Michael W. Lucas's Blog, page 5

Something coming… or some THING

People complained that I didn’t warn them.

So consider yourselves warned.

I’m also wondering if I should start a Kickstarter mailing list.

68: Flying Crabs with Teeth

Today you get a snippet of the unnamed fiction WIP.

Here’s the problem: evolution doesn’t do what works. Evolution does random things. Some random things survive. Most do not. Entirely different branches of life tried making solar panels to absorb energy, and survived. Leaves “work.” Neighboring branches tried absorbing energy from stone, or wind, or indie rock, and died.

Raising the solar panels a little higher meant the creature survived better than those around it. Stalks “work.”

Raise enoug...

“Networking for System Administrators, 2nd edition” cover art

The inimitable Eddie Sharam has finished the cover painting for the new edition of Networking for Systems Administrators. It’s a parody of Giuseppe Zocchi’s Pietre Dure of Architettura. It’s a wraparound, but you can see a mockup of the front cover at the sponsorship page.

Eddie painted this. Like, on paper. With paint. The current plan is to include the painting as a Kickstarter reward level, much as we did with the cover for Run Your Own Mail Server.

At this moment, N4SA2e has 98 print sponsor...

New Releases: Dear Abyss, The Last Hour of Hogswatch

It’s the end of the year, so I’m shoving a couple titles out the door at the last minute. Like you do.

First up we have Dear Abyss: the FreeBSD Journal Letters column, years 1-6. The ebook is on most platforms now, and print is leaking out.

For the folks who are into solstice holidays, my story The Last Hour of Hogswatch is now available standalone. It’s only in my bookstore; I don’t bother putting short stories on the big stores any more, or in print.

Happy holiday-of-your-choice, folks!

November’s Neurypnological Sausage

[This post went to Patronizers at the beginning of November, and to the public at the beginning of December. Not a Patronizer? Sign up at https://patronizemwl.com. Okay, fine, technically, you don’t sign up there. You get to choose between my Patreon and my private patronage system. Still, you all get treated with the same confusion and astonishment. There’s no way these silly posts are worth $12/year, let alone what the daft folks like the infamous First Wildebeest send me. But here you are any...

My Social Media in 2024

I left Twitter right after Elon Musk bought it. After exploring many alternatives, I’ve settled in the fediverse (often called “Mastodon”) as my main social media channel. I also have a Bluesky account, but it’s decidedly secondary.

Why did I choose this? Isn’t Bluesky the Next Big Thing? Isn’t it “like Old Twitter but better”?

Bluesky sucks less than old Twitter did, yes. It has nice features, like subscribable community-maintained block lists. It’s still a business, though. They are not making...

67: Outmoded Oddities

Working on updating Networking for Systems Administrators. The gentle “yes you need IPv6” paragraph in the first edition is getting an update to something a little more… ranty.

Commercial operating systems now default to IPv6, falling back to IPv4 only if IPv6 is unavailable. New networks, especially phone networks, are often IPv6-only. Much of the southern hemisphere, much of Asia, and much of the human race? IPv6-only. Their IPv4 connectivity is a kludge of proxies, carrier-grade NAT, 464xlat,...

66: It Means Nothing

Here’s a chunk from the new edition of Networking for Systems Administrators.

Through your career, people have repeatedly blamed “the firewall.” The word firewall dates from the 1980s, when the concept of network-level access control was both exotic and bizarre. In the last fifty years, access controls have become broader and more complex. Some controls remained in the devices arbitrarily labeled “firewalls,” while others migrated to routers and switches and other devices. What does the word “fi...

65: Ignore the Flinch

Here’s a chunk from the new edition of Networking for Systems Administrators.

Similarly, some vendors use the word VLAN. Others talk about tagging or VLAN tagging. To create a VLAN, devices add a tag to an Ethernet frame. It’s all the same thing

Most network administrators use the language of their preferred vendor. If your company only uses network gear from company X, it almost certainly uses that company’s terminology. Those of us who have been around for a long time either adopt our organiza...

October’s Ostrogothic Sausage

[This article contains RYOMS gift spoilers for print-level sponsors and Patronizers. I think everyone has their packages, but just in case, you’ve been warned.]

[This post went to Patronizers at the beginning of October, and the public at the beginning of November. Not a Patronizer? You could be, for the low price of $12 a year all thee way up to the high price of “however much money you want to dispose of.”]

It’s Halloween Month, and there was much rejoicing.

I perform one experiment with every...