- WLUG - wlug.mailman3.com

Help finding decent headset?
by E Johnson April 20, 2010

April 20, 2010

Going nuts here trying to find a headset I can use for long periods of time in VoIP. Last thing I bought was comfortable and worked OOB, but had very fuzzy sound in and out. I've been using headsets with 3.5 mm jacks, but never found a hedset that was both comfortable and had decent mic output plus phones input. What to get? VoIP needs are apparently very different than gaming needs... headsets that gamers like might not be the greatest for VoIP. VoIP headsets seem to be expensive for the build and/or quality. I don't need fabulous quality for playing music (don't listen to music or watch movies), but VoIP must sound good on my end and on my contact's side too. ALSA is working well here, want to keep it, but if anyone can provide clear direction on other options that do succesfully work with a non-zillion-dollar headset, I would dearly appreciate some consultation. Does anyone have experience with USB or 3.5 mm headsets in (hopefully) Debian or Ubuntu? TIA, Liz J

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New President
by Andy Stewart April 15, 2010

April 15, 2010

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 HI everybody, It is my pleasure to announce that Chuck Anderson was elected as the next WLUG President. Chuck has been a WLUG member since the very first meeting (July 1997) and has been very active for all of these years. Chuck hosts the WLUG website and has been getting us the meeting rooms. I'm sure that Chuck will do a fine job as WLUG's new president. Congratulations, Chuck! Andy - -- Andy Stewart (KB1OIQ) Founder: Worcester Linux Users' Group Founder: Chelmsford Linux Meetup Group President: PART of Westford, MA (WB1GOF) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFLxvXCOjiraCaOTOoRAuFhAJ4pCNu6IiwG4m/YJxjo5TQGBSh8hgCeO//T 9ytuswrp1cA/XhbP+sNCnwk= =PFSI -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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REMINDER: WLUG meeting WED evening, 7:00 PM
by Andy Stewart April 14, 2010

April 14, 2010

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 - -- Andy Stewart (KB1OIQ) Founder: Worcester Linux Users' Group Founder: Chelmsford Linux Meetup Group President: PART of Westford, MA (WB1GOF) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFLxSwFOjiraCaOTOoRAgY9AJ48+m3FtDHzJFkYYXvZ+WDSOuxbSwCg4tOJ ZJq6U7xYepjyR10/dha1Jus= =kNxp -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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Upcoming meeting: April 14th (Wednesday)
by Andy Stewart April 6, 2010

April 6, 2010

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 HI Everybody, This is an early announcement about our upcoming WLUG meeting, which is next week on Wednesday, April 14th, 2010, at 7:00 PM. I have been the acting president of WLUG since I founded the group back in July 1997. Due to increasing pressures on my personal time, I think it is time for me to step aside and let another person be the president of WLUG. I definitely have enjoyed the privilege of being the group president, and I plan to continue attending the group meetings. I think that our next meeting should include a detailed discussion of the future of WLUG, and sometime soon, an election of at least a president, and probably a treasurer. I am happy to continue acting as president until such an election occurs. I don't know if we really need a vice president and or a secretary, but those topics should definitely be part of the discussion. I think the group has been very successful due to all of you who come to the meetings, give presentations, etc. This announcement, and the election of a new president, will definitely change the group. I see this is an opportunity for the group to grow in different ways. There is no doubt that the group will be different. Whether it becomes better or worse is really up to all of us. I look forward, as always, to seeing you at the meeting *next* week on Wednesday, April 14th. Later, Andy - -- Andy Stewart (KB1OIQ) Founder: Worcester Linux Users' Group Founder: Chelmsford Linux Meetup Group President: PART of Westford, MA (WB1GOF) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with SUSE - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQFLuoNmOjiraCaOTOoRAun1AJ9Wz6jx4wvHKat9UUnOhrjcsIeZEgCglkUD x02mDM/AGIAGYPwAQ48qDUg= =iwnj -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

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How to manipulate audio (ALSA) a lot with a HD audio card?
by Tatsh April 2, 2010

April 2, 2010

Stupid Intel decided to build-in DRM into the spec of these things. I have a Conexant which has Nvidia codec to provide audio for the HDMI output (this works fine except that in alsa settings I have to force a default output device, 3). What I'd like to do is be able to record from the stereo mixer, which I have none in alsamixer. So how do I go about creating one? I've tried a few different configs I found on-line but nothing seemed to work for me. WIth this capability of course I could record audio from my computer in say, Audacity, or I could even broadcast audio through Skype. And the best part would be if I could broadcast audio through Skype AND use my headset at the same time (mixing the 2 into one channel input). I have 3 mic inputs apparently (one of them is webcam, another is the jack, and I don't know what the 3rd one is). Image of KMix: http://bitpic.net/image/kmix-nvidia-hd-audio-codec So far I know it's something I can do with ALSA settings where I can tell ALSA to redirect audio and 'copy' whatever is going on on any input channel (overriding the jack of course). No luck there yet. Any help appreciated Thanks -- Tatsh www.bitpic.net www.tatsh.net ddrtist(a)gmail.com

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Two Senior IT positions open at TripAdvisor in Newton (IT and Operations)
by Ryan Pugatch April 2, 2010

April 2, 2010

Hi all, We have a couple of tech positions open at TripAdvisor. The first is for a "Principal Technical Operations Engineer" which is on our operations team, handling our livesite environment. The second, "IT Lead", is on our internal IT team. Below are the job postings. We're definitely looking for people with several years experience. If you are interested, please email me your resume. I am also glad to answer any questions. - Ryan (Systems Administrator @ TripAdvisor) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Principal Technical Operations Engineer Hundreds of servers. Thousands of requests per second. Millions of users. Two admins (you could be number 3)! We are looking for a senior hands-on network (mostly Cisco) and systems (mostly Linux) administrator. You will have several years of prior experience in the operation of one or more of the following: High traffic web application OR Software as a service OR Internet/Network Service Provider TripAdvisor is the top site for travel advice and reviews on the Internet. It is very profitable. It's also a fun place to work where "speed wins" is the operating principle. We move fast. We are flexible and we take risks. An open mind and ideas are always welcome. Dogmatism and inflexibility not so much. You will play a lead role in the design and operation of the network, server, and datacenter infrastructure beneath TripAdvisor's applications. The environment currently spans 3 datacenters, and that is likely to increase. You will work closely with the software engineering team to support product changes and enhance their performance, scalability, reliability, and security. We are small team. You will be expected to work on a project or task from end to end with a comfort level running projects and implementing the details. One day you might be working with our ISPs to transition from static routing to BGP, and the next day you are racking and cabling switches. This morning you are kicking off a load balancer replacement project, and in the afternoon you are upgrading firewall firmware after you determine that we are exposed to a potential security vulnerability. This week you are putting together a comprehensive network monitoring system, and next week you are running tcpdump with a DBA to try and diagnose why database replication is "slow". You will have a thorough knowledge of enterprise networking including Cisco switching, routing, and security as well as TCP/IP internals. You will also preferably have a strong Linux or Unix background. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- IT Lead TripAdvisor is looking for an IT generalist who will provide leadership and mentoring to a team of 4 supporting the IT needs of roughly 350 employees worldwide. This role is part hands-on sysadmin and part team lead with the potential to grow into a team management role. TripAdvisor is the top site for travel advice and reviews on the Internet. It is very profitable. It's also a fun place to work where "speed wins" is the operating principle. We move fast. We are flexible and we take risks. An open mind and ideas are always welcome. Dogmatism and inflexibility not so much. We are not your typical Windows / Active Directory / Exchange shop. Desktops: 60% Windows 40% OSX. Our email/collaboration system is Zimbra running on Linux. Our phone system is Asterisk running on Linux. Instead of Active Directory, we use OpenLDAP. Our file/print servers run Samba. We tend to prefer open solutions that we can take off the shelf and adapt to our needs, but we are not wedded to a particular OS or vendor. To be successful in this role you will: Possess excellent interpersonal skills, patience, and a genuine desire to help people with their technology challenges Have strong troubleshooting skills and a diagnostic intuition Enjoy and excel at mentoring other talented team members to reach their full potential Be a self-starter. If you don't know how to do something you consider it a challenge to try to figure it out for yourself You will have demonstrated experience with: Linux systems administration Windows systems administration Samba OpenLDAP Postfix Server virtualization Scripting (perl, python, bash...) Duties and Responsibilities include: Operation of corporate networked applications and infrastructure (Zimbra, OpenLDAP, Samba, Asterisk) Overseeing backups of roughly 20+TB of data weekly Ensuring the security of TripAdvisor's corporate systems Procuring and deploying server hardware Tier 2/3 Helpdesk support Working with the Director of IT to develop IT strategy

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the website is in need of some love
by Jeff Moyer April 2, 2010

April 2, 2010

I'm not sure who maintains it, but it's in a very sad state at the moment. Cheers, Jeff

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Re: [Wlug] Use Drupal On The Web Site - Wlug Digest, Vol 78, Issue 1
by Steven Greenberg April 1, 2010

April 1, 2010

I am all in favor of Jeff's suggestion. I first tested Drupal on my personal web site (http://www.ssgreenberg.name/Drupal/Drupal/) I then convinced my Square Dance Club to let me work with the Webmaster to convert that site to Drupal. We have had nothing but raves from the readers since we converted. http://www.hayloftsteppers.org/ When judging the site, remember, we are (or were) engineers, not artists. /Steve > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > Subject: > Re: [Wlug] the website is in need of some love > From: > Tatsh <ddrtist(a)gmail.com> > Date: > Thu, 1 Apr 2010 10:05:30 -0400 > To: > wlug(a)mail.wlug.org > > To: > wlug(a)mail.wlug.org > > > Would be cool to do it over in Drupal. > > NOT JOOMLA (should be called 'piece of crap please give up already!')! > > All you need is a blog post system (built-in) to write about events, and add > custom fields like time if you want, etc etc. From a design stand point, there > is no reason to use images for the textual links, especially obviously > compressed JPEGs. > > Late > > Jeff Moyer wrote: >> I'm not sure who maintains it, but it's in a very sad state at the >> moment. >> >> Cheers, >> Jeff -- Steven Greenberg Email: steve(a)ssgreenberg.name 251 Holland Rd. Phone: (774)241-0095 Fiskdale, Massachusetts 01518-1231 Web: http://www.ssgreenberg.name Other Email: s.greenberg(a)ieee.org ssg(a)alum.mit.edu

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interesting article on RAID
by Chuck Anderson March 12, 2010

March 12, 2010

Triple-Parity RAID and Beyond by Adam Leventhal | December 17, 2009 http://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=1670144 As hard-drive capacities continue to outpace their throughput, the time has come for a new level of RAID. -- - Chuck (372 Days until IPv4 depletion: http://ipv4depletion.com/)

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Meeting: BtrFS: Now (Thurs March 11 7pm)
by Chuck Anderson March 12, 2010

March 12, 2010

Frank is giving a talk on BtrFS right now. It seems the website wasn't updated (but is now). -- - Chuck (372 Days until IPv4 depletion: http://ipv4depletion.com/) On Mon, Feb 22, 2010 at 06:18:44AM -0500, Frank Sweetser wrote: > I've noticed that not too many people have putting in meeting topic requests, > so I thought that if anyone's interested I'd volunteer to throw together some > slides on BtrFS. > > For those of you who haven't heard of it, BtrFS is the next generation linux > filesystem. Though still in heavy development, it was included in the > mainstream kernel last year. It promises to scale to filesystems well beyond > what any of the current offerings can handle (including ext4), as well as > offering far greater flexibility and better data security for data admins. > > If you have anything else that you'd like to hear about, either instead of or > in addition to BtrFS, chime in, and hopefully someone else on the list will be > able to make it happen! > > -- > Frank Sweetser fs at wpi.edu | For every problem, there is a solution that > WPI Senior Network Engineer | is simple, elegant, and wrong. - HL Mencken > GPG fingerprint = 6174 1257 129E 0D21 D8D4 E8A3 8E39 29E3 E2E8 8CEC

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