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As it turns out Pine64 shipped me a pair of bad cables or so it seems, as after getting replacement cables, the drives never produced any I/O errors again, and a long SMART test passed. A minor problem is that sometimes the system comes up and Linux can't detect the drives. A reboot generally serves to fix that but I wonder why it occasionally happens.

Some annoyances are that the system images that are provided don't come with proper defaults for most settings, even such things as Unicode support in the default locale, and so forth. The fan is controlled by software, and this software isn't even installed by default (grumble) and isn't available directly by an apt-get. Information on how to set these things up seems to be scattered about so I'm going to try to gather all that up here for my own quick reference in case I need to do this yet again (rather likely actually).

A big annoyance is the lack of proper UTF-8 locales. Apparently the following commands suffice to set it up:

locale-gen en_US.UTF-8
dpkg-reconfigure locales
update-locale LANG="en_US.UTF-8" LANGUAGE="en_US" LC_ALL="en_US.UTF-8"

Change the locale as desired if you don't want to use en_US. Setting up the timezone is one command:

dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

The fan control software is a package known as ATS (Active Thermal Service), and what that page doesn't tell you about setting it up is that the default kernel it requires isn't installed on the current ROCKPro64 system images as of this writing, and needs to be installed manually. This forum post gives instructions on what kernel to install before setting up ATS.

The user community is much smaller than RPi's and so a lot of these small but important things aren't set up to be done automatically. Next step I'm going to try to take is set up the software I'm planning to use for it. Most of the stuff like Transmission might be relatively trivial, but since those folks running the transmissionbt Ubuntu PPA didn't make ARM builds, I'm probably going to have try to roll my own .debs for Transmission 2.94. I had to manually kludge 2.94 for the Odroid box I'm using today, and don't want to do that for this new system. Most of the basics such as web service and Samba appear to be a matter of apt. The big one is going to be Kodi. The LibreElec builds available are said to be of alpha quality, and that makes it sound like getting that part going is going to be a lot of work.

Sorry people, comments disabled. Perhaps I'll enable them later, if I am still able. I just can't see this progressing anywhere at all if nasty rhetoric is allowed in at this point. (No Ethanol needed, thank you very much!)

Dr. King. We all know about him - he was a great civil rights leader in the US. But, how well do we know about him? Hmmmm. Let's see!

Doctor King has been politicized, as well as monetized, so it's hard to decide where to look for information on the man. There are those who blindly build him up past sainthood, and perhaps to godhood. There are of course others who want to tear him down. By necessity, we'll rely on one of the websites that I suspect has monetized Dr. King. http://drmartinlutherking.net/

So - who was this doctor? http://drmartinlutherking.net/martin-luther-king-education

The Schooling of Martin Luther King Jr

Martin Luther King’s education began at a very early age. His mother was a school teacher who taught the young MLK to read before he even entered school. He attended David T. Howard Elementary School in Atlanta at the age of five years old but the starting age at that time was six so he had to return the next year.

Martin Luther King never really completed high school. MLK Jr. was so intelligent that he skipped his first and last year at Booker T. Washington High School and went directly into college during his junior year. He entered college when he was just 15 years old.

King graduated from Morehouse College in 1948 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology. It was at Morehouse that Martin Luther King was exposed to the writings of Henry David Thoreau. King was inspired by Thoreau’s essay on Civil Disobedience, and it started the momentum that would one day change the landscape of our society.

The church soon called to Martin Luther King and he used its platform to begin his journey towards equality. At seventeen years old, MLK Jr delivered his very first public speech at the Ebenezer Church, where is father was a pastor. King was ordained as a minister and worked closely with the senior King at the church.

In 1948, MLK Jr. attended his first integrated school, Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania. King absorbed the teachings of many inspirational leaders from the past but it is here where he first became exposed to the reflective teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. King graduated with a Bachelor of Divinity degree from Crozer in 1951.

In 1955 MLK became Dr. Martin Luther King when he earned his PhD on theology from Boston University. It was while he attended school in Boston that King met a young Southern girl, Coretta Scott, who was attending the New England Conservatory of Music nearby. Coretta Scott would soon become the wife of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Pretty smart kid, huh? I guess that went without saying - no dummy could have accomplished the stuff he did.

Stay tuned, children, as I make further entries in this journal.

So a lot of folks had a lot to say about my last journal entry. For a little bit I was responding to various comments. After a while though I became a whole lot more interested in the types of objections I was seeing. Not refutations, mind. There were zero of those. Not one.

Seriously, not one of the ranty hate nuggets made even the slightest claim that the plan I laid out, if followed conscientiously, would not produce some very decent human beings. Every last one dealt with how others have practiced Christianity throughout the years, told me I didn't understand the source materials, or other utterly irrelevant to the point of the journal entry arguments.

It really amazes me how many people very obviously have a chip the size of Texas on their shoulders about any mention of Christianity or Jesus, to the point that they cannot even study or discuss it without seeing anything but what they want to see. They have pre-judged (literally what the word prejudice means) it as the worst thing ever and will not allow themselves to even understand discussion that does not align with this.

It's sad, really. I hate seeing minds not just closed but closed, locked, the key melted down, welded shut, and guarded by rabid tasmanian devils. If you're unwilling to consider the possibility that you're wrong, you're completely unable to improve yourself. Ever.

Most know Free Agents such as myself as "Vigilantes", but I actively discourage the application of "Vigilantes" do those who really _do_ aim to do right by others.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Clark County (Washington) Sheriff's Department as well as the Multnomah County (Oregon) Sheriff's Department _all_ know very well that I _relentlessly_ hunt down Child Pornographers.

To the extent I can come up with one such that is within the reach of at least INTERPOL, I file a _detailed_ report with the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center.

While to the very best of my knowledge my IC3 reports have yet to lead to actual prison sentences, I can claim some success, in that I've gotten two _particularly_ egregious E-COMMERCE - "ADD TO CART" - SITES taken down; that same IC3 complaint led to a _modest_ reduction in CloudFlare's _similarly_ egregious_ caching of Child Sexual Abuse.

I had to laugh just now when searching for a particularly well-known - former - Child Pornographic Actress; she was during her... uh... "career"... even _more_ widely known for her Still Photo work so from time to time I search for some of her such Photos for the most part at Bing Image Search.

(This because Satya Nadella is surely so-egregious himself; that is, if you catch my mother fucking drift.)

And why did I have to so laugh?

This because Bing Image Search quickly turned a quite a low low low price of a particularly hard-to-find... uh... "collectible"... Still Work set, but with the at-first puzzling result that at the actual eCommerce site that TURNS RIGHT UP IN IMAGE SEARCH, that very same Still Work set did _not_ turn up in a great _many_ purely-local searches I tried.

As For Why I'm a Free Agent?

When I find the man who published my own Still Photo work, I'm gonna tear him a new one with the rusty entrenching tool that I keep in my toilet bowl for just such an occasion.

How Twitter Amplified The Ugliest Awards Season Ever

Right, first off, I'm not a Christian. I was previously and did grow up with plenty of exposure to it though and there's a lot to be said for the source material. So this is an attempt to inform folks how to do it properly if they're going to do it. If done properly it can make for some extremely decent people and a pretty serene life. A lot of people noob that shit up though, so church should be treated as Stack Exchange; advice should be thoroughly examined before taking any of it.

For starters, skip the Old Testament for now. It's a previous major version and there were plenty of refinements and even breaking changes between 1.0 and 2.0. There are also bits that are universally applicable and bits that were only applicable to a specific person at a specific time (you know, like that bash script you whipped up to do something once and then never used again). There's plenty back there that's still useful but you need to be equipped to be able to distinguish it from what isn't and nobody is right off the bat. Reading it now will only confuse you and even send you down entirely the wrong path. That's how you end up with things like Crusades, the Inquisition, pulseaudio, and systemd.

Now there's a hell of a lot of text in even the New Testament but every last bit of it boils down to one of two precepts:

1. Love God above all else.
2. Love your neighbor as you love yourself.

Got those? Okay, moving on. All the other bits of the New Testament should be treated like /bin/dd. Which is to say, if you don't understand how to use them, do not fucking use them. RTFM until you do. Which is to say, if you can't figure out how any given bit is an example of how to better do one of those two precepts, do not incorporate it into your life until you do or you run a serious risk of fucking shit up beyond belief.

A really good beginner bit is: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It's dead simple to see how that falls under #2 and pretty easy to tell if you're fucking up on. Granted, until you've had practice implementing it you're mostly going to spot the bugs in hindsight but as you gain experience you'll be able to spot them before you run any code.

Pretty simple, yeah? It's a shame simple ain't the same as easy but that's life for you.

Now when you know your way around the New Testament backwards and forwards, or at least know how to use apropos, whatis, man, and the like to find what you need, by all means go back and read the Old Testament. Keep in mind it's there for historical reasons only. Not human or universal history, mind you, the history of your religion. Actual history ain't the province of religion; teaching you how not to be a shitbird like Lennart Poettering or Bill Gates is. Anything that looks like history should be read as a story and valued only for what it can teach you about how to achieve this. Arguing the facts of something you have no personal knowledge (not faith, knowledge) of is not the way to be anything but a dick.

That's really all there is to it. There's plenty of specific expertise you'll pick up as you go but every last bit of it derives from what you've just read.

MAJOR UPDATE on the Gofundme Wall – THIS IS THE INFO YOU HAVE ASKED FOR

Published

on February 18, 2019

  We wanted to give you a full update on where we stand at the moment. It’s been 30 days since we started this project to build the wall ourselves and we have made incredible progress to begin building the wall that will supplement President Trump’s wall. We are very proud to be working with the President and to have his blessing on our project!

Our team has been identifying zones along the Southern Border that are known to be high-traffic areas for illegal crossings and smuggling operations. We are presently working with US Customs and Border Patrol experts and other US Border Security Service professionals who are highly experienced in these matters. We are beginning extensive due diligence and the commencement of feasibility studies and will be engaging leading experts in a variety of fields necessary to construct our Border Wall. These professionals will continue to provide us with critical guidance on the legal, engineering, contracting, environmental, accounting, maintenance, and real estate issues required to build a Wall along the Southern Border. I’ve been getting a lot of questions asked about the project which is why we setup a website FAQ, please visit it after reading this.

We believe we can build segments of the US Southern Border wall for approximately half of what the Federal Government’s currently estimates. We will build the Wall mile-by-mile in strategic locations based on a variety of factors. We will build as much wall as we can based on feasibility, land use, and funding.

Me and our team have been out to Arizona, New Mexico, California and Texas multiple times meeting with landowners and state/local officials, it’s going great and the communities are supporting us! With that said I’m excited to announce that we have identified a minimum of 7 pieces of land in these border states to begin building on, and I am flying to meet with landowners this week to commence our first big land agreement which will allow us to begin the process to build. IT’S HAPPENING!

This process includes many items such as land surveying, applying for permits for construction, and all site impact studies. Typically, this process does not take too long and when its complete we will then be moving dirt and breaking ground with the first ever section of the ‘People’s Wall’… EXCITING!

We are launching our volunteer database in the next day or two on our website www.WeBuildTheWall.us so please check in on that later. Also we are pleased to announce our chairman of We Build The Wall Inc. as Steve Bannon, yes, Steve Bannon who was the mastermind behind Trump being elected. He’s now on our team and will fast track this project

This will go down in history as the people rising up to get the job done when politicians have failed them. We’re going to do this the old fashion way, rolling up our sleeves, getting dirty, and doing work! Showing America the can do attitude that this country needs again.

I’ve learned a lot along this journey, and the one thing these landowners all tell me is that they live in fear 24/7. They also feel neglected by the federal government for failing them for the past 30+ years. Property values have plummeted and crime has skyrocketed in these communities. And this is not acceptable, this is not the country I vowed to protect, this is not how we treat our citizens. It’s time we begin protecting our citizens and standing up to these cartels. Mexico has a nasty cancer, its bad, and its spreading into America. The corruption is already setting in, and that cancer is growing rapidly into the heart of our nation.

You won’t hear this on the Lamestream media:

        Former La Joya Police Chief Geovani Hernandez is facing various drug trafficking charges for allegedly helping Mexico’s Gulf Cartel move cocaine and marijuana in order to pay for his campaign to a higher office. Hernandez is still awaiting trial.

        Former Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Trevino just finished serving a five-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to having taken money from convicted Mexican drug lord Tomas “El Gallo” Gonzalez in exchange for favors. During the investigation into Treviño’s dealings with Gonzalez, close to 20 Texas law enforcement officials pleaded guilty or were tried and convicted for various corrupt activities dealing with drug trafficking.
        Former Cameron County Sheriff Conrado Cantu is serving a 24-year prison sentence for his role in protecting Gulf Cartel members living in his county and their businesses. Cantu helped protect the cartel’s drug trafficking, money laundering, and underground casinos.

‘We The People’ will build the wall!

IMPORTANT NOTE: if you donated BEFORE Jan 11, 2019 you need to opt-in by signing at this gofundme link- click here

https://webuildthewall.news/border-wall-update/

The eyes of Texas are upon you . . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=csQD4Z_uHL8

Astronomy Picture of the Day

And for the paranoid crowd:

Watch: Aurora borealis over HAARP

I had some extra money from the company Christmas bonus, and decided to use it to buy another one of these single-board computers. I have a few of them lying around, including an old Raspberry Pi Model B with a broken memory card slot, and an ODROID C2 that has been my workhorse NAS server, torrentbox, and HTPC for the past several years. I heard about the ROCKPro64 from someone here (thanks, coolgopher!), and saw how they had some pretty damn sweet-looking silicon with better I/O than USB, and a mean-looking NAS case which I could deck out with two drives.

So I ordered one from them, and I was at first rather disappointed at their rather tardy customer service as it took them more than a few days to respond to my emails following up on my order. Eventually, it seems they decided to stop ignoring me and they began corresponding with me properly, and I got my stuff soon enough.

All of the spinning rust drives I own are Western Digital: they're the only manufacturer I've had much luck with. I have a 1 TB WD Elements I bought in 2009 that I have to give them full marks for, since at one point I tripped on one of the cables while I was copying some stuff to it from my computer, sending the whole thing flying with a crash to the floor. I was terrified that the drive might be destroyed, but not only was it not destroyed, it is still working fine a decade later. It didn't see a lot of heavy use thereafter though, plugged in once in a while whenever I needed to back up my files or whatnot. Not so though with some of the other WD drives I have though. My current ODROID-based HTPC/NAS system is based on a 3TB WD My Book, and it has worked well with almost continuous use for the past three years. I've never had that kind of luck with Seagate or other manufacturers on the other hand.

And so once I got the gear from Pine64, I started building the system. I had a 3TB WD Blue lying around that I originally planned to set up as extra storage for the ODROID but never got around to setting up, and bought another 4TB WD Blue to fill it up. Building up the ROCKPro64 NAS case was not so easy though, as the interior of the thing has very little extra room. Cabling the drives in particular was rather tricky, and they had to twist and turn. Now I'm getting some I/O errors from the drives as I copy some data from the 3TB to the 4TB. I'm not yet sure if it's because I've finally gotten a bad disk from WD, or if it's because of the ugly cabling on the inside. The drives pass SMART, but the kind of ugly, twisting cabling I've had to do inside the case is also a possible source of trouble.

I'm going to try to rearrange the cables again, and perhaps buy new SATA cables tomorrow as the cables that Pine64 sent me along with the case might have problems. I've noticed that swapping the cables around seems to change which drive experiences errors, so that might be it.