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| Saturday, 13 June 2026 | Dereel | Images for 13 June 2026 |
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More web site overload and Vultr corrption
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Topic: technology, opinion | Link here |
Another case of web server overload today, just what I needed to see if a very beefy server would help. Created a “performance” instance with 4 CPUs and restored the lax.lemis.com snapshot. Once again I had a case where it hung in the early stages of booting:
Of course it shouldn't have booted in the first place. OK, this time I'll investigate more. Left that instance hanging, created a new instance and restored the same snapshot. Once again it hung in boot. OK, a new snapshot, this time of fra.lemis.com. It, too, rebooted, but this time differently: it got further, onto the second page of the boot, and then spontaneously rebooted.
Was it a “hardware” incompatibility or a corrupted snapshot? Created an instance identical to lax. Restore snapshot. Boot loop again.
This is more serious than it seems. At least in today's experience, which was spread over the whole day, I wasn't able to restore any snapshot. Google Gemini suggested that it could be a mismatch between storage systems, which seems reasonable, so I created Yet Another instance with a fresh FreeBSD installation. /etc/fstab was identical. And of course by this time the overload was over, so there was no more that I could do.
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Winter meets spring
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Topic: gardening, opinion | Link here |
Amanita muscaria are in full “flower” at the moment. Here some more further south in Stones Road:
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Still cheaper 150-600 lenses
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Topic: photography, technology, opinion | Link here |
Earlier this week I established that there wasn't much difference in price between a used OM System M.Zuiko Digital 150-600 mm (roughly $3,000) and a brand new one with warranty (round $3,500). And somehow the new prices are dropping: it's the end of the financial year, time for bargains. Yesterday I found the best yet: $3,499 from Camera House. I still can't decide whether I should buy one or not.
What do the twins say? Apart from Camera House there are others. Apart from Camera House, they mention digiDirect, Georges and Ted's. OK, time to compare. Georges were a non-starter: $4,498, discounted by $1 from $4,499, only $500 more expensive than the manufacturer's recommended price.
I later discovered that the manufacturer was offering a $500 discount at the time, something that they didn't think worth mentioning on their page, so the George's discounted price was $1 less than the list price.
Presumably that's their way of saying “we have no stock”, but wouldn't it be better just not to offer it? Ted's had it for $3,639, still not competitive. And digiDirect? They're varnishing their web server (error 405, which should mean “method not allowed”).
But that's nonsense. I'd say that it's a web server problem. But what's this “varnish”? The twins came up with a surprising statement:
The creator, Poul-Henning Kamp, named it "Varnish" because it is designed to be an ultra-thin, smooth, protective layer that coats your existing web server architecture to make it look better and perform faster—just like putting a layer of varnish on wood.
How this relates to your 405 error
When a website uses Varnish, all incoming traffic hits the Varnish cache server first. If Varnish is misconfigured—or if a browser tries to send data (like a login or checkout form) using a method the Varnish server isn't programmed to accept on that specific page—the Varnish server itself will block the request and throw a "405 Method Not Allowed" or "Error 405: Varnish cache server" message.
That still doesn't make sense to me. One of the strangest parts is Poul-Henning's involvement. I didn't think that he had anything special to do with web servers. I'll go with “if Varnish is misconfigured” and try again tomorrow.
| Sunday, 14 June 2026 | Dereel | Images for 14 June 2026 |
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Still more 150-600 investigations
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Topic: photography, technology, opinion | Link here |
I'm still agonizing about the OM System M.Zuiko Digital 150-600 mm. About the only thing that's clear is that I won't buy a second-hand one from Japan. But is it worth it? How much does it cost per photo? I have this Zuiko Digital ED 35-100 mm f/2.0 lens that I bought on a whim over 10 years ago for $1,500. It's big and heavy, almost as heavy as the 150-600, and I have barely used it.
Nothing for it. Finally write what I had been intending to write for years: a database collection of my Exif data. Oh, look, it's there, and it has been for nearly 13 years, though I didn't note it in this diary:
revision 1.244
date: 2013/09/25 01:53:57; author: grog; state: Exp; lines: +325 -237
exposuredetails: First cut at MySQL output.
It needed a lot of work, of course, but in the end I was able to
=== grog@hydra (/dev/pts/21) ~/Photos/20260613 190 -> exifx Amanita-muscaria-3.jpeg
File Amanita-muscaria-3.jpeg
Date taken: Saturday, 13 June 2026, 9:55:11
Exposure: 1/80 sec, f/4.5 (EV 10.7), 200/24° ISO
Camera: OM System OM-1 Mark II, serial BJRA15001
Lens: Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100 mm f/4 IS PRO
Focal length: 57.0 mm (full frame equivalent: 114 mm)
Focus: MF; C-AF, MF, Imager AF 2.055 m (1.97 - 2.14 m)
Field of view: 17.3° horizontal, 13.0° vertical, 21.5° diagonal
Meter mode: Center-weighted average Program AE
Stabilization: On, S-IS Auto
Size: 5184 x 3888 pixels (20.16 megapixels, 1:1.33)
Copyright: Greg Lehey=== grog@hydra (/dev/pts/21) ~/Photos/20260613 191 -> exifx -m Amanita-muscaria-3.jpeg
replace into photos values ("/Photos/grog/20260613", "Amanita-muscaria-3.jpeg", "2026:06:13", "09:55:11", "OM System OM-1 Mark II", "BJRA15001", "Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100 mm f/4 IS PRO", "ACC214354", "57.0", "2.055", "1.97 - 2.14 m", "MF; C-AF, MF, Imager AF", "4.5", "1/80", "200", "Normal saturation", "Center-weighted average", "Program AE", "0 EV", "", "Fill-in", "", "+0", "", "Bounce or Off", "", "2.0", "None", "3888", "5184", "3888", "5184", "", "0", "0", "Greg Lehey", "Greg Lehey");
With that, I was able to fill the database:
=== grog@eureka (/dev/pts/10) ~/Photos 77 -> find 202* -name '*.ORF' | xargs exifx -m | mysql photos
That ran for ever, and at the end I had my confirmation: for $1,500 I had used the lens 26 times! That's nearly $58 per photo!
But that wasn't the end of it. That's just the last 6½ years. Continued with the years 2000-2009 and 2010-2019, which took an eternity. Finally I was through, and things looked a little better:
mysql> SELECT lens, lens_serial, count(lens_serial)
FROM photos
GROUP BY lens_serial
ORDER BY count(lens_serial);
+--------------------------------------------------------+--------------+--------------------+
| lens | lens_serial | count(lens_serial) |
+--------------------------------------------------------+--------------+--------------------+
| Leica DG Summilux 25mm f/1.4 Asph. | 14111100346 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-40mm f/2.8 Pro | AC5205389 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 45mm f/1.2 Pro | 349000062 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 17mm f/1.2 Pro | ACDA00469 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 II R | ABIP10006 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100 mm f/4 IS PRO | ACC217283 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45mm f/1.8 | ABM290456 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100 mm f/4 IS PRO | ACC251771 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 II R | ABG200241 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12mm f/2.0 | ABD001175 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 40-150mm f/4.0-5.6 R | ABK200167 | 1 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12mm f/2.0 | ABF000015 | 1 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital 14-45mm f/3.5-5.6 | 102421030 | 2 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 40-150mm f/4.0-5.6 R | ABK235877 | 2 |
| Leica DG Nocticron 42.5mm f/1.2 Asph. Power OIS | 13111500260 | 2 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-200 mm f/3.5-6.3 | 350000254 | 2 |
| Leica DG Vario-Elmar 100-400 mm f/4.0-6.3 | 06AIF21G038P | 2 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 14-35 mm f/2.0 SWD | 180001188 | 2 |
| Olympus Body cap lens | H694154 | 2 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 150-400mm f/4.5 TC1.25x IS Pro | 34B00006400 | 3 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45mm f/1.8 | ABSA06173 | 3 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 50mm f/2.0 Macro | 010002018 | 4 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 14-150 mm f/4.0-5.6 | AAK211247 | 5 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 7-14mm f/4.0 | 110002240 | 7 |
| Panasonic Lumix G 20 mm f/1.7 Asph. | 19JG3043144 | 8 |
| Asahi Optical Co Super-Takumar 50 mm f/1.4 | 3077746 | 10 |
| Lumix G Vario 45-150mm f/4.0-5.6 Asph. Mega OIS | 04GX1144426A | 10 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 150-400mm f/4.5 TC1.25x IS Pro | 34B00006401 | 18 |
| Asahi Optical Co SMC Macro-Takumar 50 mm f/4 | 4417365 | 26 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 14-150 mm f/4.0-5.6 | AAK208277 | 26 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 | 212721917 | 27 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 17mm f/2.8 Pancake | AB9202060 | 43 |
| Lumix G Vario 14-140 mm f/4.0-5.8 | 09042052629 | 89 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 75mm f/1.8 | 344018628 | 170 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital 35mm f/3.5 Macro | 192054704 | 178 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 EZ | AC4B13531 | 252 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45mm f/1.8 | ABSA46896 | 277 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 7-14mm f/2.8 Pro | AC8A22385 | 425 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 II R | ABH956018 | 529 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 | 212197195 | 758 |
| | | 960 |
| Panasonic Lumix G 20 mm f/1.7 Asph. | 09LG3074803 | 1117 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital Pro ED 35-100mm f/2.0 | 170001015 | 1169 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital 70-300mm f/4.0-5.6 | 256006812 | 1293 |
| Leica DG Summilux 25mm f/1.4 Asph. | 13091100310 | 1503 |
| Leica DG Vario-Elmar 100-400 mm f/4.0-6.3 | 27CIF16G019P | 1935 |
| Leica DG Summilux 15 mm f/1.7 | 75SIC307120N | 2087 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 14-35 mm f/2.0 SWD | 180002977 | 2666 |
| Leica DG Vario-Elmarit 12-60mm f/2.8-4 Asph. Power OIS | 07DX6132475D | 3110 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 30 mm f/3.5 Macro | ACBA04378 | 3439 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-40mm f/2.8 Pro | AC5218267 | 4605 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 50mm f/2.0 Macro | 010110933 | 6242 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-200 mm f/3.5-6.3 | 350104535 | 7384 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 60 mm f/2.8 Macro | ABQ227050 | 8196 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 14-150 mm f/4.0-5.6 | AAK263738 | 9243 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 12-60 mm f/2.8-4.0 SWD | 230033616 | 14379 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 12-100 mm f/4 IS PRO | ACC214354 | 20552 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 8mm f/3.5 Fisheye | 000000000 | 21215 |
| Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 8 mm f/1.8 Fisheye PRO | 347009963 | 45482 |
| Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 9-18 mm f/4.0-5.6 | 300102323 | 60005 |
+--------------------------------------------------------+--------------+--------------------+
60 rows in set (1.94 sec)
Still some points of interest:
Why only one image taken with the Leica Summilux 25 mm f/1.4? I use it relatively frequently, including a number of shots taken with it today. But that's the advantage of the table: there are two different 25/1.4 Summiluxes (Summiluces?) there, and the query goes by serial number. This one was used for a test shot that I downloaded somewhere. I have used my Summilux 1,503 times. This also explains most of the “only once” entries, including lenses I have never even seen.
To my surprise, I used the 35-100 more than I expected, a total of 1,169 times, still a price of $1.28 per shot. By comparison, I have used the current Leica DG Vario-Elmar 100-400 mm f/4.0-6.3 1,935 times, still 85¢ per shot.
Still, the numbers are interesting. It seems that I used the 35-100 a fair amount in the first 4 years that I had it, but then stopped. I need to think out more queries.
The lens that I used the most was the Zuiko Digital ED 9-18 mm f/4.0-5.6, which I barely use at all any more. The explanation here is that I used to use it for my house photos in Kleins Road with the E-30. Each panorama took up to 24 views, and because of the limitations of the camera I needed 5 exposures for HDR, a total of 120 images for a single view. By contrast, I now only take 18 (6 views, 3 exposures per view). And still I have taken more, but with two different 8 mm fisheye lenses, which come in at place 2 and 3, which I used to replace the 9-18.
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digiDirect web site
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Topic: technology, photography, opinion | Link here |
What was the problem with digiDirect's varnish yesterday? Who knows? In any case, the varnish is now dry, and yes, they really do have the lowest price, $3,490.95.
But how much is the shipping? Asked their “AI bot”, which seems to be stuck at the intelligence of a moron. It didn't understand the question. Google Gemini did: $8.95, making the total price $3,499.90. That's quite reasonable shipping, but it makes the total 90¢ more than Camera House.
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Bloody VicRoads again!
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Topic: general, opinion | Link here |
Mail from VicRoads today, with license renewal invoice for the Commodore—without our senior's discount! We had been told 8 months ago that things had been sorted, though even then I had my doubts.
How I hate these things! The issue is that both cars are registered in Yvonne's name, and I have none in my name. But we have a „Zugewinngemeinschaft“. Oh. That's a German word, of course, and a legal term—but there's no English equivalent. Still, there must be something similar for married people who don't have a marriage contract, so the name on the registration should be relatively unimportant.
How I'm looking forward to fixing this!
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Woolworths obfuscation
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Topic: food and drink, language, opinion | Link here |
Decades ago I grumbled about Woolworths obfuscatory description of the fat we use for our deep fryer:
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But it's not oil at all! As they themselves wrote on the back,
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That really annoyed me. Many people have restrictions on what kind of animal fat they can use, if any at all. But time has moved on, and finally, it seems, they have given up this stupid claim of “oil”. Here two different packages. The one on top is a few months old, and the one on the bottom was bought last week:
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So it's “beef tallow”, something that I know as dripping. But it doesn't taste that much of beef. Hindus beware.
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Mona in the dark
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Topic: animals | Link here |
I've been trying for some time to get a picture of Mona outside the window in the dark. She appears there and is almost invisible. But this time she was much more visible:
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| This page contains (roughly) yesterday's and today's entries. I have a horror of reverse chronological documents, so all my diary entries are chronological. This page normally contains the last two days, but if I fall behind it may contain more. You can find older entries in the archive. Note that I often update a diary entry a day or two after I write it. | Do you have a comment about something I have written? This is a diary, not a “blog”, and there is deliberately no provision for directly adding comments. It's also not a vehicle for third-party content. But I welcome feedback and try to reply to all messages I receive. See the diary overview for more details. If you do send me a message relating to something I have written, please indicate whether you'd prefer me not to mention your name. Otherwise I'll assume that it's OK to do so. |
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