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Of Backups & Fresh Starts

Nov 022011

When you search "data loss" in Google Image Search, this is the first result. I suppose the shirt and tie indicate he's professional, and only professionals suffer data loss?

Many years ago I was happily typing away on my computer when the system suddenly became very slow. I couldn’t quite figure out what was going wrong with the machine so instead of spending an inordinate amount of time trying to fix the situation, I decided to restart. Upon reboot I was greeted with a message saying that my hard drive no longer existed. The result was the same after rebooting it a second time, and despite the panicked hopes for a miracle the subsequent ten or so times, it failed again and again.

A new hard drive and a fresh install of an operating system later and I had to start over again. The loss of music & pictures burned me for a few days, but I moved on – and moved on with a backup policy. Once a month I would copy said music, pictures, and documents (before the days of readily available online solutions) to an external drive – saving it for a rainy day. Thankfully that day hasn’t come, but if it does I’m ready for it.

Flash forward to the end of October. After a fun day out and about in downtown Chicago I returned home to notice my blog & message board were no longer functioning. Logging into my server, I found my SQL sever was basically dead. It wouldn’t restart after a number of tries, or a number of server reboots. The loss of everything I’ve written burned me for a few days, but I’ve moved on – with a fresh start of this blog!

(and a backup policy that I won’t bore you with…)

Fresh starts aren’t the worst thing in the world, and I believe I had narrowed myself too considerably in what I chose to write about vs. my interests, so this should be an overall good thing. This post kicks all of that off. So welcome and, if you happen to have anything important in the digital world, make a backup.

Return to Activity (Hopefully)

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Jul 042011

Aside from a couple of posts in the end of June, this blog has been sadly silent. The majority – actually the entire reason for that is that I have relocated from the Detroit area to the Chicago area. It’s much the same, except Chicago’s downtown doesn’t have a ring of abandoned rubble surrounding its core, nor is the area entirely dependent on the auto industry, and there’s also many more jobs and opportunities here. Locals I’ve talked to here find it hard to believe that it could be much worse as the streets aren’t exactly paved with gold out here (current unemployment: 8.9%, Michigan at 10.3%, Detroit Metro area at 11.6%), but I digress. I’m now settled in and plan on getting back to the business of writing much more often this week and beyond.

First, though, an entertaining distraction from all of this. A sign, perhaps? Definitely something that will get your attention – in my first couple of weeks of living in my new apartment, I was nearly hit by a tornado. The night was June 21st and while I thought I was at a safe distance from the storm, it turns out the track was within half a mile of where I was standing. Moral of the story: don’t judge distances at night.

I had my camera with me and took some video. It was at this point that I learned that my Canon SX130 IS has pathetic nighttime shooting abilities, especially when it comes to staying in focus. Still, even including that misfortune, the videos definitely get the picture across at what was incoming. Like this, for example…

Also, this…

There are a couple of more in the series (3, 4, 5), and there’s a nice write-up from the National Weather Service. Compared to the other more notable tornadoes of this year, certainly nothing major, but definitely an eye-opener, and a hell of a welcoming to the state of Illinois for me.

When a leak becomes a deluge: Wikileaks’ US Embassy Cables are out

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Nov 282010

Julian Assange, editor and head of Wikileaks

UK’s The Guardian is the first major newspaper out with coverage on the latest massive disclosure of information to come from whistle-blowing website Wikileaks. The first read is ominous enough, and probably quite accurate: “global diplomatic crisis”.

What is being revealed is the shady backroom deals that make up international politics and the balance of power the world over, and how the policy of nations of the world can be quite two-faced, when compared to public stances on the same international issues.

French paper Le Monde has justified its decision on participating in the disclosure by saying transparency and judgment are not incompatible, it does not mean to act irresponsibly, and this is what separates it from Wikileaks (and any allegations that Wikileaks itself is being the irresponsible one here).

Global Warming Ain’t No Problem – The Bible Told Me So

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Nov 262010

Illinois representative, Republican, climate change denier, John Shimkus. He'd like to have a hand in our energy policy!

With the incoming class of Republicans set to begin their rule in the House of Representatives this coming January, battles for leadership of various positions and committees have already begun. Names have been put forward hoping to step into a larger, brighter spotlight – as is the norm in the world of politics. As each formally unknown (or better said, not-as-known) Congressperson steps forward, the evaluation of who they are and what they believe begins. One of the bigger standouts in this arena of committee leadership change comes from Illinois representative John Shimkus, who is aiming for the leadership of the Energy and Commerce committee.

As the title of the committee indicates, one of the realms that it has jurisdiction over is the nation’s energy policy. As an extension of that, it also has huge effects on our environmental policies, just by which policies and energy sources would be favored by it (coal vs. clean, for example). With the threat of Global Warming still incrementally playing out year by year across the world, and with so many things related to energy, consumption, and resources seemingly near dramatic tipping points, now would be the time for some decisive leadership to help ensure that America will be on the right paths to not only help itself from an energy standpoint, but also help the world in the fight against Global Warming.

Instead? Mr. Shimkus takes his cues on Global Warming from The Bible. Continue reading »

By the way, austerity fails.

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Nov 232010

The new headquarters of the Anglo Irish Bank sits, mothballed, a reminder of how suddenly the Irish economy died in 2008.

As the financial crisis in the United States became a global pandemic in 2008, different countries reacted to the situation in different ways. Some of the smaller countries in the West that didn’t have pockets deep enough to keep their financial system adequately capitalized would consider severe government cuts in spending, more commonly known as austerity measures. When the public in said countries found out about the plans, people took to the streets – sometimes violently – because when you get down to it, austerity for the poor to cover the crimes of the rich isn’t going to go over well.

The most violent in nature of the protests were confined to Greece, but eventually they accepted the measures. They had little choice, as they had an IMF-shaped gun to their head, and the certainty that refusing of the international bailout – restrictions imposed on their economy and all – would have resulted in the destruction of their economy.

Another country decided to take a more “proactive” approach in dealing with the oncoming crisis. The nation of Ireland, another one of the smaller and shakier European states from an economic standpoint, decided to take on austerity measures at the onset of the crisis in 2008. A little more than two years later, they too have dragged their selves to the bailout window.

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