Several years ago, shortly after I'd been promoted from tech support to sys admin, and was still feeling nervous about it, I was editing the DNS zone file for the main domain at my work. I use vi, and I use ":x" to write/quit. Turns out, ":X" encrypts the file. Before I'd realized what I'd done, the file was encrypted with some random key composed of characters from whatever commands I was about to run, plus backspaces when I realized I was still in the file.
I had to reconstruct the file nearly from scratch (well, actually, just the comments, since we still had the slave zones - but the comments were very important), when it turned out the backups hadn't been working properly, either (a whole other can of worms, and my first major fix-it job as an admin). There were several old versions of the file lying around, which helped, too. The worst part was that I was the goddamn admin. I learned about not always typing at maximum speed that day.
Then, a friend/co-worker of mine deleted the public/private SSH key pair we used at the time to connect to all of our servers from our central admin box, trumping the Hell out of my mistake.
A friend of mine who has manic depression started a website/community called the Icarus Project. Though not specifically geared toward schizophrenics, this could be a good resource.
From the statement of purpose on the site:
The need for this site became exceedingly clear after two events organized in the fall of 2002 by Sascha DuBrul, my cohort on this crazy project. The first was Walking the Edge of Insanity: Navigating the World of Mental Health as a Radical in the 21st Century, a Do-it-Yourself mental health workshop in Berkeley, Ca. Sascha also published an article in the SF Bay Guardian called Bipolar World that more specifically addresses his personal experience dealing with madness and investigating manic depression through the available literature. Dozens of people all over the country, as well as those who came to the workshop, started flooding Sascha with e-mails of thanks, desperation, and incredible accounts of their histories with bipolar. We decided that there must be somewhere for these peole to connect with each other and share their stories; the Icarus Project was born. To the best of our knowledge, there is nothing quite like this out there.
At the least, it seems like it could be a good source for support.
At the same time, it's pretty close to impossible to engage in any sort of reasonable debate about
government-hyped causes. I've seen the type of debate on slashdot whenever drugs come up - you've got the D.A.R.E. parrots who've never done drugs, quoting 20/20 about deadly narcotics like THC, and the outraged pothead reaction to the aforementioned birds.
The drug war is so ludicrous, and at the same time, so in the financial interests of the powers that be, that there's nothing left to do but mock it. I can't imagine any major news outlet publishing a balanced story about it.
So when something disturbing occurs, like the latest random civilian death caused by the drug war, what do you do? If you don't have the money of a major lobbyist on your side, or greater military power than the US government, you vent a little.
It's not going to change anybody's attitudes or policies, but it helps relieve some of the anger and frustration at our government's actions.
Slashdot Mirror
Several years ago, shortly after I'd been promoted from tech support to sys admin, and was still feeling nervous about it, I was editing the DNS zone file for the main domain at my work. I use vi, and I use ":x" to write/quit. Turns out, ":X" encrypts the file. Before I'd realized what I'd done, the file was encrypted with some random key composed of characters from whatever commands I was about to run, plus backspaces when I realized I was still in the file.
I had to reconstruct the file nearly from scratch (well, actually, just the comments, since we still had the slave zones - but the comments were very important), when it turned out the backups hadn't been working properly, either (a whole other can of worms, and my first major fix-it job as an admin). There were several old versions of the file lying around, which helped, too. The worst part was that I was the goddamn admin. I learned about not always typing at maximum speed that day.
Then, a friend/co-worker of mine deleted the public/private SSH key pair we used at the time to connect to all of our servers from our central admin box, trumping the Hell out of my mistake.
That one I had backed up, though.
At the same time, it's pretty close to impossible to engage in any sort of reasonable debate about
government-hyped causes. I've seen the type of debate on slashdot whenever drugs come up - you've got the D.A.R.E. parrots who've never done drugs, quoting 20/20 about deadly narcotics like THC, and the outraged pothead reaction to the aforementioned birds.
The drug war is so ludicrous, and at the same time, so in the financial interests of the powers that be, that there's nothing left to do but mock it. I can't imagine any major news outlet publishing a balanced story about it.
So when something disturbing occurs, like the latest random civilian death caused by the drug war, what do you do? If you don't have the money of a major lobbyist on your side, or greater military power than the US government, you vent a little.
It's not going to change anybody's attitudes or policies, but it helps relieve some of the anger and frustration at our government's actions.