Greg's diary--

Friday, 1 May 2026

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More laptop setup fun

Spent what time I had today continuing with setting up bde.lemis.com. I wanted to use it in the kitchen, which of course required changing the network configuration: lagg. Once again I have instructions from Google Gemini. Basically it entails loading the lagg.ko module, creating a device and setting a configuration. The twins write:

# Bring the physical ports up without IPs ifconfig_em0="up" wlans_iwn0="wlan0" ifconfig_wlan0="WPA" # Create the virtual failover interface cloned_interfaces="lagg0" ifconfig_lagg0="laggproto failover laggport em0 laggport wlan0 DHCP"

Why DHCP? I know the address I want, so I set it. Start lagg. No more net. I cut off the branch I was sitting on. And since bde is dependent on the rest of the network for many files, it hung too.

Restart and set /etc/rc.conf.d/lagg:

cloned_interfaces="lagg0" ifconfig_lagg0="laggproto failover laggport em0 laggport wlan0 192.109.197.144

And it still hung. Looking locally, I had:

em0: flags=1008843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST,LOWER_UP> metric 0 mtu 1500 options=800020<JUMBO_MTU,HWSTATS> ether 6c:3b:e5:f3:fa:79 inet 192.109.197.144 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.109.197.255 media: Ethernet autoselect (1000baseT <full-duplex>) status: active nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL> wlan0: flags=1008843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST,LOWER_UP> metric 0 mtu 1500 options=0 ether 6c:3b:e5:f3:fa:79 hwaddr 24:77:03:d1:7c:28 inet 192.109.197.244 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.109.197.255 groups: wlan ssid L3M15 channel 10 (2457 MHz 11g ht/40-) bssid f4:3e:61:48:6c:b2 regdomain FCC country US authmode OPEN privacy OFF txpower 30 bmiss 10 scanvalid 60 protmode CTS ampdulimit 64k ampdudensity 8 -amsdutx amsdurx shortgi -stbc -ldpc -uapsd wme roaming MANUAL parent interface: iwn0 media: IEEE 802.11 Wireless Ethernet MCS mode 11ng status: associated nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL> lagg0: flags=1008843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST,LOWER_UP> metric 0 mtu 1500 options=0 ether 6c:3b:e5:f3:fa:79 hwaddr 00:00:00:00:00:00 inet 192.109.197.244 netmask 0xffffff00 broadcast 192.109.197.255 laggproto failover lagghash l2,l3,l4 laggport: em0 flags=5<MASTER,ACTIVE> laggport: wlan0 flags=0<> groups: lagg media: Ethernet autoselect status: active nd6 options=29<PERFORMNUD,IFDISABLED,AUTO_LINKLOCAL>

Where did that 244 in the last address octet come from? It's in the DHCP range. To be investigated, along with the comment in the Gemini configuration that the IP address for the em0 interface should not be set. But there's time for that later.

Wiring bde for sound

The other thing that I needed to do with bde was to get camera and microphone to work. I've established that the camera itself works, but can I get it to cooperate with a web browser? Tried it with Zoom, which confirmed that it could see me (in better resolution than pcwview), and it could play a sound better than what I got from Radio Swiss Classic yesterday. But no microphone input. How many causes can there be for that? Where do I start looking? I don't know, but I know something about when to start looking: not before tomorrow.

Saturday, 2 May 2026

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KL Hokkien Mee again

KL Hokkien Mee for breakfast today. It's been nearly two months since I last cooked it, and I had to check some details. Strangely, I missed the broth that goes into the noodles, though the rest of the sauces and cornflour were as normal. And strangely I didn't miss the broth. It didn't even seem too thick. What is right?

More fun with bde?

Cooking breakfast involved bde.lemis.com for the recipe. Nothing world-shattering, but maybe that was related to the reason why I missed the broth in the KL Hokkien Mee. But it brought a couple of things home: FreeBSD still doesn't install all normal fonts needed for X, so things like 猪油渣 render incorrectly. Once again I'm going to have to use the Linux fonts.

And the other thing? I hate laptop keyboards. Yes, they're an order of magnitude better than mobile phone surfaces, but that's not saying very much.

Sunday, 3 May 2026

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Remote watering

Chris Bahlo is currently in South Australia at some competition, so Yvonne is checking on her horses for her. Today I went with her, because she had reported that her Borzoi Fjodor had injured his paw.

Fjodor is now coming on 12 years old, quite an age for a Borzoi—we had never had one that lived much beyond 9 years of age. But they generally die of bone-related diseases, and Fjodor has spent most of his life in a dog run, where he doesn't get to run around very much. His paw injury was very minor, and it didn't need treating.

But of course we went around and looked at the horses, and discovered that one watering trough was completely dry, and the others not much better. There are no ball valves. How do we fill them? Where is the pump? Last time I didn't exactly crown myself in glory with my investigations, and Chris ended up with an unnecessary bill. So Yvonne contacted her, and... she turned on the pump, remotely! I wonder what connectivity she uses for that. Probably a mobile phone app, but what else?

Better cheese in Australia?

Finding cheese for fondue de fromage is always a problem. We have plenty in the freezer, but it's always worth looking for alternatives. And on asking for suppliers of Appenzeller in Melbourne, Google Gemini came up no fewer than 7 suppliers, including Alpine Express, located in Brisbane. But they send cheese nationwide at prices that I can accept, so they're worth considering.

In addition, they supply not one, but two different kinds of Appenzeller: “Rahmkäse - White Label and “Appenzeller Classic `Mildly Spicy'”. What does that mean? The twins tell me “The German name for Appenzeller White Label is Appenzeller Mild-Würzig.” And in English, „Mild-würzig“ means “mildly spicy”. About all I can glean is that both cheeses are only 3 months old, not what I'm looking for. Where's « surchoix »? Where's „extra“?

We have time. I'll keep an eye on supplies.