Tip for DIY Head shavers and buzzers. X-post from Frugal.

thesnarkyone · 2012-05-21T05:12:21.336046+00:00

Or you could you know, shave in the shower (when it's dry), and just pick it up. Been doing it that way for about 15 years now.

Unity993 · 2012-05-21T04:57:25.372879+00:00

Cold Steel makes really stiff foam rubber training knives. I used one for years playing woods ball. So awesome to take people out with it.

And handy too, once we were playing in an area where a tree had fallen over some discarded concrete drainage pipe (the stuff that is like 4 foot across), it made for a really awesome place to play paintball. Anyhow, I was climbing on this branch and slid down between two pieces of the drainage pipe and ended up in this really awkward position upside down.

While I was trying to figure out how to get out of there I heard a bunch of noise right where I had been. Apparently someone had seen me go out on the branch, but hadn't seen my slide down into the pipe.

So dude comes crab walking across the pipe looking for me, and paused right above where I was wedged.

There was no way I could get my gun up for a shot (which I wouldn't have taken anyway at that range), but I took my rubber knife and pressed it up into his inner thigh, while stage whispering "you're dead!"

The look on his face was priceless.

I got to use that knife many times. I eventually got to the point where I was playing with a pump gun, three cigar tubes of spare ammo and the rubber knife.

I enjoyed the challenge, and taking out guys with Angels and cockers with a pump and a rubber knife was always good for a laugh.

ash5 · 2012-05-21T01:24:37.076695+00:00

Mole Kart. If you like Mario Kart, you must try it (it's free).

NoyzMaker · 2012-05-20T20:50:33.710639+00:00

I have an oddball question I've been asking in interviews for years; why are manhole covers round?

I don't expect them to know. I use this question to see how they work through things when confronted with weird issues. Mainly I want to see where their mind goes, and how they try to solve the riddle.

Really the only wrong answer is "I have no idea." This tells me that the person isn't inclined to look for solutions beyond the obvious, and probably won't be able to deal well with those weird problems that pop up from time to time in IT.

TL;DR Circles and certain elliptical triangles (which are used in some places) are the only shapes that can't be forced down into a pipe they cover, or accidentally knocked in.

MetastaticCarcinoma · 2012-05-20T20:41:21.151697+00:00

I put a lefty safety on my 10/22. Initially I just removed the safety all together, but my wife wanted to shoot it, and the lack of safety freaked her out (no idea why, she'll shoot her Glock 26 without a second thought, but apparently a 10/22 without a safety is too scary).

It was pretty easy. I initially wanted lefty mag releases on my pistols, but I've found it's just faster for me to use the index finger on my left hand.

trevercj · 1 day

About IT having "answers":

While this is true when you break the system down into its' components, oftentimes the problem is figuring out the question.

Anyone could successfully learn to care for a single server, they're complex, but they are a known complexity.

The troubles start when you're dealing with a problem that manifests in multiple ways, and is occurring on a network with dozens or even hundreds of components which could be the culprit. These are the kind of problems that require a working knowledge that is "an inch deep and a mile wide" to fix in a reasonable timeframe.

It's an interesting conundrum, and each components ability to potentially point to the culprit is growing by leaps and bounds every year, but today, the vast majority of business networks still require someone who can determine the question before an answer can be found.

Based on the insight you show in your post, I assume you already knew this, I just wanted to point it out for those who may be unaware.

trevercj · 1 day

I see a lot of talk about "talking down to" users being a terrible crime here. Fuck that.

So I don't care what profession you work in, you are damn well expected to have competence with your tools.

Ever meet a mechanic that can't use a torque wrench or a diagnostic computer? A surgeon who can't use a Patterson Trocar? How about an accountant who can't work a 10 key? An electrician who can't use a multimeter?

Now, how many of our users sit at a computer for 8 hours a day? How many of them have been doing this for 5+ years? And they still don't know that Internet Explorer is not an OS? Or that a monitor is not a computer, or that a tower is not a "hard drive"?

I don't expect my users to be able to set up a SQL database, or an Exchange Server, or configure DFS shares, but there is a limit to acceptable ignorance of the tools you use every day to earn your living.

Beyond that point you are willfully ignorant and I have lost all respect for you. I was plenty nice the first 87 times I showed you how to take a screenshot and paste it into an email this year, don't be surprised when I walk out if your office in disgust on the 88th.

I'm all for communication skills, and mine are plenty polished, but I'm not going to smile and politely tell you how to do your job every day, over and over again.

/rant

vocatus · 1 day

PowerShell.

I started with batch, moved on to VBScript, and then I discovered PowerShell.

PowerShell unlocks massive automation functionality that the other two just can't touch.

I once spent six months writing an automation package in VBScript to upgrade and configure a couple of different software packages (kernel level filter drivers on a machine localized to German FTL!), I'm pretty confident that I could have done the same thing using PowerShell in maybe two weeks (I had to test the shit out of it).

But the best argument for PowerShell is that Microsoft has made it part of their Common Engineering Criteria for Windows. This basically means that any new functionality in Windows must be built to work with PowerShell first, and then a GUI can be built, but all functionality must work in PowerShell.

The end result is that in a version or two, every single Microsoft program will support complete PowerShell control. If you learn how to do a thing in PowerShell it doesn't matter if or how the GUI changes, it'll still work in PowerShell.

I think that in maybe 5-10 years PowerShell will be the dividing line between helpdesk and everything else on the Windows side.

vocatus · 1 day

True enough, just pointing out that they can be managed.

vocatus · 1 day

That's policy, changeable with GPO, but at the cost of all the security built into PowerShell.

vocatus · 1 day

The DHCP module on technet, and the DNSshell module on codeplex (used to be on MSDN, but the project moved) make them much easier to deal with.

Soylent_gray · 1 day

Multitasking. And Outlook.

I also work with Photoshop, InDesign, and Acrobat quite a bit.

I could live with 4GB of RAM, but I flat out refuse to have that RAM soldered in. RAM fails, and at that point, you're sending it in for repair (if it's under warranty), or SOL.

I have a netbook for when weight/size is a concern. I paid $300 for it and it's got 4GB of RAM in it (with a gimp processor, but you gotta have some tradeoff right?).

Soylent_gray · 1 day

Just the loss of RSAT is enough to prevent MacOS from being really useful for IT (at least for me, as much as I'd need to RDP to a Windows box, why even bother?), but the hardware is nice.

I've been kicking around the idea of a MacBook Pro with Win7 on it, but I'm not sold. That's a lot to pay for hardware.

Soylent_gray · 1 day

Soldered in RAM? And only 4GB at that? No thanks.

Soylent_gray · 1 day

Hence the 'w' (HP laptops with the w suffix are meant to be workstation replacements).

I've got an 8540w that I've been using for about 18 months now, and I love it.

Apple makes some nice hardware though, I've been toying with the idea of a MacBook Pro as my next laptop, but I'm just not sold yet.

MrPowerScripts · 3 days

The whole idea of a command line interface that let's you do anything you can do in the GUI, and then some.

For like 10+ years I've wanted the same ability on Windows that I have on *NIX through shell scripting, and then along came PowerShell, and BAM, here is something that gives you MORE than the *NIX shell.

I think the very first thing I saw that sold me was getting an excel spreadsheet as an object and listing all the properties available once you had the object.

An the fact that

dir HKLM:\

Replaced about 50 lines of code in VBScript was just icing on the cake.

Nylian · 3 days

Get-QADuser -enabled

This doesn't work, or you're wanting to filter based on something else?

Maybe my brain just isn't firing right, I'm confused.

Is the question "How do I use Get-QADUser to filter on any user attribute?"

Nylian · 3 days

So you want to return a list of users based on what specific criteria? Just that the account is not disabled?

soundslikeagoodidea · 3 days

My dad started me with a BB gun at like 7. I had about 8 air guns all through childhood (they'd wear out or be damaged and I'd get another one).

We had about 5 miles of fallow farmland directly across the street, so I spent countless hours with air guns in that field, firing billions of BB's and pellets at anything and everything.

At 12 dad bought me a .22 (Marlin model 60), and at 14 I started shooting competition smallbore (biathlon rifles FTW!).

Dad taught me about rifles, shotguns, and wheelguns. Pistols I learned on my own, and eventually had a friend who was a firearms instructor tune me up on my pistol skills.

My son is 4 now, I'm going to get him a BB gun for his 7th birthday, and a 10/22 for his 12th (he can shoot mine until then).

werepat · 3 days

So to add to the confusion, our Attorney General has stated explicitly that repair kits are not magazines, and do not constitute constructive possession. You can find a PDF of that on CalGuns.

Also for discussions with lawyers, since the law doesn't specify anything about the repair of legally owned full capacity magazines, it is general consensus that as long as you end up with the same number of assembled mags that you started with, it doesn't matter if the mag has any original parts left (and since it's been 12 years now, I'd say it's easily possible that you've needed to replace every part of a magazine due to wear at this point).

I'm not a lawyer, if you are thinking about doing anything that might be illegal, you should consult one first so that you don't accidentally break the law.

werepat · 3 days

Actually the law doesn't say anything about buying.

There are quite a few people who believe you can legally buy a full capacity mag in California, you just can't sell one.

I wouldn't want to be the test case on that one though.

sleeplessone · 4 days

So do you want the RDP session launched full screen, or invisible or what?

Thereal_Sandman · 4 days

I thought you all might find this useful. It's a PowerShell module with some cmdlets aimed at Sysadmin's.

I just discovered these today, the bulk of the cmdlets are free, and actually it looks like the "premium" cmdlets aren't really all that useful (unless you need to automate something without PowerShell hooks).

If you don't want to use their stupid shortcut (I hate crap on my start menu that is completely unnecessary), you can load the module with:

Get-Module Vexasoft* -listavailable | Import-Module

Which is what their "launcher" is doing anyway.

Thereal_Sandman

TROPHY CASE

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