Hermann Hesse. That'll show 'em. (Note: after I finish Ayn Rand I'm going to start rereading some Hesse, perhaps in chronological order.)

5) RIP Julius Caesar:  He got stabbed today, 2052 years ago.