Different distro, just as hilarious.

I feel my geeky ability has improved since I began using Ubuntu, sometime in June of 2007.
I've abandoned GUI settings windows in favour of nano-ing my way through /etc.
I can get all the settings right.
I just can't do them in the right order.
Allow me to elaborate...

After a sudden urge to go distro-shopping, I installed Debian 4.0 on my Media Centre/File Server/Spare-box-I-mess with.
CLI-only, headless, configured through SSH. I was feeling all very happy and geeky.

At the moment, this box has 3 functions.

1. Sit there and hum.
2. Serve up my music over Samba.
3. Serve up my files over SSH.

Being a paid-up, card-carrying member of the tinfoil hat club, I began editing /etc/ssh/sshd_config, even though it was approaching the time that most folk wake up.
I'm nocturnal, what can I say?

Protocol 2 only, yup. RSA-based authentication, course. Disable root login, naturally.
Once I'd saved that, I decided it would be a good idea to add my laptop's RSA key to the authorized_keys file. *After* I set it to use RSA authentication...

And so, with a sense of tedious inevitability, I find myself dragging an old CRT monitor over to the machine, to undo the series of (perfectly sensible) steps I took.

Coming soon! More blog posts of my incompetance.

Let's talk about feelings.

I'd hate to give the wrong impression.
Reading my last post, some may have formed the impression that the blog is to become dark and gloomy. Quite the contrary, the last post was simply the product of a couple of days without sleep. Dark and gloomy has it's place - my music collection - only sporadically will it spill over into blog posts.

For the sake of capriciousness (which may or may not be a real word) - a shiny, happy, blog post.

It's been snowing overnight in England. At least, that's what the thick blanket of snow on the ground would lead me to believe. (any other theories for how the snow got there in the comments please).

I was fortunate enough to wake up early and see *real* snow. That is, snow of the white variety, before the inevitable onslaught of traffic and small children transform it into a grey, mushy substance. I'm also fortunate that's it's Sunday, so I may be lucky enough to avoid venturing outside, into the aforementioned mushy substance. Given the nature of the area in which I live, pedestrians are almost obliged to be pelted with snow, or, later today, pelted with mush.

Which seems to be a great excuse to stay in and attempt to fix my laptop - concurrent upgrades to Ubuntu Hardy and KDE4 havn't been kind.

So there you have it - a *nice* post. There was snow, there's a definite geek angle towards the end, and not a hint of sarcasm.
I'm going to go listen to something gloomy.

***Bonus points to anyone who spotted the Lagwagon reference in the title. Your prize is in the mail. ***

Been a while...

In one of the darkest corners of rainy England, a light appears in a window, at the top of a tower.
A little past six in the morning, and Capricorication Towers has seen it's first visitor in a couple of months.

As I write (type?) this, a dozen or more excuses for my lack of posting spring to mind, some quite convincing, but I'm using none of them.
My little blog has been downright neglected. To explain why would be to reveal details of my recent life that have no place on the internet, or indeed, outside of my head.

Suffice to say, my recent change of circumstances afford me a lot more time, some of which I intend to spend reviving my fledgling blog.

The same circumstances also appear to have changed the way I'm writing. This post already appears more dark, sarcastic, and wordy, than my previous efforts. I may yet decide to delete some of the more jovial posts here, for the sake of consistancy.

I'm not sure what all this means in terms of the style and direction of the blog, but at the very least, it won't become another of the dead, forgotton, corners of the internet.
Watch...this...space.