Denis Lemire's Site

Today marks five years since I abandoned Windows on the Desktop in favor of an OS that doesn’t completely suck. At the time, my primary motivation, or excuse, was to familiarize myself with an OS that I was receiving an increasing number of tech support calls for at AirSurfer. Trying to support an OS I had never used was no easy task.

I had actually been eye-balling the Mac since the appearance of the Power Mac G4 Cube and later the iMac G4. The high cost of either of these systems kept me away, but I was definitely drawn to the compact and elegant design of the integrated hardware as well as the rich graphical UI Apple had been showing off since the early releases of OS X.

(more…)

The AirSurfer WISP network I manage for Triton Networking Solutions Ltd. utilizes hundreds of Motorola Canopy Subscriber modules to connect individual broadband clients to our network.

In order to mass manage these devices, Motorola provides CNUT. CNUT is a great tool, but in spite of the fact that it was written in cross platform languages from day one (Currently Java, previously some Perl in the mix for good measure) it is only packaged for Windows and Linux systems.

I’ve been dissatisfied for some time in the exclusion of support for CNUT on my desktop OS of choice. Being in a creative and inspired mood late yesterday evening, I did what any self respecting, Canopy using, red blooded, vigilante coding network geek would do.

(more…)

Arrived back from the Catch The Wave wireless conference in Medicine Hat put together by one of Triton’s suppliers of wireless gear (Comco Technologies Inc.). It was a very well organized event, with speakers from Motorola, Allot Communications, Orthogon Systems, and more.

There was an assortment of product demonstrations as well as a Motorola training course. The conference lasted from Tuesday to Friday evening during which I stayed at the Medicine Hat Lodge. Both the event in general and the accommodations at the hotel were very enjoyable.

I had a great time meeting numerous people from various backgrounds, both technical and non-technical. Of course, and in spite of my enjoyment of the event, after three days of early mornings and late evenings it feels great to be home.

Haven’t scribbled in this here website in way too long… If I put it off just a little bit longer it will be a year… Obviously lots has happened since the last post. I wouldn’t even know where to begin if I tried. Today marks nine months since I’ve began dating Jessie for starters. We’ve been living together now for at least four or five months… All is going great on that front… Things are going good at work… I believe Triton is on the verge of exploding in size if all involved play their cards right. Guess we’ll see where things go from here if I find the time to write…

Ever have one of those days where you wish you hadn’t bothered to crawl out of bed?

First thing in the morning I had to go to St. Albert to install two additional computers to an existing network. Let me just say that I’m now of the opinion that any city that names every single one of there streets should be destroyed and rebuilt. No questions asked. How in the hell is one to know where Joe street is from Big Building avenue? Its completely ridiculous. Needless to say I got very lost…

Granted its not like I had a sense of direction to begin with, but ending up passing through an entire city once or twice trying to find a road that according to the map you printed earlier exists is absolutely enough to irritate someone. After being lost for a bit and somehow ending up somewhere near Sturgeon (don’t ask) I got stuck in a ditch in a failed attempt to turn around.

Of course I’m also out of free AMA calls. So the dude on the other end of the cell says he’ll have a tow truck for me in about forty minutes. I mutter some familiar profanities and even learned some new ones cursing under my breath as I inhaled the toxic fumes of a cigarette leaning against my truck on the side of the road.

About ten minutes later some guy came by, said he lived not five minutes away, had a rope and could likely pull my sorry carcass out of the ditch. He came back five minutes later, and succeeded as he had planned. Awesome! I thanked the man, called off the tow truck and was one my way.

After getting lost a little more into St. Albert I finally found the office I was supposed to do the work for. I dragged all their equipment into the office and proceeded to do the three to four hours of work required.

Needless to say when I was done I was looking forward to nothing more then heading back home. Thats when I reached into my pocket and noticed my keys were gone. I leave it as an exercise to the reader to figure out where I had left them. AAARGH!!!