The joys of working at home, #928

[jducoeur]

Note to self: the interaction of cats and power switches can be unfortunate. I really need a new power strip, that's not quite so easy for someone chasing a ball to turn off.

(OTOH, the nice thing about using a laptop as my primary dev machine is that I didn't actually lose anything...)

Comments

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

Unless you use the switch often, duct-tape it in the on position.

[cvirtue.livejournal.com]

What we've done for Metageek's CPAP, which is subject to the same issue, is to tape a plastic bottle cap over the switch, tape acting as a hinge. He flips the cap up to reach the switch, and then it comes down again to protect it from the cat feet.

[jducoeur]

Fair point, but it really would make me more comfortable to get a newer surge suppressor for the computer. I'm still using my trusty old Emerald (from, what, 1987?), and while it's never failed me, it's a tad behind the times in a number of ways. So that'll go on my shopping list...

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

The more surges they dampen, the fewer surges they can dampen. So, yeah, time to upgrade. (Emerald? Blast from the past....)

We have a very large box of them, that Robin no longer uses for her company. Almost everything in the house that is on an extension cord, is also on a surge suppressor now.

While you are thinking about that - are your TVs, routers, stereo and other expensive electronics all on surge suppressors? These years, a lot of homes lose a lot of equipment because of a lightening strike on their local circuit. Robin purchased a SERIOUS "power conditioner" for our most expensive electronics, and we will be using that again for the new "media center" she wants to construct.

You may also want to consider, instead of a simple surge suppressor for your office setup, a battery backup system instead. Place your router and wireless base station on that as well... They are relatively inexpensive these days, and you can get a used one for almost nothing, and just replace the batteries.

[jducoeur]

While you are thinking about that - are your TVs, routers, stereo and other expensive electronics all on surge suppressors?

Mais oui. Some on better ones, some on lesser, but I generally don't buy ordinary extension cords these days. I use the old cheapies for things like LED clocks and lamps (things that cost < $50 to replace), but anything interesting goes on at least a low-end surge suppressor. (When I get the new TV, that'll get coupled with a really fancy one.)

And it's true that a battery backup is a fairly good idea, although I probably won't bother for my simple laptop. Once I get more serious about the server (and switch my development center from our XP Home box over to a small linux machine), that probably deserves a battery backup...

Server

[metageek.livejournal.com]

Once I get more serious about the server

Are you planning to run CommYou off of a server in your house, or is this something else?

Re: Server

[jducoeur]

Something else -- more or less. At the moment, I'm doing development on my laptop, and using our home desktop as the SVN repository and backed-up machine; it will also probably serve as the initial host of the experimental version of the Facebook app. That's not optimal, but it works for the short run.

In the medium term, the intent is to get a modest Linux box to be the central dev server. That will host SVN and get backed-up, and should be more reliable than the Windows machine. It will also become the host of the experimental app. The *real* app will get hosted on commyou.com, once I choose a hosting service for that. (Pair has the slight edge there, since that's where I registered the domain, but I'm still considering my options.)

But I expect I'll always maintain at least two concurrent hosts of the system, a dev one and a real one; for the time being, the dev one will always be at home. Hence the desire for a more stable platform to run it off of...

Ack!

[metageek.livejournal.com]

I don't recognize the brand name, but I know that most cheap surge protectors are basically ablative shielding. Unless you know for certain that yours is designed to be fail-safe ("if I can't protect you, I won't let any power through"), you should probably relabel it "extension cord".

My current favorite style of power thingie is an APC UPS whose off switch is a recessed button. It's easy to push on purpose, but hard by accident.

Re: Ack!

[jducoeur]

I don't recognize the brand name

Product name, actually. Damned if I remember the actual brand, but they were the first really serious surge suppressors aimed at home geeks, back in the 80's. The product line was the Emerald, Ruby and Diamond, IIRC. And yes, the Emerald was low-end, although still quite good for its time. (It was intended for computer equipment in the days when that meant major money.)

Re: Ack!

[metageek.livejournal.com]

That does sound better. However, consider this: low-grade power spikes do happen fairly often, and degrade your surge protector over time. So, if you're lucky, and it's fail-safe, then someday it will just spontaneously stop letting power through at all. Me, I'd start using it a clock-radio or something. :-)

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

I actually use superglue for this, but yes. (Superglue is fragile enough if I ever really needed to turn it off I could whack it.) We don't have cats, but we have feet and a mess of adapters under the table.

Other nice thing about laptops: "The power went out! Oh no! Oh, wait. I can still work. And hey, the neighbors have power -- I still can find a wireless network!" :)

[jducoeur]

Yeah -- this is the first time I've ever done serious work on a laptop, and it is a nice change in that respect. (I usually prefer doing serious work on desktops due to memory and disk speed.)