You Will Get A Virus

I’ve recently made some changes to my network topology at home which included re-IP’ing my network.  Since I do my IP addressing via DHCP this isn’t normally a big deal and I thought nothing of it.   Then I realized that my security camera through FrontPoint (and Alarm.com) no longer worked.

Since the instructions for the camera don’t give any guidance on how to reset the camera, and I could find nothing quickly in a google search, I thought I’d post a quick set of instructions on here.

Since my camera now could no longer talk to Alarm.com, I couldn’t access it via their servers to change IP information.   Instead I had to reset the camera and perform the “initial camera setup” steps all over again.

To reset the camera, take a paperclip or similarly sized object and press the reset button located in a recessed area on the back of the camera.  I held that for approximately 15-20 seconds before releasing.    The blue and orange led’s on the front of the camera flashed a few times and it rebooted (twice, I think).  Do this WITH power connected.

After that I followed the instructions for initial setup of the camera and all was fine.

Simple.  The way I like it.

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I’ve written many times here about the alarm system I’ve installed in my house.  I’m a geek, and wasn’t satisfied with an ordinary alarm system from companies like ADT, Sonitrol, Brinks, etc.   I wanted something with more interactivity, expandability, and ability to fit into the smart home I’ve been building out.
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It’s been a while since I posted anything on this site, partially due to the run-up to my recent wedding, and partially because I’ve been too busy with work and my new job to really do anything with my computer lab at home.

The wedding is now over, and the honeymoon taken, so it’s time to get back to work.  Part of that means getting back to work on my blogs and other things that have languished in the past few months as my attention has been directed elsewhere.
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So, on my work laptop I am using PGP to perform whole disk encryption.  It’s a Macbook Pro,  and being a mobile machine we needed to encrypt it’s drive.

For some reason my Macbook Pro locked up during the encryption process (I can say positively that it’s an unrelated issue - the encryption itself is not the cause of the lockup, it was happening before encryption was introduced and Ive yet to identify the cause).

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I wrote earlier about one of my XServes that had problems with a kernel panic on boot. While I still have NO idea what the underlying cause happens to be, it seems to have corrected itself.

Earlier today, on a hunch, I went and booted the server. I figured the worst that would happen is another Kernel Panic. This time, instead of the expected text output informing me the kernel had a mental breakdown I was greeted with, after a short delay, the login prompt.

My best guess, and it’s just a guess nothing more, is that this is a temperature issue. It was VERY cold last night, to the tune of about 0 degrees. Also note that, at the time this started, the garage door had been left open (and yes, my server rack is in my garage). My best guess - at this point - is that the server had a difficult time booting at such temperatures. Once things warmed up a bit during the day the problems disappeared.

This is, however, just a guess. The machine could crap out and start kernel panic’ing again at any time for all I know. I sincerely hope it does not.

I have not cut my network over to start using it as the gateway again yet. That is a project for either tomorrow or Tuesday, depending on the stability of the system.

I’ll update here as more information becomes available.

[Update]: The issue was temperature.  The temperature around the rack was approximately -3 degrees F.  For those that happent to have read the specs on XServe operating temperatures,   the low end of it is about 53 degrees warmer than my rack was.    Oops.   Apparently you CAN get a computer too cold :-).   Helluva problem to have, though.

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So I’ve written here before about my home network. It’s more advanced than most because I enjoy playing with technology and making it work for me. Some people watch TV or play video games constantly, I play with servers and networks. Just like sometimes an XBox 360 will give the red-ring of death, my servers aren’t always healthy. Or working at all.

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For the past few weeks (one could say MONTHS) I’ve had a lack of motivation to really work on my computers and technology.   By the time I get home from work my resolve and desire to work on things has dwindled and I mostly want to sit and do nothing.  This is likewise true of the weekends, which always seem to be filled with some project or another that keeps me busy.  The end result is that I’ve simply not done much with tech for a while. 

Friday night,  after spending a few hours playing rock band and call of duty: world at war with Trevor, I decided to install Ubuntu on the second hard disk on my workstation at home.  I had downloaded the X64 version of their 8.10 version a couple weeks ago but never got around to installing it.

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I have  a cat.  I love my cat, and I hate my cat.  I love her for the reason most people (cat lovers, anyways) love their cats - she’s unbelievably cute and cuddly, curls up with me when I’m watching TV, reading a book or doing anything that keeps me in one place for an extended period of time.  I HATE her because she gets fur EVERYWHERE… and I’m tired of vacuuming on a daily basis. 

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I’m not dead!     I am, however, VERY very busy and haven’t had too much time to keep up on here.  I hope to be able to post more on here in the near future as things calm down a bit.

This weekend I had a sad thing happen.  My smart home became an inexplicably dumb home.  Suddenly my life was thrown into disarray when I pressed a button and….. nothing happened.  I was left wondering what in the world happened. 

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