Michael W. Lucas's Blog, page 57
October 26, 2015
New “FreeBSD Mastery: ZFS” review
The fine folks over at NixCraft just put out a review of FreeBSD Mastery: ZFS.
Seems that the book suffers from a shortage of suck.
October 23, 2015
SSH talk, 10 November 2015
I’ll be at the Farmington Hills Public Library for the mug.org meeting on 10 November 2015, talking about SSH.
The talk will be pretty much based on SSH Mastery, as you might expect.
Meeting starts around 6:30 PM.
The library throws us out at 9PM, at which point a bunch of us troop out to Red Lobster for dinner. You’re welcome to come too.
MUG talks are normally filmed and available on YouTube. But you really do want to fly in from your distant continent to see this talk in person.
October 1, 2015
September 2015 updates
I haven’t done a general update since June? Well, let’s give where things are at the end of September. Because it’s October, and for my whole career my status reports have always been behind, and I see no reason to change now.
FreeBSD Mastery: Advanced ZFS is underway. Right now it’s in Allan Jude’s capable hands, but Allan has this thing called a “day job.” Apparently when you’re the It should be out before the end of the year.
In the meantime I’m mining words for FreeBSD Mastery: Specialty...
September 17, 2015
Reviews and Interviews
Two chunks of news on my tech books yesterday:
1) nixCraft’s Wendy Michele wrote a very nice review of FreeBSD Mastery: Storage Essentials. Apparently I need to send her a copy of the ZFS book (which I’m perfectly okay with doing).
2) BSDTalk 2^8 discusses FreeBSD Mastery: ZFS. Recorded at vBSDCon, my coauthor Allan Jude does a good job talking about the book. Fortunately, someone came into the room before they were quite finished, cutting the interview short before Will could ask “What was i...
September 8, 2015
Two new stories
Here’s two short stories I’ve just put out. I had a complete blast writing these. I think you’ll enjoy reading them.
Spilled Mirovar
Spilled Mirovar
The modern year of 1927, and orcs still have to fight elven asshole bullshit.
Prohibition left exceptions for the church of Men, the Elvish sacraments, even the Dwarfish rituals. But the elves in Congress insist that orcs have no sacraments.
Without the Orcish draught, without the rites, Uruk-Tai’s fine strong boys might grow tall. They might ear...
August 21, 2015
On “unpleasant truths” in tech books
(Part of an intermittent continuing series on tech writing. People have urged me to write a book on how to write tech books for years. If I collect enough of these, I just might.)
I’m working on FreeBSD Mastery: Advanced ZFS, and am desperately hoping to have a first draft finished and out for tech review before my September writing workshop. And I’ve hit a situation I’ve hit many times before, but not in a way that will be so obvious to so many readers.
OpenZFS runs on many operating systems...
July 30, 2015
Sysadmin Appreciation Day sale!
We all know that sysadmins don’t get enough credit.
Someone cared enough to create Sysadmin Appreciation Day, which is very nice, except that the only people who know about it are, well, sysadmins. And we are really crappy at appreciating anyone, including ourselves.
So, over at Tilted Windmill Press, I’m having a sale. The coupon code SAD15 gets you half off of all individual ebooks.
This means you could get all 7 Mastery titles in ebook for $35.
The coupon does not work on the discounted 3-...
July 22, 2015
Me at LivBSD on ZFS
On Thursday, August 20, 2015, I’ll be joining the Livingston Country BSD User Group to present about ZFS.
There are no plans to record this talk. If you want to see it, you’ll have to show up. Or, as I’m proposing a very similar talk to Penguicon 2016, you might show up there instead.
July 15, 2015
Open dinner in Scottsdale, AZ, 17 July 2015
I posted this on various social networking sites, but I should probably put it here too.
I’m in Scottsdale, AZ, this week, on family business. I have a couple readers in the Phoenix area, so I’m inviting them, and everyone else in the area, to join me for dinner on Friday night at the Roaring Fork at 6PM.
I should probably mention: while I’m issuing the invite, you get to buy your own meal.
KB suggested the Brat Haus, which looks nice–except that almost all the seating is outside. And I’m tho...
July 2, 2015
June 2015 Updates
Yes, it’s July. But these updates are for June. Because I put off writing this post.
Initial reaction to “FreeBSD Mastery: ZFS” has been positive. I’m pleased that so many people like the book.
Work on “FreeBSD Mastery: Advanced ZFS” is underway. I want to get this book done soon. Soooon. Because I’m kind of sick of writing about a single filesystem. This book should be smaller than the first ZFS book, thankfully.
I’m spending an hour a day on the sequel to Immortal Clay, called “Kipuka Blues...
