Rubenerd

From page 501 of Steven Pinker’s 2011 book, The Better Angels of Our Nature:

Animals can attack both in offence and in defence. The simplest trigger of an offensive attack is sudden pain or frustration, the latter delivered as a signal from the Seeking [reward] system. The reflex may be seen in some of the primitive responses of a human being. Babies react with rage when their arms are suddenly pinned to the sides, and adults may lash out by swearing or breaking things when they hit their thumb with a hammer or are surprised by not getting what they expect (as in the technique of computer repair called percussive maintenance).

I came awfully close earlier this week.

I like long sleeved, collared shirts. They marry the convenience of a regular shirt, with the fetching addition of long sleeves and a collar. T-shirts are comfortable, but psychologically I feel as though I’m clad in pyjamas if I wear them in public. It’s not as bad as sitting naked for your final exam you didn’t study for in so many of those cliché nightmares, but it’s close. In that it really isn’t, that sounds far worse.

Clara sent me an AmiAmi link with everyone’s favourite character from Re:Zero emblazoned on… I hope you’re sitting down… a collared shirt. I had resigned myself to the fact animu prints would only ever appear on T-shirts, and yet there’s Rem with her cute blue hair, on handsome collared attire. From the description:

The “Ani-Art series” is an original product series by AMNIBUS designed with anime illustrations processed in a more artistic style.

This presented me with an exciting, rare opportunity to showcase my love of collared shirts and blue haired waifus, until I read the specifications ending with the most sinister, evil, twisted word in the English language:

Material: 100% Polyester

Maybe they’re indirectly commenting on Rem as a character, somehow?

The Anibus website has a lot of really beautiful art from the series in their Memory Snow collection. There’s no Ram on a red shirt unfortunately, though perhaps that’s a good thing.

I can never remember the syntax for cropping a single row of pixels using ImageMagick, hence the title of the post where I elude to the fact I want to crop a single row of pixels with ImageMagick.

For a row:

$ magick convert $INPUT -chop 0x1 +repage $OUTPUT

For a column:

$ magick convert $INPUT -chop 1x0 +repage $OUTPUT

I probably keep forgetting because I want -crop, not -chop.

While I’m here, thanks to the ImageMagick team for their amazing toolkit, and kwm@ and adam@ for maintaining the FreeBSD Port and pkgsrc packages!

TL;DR: Use Rufus with GPT/UEFI if you can, and save yourself a ton of pain.

Creating a key, the official Microsoft way

Responsible operating systems ship either with memory key images in the case of the BSDs, ISOs that also work when dd’d across in the case of Debian, or a simple script to convert. But if you have a reason to still make a Windows Server 2012 R2 USB boot key, things are unsurprisingly more complicated.

The official Microsoft way to create a bootable key is to use the official, confusingly-titled Windows USB/DVD Download Tool. Make sure you’re logged out [sic] of your Microsoft ID when downloading, or chances are you’ll get the following error:

Sign In. Sorry, but we’re having trouble signing you in. AADSTS90015: Requested query string is too long.

Once downloaded, you copy it over to your trusty Windows virtual machine you keep around for specific occasions like this. You attach your USB key, provide the tool your ISO, then wait for the inevitable error messages:

Status: Files copied successfully. However, we were unable to run bootsect to make the USB device bootable.

There are a multitude of reasons this can happen, but in my case it was attempting to make a 64-bit bootable USB key using a 32-bit Windows 7 virtual machine. If you’re confused given the error message said nothing of the sort, that makes two of us. This can also come up if your hypervisor is passing through USB 3 with a USB 3 key, or USB 3 with USB 2, or you don’t have the right drivers installed, or… trails off.

Booting Windows Server 2012 R2 and failing

Anyway, you have your bootable USB key, so you attempt to start some Quanta hardware in a rack with the data centre aircon vents inflaming your head cold, only for Windows Server 2012 R2 to confront you with this when you attempt to install to disk:

We couldn’t create a new partition or locate an existing one. For more information, see the Setup log files.

As an aside, this whole royal we thing, and computers talking in the first person by saying hi, I’m doing this for you now needs to stop. I’m not sure which focus group said this was a good idea, but it gets aggravating quickly when you’re troubleshooting.

There are so many threads about this online, in part because it also affects Windows 7 and 8. Broadly their recommendations fall into the following categories, none of which worked for me, but maybe you’ll have better luck:

• Unplug the key before reaching the disk detection screen.

• Use Diskpart to clear, partition, and set active, as per this article in the delightfully-named Microsoft Reduce Customer Effort Center.

• Use a live *nix CD to dd the target drive first to clear out any partition errors, either in place of above, or before.

• Set the USB key to be the first boot device in the BIOS. Or set your disk array(s) to be the first boot device in the BIOS. Basically, futz around with the boot order, rather than using the one-time boot option to start with USB.

• Disable USB. Yes, people say disable USB when you’re saying you’re having trouble booting from a USB key. I think data centre security walked passed me just to make sure my cackling laugher wasn’t me dropping a server on my foot.

• Glare intensely at the KVM connected to the box until you guilt Window Server into doing what you paid for through your company’s expensive SPLA.

• Boot using a USB CD-ROM instead. Which I entertained doing, before realising the ISO was too big for a regular DVD-ROM, and I couldn’t find shops still selling dual-layer discs on short notice.

Going back and using Rufus instead

So I did what I should have done from the start, and deployed Rufus. I’ve also had mixed success with this third party bootable USB key creator, most often I get the following error:

This image is either non-bootable, or it uses a boot or compression method that is not supported by Rufus…

But it made light work of the Windows Server 2012 R2 Datacentre ISO I had. Which didn’t work, in the same way as above. So I did a last Hail Mary and created a key with GPT/UEFI instead. Low and behold, with further BIOS tweaking the sucker booted, and installed. Hashtag boom!

Doug DeMuro reviewed the 1989 Cadillac Broughman d’Elegance, an utterly dated vehicle that’s also a quintessential slice of 1980s Americana. I always have to check the spelling of quintessential.

Sometimes I worry I’m too funny. It doesn’t last.

Mac?

Damn it! That name would have been so good. Though it’d be me telling you lies, telling you sweet little lies.

I haven’t followed WWDC 2019 beyond the long-awaited Mac Pro announcement, but I’m stoked for this news.

• zsh is a far better interactive shell than bash. It’s more extensible, its auto-complete is faster, autopushd is wonderful, and from my selfish perspective it closer matches ksh, my current shell family of choice.

• It’s MIT/BSD-ish licenced. I prefer this to the GPL for reasons that are beyond the scope of this post, but clearly so does Apple based on their development and support for llvm and Darwin’s BSD userland.

• For scripts, people should be writing Bourne-shell code anyway. I know I’m fighting a losing battle here, but portability and correctness are important.

• bash may be a pun, but it sounds aggressive. Pronouncing zsh sounds like a hipster fruit juice.

bash fans may be disappointed or frustrated by the decision. But to them I repeat their advice given simultaneously nicely, and condescendingly, when 10.4 Tiger replaced tcsh: you’ll still be able to run it, and you can always swap it back if you want.

Update: Someone with a locked Twitter account messaged surprised that I’m a Mac user, given they know me from BSD circles. I sure am. I’ve had my feet in both camps since school. In some ways I can use my Macs because I have a rock solid FreeBSD box to delegate critical stuff to.

This is a post I wouldn’t think I’d ever write, or more accurately type. I resent the idea that written words are somehow more meaningful than typed; even ignoring accessibility concerns, some of us express our creativity and thoughts through keyboards not pens.

And it’s that kind of Apple person who’s happy and, above all, relieved to hear about the new Mac Pro. I’ve had PCs running FreeBSD, NetBSD, and various Linux flavours for as long, but I’ve also had a foot firmly in the Apple camp since they were rocking PowerPCs and CRTs. And I feel people like me have finally been listened to, after more than half a decade of lip service.

Unlike the cylindrical rubbish bin in name and nature, the 2019 Mac Pro feels like the true replacement of the original Mac Pro, and a worthy addition to a long line of professional Macintosh computers. As I wrote about in 2012:

People have been whinging about the “dated” Mac Pro case which was borrowed from the original PowerMac G3 in 2003 (of which I also owned at one point). All one needs to do is spent five minutes battling with the cables in a regular PC chassis to appreciate how wonderfully simple it is to add components to a Mac Pro.

Then the rubbish bin came out, and I lamented the inevitable rise of cable spaghetti mess. Then the lack of expansion became more apparent. Then it wasn’t updated. Then we were assured it would be. All it took was six years.

This new Mac Pro addresses several key concerns:

Lack of expansion and ability to upgrade

The previous rubbish bin Mac was so limited in that regard, you may as well get an iMac.

Lack of focus

We were all worried the Xeon/ECC iMac Pro was the de facto replacement for the Mac Pro, which it most definitely wasn’t.

Lack of interest

Apple hasn’t been a stranger to letting certain product lines languish, but the Mac Pro was beyond laughable.

Lack of whimsy

Apple have lost that a lot lately, from removing the happy startup chime, to that puff of smoke when you remove a Dock icon. This machine has giant steel handles, the option for wheels, and the top handle for removing the internals is a giant smiling face!

Lack of cheese grater

I loved the industrial design of my original Mac Pro and the PowerMac G5 tower that inspired it. It’s great to see them return to what made those earlier cases great.

I likely won’t be buying one, largely because I’ve shifted my processing to a FreeBSD tower with ZFS, the only OS/file system combination I trust with my photos and other memories. I also want to be able to eat.

But I’m relieved Apple is thinking of pro users again, and more importantly, they’re willing to release unapologetically awesome hardware again. It’d had started to feel as thought Apple couldn’t, not that they didn’t choose to.

Malaysia is a tiny, densely-populated country, especially around the Klang Valley on the peninsula. But for those of us who grew up on the even tinier city-state island of Singapore, crossing the Causeway into the land of Lat, Proton cars and nasi lemak felt like a trip into endless highways and vast, open spaces. My dad would ride his motorcycle there to unwind on the weekends; my sister and I would have school camps in the relative wilderness outside the main cities. It’s the closest Singapore has to a hinterland, not having a native one herself.

It’s in that nostalgic context I stumbled across this video of another super shopping centre being built there, this time in the southern border city of JB. They used drones to great effect filming this.

Even as a kid I was always struck by how many grandiose shopping plazas and office buildings Malaysia had, often with swaths of boarded up or empty stores. Nothing on the scale of the PRC, but before all vacancies were filled, another concrete tower would spring up elsewhere. Perhaps the most well known example was the Hyatt in KL; it’s half-completed shell stood there for more than a decade before construction resumed.

Retail is being shook up in places like Australia and Singapore, and doubly-so in the United States. A combination of high rent and people flocking to online retail are squeezing interesting and fun stores out for those with the profit margins to stick around, such as high fashion and restaurants. Developers in Malaysia must be confident they can ride out this wave, or offer an experience that can’t be bought online. After all, this is the land of indoor shopping centre roller coasters.

Clara and I are hopefully going back to Singapore and Malaysia later this year. I’ll be keen, and a little nervous, to see how much has changed.

I abstained from blogging over the past week out of respect for our beloved family pet Tigerlily, and so she could get top billing for a while. Thanks to all of you for your kind words, I was blown away, bowled over, and every other metrological metaphor you care to impart. ♡

Back to our regularly scheduled programming, with a couple of housekeeping items:

• Next and previous post links are gone until I can fix them. The otherwise-awesome static site generator Hugo deprecated the way I was calling these, but the drop-in replacement functions they quoted simply don’t work, or at least not the same way as advertised.

• My posts for Michael Dexter’s bhyvecon BSD hypervisor conference in Tokyo and now Ontario will be up soon. These have been among the technical highlights of the year for me; I’m so pumped for everything that’s happening in this space.

• I’ve had more feedback on my Arena swimsuit fitness post than I have for any other in a while. I wanted to acknowledge everyone here, and say my followup post is also incoming! This silly blog is now on the first page of DuckDuckGo and lesser search engines for the specific suits Clara and I were looking at, which is so delightfully odd and silly I can’t help but smile.

• Speaking of Clara, I’m in the process of importing her disparate blogs into one place and hosting them on a shiny new FreeBSD OrionVM instance. Her writing is more interesting than mine, so I’m keen to showcase it again.

Yesterday afternoon we lost our beloved family pet Tigerlily. She’d lived beyond a hundred in dog years, but had been increasingly living in pain over the last few days. So we all sat around the vet’s office and said goodbye.

My mum Debra picked her out as a companion to herself and Romeo back when my sister and I were in high school in Singapore. A part of me felt she was living through her somehow, so Tigerlily moving on was the last small spark of her still around being extinguished.

As my mum’s own condition worsened, I think these two wonderful dogs did more to help her than anyone or anything else. They were sweethearts.

Tiger, as we came to call her, was the mischievous of the two. One time we thought she’d escaped, only to find her perched on the top of the piano like a tiny white statue next to the stairs. And whereas Romeo would attempt to cute his way to treats, Tiger’s doe-eyes could get you to do anything.

She’d rapidly spin in clockwise circles when she was excited; enough that I used to joke we could power a generator. If I sat cross-legged on the floor, she’d bound over and jump into my lap, as she did in the photo above. And if you blew lightly into her face, regardless of whether you had morning coffee breath or just finished eating something tasty, she’d rapidly extend her iguana-like tongue to try and lap it up. Silly little thing.

She was so much a part of our lives for almost two decades, I can’t imagine what it’ll be without her. At least she’s reunited now with her friend. ♡