WIL WHEATON dot NET

50,000 Monkeys at 50,000 Typewriters Can't Be Wrong

12.11.02

  • random thoughts

I’m putting my time into finishing my book this week, so updates may be infrequent, but I wanted to give up a couple of computer things:

  1. Over at Lockergnome’s Penguin Shell, Tony is running a great week-long tutorial on using procmail to get rid of spam. I’ll be following it all week, moving closer and closer to getting a sendmail server working here at home.
    Yeah, that’s right, sendmail. See, I’ve been having a real good time with computers for about a month now, and I need a reason to hate them again.
  2. Tonight, at 6:20 PM PST, I’ll be a guest on MacRadio. I’ll be talking about my iBook, Linux, my upcoming book, and stuff. It should be a good time, and you can listen in right through your browser.

Finally, my friend sent me this page of really cool fractals he made. I wish you would like it.
Now, I am leaving to go buy the good version of Lord of the Rings, before I park my ass beneath a tree in a park to write.
Life is good.

  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window) Tumblr
  • Click to share on Bluesky (Opens in new window) Bluesky
  • More
  • Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window) Pinterest

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related


Discover more from WIL WHEATON dot NET

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Subscribe

12 November, 2002 Wil

Post navigation

Anthem → ← 11.11.02

73 thoughts on “12.11.02”

  1. Catsudon says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:00 am

    Good luck with the book!!!

  2. Jeanne says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:04 am

    I can’t wait to get my hands on the new LOTR!
    And good luck on your book.
    Your website rocks.

  3. Fried Amigo says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:07 am

    Dude! Your fractals link is blown cheese! Check it!

  4. Alex says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:13 am

    Wil all the links in this post are broken

  5. setf/shanna/whatever says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:18 am

    Those fractals are beautiful. Best of luck with the book. Personally I’m trying to participate in NaNoWriMo and having a very difficult time of it. Can’t imagine trying to write a real book.
    Yes, people, the links are broken due to what looks like a wee error, but it’s easy enough to get to the pages anyway.

  6. Spudnuts says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:21 am

    >> I

  7. Larry says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:21 am

    Sixth Post!

  8. Larry says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:21 am

    Doh!

  9. s'becks says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:25 am

    ooo this is the closest i’ve been to the top!lol
    Enjoy your trip?
    I love salmon.

  10. Terry says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:30 am

    looking forward to the book, should be a great read. I’m also glad you are getting the good version of lotr, i will also be purchasing it to. Have a great day!

  11. wil says:
    12 November, 2002 at 10:54 am

    Argh.
    See, I compose offline all the time, and cut-n-paste into MT to update.
    I usually use gedit, or some other simple text program, but I was sitting on my patio, enjoying the strangely warm November morning, writing on my iBook in Appleworks.
    Turns out Appleworks replaces lots of “special characters” with codes.
    Grumble. Stupid computers.
    Well, the links should work now.

  12. Bill says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:06 am

    Must have Lord of the Rings DVD set….
    *drools*
    And a towel, too

  13. drow says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:07 am

    friends don’t let friends use sendmail.
    http://www.postfix.org/

  14. lloyd says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:08 am

    Ooh don’t use sendmail! It’s evil!
    Use qmail: http://www.qmail.org/
    Sendmail will give you nothing but headaches, I learned this the hard way 😉

  15. ScottMcW says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:17 am

    Hey Wil, Not to get technical and geeky and all…but isn’t this (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0395489326/qid=1037128342/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-9422529-3194328?v=glance&s=books) the GOOD version of the LoTR? It’s even UNabridged unlike the movie. 🙂

  16. d. burr says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:23 am

    those fractals are cool…i’d like a whole room covered with them!

  17. jgramz says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:34 am

    The fractals are way cool! Thanks for the update about MacRadio, I will definitely check it out. So glad that Finally after months of waiting LOTR is available. If there are die hard fans here check out
    http://www.tolkiengathering.com

  18. Anna Trueblood says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:36 am

    I can’t contact the owner of the fractals page, but was wondering if he’d be adverse to me printing them? I’m not going to sell them or anything, I just want to get them on cardstock and use them for custom covers for journals for a couple of writers on my Xmas list.

  19. Rich says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:43 am

    Sendmail?
    Most in the know would recommend Postfix, Qmail, or exim (depending on, well, variaus issues). Sendmail’s got a bad reputation for exploits–think IIS. IIRC, the Moris worm was a Sendmail exploit (for what it’s worth).
    Just my two cents.

  20. Emanuel says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:46 am

    Others have already mentioned the evilness of sendmail. Their suggestions are fine, but I thought I should mention my favorite MTA: Exim. It’s highly configurable yet very simple, and just works.
    My anti-spam solution is “Active Spam Killer” (http://www.paganini.net/ask/) which I’ve used for almost a year now and has worked perfectly.

  21. Craig says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:05 pm

    Wil uses an iBook? SWEET !!!!!
    Does that make him a switcher???
    Welcome to ou team, we’re glad to have you.

  22. randomgang says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:11 pm

    Here’s a pro sysadmin vote for procmail (having said that, I haven’t ever tried out exim). I was actually doing this work at the time of the aforementioned Morris worm, and strangely enough, I’ve steered clear of sendmail ever since. Unfair, since that was nearly 14 years ago? Sure, but the general design philosophy of sendmail (monolith process, maximum privileges) hasn’t much changed, so.
    For spam, I use procmail and bogofilter, one of the Bayesian analysis filters. It’s…interesting, at least.
    Wouldn’t you know the first time I said anything on your blog it would be something work-related?

  23. The Slice says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:14 pm

    I’m going to Atlanta tomorrow.

  24. Jesse says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:17 pm

    Don’t use AppleWorks… one word: BBEdit! http://www.barebones.com. You can get a demo, lite or the real thing. One you go BB, you won’t go back.
    Also, check out all the web services hooks into MT. Try Versiontracker. I don’t use ’em myself (got my own PHP system) but I know there are some who are doing some totally slick stuff with blogging with MT. One more note: NetNewsWire from http://www.ranchero.com – Oh heck one more note: Watson from karelia.com – These are the tools that make the Internet your slave.

  25. Sunidesus says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:20 pm

    So that’s what I need to get my but in gear on this writing thing… a tree in a park.
    Can’t wait for the book!

  26. Jonathan says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:21 pm

    Good luck on it Wil. I have the email from my domain routed to a server outside my home network, then poll with fetchmail to bring it inside. I’m way too paranoid to expose that much of a home server beyond my firewall. Then again, over the years, I’ve had to deal with way too many mail-based system attacks. 😉 I can’t speak for Mandrake, but the latest distribution from Redhat and some others defaults sendmail to only listen to the localhost (lo) and ignore external networks so you might need to check sendmail.mc or the dist. release notes as a prelim.

  27. njr says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:25 pm

    procmail is a MDA, not a MTA. exim and postfix are both decent free MTAs. For delivery I use mailfilter (part of Courier), though if you’re a Perl person I’ve heard good things about Mail::Audit.

  28. Annie says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:27 pm

    Just don’t sit under a tree. Appealing as it may sound, there are lots of things that could go wrong (e.g. a bird deciding at that very moment that it’s bowel is just TOO full; you sit in the exact spot where a dog has just followed the birds example, etc).
    Gotta ask, going barefoot?

  29. Bat Boy says:
    12 November, 2002 at 12:59 pm

    BLARG! The good version of lord of the rings ey? Didnt know there was a bad one. heh

  30. Mike C says:
    12 November, 2002 at 1:32 pm

    Welcome to the Mac world!
    I see a few people already mentioned NetNewsWire Lite – I have it running all the time & I can see in my dock when anything has been updated.
    For a web browser, check out Chimera (http://www.mozilla.org/projects/chimera/) – it’s the nicest & fastest even if it’s still unfinished.
    I also can’t live without DragThing & ASM (http://www.vercruesse.de/software), which adds an application menu.
    If you want to get really geeky, check out Fink (http://fink.sourceforge.net/) to install open source software including X11.

  31. Pat says:
    12 November, 2002 at 1:34 pm

    ETA on the book? When can I expect to get my hands and eyes on it? Not to rush the creative process, but I am very much looking forward to reading it.

  32. eqkimball says:
    12 November, 2002 at 1:46 pm

    It’s December 11th already???
    Man time flies!!

  33. Helen says:
    12 November, 2002 at 1:52 pm

    Is it just me or does the Shmoo fractal look really sexual? Maybe it’s just me….

  34. Courtney says:
    12 November, 2002 at 3:17 pm

    Don’t use AppleWorks for your text… I’ll agree with the BBEdit chime, but OS X’s built in TextEdit works just fine too… just make sure you use plain text instead of RTF, natch (hit command-shift-T to convert from RTF to plain).

  35. Nic T says:
    12 November, 2002 at 3:49 pm

    Yeah, I just watched the new LOTR version and I must say that one of the greatest movies of all times just got better! Plenty more character interaction. Just glues the thing together. Fantastic.
    When do we get to hear more about the movie, Wil? What’s it called?

  36. Angie says:
    12 November, 2002 at 4:02 pm

    Good luck on MacRadio tonight — I’m so pleased that you’ve come over to the creative side of computing. Couldn’t live without my Mac — G4 at work, G3 PowerBook and G3 iMac at home — they rock! And, pc people, don’t start some flame war, OK? I won’t change and I don’t care if you do or not. It’s just nice that Wil did.
    Wil is smart.

  37. dan says:
    12 November, 2002 at 4:05 pm

    iBook…. now you’re gonna be famous! I can see you now… white background…. arm-in-arm with Steve Jobs….
    Big welcome back to the apple!
    some favorite links:
    http://www.macosxhints.com/
    http://www.insidemacgames.com/
    http://arstechnica.infopop.net/OpenTopic/page?a=frm&s=50009562&f=8300945231
    http://www.macwindows.com/

  38. fluffy says:
    12 November, 2002 at 4:06 pm

    Im very pissed off with Amazon of the new release of LOTR. My copy did not arrive today, as it should have done. I’ve had the damn thing on order since 6th October, and a friend of mine who also ordered it from Amazon, and who lives five minutes walk away from me, got his. Another guy i know ordered his copy from Black Star and he got his on SATURDAY!
    On the plus side, that meant I got to see it, and my god is it stupendous. It truly is an even better version than the origional cinema release. Its got even more depth, and its just beautiful. Many scenes make more sense and flow smoother.
    Thank you Peter Jackson. You made a fucking amazig movie of one of the best fantasy stories every written, and then you released a DVD version which was even better.
    Yeah, so I’m a geek/fanboy. Bite me.

  39. Dude says:
    12 November, 2002 at 4:49 pm

    Hey Wil,
    This weekend I watched LOTR, having seen it only once before, and realized with a jolt that Elrond is played by Hugo Weaving, the same actor who played Agent Smith in The Matrix.
    Whoa.
    So here’s what pops into my head next:
    Elrond: You lead… TWO lives… don’t you, Missterrrrrrrrrr Baggins.
    One, a peaceful hobbit, in a quiet shire.
    The other, an advennnnntchurr-urrr…
    a Rinnnnggg bearrrerrrr…
    One of these lives, Mister Baggins, has a fewtchurrrrrrre…
    The other does NOT.
    heh-heh

  40. wil says:
    12 November, 2002 at 5:01 pm

    Thanks for all the links, everybody.
    However, I must set the record straight: I haven’t “switched” in the sense that I’ve gone 100% Mac.
    I have the iBook, and she is a wonderful mistress…but I am still married to my RedHat 8.0 box, and Anne and the boys use the Mandrake 8.2 box.

  41. Gwalchmai says:
    12 November, 2002 at 5:18 pm

    Hold out for the gift set! Bookends = luv!

  42. Danielle says:
    12 November, 2002 at 5:25 pm

    Good luck finishing your book! I’m another of those NaNoWriMo.org pain-loving freaks, and I’m only at 19K so far. If your book is written anything like this website, I’ll definitely have to keep an eye out for it! 🙂

  43. keri says:
    12 November, 2002 at 5:27 pm

    Bought LOTR:FOTR Special Edition today. Watched it today before work. It made me late because it was sooooo long. But it was worth it! I’m going home tonight and watching all the extras. 🙂

  44. uman says:
    12 November, 2002 at 6:18 pm

    Been trying to connect for several minutes to macradio to hear the broadcast, but keep getting an “Internal Server Error”. So I’m probably gonna miss it unless it gets fixed RSN.
    Got a message from Amazon saying that they’ve shipped my expanded LOTR. I’ve had it on order since September, so I can hardly wait.
    The bookends woulda been neat, but I can live without. I need more bookSHELVES, but bookends.
    /wave,
    uman

  45. Andie-Gypsy_girl says:
    12 November, 2002 at 7:03 pm

    Wil,
    you computer geek, *scribbles notes* as Gypsy is planning to one day own a ibook—
    Good luck with the book- can’t wait til it comes out….
    :)—- 😛

  46. dan says:
    12 November, 2002 at 7:43 pm

    Nice job on macradio! But those guys are “real” geeks 😉

  47. Guy Dickinson says:
    12 November, 2002 at 8:40 pm

    Good luck with the server Wil, though may I recommend Qmail over sendmail? It has way, way, better security, is much faster, and uses maildirs instead of classic mailbox files, which assists in numerous ways…
    Qmail can be found at http://www.qmail.org

  48. fluffy says:
    12 November, 2002 at 11:57 pm

    Joe Q Public
    Stop taking those pills, they aint doing you any good. May I also suggest that you ask your Doctor for a full frontal lobotomy, 10 rolls of padded wallpaper and some armless pyjamas.
    You ruined and terrible form of life, fucked up in a dribbling Uruk-Hai

  49. stikkinixx says:
    13 November, 2002 at 12:19 am

    OMG I’M LIKE NOT EVEN CLOSE TO BEING THE FIRST TO POST!!!!!!111
    You are sooo sappy and cheesy. To an almost pukey, gross degree. I keep reading it though. God, I’m sick.
    Congrats, good luck…woohooo and stuff.

  50. Peter says:
    13 November, 2002 at 1:20 am

    Your composing more of the book?
    Let me know when its done. I’ll take a dozen!
    Seriously is it going to be on distribution? Even in the UK?
    *hopes*

Comment navigation

Newer Comments →

Comments are closed.

Related Posts

Qapla’! tlhIngan maH!

With respect to the ongoing discussions and arguments regarding AI, I present a couple of images I coaxed out of Stable Diffusion this morning, when I asked it to help me make some Psychedelic Black Light Klingon posters...

No relation that I’m aware of…

(via)

not all heroes wear capes

Take two minutes, for you, because you deserve it.

you can’t pay your rent with “the unique platform and reach our site provides”

A very nice editor at Huffington Post contacted me yesterday, and asked me if I would be willing to grant permission for the site to republish my post about the […]

Recent Posts

catching halos on the moon

catching halos on the moon

I had such a good time with my garden last season. It was the first time I had ever capital-t Tended a garden in my life, and it was a […]

More Info
in the heat of the summer better call out a plumber

in the heat of the summer better call out a plumber

Back in the old days, the good old days, when it was generally accepted that Fascism and Nazis were bad, bloggers would write these posts that were sort of recaps […]

More Info
lift every voice and sing

lift every voice and sing

Lift every voice and sing,‘Til earth and heaven ring,Ring with the harmonies of Liberty;Let our rejoicing riseHigh as the listening skies,Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.Sing a song [...]

More Info
it picks me up, puts me down

it picks me up, puts me down

I’ve been open and unashamed about my mental health struggles and triumphs, always willing to talk about my CPTSD, always willing to supportively listen when someone chooses to share their [...]

More Info

 

  • Instagram
  • Facebook

Member of The Internet Defense League

Creative Commons License
WIL WHEATON dot NET by Wil Wheaton is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://wilwheaton.net.

Search my blog

Powered by WordPress | theme SG Double
%d