kugelfish

Since my previous experiments with Apple's Time-Machine online backup solution had not turned out as expected, but I really like the idea of continuous online backup - specially since the new 10.5 Leopard release does not seem as stable any more as my old 10.2 Panther release. The basic idea is to use rsync, which is an efficient and robust way to synchronize two file-system trees over the network. This article for example explains in much detail, how to use rsync and unix-file system hard-links to create multiple snapshots of a filesystem tree over time and only consume disk-space for the files which have change in the meantime. Minus the fancy GUI, sounds a lot like what Time-Machine is trying to do... For my purpose a few monthly snapshots are more than good enough with the current one being kept reasonably well in sync - daily at least, as long as the laptop happens to be online long enough for the changes to be pushed over. Since the network is private, I am using a native...

The latest version of Mac Os comes with automated backup system called time machine, which besides the cool GUI is basically taking periodic snapshots of all changes and saves them to an attached disk. Since my new 17' Powerbook is suspended most of the time and moving back and forth between home and office, any solution which assumes a static environment is going to be challenging. I was hoping for a solution which would automatically back up any changes incrementally to my linux server at home, whenever the laptop finds itself on that network. This means, the system would have to auto discover its network environment and deal with interruptions, since I am not going to wait for any invisible backup job to complete before closing the laptop again. Following these instructions , I created an AFP share from my linux server, including a bonjour zero-conf advertisement, which can easily be discovered in the network neighborhood and mounted as a share on the mac. Despite Apple...

Being a hard-core computer geek, I had always felt the need to have a generic PC to run Linux or FreeBSD in addition to my now somewhat aging Apple PowerBook, which I use as a desktop and writing pad (when closed due to desk-space constrains...). Given the space, noise and aesthetic constraints of living in a NYC studio apartment - suburbanites, think walk-in closet - a standard desktop or server was pretty much out of the question and another laptop didn't seem ideal either. I was planing to use it as a server, which is accessed remotely and need a monitor and keyboard only when something goes wrong. AOpen makes with MP915 a knock-off design of the Mac mini - not as nice as the original, but not bad compared to other PCs. Like the Mac Mini it's a square box about the size of the CD-ROM drive. Since it uses laptop parts, the computer itself can be low-power and thus much quieter than most desktops. Since it's a bare bone system, prices start at about $300 - $400-$500 for ...

In between jobs, I had originally registered this domain as a corporate identity to do some consulting on software development methodology. The world is an anglification of the German word for blowfish or pufferfish. Besides sounding exotic and being still available as a domain-name, it also seemed an appropriate mascot with a certain sense of irony: Blowfish are experts at appearing bigger, more established and significant than they really are - a very useful skill for anybody just starting out in the consulting business. I ended up getting another corporate job, but the name is still here and it seemed appropriate to use it as an umbrella identity for publishing anything of technical nature.