lensblog

Funny how things work out…

You get up in the mornings, get ready for the day, get started along what you think will be a series of events for the day, then get sideswiped by real life.

I was supposed to go on MailMarshall training today in Sandton… got up early to try and miss the traffic on the freeway, though it took me about 30 minutes to get onto it in any case… busy listening to my music on my headset… then I get an SMS alert. Look around for Metro Police goonsquad… no-one nearby, so let’s check the phone…

The SMS is from my technical director. A change in plans. My colleague that was supposed to stand in for another colleague at one of our onsite posts in the CBD, has called in, with what we eventually found out was kidney stones… poor bugger. I know how he feels, as I was in the same position this time last year.

So I now need to go through to town… if anyone knows Johannesburg well, you know that trying to get anywhere in traffic after 7:30am is a nightmare… William Nicol is a gauntlet, Jan Smuts is worse…

At least I remembered the route. The last time I had to do this, it’d had been my first time venturing into the CBD and if I hadn’t had Rozz (who works in the CBD) to follow, I would have gotten hopelessly lost.

The day itself has been pretty quiet. Ran into some old colleagues and friends from my time as a contractor at SecureData so I had someone to chat to. Other than that, just been answering the phone and checking mail for tasks. And remoting into the main office and updating my tickets.

Now to try get home in one piece. Already dreading the return traffic.

From The RIPE 55 Secret Working Group Session
Featuring “The Day the Routers Died…”

Words and performance by Gary Feldman

a long long time ago
i can still remember
when my laptop could connect elsewhere

and i tell you all there was a day
the network card i threw away
had a purpose – and worked for you and me….

But 18 years completely wasted
with each address we’ve aggregated
the tables overflowing
the traffic just stopped flowing….

And now we’re bearing all the scars
and all my traceroutes showing stars…
the packets would travel faster in cars…
the day….the routers died

So bye bye, folks at RIPE 55
Be persuaded to upgrade it or your network will die
IPv6 just makes me let out a sigh
But I spose we’d better give it a try
I suppose we’d better give it a try

Now did you write an RFC
That dictated how we all should be
Did we listen like we should that day

Now were you back at RIPE fifty-four
Where we heard the same things months before
And the people knew they’d have to change their ways….

And we – knew that all the ISPs
Could be – future proof for centuries

But that was then not now
Spent too much time playing WoW

ooh there was time we sat on IRC
Making jokes on how this day would be
Now there’s no more use for TCP
The day the routers died…

So bye bye, folks at RIPE 55
Be persuaded to upgrade it or your network will die
IPv6 just makes me let out a sigh
But I spose we’d better give it a try
I suppose we’d better give it a try

I remember those old days I mourn
Sitting in my room, downloading porn
Yeah that’s how it used to be….

When the packets flowed from A to B
via routers that could talk IP
There was data..that could be exchanged between you and me….

Oh but – I could see you all ignore
The fact – we’d fill up IPv4

But we all lost the nerve
And we got what we deserved!

And while…we threw our network kit away
And wished we’d heard the things they say
Put all our lives in disarray

The day…the routers died…

So bye bye, folks at RIPE 55
Be persuaded to upgrade it or your network will die
IPv6 just makes me let out a sigh
But I spose we’d better give it a try
I suppose we’d better give it a try

Saw a man with whom I used to peer
Asked him to rescue my career
He just sighed and turned away..

I went down to the net cafe
that I used to visit everyday
But the man there said I might as well just leave…

And now we’ve all lost our purpose..
my cisco shares completely worthless…

No future meetings for me
At the Hotel Krasnapolsky

and the men that make us push and push
Like Geoff Huston and Randy Bush
Should’ve listened to what they told us….
The day…the routers….died

So bye bye, folks at RIPE 55
Be persuaded to upgrade it or your network will die
IPv6 just makes me let out a sigh
But I spose we’d better give it a try
I suppose we’d better give it a try

Tomorrow night, at 8pm, I do my first firewall maintenance at a client before the 3rd Party (banking institution) they’re trying to interact with, go into change-freeze at the end of the week…

It’s one thing to sit in the office and do changes where you can (hopefully) reverse them or ask for some advice from a colleague before committing the changes to the firewall. It’s an entirely different story to be at a client with them looking over your shoulder while you ‘tinker’ with their firewall.

What makes this particular change even more nerve-wracking is that the client cannot really explain the changes that I need to make to me upfront… we’re sort of winging it, trying to get something to work.

Hopefully it’s not too big a job. I need to route traffic from one network to another over two Microsoft ISA servers… how hard can it be?

Last night, Craig came to visit me so that I could design his business card for him to take to TechEd 2007. Because he had a function on earlier in the evening, he only ended up coming through to me around 10:45pm.

After some casual banter, we got to work and were doing pretty well until I screwed up and closed the file I was working on… meaning we started again. From scratch.

In the end, it was probably worth it though, as it provided a few laughs and a chance for Craig to tease me about saving as often as possible. We also discussed Microsoft’s Silverlight and a few of the other goodies that Craig has been playing with lately.

We finished up around 12:30am… this is the finished result. Front and back.

If you’re an outsider to the IT industry, does our jargon confuse you? Are we, so to say, speaking in another language? A few years back, I found a little book at a second hand book shop, called Jargon Watch, by Gareth Branwyn.

I remember paging through this pocketbook and smiling to myself as I read the entries, sometimes laughing, sometimes shaking my head. Here was a perfect example of technology taking the English language and redifining it, providing those of us in the industry with so many new ways to describe our world.

Below are some entries I found most appropriate:

• Alpha Geek – The most knowledgeable, technically proficient person in an office or work group. “Ask Larry, he’s the alpha geek around here.”
• Appeasement Engineer – The field service engineer whose job is to arrive at your site within the guarenteed response time, make sure the machine is plugged in, and then call the home office for further instructions.
• Beepilepsy – The brief seizure people sometimes have when their beeper (or cellphone) goes off (especially in vibrator mode). Characterised by physical spasms, goofy facial expressions, and interuption of speech in mid-sentence.
• Bio-break – Techie euphemism for having to use the toilet.
• Bit Diddling – The act of manipulating bits with little to show for it. “The artist bit diddled the image for hours, but I can’t see much of an improvement.”
• Bitslag – All the useless rubble one must plow through on the Net to get to the rich information ore.
• Blowing your buffer – Losing one’s train of thought. Occurs when the person you’re speaking with won’t let you get a word in edgewise, and/or has just said something so astonishing that your train gets derailed. “Damn, I just blew my buffer!”
• Byte-bonding – Occurs when computer users get together and discuss things that non-computer users don’t understand. When byte-bonded people start playing on a computer during a noncomputer-related social situation, they are “geeking out.”
• CLM or Career Limiting Move – Used to describe an ill-advised activity. Sending one’s boss a memo on recycled paper, the reverse of which contains a rant against him/her, is a serious CLM (a real life example, btw!)
• CEOP-phobia – The male fear of peeing while standing next to one’s CEO at a urinal.
• Client/Server Action – Geek euphamism for getting laid. “I went to the Oracle party the other night hoping for a little client/server action.”
• Cube Farm – An office filled with cubicles.
• Cybrarian – A digital librarian. One who makes his/her living doing online research and information retrieval.
• Dead Tree Edition – The paper version of a publication available in both paper and electronic forms, as in “the dead tree edition of the San Francisco Chronicle…” Also known as Treeware.

More to follow when I have some more time to type them up.