406 Not Acceptable

Actually make that I hate both Solaris 9 and Oracle 9. If you ever get asked to set these buggers up on a machine just say no. It probably is a whole lot easier using the current versions! (Or get Oracle to do it for you!)

I had to get this working environment up on an old system at work (programmers get to do hardware, yay!) Running on some old SPARC boxes with not-so-healthy drives and broken backups. Sat back and watched Solaris 9 take about half a day to install! Then the nightmare began…

Next you run into issues with your standard Solaris SPARC machine being headless and Oracle deciding to require a GUI and X windows when all you would do is click ‘ok’ four or five times. So off you go setting up the server to allow remote X connections, only Solaris is bolted down in a number of places to stop this happening (think security.) SSH -x may do some things but not all you need on Solaris!

In case your getting the handy “timeout locking .Xauthority” message, as root you need to copy the /.Xauthority file into the users home directory. Then give ownership using chown to the user. You may need to set up the user’s home directory, have a look at the contents of /etc/passwd to see where the user’s home directory is located. This should reside in /export/home/username/

Then when you actually get xclock and friends running you hit another wall. Oracle needs to link a bunch of files, but Solaris 9 does not come with the required tools! Being an old system you do not get a nice apitude style installer for simple dependencies; you have to go dig around for them yourselves. In case you’re wondering where to go, they’ve been hidden on the second of three install CDs.. Then Oracle will probably crash out for another reason and you’ll be left wanting to grab the nearest gun/axe/chainsaw and finish off the decrepid system yourself.

When this site was first set up I allowed for unregistered users to comment on the site, and well you can guess what happened next… if you haven’t got it by now, then I can spoil it for you: SPAM! I then decided to counter this with only allowing registered posts and the spam died down alongside actual comments. User activity is a problem that all sites have to deal with, as the administrator is faced with a problem: enable unregistered comments or posts and face a spam problem that makes global warming look like a minor inconvenience? Or just get no activity at all, because no one wants to register for anything.

Some people are just deluded I guess; whilst you will not find me giving Vista glowing praise, I just can not believe the rubbish other blogs and sites are coming out with. Take thisNews Blog post, on CNET.

There are a lot of sites on the internet about Tescopoly or generally are anti-Tesco or attack supermarkets in general. Now I personally do believe that a balance needs to be made and that local governments need to ask the populous on these issues, but some of these sites push people with a one sided story. One that, perhaps, intends makes people against the building of supermarkets in general. In addition, I believe some of these sites are incorrect, as they do not show the full story due to the vested interests of their supporters. Now, I feel some counter arguments need to set down.

Bah! This is a really annoying occurrence! Trust the mail service to go on strike just when you have a bunch of important letters to send and happen to have a few parcels on their way.

The html tag rel=”nofollow” is the subject to todays little rant. This has to be one of the most pointless aspects of HTML and something all search engines should ignore. The rel=”nofollow” HTML tag basically tells a search engine bot to ignore the link, so apart from a small about of traffic the link is pointless.

Ahh… the iPhone, can you even say something about it which has not already been said? The hype train keeps on streaming along, powered by a media that seems to love Apple more than themselves. A media which has basically split mp3 players into two types: an ipod or simply a mp3 player.

As you may or may not know, ESPN are covering the final table of the World Series of Poker right now. I paid my $20 to watch this event online, as I am a poker nut. Now there is no other live coverage of this event in England, so I have no choice but to watch the ESPN stream online.

I ranted earlier about Sony Ericsson being rather slow on their uptake of Windows Vista. Well it seems they have pulled their fingers out (nicely after I have dumped Vista.) Still their support is baffling…

As the site gathers closer to 50k hits — lovin’ the plug? — a thought entered my head (heavens forbid!) This site is called ‘Tech Rant’ but there is a lack of ranting. Heck, more people come here for fairuse4wm than anything else. So over the coming months, I will try to add a couple of rants in here and there, if I get the time!

Oh and update the damn poll!