... my co-worker at the opposite table sais "Pah, blackouts can't happen in germany. We have a very narrow and redundant power grid." [translated]
Now imagine his face ten seconds later, when all monitores became black, all lights went off, and the UPS switched to battery supply. The local power company needed 2.5 hours to get the power back...
I couldn't agree more. When I did my alternative civilian service [Zivildienst] in a sheltered workshop [Werkstatt fr Behinderte], the handicapped people built the wiring harnesses for medical autoclaves from wire and crimp contacts. We had to rework the wiring harnesses several times, because the wires (mainly their electric insulation) and the contacts did not stand the conditions (heat and humidity) inside the autoclaves. The contacts corroded, the insulation melted or broke and caused short circuits, and so on.
Those parts were specified for this hard conditions (but they actually did not met the specifications). Now guess what happens to a mobile phone that is certainly not designed for that conditions if you put it inside an autoclave.
You may find some more information about autoclaves at the web site of the company we worked for: www.melag.de (english pages available). (I'm no longer related with that company, it's just the only company I know that produces autoclaves.)
My first idea (assuming your biggest problem with the keyboard are the various "shifting" keys): Get some foot switches from the local electronics store, open the keyboard, and wire the contacts of Shift, Ctrl, Alt, and (if present) the Apple or Windows key to one switch each (in parallel to the original key-operated switch). Using a headphone jack for each foot switch at the keyboard might be a good idea.
Each foot operates two keys, the "smarter" one should operate the most frequently used keys (I guess Shift and Ctrl), the "dumber" foot gets the remaining keys (Alt and OS specific).
This solution might look a little bit strange, but you can use a simple keyboard that works without extra software, and it will still work with the next generation of operating systems.
I see that you may have some difficulties building it yourself, but except for a little bit of mechanics, the modification is trivial. Maybe some electronics, computer, or TV workshop can do them for a little money. One of the "ancient" or high-quality keyboards using mechanical switches instead of plastic foil may make the job easier, because you can hardly solder wires to plastic foil. But when you are stuck with a plastic foil keyboard, you still can trace the tracks on the plastic foil to the controller chip and solder the foot switch wires there.
When it panics, it reruns the bootloader (use BIOS calls to read the first HD sector and go from there) [...]
When Linux panics, it usually has a good reason to do so. Something like a damaged descriptor table, overwritten kernel code, hardware that works wrong, and various other catastrophes. Panic means a real panic: You can not reliably use any hardware. So you can not rerun the bootloader, and you can not access the BIOS. You can only hope that a hardware watchdog card notices that the kernel has paniced (because its timeout counter is no longer reset) and reboots the machine.
(BTW: to access the boot loader and the BIOS, you probably would have to drop out of protected mode back into the ugly world of real mode (or V86 mode), causing even more P.I.T.A.)
Nope. RTC memory is something between 128 Bytes (IBM AT) and 2 KBytes (IBM PS/2 series). And each bit of it is used for the BIOS and some hardware stuff (Microchannel requires a lot of memory). Perhaps, some machines have a few unused bits. But you can't stuff all your memory into them. You can't compress several megabytes or gigabytes into 10 to 20 Bits (at least not lossless). With a lot of luck and deep knowledge of the used machine and BIOS, you may be able to store a dirty-or-clean shutdown flag. But as I said, it depends very much on the machine and the BIOS.
Generate special RRIP records for transparently compressed files. This is only of use and interest for hosts that support transparent decompression, such as Linux 2.4.14 or later. You must specify the -R or -r options to enable RockRidge, and generate compressed files using the mkzftree utility before running mkisofs. Note that transparent compression is a nonstandard Rock Ridge extension. The resulting disks are only transparently readable if used on Linux. On other operating systems you will need to call mkzftree by hand to decompress the files.
(Should not be too hard to port the transparent decompression code to *BSD and Darwin...)
Method 2:
KNOPPIX uses transparent decompression through a loop device to store more than 2 GBytes on a simple CDROM.
Currently, I have not found a suitable fanless PSU in a standard PC-mountable case. But there are other options. I have not yet decided which way I will go.
A four-voltage open frame PSU rated at 80/110 Watts (without/with fan), as offered by HN-Elektronik as PU110-40. I guess it requires a little work to mount it in a standard PC case, and the output wires must be hand-made from PSU-specific connectors and a standard PC cable loom. I don't know if this PSU has enough power for your PC, but I hope it has enough power to supply my nearly-barebone system nearly twice.
A standard PC PSU with a regulated or disconnected fan. As long as the PSU must supply only a fraction of the rated wattage, it does not get very warm. A good fan regulation could switch off the fan until the PSU gets hot. Fan regulation circuits are available for a few EURO/US$. If you have a spare PSU, disconnecting the fan may work, too. But you must then remember that a 200W PSU is now rated for about 50 W. I HAVE NOT TESTED DISCONNECTING THE FAN. Mesuring the temperature of the PSU parts is recommended during the tests. A standard PSU may BURN if the fan is disconnected.
Using a fanless ATX PSU (google finds many of them) will work, the AT Power switch remains in the case, but it does no longer switch the input voltage, but the ATX "Power Supply On" signal (connect to Ground to enable PSU). The 3.3V line and +5V Standby are not connected in an AT system, all other lines are connected to the standard AT connector).
Reusing an ITX PSU (that is in fact a splitted ATX PSU with a low-voltage part in the PC case and a high-voltage part in an external "brick") could also work. ITX PSUs have a low wattage (still more than required for my system), but they are generally fanless.
I hope this information helps you. I'm sorry, but for all variants, you need to know which end of the soldering iron you can always touch without pain.;-)
... just try FLI4L (english page, there is also a german page). It is a modular router that can be extended to provide ISDN, DSL, Modem, and many, many more features listed on the web page. A simple ISDN/DSL router with port filtering ("firewall") fits on a floppy, with more features, you may need more room. You can get modules to install fli4l on a harddisk (or compact flash or IDE flash), other modules support booting from CDROM. With etherboot, you can also boot from a TFTP server.
I run fli4l since years on my router (some old 100 MHz Pentium clone made by AMD), the last modification was to replace the old HDD with a 64 MBytes IDE flash module (made by Transcend) -- 60 MBytes are still free.
Now, there are only three moving (i.e. noisy) parts left: one floppy for updates, CPU fan and PSU fan. The floppy will soon be replaced by an etherboot EEPROM on the internal ethernet card, set to boot from local drives by default. The CPU fan will be replaced by a larger heat sink, and the PSU will be replaced with a fan-less PSU.
Don't these people know that gamers burn to ash when they are exposed to sunlight? That's why they hide in dark rooms with only artificial light and don't go out until it's dark.
Warning: Don't look into the microwave beam with the remaining eye!
If you transmit a few kilowatts via Microwaves, just be careful not to walk into the microwave ray, unless you are well-shielded. Wrapping yourself in tinfoil should help. You don't want to end as a fried chicken, do you?
Yes, my preciousssss... /me needsssssss internet real sssssssssssssoon....
... in an area where children die from drinking water from the local river. Get the "life support" infrastructure back to "up and running" state, then think about getting the internet up.
Get rid of Access as a database server. It is ok to use Access as a frontend to almost any "real" database server. If you have a samba server, you may want to put a PostgreSQL or MySQL server on that machine. Install ODBC sources for the server on the clients, and connect Access through ODBC to the server. In Access, separate program code and database, delete the database part, and distribute the *.mdb "Program" via the samba server. Your users can still use the user interface they are used to, but there will be no more file sharing conflicts.
I plan to use Linux' Software RAID to mirror all my data to one or two harddisk in an exchangeable frame. A RAID restore took only two thirds of the time for a file-by-file copy on my old machine. It is already using two disks in a Software RAID mirror. So the next step is to threw in another disk, and make linux mirror the data to the third drive. Should run nicely in background.
Sure, this is a home solution, not a professional solution, but it should be simpler than fiddling with tapes that don't have enough capacity for all my data.
You asked for VGA or DVI, not for composite video or similar. So please let me ask this: Have you considered using two Dual-Head VGA cards or maybe four Standard VGA cards and the Multi-Monitor Features of X11 or Winddows?
A laptop that old should have a standard 2.5 inch harddisk. Download a linux kernel and a ramdisk image, load it via loadlin.exe, run fdisk and mke2fs/mkswap to have proper partitions. Get an adapter that converts the 2.0mm 44 pin connector from that drive to a 2.5mm 40 pin connector plus a power connector (Like this one found at Reichelt Elektronik in Germany for 4 EUR = 4 USD). Plug it into your laptop harddisk and your desktop PC, replacing the build-in harddisk, and install your favorite Linux distro from CDROM. Don't configure X or other stuff, then put the drive back into your Laptop. Finished.
The trick is to do the fdisk and format in the laptop so that the geometry information written to the master boot record of the harddisk matches the laptop bios' idea of what kind of harddisk you have.
You may want to keep a very small DOS partition (5 megs or so) with loadlin.exe and a kernel, marked as active partition, so that you can start up Linux (and then lilo) from a known-good state instead of hoping that lilo was installed properly in the desktop. You could also use a partition of about 100 MBytes and reuse it as swap later.
No warranty, your mileage may vary, don't kill your granny, jadda jadda jadda...
So what ? Hit Ctrl-G (to switch to user stylesheets defined in Opera) and you can see the MS content. If you love your mouse, hit the "Page" icon left of the address bar labeled "Toggle between author mode and user mode". Repeat this step after you changed to a non-broken page to see the original styles again.
BTW: MS is not the only one who has broken style sheets. But most other pages I've seen used broken style sheets accidentally. And yes, Ctrl-G helped with those pages.
The famous german c't Magazine has instructions how to build a very simple ISA-based POST card, using only two GALs, a two-digit seven segment LED display, and 15 resistors. You can buy the programmed GALs at eMedia (order code 9503314PAL, 9,50 EUR, roughly the same in US$). The full article is available online for 0,40 EUR. (If you create a new account, you will get 1,00 EUR to play with. So basically, it is free.)
I built one POST card myself, and I never leave home without it.;-)
Slashdot Mirror
Does a LART count as Non-Technological? ;-)
... my co-worker at the opposite table sais "Pah, blackouts can't happen in germany. We have a very narrow and redundant power grid." [translated]
Now imagine his face ten seconds later, when all monitores became black, all lights went off, and the UPS switched to battery supply. The local power company needed 2.5 hours to get the power back ...
(This is real life, not a joke.)
Tux2000
I couldn't agree more. When I did my alternative civilian service [Zivildienst] in a sheltered workshop [Werkstatt fr Behinderte], the handicapped people built the wiring harnesses for medical autoclaves from wire and crimp contacts. We had to rework the wiring harnesses several times, because the wires (mainly their electric insulation) and the contacts did not stand the conditions (heat and humidity) inside the autoclaves. The contacts corroded, the insulation melted or broke and caused short circuits, and so on.
Those parts were specified for this hard conditions (but they actually did not met the specifications). Now guess what happens to a mobile phone that is certainly not designed for that conditions if you put it inside an autoclave.
You may find some more information about autoclaves at the web site of the company we worked for: www.melag.de (english pages available). (I'm no longer related with that company, it's just the only company I know that produces autoclaves.)
My first idea (assuming your biggest problem with the keyboard are the various "shifting" keys): Get some foot switches from the local electronics store, open the keyboard, and wire the contacts of Shift, Ctrl, Alt, and (if present) the Apple or Windows key to one switch each (in parallel to the original key-operated switch). Using a headphone jack for each foot switch at the keyboard might be a good idea.
Each foot operates two keys, the "smarter" one should operate the most frequently used keys (I guess Shift and Ctrl), the "dumber" foot gets the remaining keys (Alt and OS specific).
This solution might look a little bit strange, but you can use a simple keyboard that works without extra software, and it will still work with the next generation of operating systems.
I see that you may have some difficulties building it yourself, but except for a little bit of mechanics, the modification is trivial. Maybe some electronics, computer, or TV workshop can do them for a little money. One of the "ancient" or high-quality keyboards using mechanical switches instead of plastic foil may make the job easier, because you can hardly solder wires to plastic foil. But when you are stuck with a plastic foil keyboard, you still can trace the tracks on the plastic foil to the controller chip and solder the foot switch wires there.
Just my 0.02 EUR.
"Now, where was the power outlet for the vaccuum cleaner? Hell, I'll tear out that red cable and plug the vaccuum cleaner there."
Add a serial or parallel console that writes to paper, i.e. a printer. Disable syslogd and klogd and let all log output go to the console.
When it panics, it reruns the bootloader (use BIOS calls to read the first HD sector and go from there) [...]
When Linux panics, it usually has a good reason to do so. Something like a damaged descriptor table, overwritten kernel code, hardware that works wrong, and various other catastrophes. Panic means a real panic: You can not reliably use any hardware. So you can not rerun the bootloader, and you can not access the BIOS. You can only hope that a hardware watchdog card notices that the kernel has paniced (because its timeout counter is no longer reset) and reboots the machine.
(BTW: to access the boot loader and the BIOS, you probably would have to drop out of protected mode back into the ugly world of real mode (or V86 mode), causing even more P.I.T.A.)
Nope. RTC memory is something between 128 Bytes (IBM AT) and 2 KBytes (IBM PS/2 series). And each bit of it is used for the BIOS and some hardware stuff (Microchannel requires a lot of memory). Perhaps, some machines have a few unused bits. But you can't stuff all your memory into them. You can't compress several megabytes or gigabytes into 10 to 20 Bits (at least not lossless). With a lot of luck and deep knowledge of the used machine and BIOS, you may be able to store a dirty-or-clean shutdown flag. But as I said, it depends very much on the machine and the BIOS.
Method 1:
mkisofs -z
From the manpage:
-z(Should not be too hard to port the transparent decompression code to *BSD and Darwin...)
Method 2:
KNOPPIX uses transparent decompression through a loop device to store more than 2 GBytes on a simple CDROM.
Just my two cents.
Two options: get a soldering iron or take that case back to the shop.
Currently, I have not found a suitable fanless PSU in a standard PC-mountable case. But there are other options. I have not yet decided which way I will go.
I hope this information helps you. I'm sorry, but for all variants, you need to know which end of the soldering iron you can always touch without pain. ;-)
... just try FLI4L (english page, there is also a german page). It is a modular router that can be extended to provide ISDN, DSL, Modem, and many, many more features listed on the web page. A simple ISDN/DSL router with port filtering ("firewall") fits on a floppy, with more features, you may need more room. You can get modules to install fli4l on a harddisk (or compact flash or IDE flash), other modules support booting from CDROM. With etherboot, you can also boot from a TFTP server.
I run fli4l since years on my router (some old 100 MHz Pentium clone made by AMD), the last modification was to replace the old HDD with a 64 MBytes IDE flash module (made by Transcend) -- 60 MBytes are still free.
Now, there are only three moving (i.e. noisy) parts left: one floppy for updates, CPU fan and PSU fan. The floppy will soon be replaced by an etherboot EEPROM on the internal ethernet card, set to boot from local drives by default. The CPU fan will be replaced by a larger heat sink, and the PSU will be replaced with a fan-less PSU.
Don't these people know that gamers burn to ash when they are exposed to sunlight? That's why they hide in dark rooms with only artificial light and don't go out until it's dark.
No wait, that was vampires, not gamers, right?
Warning: Don't look into the microwave beam with the remaining eye!
If you transmit a few kilowatts via Microwaves, just be careful not to walk into the microwave ray, unless you are well-shielded. Wrapping yourself in tinfoil should help. You don't want to end as a fried chicken, do you?
Sorry, this idea is DANGEROUS NONSENSE!
http://www.zero.iq/
Yes, my preciousssss ...
/me needsssssss internet real sssssssssssssoon ....
... in an area where children die from drinking water from the local river. Get the "life support" infrastructure back to "up and running" state, then think about getting the internet up.
Get rid of Access as a database server. It is ok to use Access as a frontend to almost any "real" database server. If you have a samba server, you may want to put a PostgreSQL or MySQL server on that machine. Install ODBC sources for the server on the clients, and connect Access through ODBC to the server. In Access, separate program code and database, delete the database part, and distribute the *.mdb "Program" via the samba server. Your users can still use the user interface they are used to, but there will be no more file sharing conflicts.
Hey, it's April 1st, isn't it? Just wait 24 hours and look at the licence stuff again.
"3 is prime, 5 is prime, 7 is prime, 9 is, um, experimental error, 11 is prime, 13 is prime--looks good."
German for "to set a fox to keep the geese" (thanks to dict.leo.org).
I plan to use Linux' Software RAID to mirror all my data to one or two harddisk in an exchangeable frame. A RAID restore took only two thirds of the time for a file-by-file copy on my old machine. It is already using two disks in a Software RAID mirror. So the next step is to threw in another disk, and make linux mirror the data to the third drive. Should run nicely in background.
Sure, this is a home solution, not a professional solution, but it should be simpler than fiddling with tapes that don't have enough capacity for all my data.
You asked for VGA or DVI, not for composite video or similar. So please let me ask this: Have you considered using two Dual-Head VGA cards or maybe four Standard VGA cards and the Multi-Monitor Features of X11 or Winddows?
A laptop that old should have a standard 2.5 inch harddisk. Download a linux kernel and a ramdisk image, load it via loadlin.exe, run fdisk and mke2fs/mkswap to have proper partitions. Get an adapter that converts the 2.0mm 44 pin connector from that drive to a 2.5mm 40 pin connector plus a power connector (Like this one found at Reichelt Elektronik in Germany for 4 EUR = 4 USD). Plug it into your laptop harddisk and your desktop PC, replacing the build-in harddisk, and install your favorite Linux distro from CDROM. Don't configure X or other stuff, then put the drive back into your Laptop. Finished.
The trick is to do the fdisk and format in the laptop so that the geometry information written to the master boot record of the harddisk matches the laptop bios' idea of what kind of harddisk you have.
You may want to keep a very small DOS partition (5 megs or so) with loadlin.exe and a kernel, marked as active partition, so that you can start up Linux (and then lilo) from a known-good state instead of hoping that lilo was installed properly in the desktop. You could also use a partition of about 100 MBytes and reuse it as swap later.
No warranty, your mileage may vary, don't kill your granny, jadda jadda jadda ...
cool ;-)
So what ? Hit Ctrl-G (to switch to user stylesheets defined in Opera) and you can see the MS content. If you love your mouse, hit the "Page" icon left of the address bar labeled "Toggle between author mode and user mode". Repeat this step after you changed to a non-broken page to see the original styles again.
BTW: MS is not the only one who has broken style sheets. But most other pages I've seen used broken style sheets accidentally. And yes, Ctrl-G helped with those pages.
Tux2000
The famous german c't Magazine has instructions how to build a very simple ISA-based POST card, using only two GALs, a two-digit seven segment LED display, and 15 resistors. You can buy the programmed GALs at eMedia (order code 9503314PAL, 9,50 EUR, roughly the same in US$). The full article is available online for 0,40 EUR. (If you create a new account, you will get 1,00 EUR to play with. So basically, it is free.)
I built one POST card myself, and I never leave home without it. ;-)