Posted on

19-Jul-2007

No T4 output yet
and I found out why: Gave it a wrong date parameter (“dd-MMM-yyyy hh:mm:ss” in stead of “dd-MMM-yyyy:hh:mm:ss”) and therefore it couldn’t process the data – nor did it resubmit itself. Today I corrected the issue by using the T4$SYS:T4$CONFIG.COM procedure and all seems right now. We’ll see tomorrow.
MySQL crashed
yesterday and looking in ‘the logs (the one closed yesterday and a previous one) it occurred to me it crashed on EXACTLY the same spot – at least in most places. What may give a clue is the elapsed time of the processes:

Elapsed time: 31 16:55:20.72 for the crash on 17-JUN-2007 13:23:14.10
Elapsed time: 31 05:51:39.20 for the crash on 18-JUL-2007 19:19:51.08

Chances are the next crash will be the first update after 19-Aug-2007. I don’t know if the system would be up that time, but it’s worth thinking about.

(For details look at the 17-Jun-2007 post. This ona has the same figures)

Posted on

Interact Suite abused for phishing

Someone has send mail around requesting you, as an Interact Suite cusomer, to help them to “enhance security”. This is how the message looks like when opened in Outlook – where it will show up as HTML page (I guess most users have it set that way):
Urgent request like it shows as HTML-based mail (Outlook)
But in raw tekst (use “View source”), it’s appears to be some other addaress:

In accordance with introduction of the new security level in our system, it is urgently requested to follow this link
<a href=”http://interact.regions.secuserver8.com/ibsregions/cmserver/welcome/default/verify.cfm”>
https://interact.regions.com/ibsregions/cmserver/welcome/default/verify.cfm</a>
and to create a secret question/answer pair, which will be an additional measure for preventing nauthorized access to Your accounts.

In order that only customers will use this abusive link, is says:

If You are not Regions Bank US InterAct Customer please disregard this letter.

A good bank has proper relation management and this letter would not have been sent in the first place!

Full header as it appears on my system:

Return-Path: akstcutahmbdmnsdgs@utahmbd.com
Received: from 198.pool85-49-20.dynamic.orange.es (85.49.20.198)
by diana.intra.grootersnet.nl (V5.6-9, OpenVMS V8.3 Alpha);
Tue, 17 Jul 2007 23:49:49 +0100 (CET)
Return-Path:
Received: from aa.bb.cc.dd (HELO utahmbd.com)
by grootersnet.nl with esmtp (C-X)*-PU0A6G 7++;+S)
id B5J@/5-152D.< -M. for XXXXXXXXXX@XXXXXXXXXX.NL; Tue, 17 Jul 2007 21:49:44 -0100 From: "administration@XXXXXXXXXXXX.net"
To: < (Me)>
Subject: Urgent Request ID586948
Date: Tue, 17 Jul 2007 21:49:44 -0100
Message-ID: <01c7c8bc$6345e3c0$6c822ecf@akstcutahmbdmnsdgs>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/related;
boundary="----=_NextPart_000_000A_01C7C8CD.26CEB3C0"
X-Mailer: Microsoft Office Outlook, Build 11.0.5510
X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4963.1700
Thread-Index: Aca6Q7S.*N?F8/51UL9890?+F9?73)==

(for obvious reasons, I have removed email addresses – except the sender’s one. To start wityh, it looks like a complete bogus one, and if it isn’t, well, ít’s his own fault)

I have informed the ISP and the expected sender.

Posted on

A difference in perception?

Hoff thinks it’s funny, I think it’s pathetic:

LIB$SIGNAL, JAVA style

If this is coding, modern style, I pity those that will have to mainain that code in the future. Or is this a way to make yourself irreplacable, or pump up your income (if you get paid by the characters typed)…

If Java had a only a function like LIB$SIGNAL, life would be much easier. If this is humour, it’s just to know our life as VMS programmers is much, much easier.

Posted on

17-Sep-2007

New T4 collector
I got the new T4-collector and installed it on Diana, and I hope this wil solve the problems with Monitor output. Again, the ‘special version’ had to be commented out and the batchjob resubmitted, so it is to be expected that the day after tomorrow we’ll have results – or tomorrow, perhaps. We’ll see.
Aphrodite’s system disk
is full for just over 50% and I was curious what files wer on that. First sorted on size, it shows that 30% of the files is over 32 Mb in size:
Disk usage \\Aphrodite\c:. Next, of course, to find out what files take that space! The obvious cause: all the photographs, because both the originals I’m currently working on ar of course on-line, and also the ones published on the web are here – as a backup (to create the new content, for instance).
It will improve over time, when all are published, it will be archived (The raw material already is but they are needed online as well).
2007 Holiday pictures
are almost done. It takes time to process over 500 images, combining them (there are quite a lot ‘composed’ images this time), filtering out what’s too bad, and comment them (as far as needed). The process has been delayed by numreous problems on the Windows workstation, of which loss of the active tasks on the toolbar was most annoying. It could not be solved, and things tunrned out so bad I had te reverse to an earlier restore point, and that meant re-applying patches and re-installing the album-software – finding out that all comments that have been entered before, were lost….Reversing the restoration returned my taskbar – and all comments, so my suspicion is that JAlbum stores data in the Windows registry. Bad place for that!
Anyway, only four days to go (two of them hold a lot of pictures!).
Web re-design is getting on slowly as well, but I get a pretty good idea how it will look like. It’s being looked at on an XAMPP installation, although that is a newer PHP version. I’m inn the process of changing the template I intend to use, still working out what images will be on top and in the body. Perhaps I’ll start with the basic structure first, and push in the new main page later on.

Posted on

09-Jul-2007

Disaster tolerance
To prove a point, take a look at this video (it links you to YouTube). This is why I’d prefer OpenVMS over any other OS in case of an emergency: just count the seconds ticking away!

(These systems were set up by people that know how to configure these systems, and they know more about it that I do. I haven’t setup my systems to be as disater tolerant as this – it would blow the roof of my house, if not more – but it proves a point, doesn’t it?. 13 seconds (and a bit more) for OpenVMS where Linux barely made it within the required 2 minutes….)