October 2013 - Roundtable

IBM "clicky" keyboards
by Adam Thompson 13 Oct '16

13 Oct '16

Enough people have wondered/asked/complained to me about this that I'm posting this now as a public service. IBM Model "M" keyboards are still available, *NEW*, today. They are expensive, but they are the original design that you can use as a melee weapon. The catch is that they don't say "IBM" or even "Lexmark" on them. They are available for purchase from the manufacturer, Unicomp, who can be found online at http://www.pckeyboard.com/. You can also find some vintage NIB units from time to time at http://www.clickykeyboards.com/. There are also a number of other manufacturers now making similar, but not quite as good, keyboards. - CVT Inc., the maker of the Avant Stellar (I own two of them), which is the direct descendant of the Northgate Omnikey, seems to have restructured and no trace of their keyboard manufacturing operation can be found online. However, Northgate keyboards are still available new-in-box from (this is a horrible site, beware) http://www.northgate-keyboard-repair.com/. - The Happy Hacking keyboard (now owned by Fujitsu, apparently) is equally comforting to some people despite having a totally different feel. They, and many others, can be had from http://www.elitekeyboards.com/ - Das Keyboard - Anything using Cherry MX Green, Blue, or White keyswitches. The "green" switches apparently are the closest anyone's come yet to emulating the IBM/Lexmark/Unicomp switches... and they can be had in MUCH cheaper keyboards, like the Rosewill RK-9000 (http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16823201040 and http://techreport.com/review/23405/rosewill-rk-9000-series-mechanical-ke yboards-reviewed). - And there are an increasing number (yes, again, after the big die-off ca. 2009) of speciality manufacturers of "ergonomic" keyboards that are making clicky keyswitches available as an option. One of the better ones is a tiny shop in Ontario, but I can't find the name right now. References: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_M_keyboard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicomp http://deskthority.net/wiki/Cherry_MX -Adam Thompson athompso(a)athompso.net

7 12

SpamAssassin false positives on DATE_IN_FUTURE_96_Q?
by Gilbert E. Detillieux 23 Feb '16

23 Feb '16

I mentioned this problem at the last round-table session, but didn't get a solution, so I thought I'd post it here, just in case anyone has any suggestions to offer. I'm still seeing a whole bunch of false positives in SpamAssassin, since an update was installed in mid-September on a CentOS 5.7 system, for a rule called DATE_IN_FUTURE_96_Q, which is only supposed to be triggered when the "Date:" header has a date that is 4 days to 4 month ahead of the date in the "Received" header that has the _smallest_ difference in date. Here are the headers from the latest e-mail I've received with this false-positive. (I've stripped out irrelevant headers, for the sake of clarity and simplicity.) From topfivestories(a)messagent.itworldcanada.com Mon Nov 14 07:50:13 2011 Received: from mail.messagent.itworldcanada.com (mail.messagent.itworldcanada.com [207.112.10.80]) by palladium.cs.umanitoba.ca (8.13.8/8.13.8) with SMTP id pAEDoAxV028594 for <gedetil(a)cs.umanitoba.ca>; Mon, 14 Nov 2011 07:50:12 -0600 Date: Mon, 14 Nov 2011 08:50:13 -0500 X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,DATE_IN_FUTURE_96_Q, HTML_MESSAGE,RP_MATCHES_RCVD autolearn=no version=3.3.1 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.3.1 (2010-03-16) on palladium.cs.umanitoba.ca Note that I'm calling spamd via the spamass-milter on a system running sendmail. Note also, that in the above example, the only "Received" header was the one generated by my own server. (I've had other false positives, however, with multiple "Received" headers, all of which were within seconds of the time in the "Date" header.) Any ideas? -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.mb.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://www.muug.mb.ca/ PO Box 130 St-Boniface Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg MB CANADA R2H 3B4 Fax: (204)474-7609

6 11

big scanner
by Trevor Cordes 27 May '15

27 May '15

Does anyone have big (like tabloid or bigger) scanner they want to sell? Even an ancient SCSI or parallel one might be ok. I just want *big*. Do they even make scanners bigger than legal or tabloid?

4 6

Linux distro for Pentium III
by Robert Dyck 01 Jun '14

01 Jun '14

I have a customer who wants a laptop with Linux. My impression is he wants to learn Linux. I have refurbished laptops: IBM ThinkPad A21m, with Pentium III processor @ 750 MHz, 512MB RAM, and I can upgrade the hard drive to 40GB. Which distro of Linux would you recommend? I would ask Mike Pfaiffer, but he passed away earlier this year. Thanks, Rob Dyck

8 16

Off topic: coax work
by Kevin McGregor 29 Oct '13

29 Oct '13

I'm in dire need of having two, maybe three CATV coax cables terminated. Does anyone have the ends and tool(s) for this in S. St. Vital or vicinity? Or downtown tomorrow? Kevin

3 5

Obscure Solaris email?
by Kevin McGregor 25 Oct '13

25 Oct '13

We've been getting email from one of our Solaris 10 servers, and I can't figure out precisely where it's coming from. It's a system call "Auto Service Request" or ASR, and produces and email like this: You requested the following events be forwarded to you from wwdsvpciss2 Site : City of Winnipeg 510 Main St Agent : wwdsvpciss2 Severity : Major Category : agent Device Id : wwdsvpciss2 Topic : System Event Type : NotifierFailedEvent Event Code : 4.72.582 Event Date : 2013-09-26 03:29:30 Description: An attempt to contact the ASR server resulted in a Connection timed out failure. Probable Cause: The ASR has indicated a problem processing the posted data. The cause may be due to an internal server failure, invalid settings locally, or due to the Recommended Action: Examine the reason indicated in the description. If the reason indicates a server failure, then back end support will need to be notified. If the connection was refused, verify the Sun Connection Configuration settings first, then verify with back end support that the server is operational. It seems like there is a package responsible for this called "SUNWswasr" except that's not installed on this machine! I've checked all kinds of logs and it also doesn't seem to have a trace in crontab. Magic? Please suggest some other places to look! We want to stop getting these messages or at least direct them to a different account. Thanks, Kevin

3 3

Audio and video cables
by Kevin McGregor 25 Oct '13

25 Oct '13

Anyone know of a place in Winnipeg that carries HDMI/audio/S-Video cables in stock for a good price? I'd order them online but I'd like to get them before Sunday...

2 1

Anyone used Metz RJ-45 connectors?
by Adam Thompson 23 Oct '13

23 Oct '13

Has anyone used Metz RJ-45 connectors for Cat6 termination? I'm referring to these: http://www.metz-connect.com/us/rj45-connector-for-direct-attach-application I'm particularly interesting in knowing if they're worth the premium for when you have to do two or three Cat6 terminations in the field, not for bench work. -- -Adam Thompson athompso(a)athompso.net Cell: +1 204 291-7950 Fax: +1 204 489-6515

2 1

Freebie - HP LJ 4050DN
by Kevin McGregor 22 Oct '13

22 Oct '13

Anyone interested in taking away my HP Laserjet 4050 DN? 600 dpi, 17 ppm, autoduplexer. You have to pick it up. Two strong people required; it's really heavy. Kevin

4 8

Antenna cable
by Kevin McGregor 14 Oct '13

14 Oct '13

Sorry, not UNIX related... Does anyone have a recommendation for a place to buy a LMR N male to RP-TNC cable of about 20 ft. length? I've bought from Superpass.com before, and it worked out fine. They have a 25' one for $26+tax+shipping. A local place would be nice. Kevin

2 1