I'm having problems with the network card on my desktop (XP).  The quick fix is to reboot my computer and hope it doesn't happen again anytime soon.  But after spending more than an hour trying to figure out the exact cause this weekend, I am out of ideas.  My roommate had this problem before upgrading from XP, only it would happen anytime the computer was on for more than about 4 hours.  Aside from the operating system, the only similarity I can think of is that we both use TrendMicro (version 8 when he had the trouble, versions 8 and 10 when I had the trouble).  However, I had successfully used this computer for more than a year with TMSC 8 before the problem started.

The symptoms:

• The computer will be working fine for hours or days, until suddenly all http traffic fails to successfully load.  I can ping other computers and on- and off-campus servers (Google being my favorite), I can check email using Thunderbird, but I cannot get any webpages to load in either Firefox or Internet Explorer.
• the ARP table doesn't seem as full as it should be.  I compared between my laptop and desktop (connected to the same switch), and the desktop had only the gateway for the subnet I'm on, while the laptop had several other local IP addresses.
• I can't enable the wireless network card, nor can I disable the Ethernet card.
• I disabled the Windows Firewall (I left the TrendMicro firewall up), but this did not fix the problem at the time.

Some solutions I've seen on the Internet but haven't tried yet:

• from: http://beer234.blogspot.com/2008/10/port-80-blocked-windows-xp.html
  Restart the Windows XP PC in Safe Mode.
  Run Regedit.exe to open the registry editor.
  Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\vsdatant
  Click start in the right pane and modify the value to 3.
  Restart the PC and port 80 should no longer be blocked and you can use http with any browser.

My college has an emergency alerts system that sends email and text messages to registered students and staff in the event of an emergency.  Because of an error in how they set the system up, I was able to send a message to about 12,000 people last Wednesday.  (The error has since been corrected.)

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It started out simply enough.  I was just making sure that my contact information was up to date so that I would get any emergency alerts.  I saw that I was subscribed for alerts for both campuses, and I noticed that I could "Click for more information".  This sent me to a page with a basic description of alert distribution list, an empty section that was labeled "Posts", and a 3rd empty section I can't remember much about.

When I clicked on the "Add new post" button, I expected one of two things to happen.  Either I was going to get a message saying Insufficient Privileges, or I was going to find an online forum or message board.  Instead, I was presented with 2 text boxes, one for the text message and one for the email message.  At this point I was sure that the system waited until someone attempted to post a message before determining if the person had permission to send a message to the whole campus, which seemed somewhat sloppy.

Just in case the system ended up letting me send a message out, and because it was accurately describing what I was doing, I decided  to send a message that said "Test - Manhattan_Campus_Alerts sent 12:20 P Central".  This way people would not get a blank emergency alert, and I just felt like I should put something there.  I didn't really think this through very far, otherwise I would have realized that if this works, I would be sending a message to everyone on campus, but I was still convinced that I was going to get a message telling me I wasn't allowed to send this message.  Instead, within 15-20 seconds after pressing the send button and thinking "Why'd it send me back to the beginning?  Does that mean it didn't work?", I felt me phone vibrate with a text message - the text message I had put in the box on the web interface.

After panicking for a few moments (well, hours really, but I started acting before the panic stage was over), I talked with a couple of older, wiser souls who encouraged me to call someone so that they would know that I wasn't acting maliciously and so that they would know to patch the hole in their system.  As luck would have it, they guy I tried to call was out for the week.  Of course, I didn't find this out until I got a call from the director of the department responsible for the alert system.  Luckily, he wasn't too angry with me (I'm not going to jail, that's enough for me).  He thanked me for treating it like a test rather than saying that there was a bomb on campus.  It turns out that even though any student could have sent a message, I was the only one who did.  Normally, only about 5 people are allowed to post to the emergency alert system.  He did request that I call before clicking anything critical the next time I try testing their security.

Most people don't know that I sent the message, unless they happened to be around while I was panicking about getting expelled or going to jail.  I have had a few suggestions about what I should have said instead of "testing":

• "Class is cancelled for today.  Please leave campus."
• "Long live Tony"
• "Hey ladies, I'm single.  Give me a call at (###) ### - ####

Then again, any of these messages would likely have resulted in some more serious punishments.  And for now, I'm just glad to have this whole experience behind me.

We managed to avoid the "swine flu" H1N1 virus in summer camps at K-State (to the best of my knowledge).  Now that class is back in session for 1 day, we have at least 2 cases.  KU has 30 cases after its 3rd day of class.  I made the connection at the floor meeting that I work at the front desk in a way that interacts with almost every resident who walks through the doors at night.  My plan right now is to stock up on hand sanitizer and make use of it often.  Beyond that, I'm just going to rely on my wicked good looks and awesome luck to get me through the next few months.

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In other news, because of previous failures to hire new desk workers, there are currently only 8 people who are supposed to fill 220 hours per week.  That's an average of 27.5 hours per week per person (and we also have to go to class, eat, and sleep).  The new administration has made significant changes to the desk layout, but the actual policies are remarkably the same as before.  It's just really hard to do the same thing when everything is in a different place, including me.  I've decided to wait until the end of the week to give the new layout a try, and then I'll be requesting that we make some changes to improve the layout of the desk.  I think that this should be enough that I don't complain about anything just because it is different.

I moved out of Marlatt 204, my longtime college home, for the last time tonight.  I think it will also be the last time I will ever move out of stately Marlatt Hall.  Though I will return to Marlatt next year, it will only be for convenience and to see how my home fairs under the new conditions forced upon it.

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Some background: Marlatt was the only all-male residence hall at Kansas State University for the past few years (ever since Haymaker went coed).  This academic year, it was decided that Marlatt would be converted to a coed residence hall so that it could house the honors program cluster floor.  This change (along with a few others) were kept secret until the last possible moment.

Because K-State Housing & Dining Services refused to even allow residents and staff to comment on the change, several hall leaders have elected to not return to Marlatt Hall for another year.  I myself must return as I intend to graduate in December, and finding a place to live that doesn't charge you extra for staying only 5 months is difficult.  I also don't want to have to search for a new job for only a few months.

There are two things that really concern me about this change (aside from the fact that it was, in my opinion, ill-advised):

1. Aside from salaried staff (the resident assistants), all females in the hall will either be freshman or transfers from another university - there were no females currently attending K-State to choose to live in Marlatt next academic year.
2. The management (they) elected to not hire new desk staff (CAs & DAs) until next year.  The reason given for this was because they wanted to give the new Residence Life Coordinator (RLC) ownership of the CA/DA staff.  I say "BS!"  There will be 7 to 9 returning desk staff.  At least 2 of them are graduating in December and won't be able to work much because aside from enduring our most brutal semester in the College of Engineering, we will also have to find a job for when we leave school.  At least 1 of them (me) will be very busy with his summer job for the first couple of weeks of school, and I don't work very much anyways during the school year.  So there will be basically between 5-7 people to work 168 CA hours and 42 DA hours that first week.  That right there is a huge red flag in and of itself.
   Also, the RLC doesn't really need ownership of the desk staff - unless a problem comes up, he only really needs to be there for performance reviews, training, and the 2 scheduling periods (and maybe not even that much).  Most of the desk staff's job is to either sit and wait for someone to need assistance or to perform simple tasks.  The really complex student job is the RA position.  The RLC has weekly meetings with the RAs sometimes, and also gets reports from them about what is happening on the floor.  The new RLC for Marlatt will not have ownership of the RAs (his most critical student employees) for next year, because they had to be selected before he was even interviewed for his position.
   What we think the real reason for waiting until next semester to hire desk staff is: they want to hire some female desk staff.  Our problem with this reason, and why they won't admit to it: why hire a freshman girl who has never lived in the halls before and is just starting to take classes at K-State instead of a man who has lived in the halls for a year or more and is familiar with K-State Housing policies and K-State policies in general?  For example which is more likely to know where the post office is, or what a good resturant for a date is, how to give directions to the computer help place which is all the way across campus, or any other number of questions that sometimes don't even have anything to do with Housing & Dining.
   

In short, I think it is foolish for K-State Housing & Dining to pursue these changes without even consulting us for our opinion (we do live here 24/7, for example) or provinding explanations for their desicions.  In many meetings, the attitude we got was "We're doing this, and there's nothing you little peons can do to stop us."  We know that they're above us on the food chain.  And we don't need them forcing changes upon us to remind us of that.