Using Rsync to do local snapshotting/backups
January 9, 2010
Jeff Atwood's recent data-loss story
is a good reminder of why you should do off-site backups.
But what if you just accidentally rm'ed a file, or saved over it's contents with bad data? It's a lot of work to
do a full backup recovery of your entire system just to get back one file. Isn't there an easier way?
Local Snapshotting: not perfect, but super ...
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How to Fix the Sharp Edge on your MacBook Pro
December 1, 2009
Problem:
The MacBook Pro has ridiculously sharp edges. After using it for a hour my wrists had annoying (and painful) indentation lines on them. It doesn't bother everyone, but I'm not the only one.
Solution:
It's pretty easy to shave that ...→ Read the rest
How to Diagnose your Flaky Internet Connection
July 12, 2009
I have Verizon Avenue DSL, the worst ISP I've ever had, so I've gotten to learn a few tricks on how to troubleshoot my internet problems.
Here are the steps:
Can you ping the outside world?
Try pinging a well-known IP address like 4.2.2.2- In Windows: Click Start -> Run... -> cmd -> type "ping -n 50 4.2.2.2"
- In Linux/Mac: Open a Terminal and ...
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Good Politician != Good Decider
April 3, 2009
I've just realized what's wrong with our government: it's run by politicians. Seriously though, hear me out. The qualities that make a good politician aren't the qualities that make an ideal government official.
Here are the traits that make a successful politian:
→ Electability
Because of our media-based election system, you can't get into office unless you have a good on-camera personality, have the gift of gab, and are ...→ Read the rest
How iTunes works under the (file) covers
April 2, 2009
If you're like me, you have a bunch of mp3s (that you legitmately obtained from your CD's - ahem) in a neatly organized directory tree on your hard drive. And it's a breeze to navigate, play, backup, and share.→ Read the rest
Is Drinking Distilled Water Dangerous?
November 9, 2008
Note: I'm not a doctor, zealot, or trying to sell anything - I'm just a regular guy summarizing all the research I did on this topic.
There seems to be a lot of controversy about what kind of water people should be drinking and cooking their food with:
- tap water
- natural "spring" or "rain" water
- filtered, reverse-osmosis, or other cleansed/purified/low-mineral water
- distilled water
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How X Over SSH really works
September 27, 2008
Imagine you are sitting in front of a machine named
"home"
that has a keyboard, mouse, display, and is running an
X server. Now you open a terminal and
ssh to a machine called
"remote"
(which doesn't need to have an X server running), and run a program like "firefox" which pops a window in your screen. How does this all work?
First, let's clear up the client/server ...