I have a new Macbook Pro from January 2008. This model wasn't yet referred to in the debian wiki, so i had a little difficulty at first. I also couldn't remember how to figure out what my wireless card was, and thus which drivers it needed, so ended up typing in a load of different commands. Here are some of the useful ones:

I recently started back at school and, being one of the leading academic postgraduate institutions in the world, there is very good network access. However, not surprisingly, the support for linux is minimal - and being that I run Debian on an old powerbook, the computer help desk people all seemed to be more impressed with my machine but unable to help. They use Red Hat, though, and I was able to get one of the guys to show me the dhcp server logs, which was great as I could then tell what was working or not...

I decided to set up a fairly decent home network. My problem is I don't have many physical machines, though, so I decided to use vservers to help... This is how I did it.

there used to be a copy of pred.txt online. there isn't anymore, so here is a replacement. predator, or michael carlton, was an amazing guy who did a lot more than many of us could imagine. this is his story, and some of his writing.

• Pred.txt (pdf - 11MB)

With the semi-collapse of Modernising Medical Careers (MMC), about which I have certainly written elsewhere, if not here, everyone seems to be trying to figure out what to do next. Despite Remedy UK failing in court, they are still the moral voice of UK doctors - and the BMA is rapidly backpedalling to try and regain legitimacy. This is evident in their most recent mail out to doctors, in which they say they are "committed to assisting junior doctors" - although this has hardly been apparent over the past few months, and it is the same signatories at the end of the mail sending us "Best wishes." What is perhaps most ironic is that the BMA consistently claims to be the voice of the profession, representing all doctors, even those not members, yet advice and surveys go only to their members. Oh, but for more choice... roll on Remedy, the union!

One of the great difficulties I had was getting the wireless configured on my new setup. There are many links and howtos scattered around the internet, but actually not one of them was what I needed - or really explained the nitty-gritty details: they all just skimmed over a few bits, presumably assuming that if you're clever enough to get debian running, you must know how to get the networking sorted. Or, maybe I just missed the ones that could have really helped me.

The result is, I've decided to write some brief notes about what I did to get stuff working. It should also be noted that I'm prompted to do this not only by dkg but also cos I'm trying to clean up my homedir a little bit, and I had some old notes lying around that would otherwise get lost and forgotten.

Having played around with the prototypical installation that I set up recently, I've now decided to take the plunge - having sussed out the connectivity in Islington-by-Sea as well (see a post to come that I started recently in a pub but then lost and is still to be rewritten). I'm planning on setting up a dual-boot powerbook, with the main focus being a debian system, but a "backup" macosx partition of about 20GB and also a shared media partition where I can store music - and any other files I wish to share between the two systems.

So I'm going to pick up the story after my hard drive crashed recently. At that point, the primary concern was the data loss, which was pretty annoying. However, it really has turned out that I have not lost that much, most stuff was - in one way or another - backed up. So then the emphasis turned to sorting out the computer. It was still under Apple Care Warrancy, which I had bought literally hours before my eligibility ran out. It has proved worthwhile, and I would do it again. First, I had to get it enabled: that involved telephoning the support line. But I had all the appropriate documentation still (original invoice, receipt, delivery notes, etc) so it was fine. Then, getting an appointment at the apple genius bar at the regent street store. The first time I went in, I was served by a real jerk of a guy who had obviously been told to learn the company style as his own would have been too bad. I'm sure there must have been complaints about him. Anyway, I got the manager who came over and offered to replace the screen and the top casing, which had worn away under the sweat from my wrists one hot summer in new york, but said i'd have to pay for the bottom casing and hard drive as there was clear evidence of damage. It was noted in the records - which I was only allowed to see at a strange angle after absolutely insisting - and I left.

I came back a few days later, having decided that I would have the cosmetic repairs done, but leave the hard drive. What a sensible decision that seems to have been! The big catch with apple was that if they replaced the hard drive, they would only do like for like (i.e an 80GB hard drive for another 80GB one) and they would keep the old, damaged one. That didn't seem fair, as it had all my data on it - albeit encrypted. Even so, I wanted to be able to attempt to get it off.

The hard drive on my laptop failed last week - I've lost everything. Well, not quite: turns out that actually i managed to back up most of the most important stuff somehow, in the haphazard way they call "my life." Like, I had backed up all my emails about 18 months ago, plus am pretty good at keeping those scraps of paper that I write down people's info on, so somehow I can still contact most people, I think.

Another movie night, having done over 400 multiple choice questions today (didn't mark them yet - although I know I got 50% on the first two). Felt it was appropriate to relax a little bit, and get up early again tomorrow. Previously, I've written about Fitzcarraldo; I also previously watched that in this house, the house of the chickens, a year or more after I'd first seen it. Magnificent. But tonight, was a night of Alain Resnais.