Tips for computer

Solaris 10 sendmail relay woe

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For the last two weeks since I switched on the new NIS servers, per Sun’s IT mandate, I have not been able to send emails out from my smtp server (my own mail server) running on Solaris 10 x64. Of course, submitting the ticket to our IT department didn’t help because they don’t support “personal” mail servers, due to Sun’s outsourcing effort to cut costs.

Thanks to Google search, I found my clues on the following link:
http://www.sunmanagers.org/pipermail/summaries/2006-September/007532.html

After changing the following line to my /etc/mail/submit.cf , I was able to send mails again.
Amazing! Google may be better than IT support. In fact, I have resolved several installation issues (Apache, MySql) by searching on Google. Why do you need an IT support group when you have Google?

# “Smart” relay host (may be null)
#DS (old setting)
DSmailhost.sfbay.sun.com

Make sure the sendmail server is re-started with the following command:
svcadm restart smtp

Book Reviews

Book Review: “Mind Set! : Reset Your Thinking and See the Future” by John Naisbitt

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John Naisbitt wrote a pretty decent book called “Megatrend” in the early ’80’s. In his late life, he’s trying capture the mindsets that allow him to see the trend and future. The author went into 11 mind sets and 5 projected future states.

Mindsets:
1. Most Things Remain Constant: His caution is to avoid getting carried away with seeing temporary trends as permanent changes.

2. The Future Is Embedded In The Present. You only need to see the “sky” above you. You can’t see the forest for the trees and watch out for the fads that come and go.

3. Focus On The Score Of The Game. Look at the actual measures. Politicians and newsmakers try to bend our perspectives away from what’s happening. The key numbers tell the real story. For example, it was first global cooling and then global warming. What is it? Look at the data. “It’s the nature of human beings to bend information in the direction of desired conclusions.” How true!

4. Understand How Powerful It Is Not To Have To Be Right. Massive failures follow those who blindly follow a doctrine. “But only if I don’t have to be right can I imagine anything, suggesting anything.”

5. See The Future As A Picture Puzzle. Assemble your perspective by seeing how a variety of current trends fit together – not just a straight line. Einstein put together all the pieces (readily proven theories) together to formulate his theory of relativity.

6. Don’t Get So Far Ahead Of The Parade That They Don’t Know You Are In It. Don’t project ahead of what people can appreciate: otherwise, the new perspective adds no value. For example, Charles Darwin waited until the last minute to challenge God and reveal his “Origin of Species” after building up his reputation as a Geologist.

7. Resistance To Change Falls For Benefits. People will change to gain improvements, for example, shooting basketball with one hand. It’s easy to overestimate resistance, in particular, to new technology that requires us to change our habits. I think iPod is a good example, people don’t mind less direct control of the button as long as the MP3 player is elegant enough for you to carry around and don’t make you look geeky.

8. Things That We Expect To Happen Always Happen More Slowly. Remember the forecasts of everyone owning a car-plane in the 1950s? We should be all using them by now. Nestle’s Nespresso machine was used as an example. It was founded in 1986 and has just started to catch on. I don’t know if this is a good example, because I had not heard of Nespresso and I don’t think I would buy one.

9. You Don’t Get Results By Solving Problems, but by exploiting opportunities. The examples are Fedex’s Fred Smith and Dreyers Ice Cream’s T. Gary Rogers. I’m not sure you don’t get results by solving problems. Some of the best opportunities in existing problems. I think what the author was trying to say that one must think outside of the box.

10. Don’t Add Unless You Subtract. This is a practice similar to a professional sports team. The roster of team is usually fixed at a number. I like this mindset the best among all. In today’s ever-increasing complex work and family life, pruning things can add greatly to the quality of the output or life.

11. Consider The Ecology Of Technology. Evaluate technology in terms of the nontechnical constraints. The author suggested we put more “poets” than computer in our school. He’s arguing for more balance between arts and technology. “Technology is a great enabler, but only when in balance with needs and skills and our human nature… When a new technology is introduced, make it a rule to ask: What will be enhanced? What will be diminished? What will be replaced? What new opportunities does it present?”

In Part II, the author proceeded to frame the pictures of the future:

1. Videos, attractive designs, use of color, and visual imagery are replacing the written word as a key influence. For example, the slow death of newspaper is a convincing point.

2. From nation-states to economic domains. Industries are organizing globally for supply, distribution, and production rather than by nation.

3. China’s economic growth will continue, to be followed by political freedom. The nation will become a global design and branding base, rather than just a source of low-cost production labor.

4. Europe will experience slow growth (mutually assured decline), burdened with below-replacement birth rates, tough policies against immigration, and high social welfare costs.

5. The importance of new technologies will slow down while the application of technologies developed in recent years will accelerate. Although he doesn’t directly say it, biotechnology and nanotechnology are immensely slow methods of invention.

Overall, the abridged audio book was a easy listen, perhaps too easy that I had to borrow the book and catch up with some of this points. The mindsets generally make sense but not extraordinary. I guess it doesn’t take a genius to figure the future out. I also agree with the future states he painted. On the other hand, I was hoping for some controversial future states…

mind-set.jpg

Book Reviews

Book Review: “Fooled by Randomness” by Nassim Taleb

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I read this book after reading the “Black Swan” book that was written after the success of this book, hoping to get more insight of his arguments. I was greatly disappointed, as most of the points were discussed already in “Black Swan.”

Early in the book, he told a story of Nero and John, who live next to each other. Nero is the conservative, constantly-hedging trader (not very rich) and John is the lucky, temporarily rich fools who traded high-yield bond and were on the winning/awarding streak until the market collapsed. The morale of the story: don’t think all rich people are smart – they may have been lucky and it ain’t over until it’s over (Solon’s or Yogi Bera’s advise). This may sound like sour grape but it has some truth to it. The same argument can be applied to the heroes or national leaders we worship. Are they truly that good or they happen to be at the right place at the right time. As the Chinese saying goes, it’s the era that makes the heroes.

Taleb assailed the reports for blowing things out of proportion like mad cow disease (killing hundreds) as opposed to car accidents (killing hundred thousands). The sensationalism of journalism can “divert empathy toward wrong causes, sacrificing cancer or malnutrition or other worthy causes. He concluded that journalism may be the “greatest plague we face today – as the world becomes more and more complicated and our minds are trained for more and more simplification.” I noticed this trend as well. Less and less people want to spend the time to think. “Just tell me what to do.”

Taleb mentioned many times in the book the use of Monte Carlo simulation. I was amazed how he could apply Monte Carlo to historical events and see how history might have been changed. He highlighted that there are many historical paths that were never played out and we are obsessed with only one of the historical path within a very short time horizon. He also touched on the possibility that due to randomness evolution may be fooled by randomness. In other words, not all species within a short time horizon are fittest (like John in his example), they may be just lucky enough to face no environmental obstacles. In the long run, these species will be wiped out. Is homosapien one of these species?

The author elaborated that why the statisticians are not good at predicting the future: 1) rare samples may not be included in the samples due to its rarity, 2) the population is constantly changing due to people’s rational behavior in reacting to changes (like having a mischievous boy keep adding/removing balls from the bottom of the urn while you’re sampling balls from the top of the urn). According to Taleb, “rare events are always unexpected, otherwise they would not occur.” He cites the examples of your “killer” neighbor that seems so courtly, reserved, the model of an excellent citizen until he shows up in the national newspaper. In other words, the past cannot predict the future. Sounds familiar?

On the problem of induction, Popper’s answers are there are two kinds of theories: 1) ones that are proved wrong (like Newtonian mechanics) and 2) ones that have yet to be proved wrong. No theories are ever right because we haven’t tested all the cases yet – time will tell. Our brain simply cannot handle all the random possibilities; we need to generalize and make inductive inferences. This is our human limitation. The best way is to take advantage of the statistical data in making bets but make sure you hedge your bets.

The “Millionaires next door” book suffers two major flaws, according to Taleb, 1) survivorship bias. All the interviewees were visible winners. What happened to those who practiced the same austerity and didn’t become a millionaire. 2) It ain’t over yet. Virtually all subjects enjoyed the asset appreciation. What if we have asset value crash? Watch out for the trading strategy of investing on “dogs” of the funds, as the theory of the strategy is deeply flawed in the survivorship bias – based on Taleb’s advise.

Speaking on superstitions, Taleb caught himself practicing superstitious acts after the taxicab driver dropped him off at the undesirable entrance to work and ended up having a profitable trading day the day before. “Our brains are simply not made to view things independent from each other… Our bias is simply to establish a casual link… For it is harder to act as one were ignorant than as if one were smart… We take things too seriously.” I guess one reason we are superstitious is that we want to know we’re in control, not a victim of circumstances.

People, even the best of them, are often fooled by randomness. The conservative Nero character beat the 28% chance of dying from cancer and vindicated himself of this trading strategy when all other Wall Street hotshots got poor, but he ended up dying from a helicopter crash he piloted. The “black swan” got his man.

Taleb labeled that most the corporation CEO are “empty suites” – just lucky (lucky decisions) and tall and charismatic and good at looking the part or playing “corporate politics.” “The higher up the corporate ladder, the lower the evidence of such contribution – The Inverse Rule.” To a certain extent, I agreed with him. This may explain why we had so many optional back-dating scandals and certainly Enron comes to mind. Perhaps due to the extreme luck factor, the CEOs’ salaries (or the jackpot) continue to rise – so the “expected” salary remains the same.

I like one of his afterthoughts: Randomness’ benefit – less stress. If all things are random (like subway schedule) and we all believe in them, we will most likely take things less seriously and subject ourselves to less strict schedule.

This book is a difficult read. Many times, I tried to stay awake to finish the chapters and eventually gave in to the boredom or his esoteric arguments, sometimes seem trivial. I had to read the book twice to capture the above essence from my perspectives. In a way, Taleb practices what he preaches – random thoughts.

fooled-by-randomness.jpg

Tips for computer

Setting/Centering the Horizontal Display Position on Ubuntu or Linux

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Linux is notorious in positioning the horizontal position on your monitor. After installing the Ubuntu on my old Sony Vaio PCV-RX650, which has a Nvidia TNT2 display card, I found the display is shifted to the right, leaving a blank strip on the left and distorted image on the right. This was very annoying. I had to re-adjust the monitor every time. This was one the reasons I gave up on Linux a few years back. You’d never see this kind of problem on Windows. I’m determined to find the fix for this.

So, I ventured into Google and found a few tricks to set the display correctly once and for all.
First, run the “xvidtune” to determine all the parameters needed to adjust the display. See below:

xvidtune.png

This software is not really intuitive. You’d need to click “left” or “right” and then click “apply” to see the effect. Keep doing this until you get the desired screen fit and then click “show” to show the parameters on the terminal. Copy the output.

Then gedit or vi the following file /etc/X11/xorg.conf, which I append below:
paste the line in between the “Monitor” Section as follows:

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Generic Monitor”
Option “DPMS”
HorizSync 30-83
VertRefresh 55-76
Modeline “NV1280x1024” 135.00 1280 1312 1456 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync

You’d need to the prefix of “Modeline” in front of the line. Notice that I added “NV” (or any thing to make it unique) in front of “1280×1024”. Well this is really the trick that took me over a couple hours to figure out. This string “NV1280x1024” needs to have a same counter part in the Display Section. In my case, it is as follows:

SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
Modes “NV1280x1024”
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
EndSubSection

Notice that I comment out the original lines and all other Display sections so I can force X display
to use this particular mode I just specified. You may want to have more than one mode after you become more familiar with how the file works.

Save the file then refresh the display by doing
CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE

The display should be what you intended. If not, keep editing the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file until you get what you want.
There it is. A bit tedious.

Appendix: My /etc/X11/xorg.conf file contents – your file may be different.
#=====================================================
# /etc/X11/xorg.conf (xorg X Window System server configuration file)
#
# This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
# values from the debconf database.
#
# Edit this file with caution, and see the xorg.conf(5) manual page.
# (Type “man xorg.conf” at the shell prompt.)
#
# This file is automatically updated on xserver-xorg package upgrades *only*
# if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xorg
# package.
#
# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command:
# sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg

Section “Files”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/misc”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/cyrillic”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/:unscaled”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/:unscaled”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi”
FontPath “/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi”
# path to defoma fonts
FontPath “/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType”
EndSection

Section “Module”
Load “i2c”
Load “bitmap”
Load “ddc”
Load “dri”
Load “extmod”
Load “freetype”
Load “glx”
Load “int10”
Load “vbe”
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
Identifier “Generic Keyboard”
Driver “kbd”
Option “CoreKeyboard”
Option “XkbRules” “xorg”
Option “XkbModel” “pc105”
Option “XkbLayout” “us”
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
Identifier “Configured Mouse”
Driver “mouse”
Option “CorePointer”
Option “Device” “/dev/input/mice”
Option “Protocol” “ImPS/2”
Option “ZAxisMapping” “4 5”
Option “Emulate3Buttons” “true”
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
Driver “wacom”
Identifier “stylus”
Option “Device” “/dev/input/wacom”
Option “Type” “stylus”
Option “ForceDevice” “ISDV4” # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
Driver “wacom”
Identifier “eraser”
Option “Device” “/dev/input/wacom”
Option “Type” “eraser”
Option “ForceDevice” “ISDV4” # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
Driver “wacom”
Identifier “cursor”
Option “Device” “/dev/input/wacom”
Option “Type” “cursor”
Option “ForceDevice” “ISDV4” # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section “Device”
Identifier “Generic Video Card”
Driver “nv”
BusID “PCI:1:0:0”
EndSection

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Generic Monitor”
Option “DPMS”
HorizSync 30-83
VertRefresh 55-76
Modeline “NV1280x1024” 135.00 1280 1312 1456 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync

EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Default Screen”
Device “Generic Video Card”
Monitor “Generic Monitor”
DefaultDepth 24
# SubSection “Display”
# Depth 1
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
# EndSubSection
# SubSection “Display”
# Depth 4
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
# EndSubSection
# SubSection “Display”
# Depth 8
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
# EndSubSection
# SubSection “Display”
# Depth 15
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
# EndSubSection
# SubSection “Display”
# Depth 16
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
# EndSubSection
SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
Modes “NV1280x1024”
# Modes “1280×1024” “1024×768” “800×600” “640×480”
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section “ServerLayout”
Identifier “Default Layout”
Screen “Default Screen”
InputDevice “Generic Keyboard”
InputDevice “Configured Mouse”
InputDevice “stylus” “SendCoreEvents”
InputDevice “cursor” “SendCoreEvents”
InputDevice “eraser” “SendCoreEvents”
EndSection

Section “DRI”
Mode 0666
EndSection

Tips for computer

Fan Control on Ubuntu for my old Sony PCV-RX650

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Thanks to the below link, I was able to turn down the annoying fans on my old Sony PCV-RX650 while running Ubuntu:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?s=f65942f674eb3572c64c294ca6810608&t=238566&page=2
This problem has been bugging me and preventing me from running Linux on this system. I’m glad I was able to resolve this problem without having to upgrade the BIOS (~ $30) to have the latest ACPI 2.0 feature (currently it has APM).

I first found out that I need to activate the root password on Ubuntu by running “sudo password root”, this allows me to act like root.

I then followed the instructions of getting and installing the lm_sensors package first by running “sudo apt-get install lm-sensors”
run: sensors-detect (answered “yes” to all of their questions)
This basically add the following lines to /etc/modules:
#====================================
# Generated by sensors-detect on Thu Aug 23 23:44:40 2007
# I2C adapter drivers
i2c-i801
# Chip drivers
eeprom
w83627hf
#====================================
reboot to have the modules loaded

run: pwmconfig
to set the preferences
you can try to run fancontrol at this point as root to see if it is working.

Finally add a line below to to /etc/rc.local (to allow for auto execution upon power up)
/usr/sbin/fancontrol &

Below is the transcript of what I did:
======================================================
dtsai@ubuntu:~$ sensors
w83637hf-isa-0290
Adapter: ISA adapter
VCore: +1.74 V (min = +0.71 V, max = +0.70 V) ALARM
+12V: +11.92 V (min = +0.00 V, max = +3.89 V) ALARM
+3.3V: +3.36 V (min = +2.24 V, max = +0.51 V) ALARM
+5V: +5.15 V (min = +0.00 V, max = +0.21 V) ALARM
-12V: +6.06 V (min = -14.91 V, max = -4.14 V) ALARM
V5SB: +5.08 V (min = +0.00 V, max = +3.44 V) ALARM
VBat: +0.00 V (min = +0.00 V, max = +2.06 V)
fan1: 4530 RPM (min = 16071 RPM, div = 2) ALARM
CPU Fan: 2265 RPM (min = 168750 RPM, div = 4) ALARM
fan3: 0 RPM (min = -1 RPM, div = 2) ALARM
M/B Temp: -48°C (high = +33°C, hyst = -127°C) sensor = thermistor
CPU Temp: +38.5°C (high = +80°C, hyst = +75°C) sensor = diode
temp3: +34.0°C (high = +80°C, hyst = +75°C) sensor = thermistor
vid: +1.550 V (VRM Version 9.0)
alarms:
beep_enable:
Sound alarm enabled

dtsai@ubuntu:~$ pwmconfig
This program will search your sensors for pulse width modulation (pwm)
controls, and test each one to see if it controls a fan on
your motherboard. Note that many motherboards do not have pwm
circuitry installed, even if your sensor chip supports pwm.

We will attempt to briefly stop each fan using the pwm controls.
The program will attempt to restore each fan to full speed
after testing. However, it is ** very important ** that you
physically verify that the fans have been to full speed
after the program has completed.

Found the following PWM controls:
9191-0290/pwm1
9191-0290/pwm2
9191-0290/pwm3

Found the following fan sensors:
9191-0290/fan1_input current speed: 4530 RPM
9191-0290/fan2_input current speed: 2280 RPM
9191-0290/fan3_input current speed: 0 … skipping!

As you are not root, we cannot write the PWM settings.
Please run as root to continue.
dtsai@ubuntu:~$ su root
Password:
root@ubuntu:/home/dtsai# pwmconfig
This program will search your sensors for pulse width modulation (pwm)
controls, and test each one to see if it controls a fan on
your motherboard. Note that many motherboards do not have pwm
circuitry installed, even if your sensor chip supports pwm.

We will attempt to briefly stop each fan using the pwm controls.
The program will attempt to restore each fan to full speed
after testing. However, it is ** very important ** that you
physically verify that the fans have been to full speed
after the program has completed.

Found the following PWM controls:
9191-0290/pwm1
9191-0290/pwm2
9191-0290/pwm3

Found the following fan sensors:
9191-0290/fan1_input current speed: 4470 RPM
9191-0290/fan2_input current speed: 2265 RPM
9191-0290/fan3_input current speed: 0 … skipping!

Warning!!! This program will stop your fans, one at a time,
for approximately 5 seconds each!!!
This may cause your processor temperature to rise!!!
If you do not want to do this hit control-C now!!!
Hit return to continue:

Testing pwm control 9191-0290/pwm1 …
9191-0290/fan1_input … speed was 4470 now 0
It appears that fan 9191-0290/fan1_input
is controlled by pwm 9191-0290/pwm1
Would you like to generate a detailed correlation (y)? y
PWM 255 FAN 4530
PWM 240 FAN 4500
PWM 225 FAN 4272
PWM 210 FAN 4115
PWM 195 FAN 3857
PWM 180 FAN 3688
PWM 165 FAN 3426
PWM 150 FAN 3199
PWM 135 FAN 2973
PWM 120 FAN 2710
PWM 105 FAN 0
Fan Stopped at PWM = 105

9191-0290/fan2_input … speed was 2265 now 2265
no correlation

Testing pwm control 9191-0290/pwm2 …
9191-0290/fan1_input … speed was 4470 now 4383
no correlation
9191-0290/fan2_input … speed was 2265 now 0
It appears that fan 9191-0290/fan2_input
is controlled by pwm 9191-0290/pwm2
Would you like to generate a detailed correlation (y)?
PWM 255 FAN 2280
PWM 240 FAN 2280
PWM 225 FAN 2265
PWM 210 FAN 2265
PWM 195 FAN 2205
PWM 180 FAN 2149
PWM 165 FAN 2070
PWM 150 FAN 1985
PWM 135 FAN 1896
PWM 120 FAN 1814
PWM 105 FAN 1704
PWM 90 FAN 1607
PWM 75 FAN 1500
PWM 60 FAN 1383
PWM 45 FAN 0
Fan Stopped at PWM = 45

Testing pwm control 9191-0290/pwm3 …
9191-0290/fan1_input … speed was 4470 now 4500
no correlation
9191-0290/fan2_input … speed was 2265 now 2280
no correlation

No correlations were detected.
There is either no fan connected to the output of 9191-0290/pwm3,
or the connected fan has no rpm-signal connected to one of
the tested fan sensors. (Note: not all motherboards have
the pwm outputs connected to the fan connectors,
check out the hardware database on http://www.almico.com/forumindex.php)

Did you see/hear a fan stopping during the above test (n)?

Testing is complete.
Please verify that all fans have returned to their normal speed.

The fancontrol script can automatically respond to temperature changes
of your system by changing fanspeeds.
Do you want to set up its configuration file now (y)?
What should be the path to your fancontrol config file (/etc/fancontrol)?
/etc/fancontrol does not exist, shall I create it now (y)?
Loading configuration from /etc/fancontrol …

Select fan output to configure, or other action:
1) 9191-0290/pwm2 3) Change INTERVAL 5) Save and quit
2) 9191-0290/pwm1 4) Just quit 6) Show configuration
select (1-n): 6

Common Settings:
INTERVAL=10

Settings of 9191-0290/pwm2:
Depends on
Controls
MINTEMP=
MAXTEMP=
MINSTART=
MINSTOP=

Settings of 9191-0290/pwm1:
Depends on
Controls
MINTEMP=
MAXTEMP=
MINSTART=
MINSTOP=

select (1-n): 1

Current temperature readings are as follows:
9191-0290/temp1_input -48
9191-0290/temp2_input 36
9191-0290/temp3_input 34

Select a temperature sensor as source for 9191-0290/pwm2:
1) 9191-0290/temp1_input
2) 9191-0290/temp2_input
3) 9191-0290/temp3_input
4) None (Do not affect this PWM output)
select (1-n): 3

Enter the low temperature (C)
at which the fan should be switched off (0): 32

Enter the high temperature (C)
at which the fan should be switched to full speed (60):

Enter the minimum PWM value (0-255)
at which the fan STARTS spinning (press t to test) (150):

Enter the minimum PWM value (0-255)
at which the fan STOPS spinning (press t to test) (100):

select (1-n): 2

Current temperature readings are as follows:
9191-0290/temp1_input -48
9191-0290/temp2_input 35
9191-0290/temp3_input 34

Select a temperature sensor as source for 9191-0290/pwm1:
1) 9191-0290/temp1_input
2) 9191-0290/temp2_input
3) 9191-0290/temp3_input
4) None (Do not affect this PWM output)
select (1-n): 3

Enter the low temperature (C)
at which the fan should be switched off (0): 32

Enter the high temperature (C)
at which the fan should be switched to full speed (60):

Enter the minimum PWM value (0-255)
at which the fan STARTS spinning (press t to test) (150):

Enter the minimum PWM value (0-255)
at which the fan STOPS spinning (press t to test) (100):

select (1-n):
1) 9191-0290/pwm2 3) Change INTERVAL 5) Save and quit
2) 9191-0290/pwm1 4) Just quit 6) Show configuration
select (1-n): 6

Common Settings:
INTERVAL=10

Settings of 9191-0290/pwm2:
Depends on 9191-0290/temp3_input
Controls 9191-0290/fan2_input
MINTEMP=32
MAXTEMP=60
MINSTART=150
MINSTOP=100

Settings of 9191-0290/pwm1:
Depends on 9191-0290/temp3_input
Controls 9191-0290/fan1_input
MINTEMP=32
MAXTEMP=60
MINSTART=150
MINSTOP=100

select (1-n): 5

Saving configuration to /etc/fancontrol…
Configuration saved

Personal

Bad things tend to come in three or more

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Last Friday, 8/10/07, I experienced a sort of the personal perfect storm. I think bad things tend to come in three or more – probably a result of natural selection. Anything less wouldn’t be memorable. It’s like you always find the thing the last place you look.

It started with my credit card being denied at the cafeteria during lunch. Upon returning to my office, I called the credit card customer service and found out someone has gone on a shopping spree with my credit card number. Thanks to their sophisticated theft prevention software, the credit charges were stopped in time. They are small charges like iTune downloads and on-line game charges – probably stolen by kids. Of course, the credit card company quickly stopped the card charges and cancel the card altogether. This is going to cost my some griefs in moving several monthly charges to the new credit card number. It’s a nuisance for the modern world of convenient shopping experience.

After coming back home, I found out that my dishwasher was clogged up again after nearly a half year of good operation. This took me another hour or so to clear the drainage tube to the air hole and then to the garbage disposal. There were some undigested rices. This took several trials; I had to re-do it on Saturday. Another nuisance for the modern technology. I don’t know why there is always some residue water on the dishwater, no matter what – probably acting as p-trap thing I suppose.

While trying to pay off my credit card payment by phone (the on-line account has been closed), I discovered that my land line phone didn’t have a dial tone. I spent another hour tracing the problem to the outside jack. So I then scheduled a checkup with our phone company, AT&T. They sent a technician out on Saturday morning and found out the wires were lose at the distribution box a few blocks away in my neighborhood. Boy, first AT&T (or Pacific Bell, or SBC) lost my DSL business, now they couldn’t even keep the wires attached. This is another interconnect problem in today’s interconnected world.

And now the bonus nuisance: On Friday, IT had EOL’ed the NIS server my mail server normally used. After switching to the new NIS server, my email SMTP server has stopped sending emails out. I haven’t figured out why yet as of today (Monday). Rebooting did not fix the problem though. I had to switch to another SMTP server. It took me a few days to figure out that my emails were not being sent out. Somehow, I felt my communication to the world has been cut. It’s a stymieing kind of feeling.

There you go! 3 bad things or more like nuisances in one day of living in a modern world. Let the record shows.

Book Reviews

Book Review: “How to Make People Like You in 90 seconds or Less” by Nicholas Boothman

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This is a book about building rapport on your first impression. As the author stated, you have roughly 90 seconds to make a first impression – making the best impression during these 90 seconds makes a whole world of difference. My main take-aways:

1. Be congruent of your body language (3 V’s: visual constitute 55% of communication, vocal (tone) 38%, and verbal words only 7%) from your head to toe: in your eye contacts, smile/”beaming,” head tilt (like a model would do), unbuttoned coats, open hand pointing to the heart, a slight lean (this is the subtle one), handshake, and good posture.

2. Interesting conversation: start with current event or weather then ask open ended questions on things related to the person who may have dropped the hint or clues like where they work and etc.

3. KFC: Know what you want, Find (get the feedback) and Change.

4. Synchronize to the 3 dominant sensories: visual, auditory and kinesthetics (touchy and feeling). This is nothing new to me but the quizzes are very interesting and help you differentiate which of your sensories are strong. He also pointed out the long-lasting married spouses tend to have non-overlapping dominant senses, which make married lives more interesting and probably incurring more conflicts at times as well.

5. Mirroring people’s gesture, language, attitude and tone. I didn’t know there are so many aspects of the mirroring. The tough part is to do this without being noticed and to able to conduct a meaningful conversation at the same time.

6. Identify the eye cues: Based on people’s eye movement, you can tell which of the dominant sensory type he/she is. Looking up tends to be visual (and right – fetching visual memory, and left constructing visual image). Looking side ways tends to auditory (and right – fetching auditory memory, and left – constructing auditory sound). Looking down tends to be kinesthetic (touchy) (and right – fetching past feeling, and left – internal dialog).

7. Make a memorable impression – this is a challenging one. Sometimes a memorable impression does not make a good impression. Giving easy-to-remember tag (like a nick name, certain clothing pieces – a loud shirt) could be a good way to make people remember you.

8. I like you = I am like you. If people like you, they’ll see the best in you and help you succeed. To make people like you is to mimic/synchronize your body language, verbal cue, attitude with the person. In other words, to connect with them. Who wouldn’t like that?

The author spoke with a British accent but is general easy to understand. Oh yah, he just made a memorable impression on me – the smooth Brit 🙂 This books taught me a few things. Indeed, making first impression could sometimes make or break a person’s career and livelihood. Some may consider this book a used-care sales training, but I think it’s a must for a world that’s even more connected ever. I think I’ll listen to it again.
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