mcgrew's Journal: Sorry I haven't written

I've been busy editing. I sent off for a printed copy this morning, so you'll probably see more of me the next couple of weeks, as will the folks at the bar. I'll probably be bored, since I've been working obsessively on that book since March.

I updated my web site slightly this morning, adding a "coming soon" heads up about the book. I'm hoping to publish in a month. There will be one lucky fellow who will get a free hardcover copy, and hardcover copies will be "invitation only" but all you'll have to do is email a request and I'll return the mail with a URL where you can get it. I may do the same with the paperback.

My apologies, but the eBook version will be priced at two dollars more than my first books, which were free. It will be a two dollar Amazon download. If your reader doesn't do Amazon, forward your Amazon receipt to me with your reader type and preferred file type and I'll send it back by email.

If you're afraid I'm just trying to collect email addresses to spam, I'm not. I don't give or sell my address book to anyone. Moreover, my site collects absolutely no information about visitors whatever, and doesn't use cookies or any kind of scripting whatever.

PDF and HTML files will continue to be free, as well as the eBooks of the two previous books. The prices on the printed books will only change if the printer changes his prices.

Most likely I'll work on that new short story, Moroned Off Vesta about the incident Captain Knolls mentions several times in the book. It will have him in his Martian bar telling a friend who captains the company ships about what happened.

The title is a nod to Isaac Asimov's first published story, Marooned Off Vesta. I may try to shop it to a few science fiction magazines before I post it.

I mentioned my web site earlier, the domain registration needed to be renewed and I needed more space; their "free" hosting (it comes with registration) only gives you five megabytes. I had to delete the Bible to make room for The Paxil Diaries and wouldn't have had room for Mars, Ho! It's costing me $35 a year for ten times the space. "Free" is fifteen bucks.

Yes, they're cheap and they're good. I had to use their tech support to get FileZilla to see the files for FTP; the process had completely changed. Unlike some help desks I've dealt with in the past, they were excellent.

The changes to FTP include a lot. I can have subdomains, many subusers with their own separate users, all sorts of goodies now. Forums, discussion boards, comments, SQL, PHP, Java, Ruby, the whole kit and kaboodle.

And I won't be using any of it.

I've registered all my past domains with them, starting in 2000, and never once had a problem with them. They're a Canadian company, register4less. If you have a small site and need less than 5 megs and no frills it's only fifteen bucks.

Oh, and buy a book, I have new false teeth to pay for.

Why not self host?

[damn_registrars]

I don't recall now what your internet connection situation is like at home, but hosting your own site is becoming much more viable for a lot of people now thanks to high(er) speed connections being so very cheap. I have a basic cable modem and do my domain through dyn.org (I know, a lot of people hate them but I'm happy with them for $10 per year). Then I can host as much of whatever as I want. Granted, your site probably gets a lot more traffic than mine, so that might not be as great, but you could alw

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[mcgrew]

A lot of reasons. I probably don't have a fixed IP address, I'd have to keep on top of security far more closely than with a PC, and I'd have to have at least two computers running 24/7/365 in case one went down, and I usually only have one or two running when I'm awake. The electricity alone would cost more than hosting.

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[damn_registrars]

I probably don't have a fixed IP address

That part is easy to address with dyndns or various other services.

I'd have to keep on top of security far more closely than with a PC

That depends on what you need. If all you need is to host a static website, the security concerns are actually pretty minimal. If you want php and a lot of goodies plus remote login and what-have-you then your concerns grow quickly.

I'd have to have at least two computers running 24/7/365 in case one went down, and I usually only have one or two running when I'm awake

Perhaps I underestimated the traffic volume for your web site, then. I know if my site is down occasionally (my personal server at home pulls five nines without much effort but there are sporadic things beyo

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[BarbaraHudson]

Or just use a junk laptop booting off a usb key ... no spinning rust, so even less heat buildup, so even less fan noise and power consumption. And to save even more power, remove the battery - the circuitry monitoring it and keeping it topped up will no longer run either. And if you kill the x server, even more power savings (the console should go blank within 15 minutes by default, but you can change that).

The best part is when something better comes along as a freebee, you can just plug the key into it

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[damn_registrars]

That is an excellent idea, there. One change I would make to that suggestion though is to just do an install that doesn't include an x server (ie, either a "server" linux install [ubuntu server is OK though not great for this] or FreeBSD). Then you don't have to waste time and storage space installing a service that you're not going to run.

Another possible change on it would be to use a compact flash card in a CF->IDE (or CF->SATA, depending on the age of the laptop) adapter. I like to keep thi

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[BarbaraHudson]

Thanks. I haven't tried it, but I see no reason why the laptop can't boot off the internal CF reader if it can boot off an external flash. The card is shown as just another /dev/sd*, same as the usb key. Oracle of all people have some good advice [oracle.com] for both their OS products and linux. One linux distro has cf-card specific instructions here [alpinelinux.org].

The first few links did discuss making or using an adapter, but that should no longer be necessary.