Leopard upgrade is a disaster

I started my Leopard upgrade by doing a backup with SuperDuper! as who knows what can happen when installing software. I decided to do an archive and install as that would preserve my info and get me up and going faster. Well, that seems to have been a mistake. For whatever reason, after I restarted, my default keychain was hosed (20 minutes later I was able to repair that), then I went to remove components from the previous system. This seemed to sort of work, but launching apps gave me a -10810 error. The problems likely stemmed from some of the apps I carried over from before, but this upgrade has been a disaster. So, I now erasing my drive and doing a clean install. I'll start rebuilding my system after things are installed. I really hate doing this, but I'm out of options that don't require a larger time investment and lots of frustration.

Video Conferencing and my wacky network

Yesterday, my mother-in-law had a cable modem installed so that she could video conference with us and see our son (she just got a new 20" iMac the other day). Video conferencing is easier said than done with NAT routers. I've used a Linux box as a router for a long time so I have full control over everything; the problem is that having more than 1 person do a SIP based connection is tricky. I had my iptables setup to route SIP traffic to my Mac, so things worked fine. Well, UPnP on my Linux box didn't seem to work, so I finally plugged a router right into my cable modem only to have mixed results. As a last resort, I plugged an Airport Extreme base station into my cable modem and presto, everything started working. So while Apple's router costs 3 times more than any other home based router, it sure is worth it as I think I spent over 8 hours to fix this issue. Below is a diagram of my wacky network; it is a bit strange in order to have my server running and have the Airport Extreme base station working. I'm almost surprised it all works. Networking is an art, not a science.

Smart Dog

Last night after I read to our son and was ready to put him to sleep, I kept calling my wife to come up and say goodnight, but she couldn't here me. So, I told our dog, Marley, to "get Janessa". He went downstairs and then I hear Janessa say "did you come and get me?". Wow, Janessa thought it was a fluke. We decided to try it again today and this time, Janessa told Marley to get me. He came into my office and started wagging his tail.

I wonder what else we can teach this smart dog; he already gets the newspaper in the morning.

More on the San Diego Fires

While I'm quite happy that the fires haven't affected us (except for the smoke and particulates in the air), it saddens me to see the great loss that so many people have suffered. We returned to our house on Wednesday as the fire threat lessoned and my parents' 2 bedroom condo is a bit small for 4 adults, a baby, and a dog.

I decided that since we have been and are so fortunate, that I would volunteer. On Wednesday, I went down to Qualcomm Stadium to volunteer. There were so many volunteers, it almost seemed like chaos. I checked in and then waited around. When the guy organizing teams took my name, I said that I had some medical experience (I'm an EMT-B) as I saw other teams being sent out to move stuff to/from people's cars in the 80+ degree heat. He sent me to the medical volunteer station (which I should have seen first) and they sent me upstairs to the club level where they had the medical facility. So, I checked in and helped out checking people in before they could be seen. As the day continued, my job turned into the job of bouncer. I was supposed to make sure that people didn't storm the door, were checked in before going inside, and had to keep the media and unnecessary people out. I met some nice people and it was great to see so many people of all different skill sets volunteering their time. Their were some many volunteers that people were being turned away. At the end of the day, I was asked to do data entry into an Excel spreadsheet. This started me thinking that there must be a better way to handle all the information. After talking with the doctor that set it up, I'm convinced that with some assistance from some of the doctors there, I can develop and a deployable, self contained computer/network that could handle supply needs, patient checkin, records, patient checkout, etc.

In any case, we're all doing fine and paraphrasing the rabbi on Yom Kippur, I wish all those affected by the fires an easy recovery.