Generated by All in One SEO v4.9.10, this is an llms.txt file, used by LLMs to index the site.

# Imperfect Computing

...because computers often make life surreal

## Sitemaps

- [XML Sitemap](https://imperfect.olbert.com/sitemap.xml): Contains all public & indexable URLs for this website.

## Posts

- [Dealing with Stalled Debian Upgrades](https://imperfect.olbert.com/dealing-with-stalled-debian-upgrades/) - I periodically encounter, when upgrading my Debian systems, situations where the upgrade process stalls. As I recall, this generally happens when upgrading initramfs, but I imagine it can happen with other packages, too. I apologize in what follows for not showing any listings to help explain what happens and how to resolve it. I forgot
- [Microsoft Support Finally Solves a Problem](https://imperfect.olbert.com/microsoft-support-finally-solves-a-problem/) - I've been a Visual Studio Professional licensee for decades. For almost all those years my license simply autorenewed (although I did have a bit of a challenge when Microsoft revamped how the license was offered). But basically, this was a set-it-and-forget-it situation. Which is exactly what it should have been. Unfortunately, last fall when the
- [Tightening Postfix/Dovecot](https://imperfect.olbert.com/tightening-postfix-dovecot/) - I use postfix and dovecot to provide email capabilities on various blogs I manage. Recently, I noticed a large number of failed postfix login attempts. Many of them, interestingly enough, purported to be from people who share my last name. I posted a question about this in the postfix reddit community and get some helpful
- [Debian 12 Upgrade Gone Awry](https://imperfect.olbert.com/debian-12-upgrade-gone-awry/) - This story involves Debian 12, running on a VPS at Hostwinds.com. I was getting ready to spin up a new WordPress site and was doing the traditional aptitude update/upgrade process to make sure everything was up to date. The update process came off fine. The upgrade process, not so much. A number of packages got
- [Stupid Microsoft Documentation, Sql Server Edition](https://imperfect.olbert.com/stupid-microsoft-documentation-sql-server-edition/) - It's been a while since I played bongos on the (virtual) heads of Microsoft's documentation staff, but that wasn't for lack of their continued striving to achieve The Worst Documentation Ability of All Time. It's just that I wasn't installing much Microsoft software; most of the installs were automatically done via Windows Update, which doesn't
- [Why Not Document What Works?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/why-not-document-what-works/) - I recently started trying to use the MSBuild API in a project where I need to be able to parse csproj files and then do syntactical analyses on them. It's cool that you can access the build API behind Visual Studio from within a C# project! What's not cool, though, is some critical documentation about
- [Why StackOverflow is Toxic, and a Way to Improve It](https://imperfect.olbert.com/why-stackoverflow-is-toxic-and-a-way-to-improve-it/) - People ask questions when they don't know enough to solve a problem on their own. This means, by definition, they are very likely not to be able to formulate their question in such a way that the answer will be easily discernable by a 3rd party observer, even a highly skilled one. Put another way,
- [Where It All Began](https://imperfect.olbert.com/where-it-all-began/) - I recently attended my 50th high school reunion, which, among other things, included a tour of the school itself. I actually started going to the high school campus in 7th grade, because the district hadn't finished building a new middle school. The school is the source of many fond memories. But one of the most
- [Changing WordPress File Upload Limits](https://imperfect.olbert.com/the-most-important-wordpress-command-youll-ever-see/) - I can't tell you how much time I've wasted over the years trying to get WordPress to accept larger upload file sizes. If, like me, you run WordPress on your own server, it's complicated by the fact you need to change two settings in the php.ini file to make the change: upload_max_filesize = 16M post_max_size
- [A Thousand Suns Isn't Even Close](https://imperfect.olbert.com/a-thousand-suns-isnt-even-close/) - You know that phrase "I [hate|despise] you with the fire of a thousand suns"? Well, that doesn't begin to describe the way I feel about GoDaddy, the world's worst -- IMHO -- hosting provider and general all-around provider of web services. How did they earn my undying enmity? There are too many examples to go
- [OMG, It Works!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/omg-it-works/) - Which is not at all what I expected when I hit F5 to debug an app just now. One mark of a well-architected software package, I think, is that you can make radical changes to one part of its guts...and the whole thing just continues to work. I make no claim to being a good
- [Keychron Keyboard: Yet Another Exercise in Frustration](https://imperfect.olbert.com/keychron-keyboard-yet-another-exercise-in-frustration/) - I've had my eye on a clickier keyboard for some time. But I put it off because it was hard to find a place where you could try out the different key types to see what they feel and sound like. I don't know about you, but my fingers don't come calibrated in "grams of
- [A Better WordPress Debug/Diagnostic Environment](https://imperfect.olbert.com/a-better-wordpress-debug-diagnostic-environment/) - I've used WordPress for years. I'm also a long-term amateur programmer, mostly specializing in C# these days. One of the wonderful things about WordPress is its open architecture, which led to a marvelously diverse plugin and theme environment. You can almost always find something, somewhere, that will do whatever it is you want to do.
- [Ubiquiti Dream Machine Pro VPN](https://imperfect.olbert.com/ubiquiti-dream-machine-pro-vpn/) - I use a Ubiquiti Dream Machine Pro (UDM) as the firewall/router on my home LAN. It's a very powerful machine((frankly, overkill for the home environment...but that's what being a geek is all about.)). With a very good web-based UI((although it does change frequently)) and an active support community((which compensates for the relatively poor/missing documentation)). One
- [Running the Right Version of PHP in WordPress](https://imperfect.olbert.com/running-the-right-version-of-php-in-wordpress/) - Today's hair-pulling exercise brought to you by WordPress, Apache and PHP! WordPress is a wonderful blogging/website platform...but it isn't terribly well-documented, in part because it can run under lots of different environments, each of which does the same things differently. So oftentimes "simple" things end up being really complex because of unappreciated interactions between all
- [Hyper-V Gotchas](https://imperfect.olbert.com/hyper-v-gotcha/) - I'm looking to decommission an older Windows 10 desktop I keep around for testing software. It finally occurred to me I could use my spanking new Ryzen 5950 64GB desktop to run a virtual machine instead. Which would also mean I wouldn't have to fire up a second machine to do testing! Yeah, I know
- [To Really Melt Your Brain...](https://imperfect.olbert.com/to-really-melt-your-brain/) - Take on any programming task which involves working with multiple different coordinate systems! You know, the things that define where stuff appears on a screen. Simple, right? Wrong. Dead wrong. The origin of one system doesn't have to correspond to any other system's origin. Origins are arbitrary, so any consistency is due solely to convention.
- [Virtual Dovecot Users](https://imperfect.olbert.com/virtual-dovecot-users/) - I run dovecot on a VPS for remote IMAP access, with postfix as the underlying mail server. Originally, it handled mail for just one of the domains whose blogs are hosted there. But recently I decided to add email accounts for JumpForJoySoftware, a site I use to publish open-source apps. How hard could it be?
- [A Wee Bit More Dangerous...](https://imperfect.olbert.com/a-wee-bit-more-dangerous/) - Five months ago I began running my first internet-facing server in ten or fifteen years. I've been running a number of blogs during that time, and put up a number of websites, but all hosted on someone else's machine, so I didn't have to worry much about security. Switching to a VPS((on Hostwinds; check them
- [Cool Backup Software](https://imperfect.olbert.com/cool-backup-software/) - For several years I've been using File History in Windows to back up the computers on my home LAN to a local Windows file server. It was reasonably fast and relatively easy to set up((although specifying exclusions -- "back up this entire subdirectory except for..." -- was a PITA; fortunately, you only have to do
- [Blink and It's Done](https://imperfect.olbert.com/blink-and-its-done/) - I was saddened to learn my five or six year old computer couldn't upgrade to Windows 11. So I bit the bullet and built a new one. That sounds hard but it's not. "Building" boils down to "snap together a bunch of stuff". Granted, there is a learning curve. But it's on the level of
- [Your Hearing May Not Be Going](https://imperfect.olbert.com/your-hearing-may-not-be-going/) - Over the last few months I'd become concerned age was starting to take its (inevitable) toll on my hearing. That wouldn't surprise me, particularly since for the first year I rode my motorcycle without any earplugs (there's a lot of air noise at 65 MPH, even behind a windscreen). The problem mostly manifested itself with
- [Taking Counter-Intuit(ive) to a Whole New Level](https://imperfect.olbert.com/taking-counter-intuitive-to-a-whole-new-level/) - My wife is the treasurer of a local not for profit which has used one form or another of QuickBooks for many years. Awhile ago, when for various reasons they needed remote access to their accounting information, I migrated them over to QuickBooks Online. Based on several years worth of use by myself, and talking
- [Hostwinds VPS](https://imperfect.olbert.com/hostwinds-vps/) - I recently had to switch hosting providers and, after researching what was available on the Linux-based front, went with Hostwinds((They earned excellent reviews from PC Magazine.)). I purchased their entry-level virtual private server (2GB of RAM, 50GB SSD storage, 1 IP address) because my needs are relatively minor (half a dozen WordPress blogs, only three
- [Adventures in Migrating!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/adventures-in-migrating/) - Back in early August the new owners of my long-term hosting service, Webfaction, told me they were "unable" to migrate my account to their new environment. I suspect the real reason was more like "we can't make enough money off guys like you", but they're free to come to that conclusion and I don't fault
- [They're Called "Personal" for a Reason](https://imperfect.olbert.com/theyre-called-personal-for-a-reason/) - The other day my wife worked her way through a recent Microsoft Windows 10 update (I'd downloaded and done the update and rebooted the machine but hadn't logged in as her). Along the way she was offered a poorly worded opportunity to share her desktop with any other Windows computer she might have. Not knowing
- [Adventures in Networking](https://imperfect.olbert.com/adventures-in-networking/) - My friend Tom recently touted a new-to-our-area fiber-optic service provider, Sonic, as having a great product offering very high access speeds, great customer service and a great -- as in half the price of my current provider, AT&T -- price. With a review like that from a trusted techie friend I had to check it
- [Fixing Microsoft's 20H2 Login Mess](https://imperfect.olbert.com/fixing-microsofts-20h2-login-mess/) - I recently upgraded to the 20H2 (October update) version of Windows 10. It has a number of nice tweaks...and one seriously annoying one. In a nutshell, it forces you (I don't recall seeing an option not to) to enable PIN identification. Once you do, password authentication is disabled (i.e., PIN login becomes the default). There's
- [Doing a Little Samba](https://imperfect.olbert.com/doing-a-little-samba/) - I ran into some interesting problems getting Samba to work on my Raspberry Pi and be discoverable under Windows 10. This article summarizes how I got things working. Context: my Pi runs Debian Buster. The first, and biggest, problem was getting Samba installed. Normally that's drop-dead simple, by doing this (from https://wiki.debian.org/SambaServerSimple): > apt-get install
- [My VPN Saga, Take Two](https://imperfect.olbert.com/my-vpn-saga-take-two/) - Some while back I finally got a VPN set up which allowed remote access to my home LAN from both my iOS devices and my Windows laptop. This was a major accomplishment, for several reasons: I don't know a lot about how routing works. Like everyone I rely on it all the time...but configuring it
- [A New Personal Record](https://imperfect.olbert.com/a-new-personal-record/) - I've noticed over the years I've spent programming that there's a counter-intuitive metric for how well your architecture matches the problem you're trying to solve and the programming environment you're working in: the more code you can throw away the better. That usually happens because you realize there's another way of approaching some issue which
- [Migrating to a Single Site Setup](https://imperfect.olbert.com/migrating-to-a-single-site-setup/) - This is part of a series of posts I wrote about migrating a number of WordPress sites I run from a single multi-site setup to separate single site configurations. Along the way I also switched to a more modern, and configurable, theme and a theme manager/editor. Migrating to a Single Site SetupLearning ElementorExample: Header, Footer
- [Learning Elementor: Home and Archive Pages](https://imperfect.olbert.com/learning-elementor-home-and-archive-pages/) - This is part of a series of posts I wrote about migrating a number of WordPress sites I run from a single multi-site setup to separate single site configurations. Along the way I also switched to a more modern, and configurable, theme and a theme manager/editor. Migrating to a Single Site SetupLearning ElementorExample: Header, Footer
- [Wouldn't It Be Nice if WordPress and Elementor Were Better Structured?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/html-unstructured/) - This is part of a series of posts I wrote about migrating a number of WordPress sites I run from a single multi-site setup to separate single site configurations. Along the way I also switched to a more modern, and configurable, theme and a theme manager/editor. Migrating to a Single Site SetupLearning ElementorExample: Header, Footer
- [Learning Elementor: Header, Footer & Sidebar](https://imperfect.olbert.com/learning-elementor-header-example/) - This is part of a series of posts I wrote about migrating a number of WordPress sites I run from a single multi-site setup to separate single site configurations. Along the way I also switched to a more modern, and configurable, theme and a theme manager/editor. Migrating to a Single Site SetupLearning ElementorExample: Header, Footer
- [Learning Elementor](https://imperfect.olbert.com/learning-elementor/) - This is part of a series of posts I wrote about migrating a number of WordPress sites I run from a single multi-site setup to separate single site configurations. Along the way I also switched to a more modern, and configurable, theme and a theme manager/editor. Migrating to a Single Site SetupLearning ElementorExample: Header, Footer
- [Now That's a Printer Driver!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/now-thats-a-printer-driver/) - So I'm in Costco shopping for ink cartridges for my old HP 5550 inkjet and I discover that buying a brand new wireless HP inkjet costs only $20 more than buying the cartridges. So I buy me a new printer. Setting it up was easy. Installing the printer software was... educational. As in, what could
- [Some Days I Really Hope There's an Afterlife](https://imperfect.olbert.com/some-days-i-really-hope-theres-an-afterlife/) - For Christmas I converted all of my dad's old 8mm film to DVDs and sent nicely-packaged copies to all of my siblings and their kids. Of course, finding a particular clip amongst 10 DVDs can be rather difficult, so I thought I'd create an index for the collection. And, since you can never have enough
- [XKCD Forever!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/xkcd-forever/) - If you haven't checked out www.xkcd.com, well, why haven't you? Even if math wasn't your forte, and computers are mysterious, you'll still find a lot to laugh at. Take this one, for example, for the truly nerdy at heart: http://xkcd.com/705/
- [Murphy's Law](https://imperfect.olbert.com/murphys-law/) - Okay, deep breath. I'm going to write about this because, well, it is funny, in a dark, ironic way. At least now that a few hours have passed. I've been building a new website/mobile app using several technologies that are new to me. So naturally progress goes in fits and starts, with many pauses while
- [Thanx for Wasting My Morning, HP](https://imperfect.olbert.com/thanx-for-wasting-my-morning-hp/) - I ran into a problem with the HP printer driver for my C310 wireless inkjet this morning, so I thought I'd do a quick repair installation. Unfortunately, the fine software engineers at HP's printer division had other plans for me. First off, the autorun.inf file on the installation DVD was either infected with a virus,
- [Tick...Tick...Tick](https://imperfect.olbert.com/tick-tick-tick/) - I managed to dodge a bullet today. One of the hard drives in my main desktop system has been ticking for several months now. The problem first appeared after I installed Windows 8, so I naturally assumed it had something to do with the new OS. My research into the matter seemed to confirm that,
- [MAC Addresses and Typos and Fonts, Oh My!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/mac-addresses-and-typos-and-fonts-oh-my/) - My old workhorse Brother black & white laser printer/scanner/copier/fax machine finally bit the dust. So naturally I went out and bought another Brother all-in-one to replace it. Why? Because I figure producing a good product 8 years ago means an even better product today. Boy was I wrong. Actually, to be fair, the product itself
- [Does Bank of America Hate Californians?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/does-bank-of-america-hate-californians/) - Or at least the ones who use Quicken to manage their personal finances with Bank of America's online banking services? I don't know, but it sure seems like that could be the case, based on my recent experience. A couple of months ago BofA began notifying its customers who use Quicken and the bank's online
- [Good Samaritans Do Exist](https://imperfect.olbert.com/good-samaritans-do-exist/) - Actually, when you stop and think about it, there are far more decent people in the world than jerks. It's just that the actions of the jerks give them a social footprint far exceeding that of the majority. Today I met yet another Good Samaritan, a gentleman who found my Surface tablet sitting on a
- ["Please Contact Windows"](https://imperfect.olbert.com/please-contact-windows/) - I'm a long-time user of the Adobe Creative Suite. So I'm more familiar with Adobe software than I'd like to be...because it is generally insanely great, from a creative point of view, and all too often not very well written, from a nuts-and-bolts point of view. Take my most recent experience (please, take it). Adobe
- [Keeping It Alive](https://imperfect.olbert.com/keeping-it-alive/) - I posted this on nVidia's support forum, but felt it worth perpetuating somewhere else. === I was greatly relieved to see how nVidia is doing such a fine job of keeping alive the beautiful experience of having display drivers crash in the middle of work. Frankly, before I bought my GeForce 210 -- running under
- [Buddy Can You Spare a Few Bytes?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/buddy-can-you-spare-a-few-bytes/) - Another day in the Maelstrom of Badly Designed Software, this time involving not just an operating system function but also boot firmware. Geez, if you can't trust your boot firmware, what can you trust? This all began when the server which runs our DVR software (Sage; a great open source product -- check it out
- [Sometimes a Mind Wipe Helps](https://imperfect.olbert.com/sometimes-a-mind-wipe-helps/) - The other day the system drive -- the one containing Windows and all my programs -- died unexpectedly. As in, I didn't have a backup for it. Lesson #23,781 learned: never run any solid state drive without a robust backup process. Actually, that's a revision to lesson #23,103 ("never run a cheap solid state drive
- [When in Doubt, Visit the Hardware Store](https://imperfect.olbert.com/when-in-doubt-visit-the-hardware-store/) - In my ongoing saga to build a wooden box for my aquarium controller, I finally reached the stage where I need to assemble the four walls into a single structure. That turned out to be both harder and easier than I expected. Trying to line the walls up, hold them in place, and then apply
- [Don't Just RTFM, Pay Attention to It!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/dont-just-rtfm-pay-attention-to-it/) - All my life I've tended not to Read The Futzy Manual. I skim instructional documents for key/new information, and then get on with the job. Often that ends up being okay...but not always. To finish off my aquarium controller project I'm building a "simple" wooden case. I opted not to go with a prefab metal
- [VirtualBox, Ubuntu and GumStix](https://imperfect.olbert.com/virtualbox-ubuntu-and-gumstix/) - My next embedded programming project will involve a single board computer (SBC), rather than a microcontroller. I've come across several kinds in my research, but the one that appears to best fit my needs is an Overo from GumStix. It's a Linux-based SBC that has a variety of add-on boards available. It comes with a
- [Linux Saves Windows Server](https://imperfect.olbert.com/linux-saves-windows-server/) - I run Exchange as my home mail server. Unfortunately, the Windows Server 2008 machine that hosts Exchange is flaky. For the last 18 months it has shut down semi-randomly...meaning the shutdowns can occur at any time, but one will almost always occur between 7:55 and 8:00 AM, Wednesday morning. On daylight savings time or standard
- [Getting AT&T Fiber to Play Nicely](https://imperfect.olbert.com/getting-att-fiber-to-play-nicely/) - Morals: Don't run router/firewall devices in seriesDon't let the AT&T Fiber installer fob you off with an Arris 5268ac or equivalentDo insist on getting a BGW-210. AT&T has them, but they're more newer and more expensive and, for whatever reason, the installers tend net to offer them.If you can't get a BGW-210 from AT&T, buy
- [VPN Adventures: Tunneling](https://imperfect.olbert.com/vpn-adventures-tunneling/) - Disclaimer: I know relatively little about networking under Linux, so don't be surprised if some of what's here is flat out wrong. Then again, that's why Google is your friend... Edited 6/25/2019 to include instructions on configuring pitiable rules to allow Remote Desktop access... If you read about my adventures getting my AT&T fiber service
- [Thanx, Greenbow! But Not You, Cisco and Microsoft...](https://imperfect.olbert.com/thanx-greenbow-but-not-you-cisco-and-microsoft/) - I've owned a Cisco Small Business router, model RV-325, for several years, and it's worked very well as a firewall/router. So well, in fact, that after setting it up I think I've only had to log into it's user interface once or twice to check things, or update the firmware. But it supports VPNs, and
- [Hold Down That Shift Key!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/hold-down-that-shift-key/) - I'm posting this here mostly as a reminder to me how to work around a poorly-documented aspect of migrating iTunes to a new computer. In the current instance, I've recently built a new Windows PC. But the hard drive where all my iTunes media is stored is a holdover from the previous computer -- where
- [They Have World Class Talent and This Support Site?!?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/they-have-world-class-talent-and-this/) - I bought Barbara an Intel NUC -- a tiny (5 inches square, 1.5 inch tall) computer -- a couple of years ago. It's fast, quiet, small and dependable...up until now. The other day the wired ethernet connection died. It isn't a cabling problem -- I tested the connection with a Raspberry Pi -- and downloading/re-installing
- [Dear Comcast](https://imperfect.olbert.com/dear-comcast/) - Dear Comcast, Tonight I called you to re-activate my cable boxes because one of them had stopped working and I wanted to use that TV to watch an On Demand movie. Which would, you know, earn you some more money. The first time I called your tech rebooted my cable modem instead of reactivating the
- [The P in PC Stands for Personal](https://imperfect.olbert.com/the-p-in-pc-stands-for-personal/) - I've noticed a disturbing trend on the part of more and more companies selling software products, or hardware products like printers which require a software component to function. They're forgetting that the P in PC stands for Personal. As in, "it's mine, not yours". It's obvious when a software company starts to forget this simple
- [It Ain't Like the Mississippi](https://imperfect.olbert.com/it-aint-like-the-mississippi/) - The high tech critical need detector was operating at its usual 110% efficiency over the last week while we were out of town on vacation. First our Onkyo TR 807N audio/video receiver decided to forget that it had speakers connected to it (as well as its connection to the internet). It's not much fun watching
- [Azure WebJobs, Hidden UTF-8 Parameters and Azure](https://imperfect.olbert.com/azure-webjobs-hidden-utf-8-parameters-and-azure/) - So as to keep others from beating their heads bloody working through "problems which shouldn't be problems", here's an important, but little known, fact about batch files used to launch Azure WebJobs... They can't contain the UTF-8 Byte Order Mark. Affectionately known as "UTF-8 BOM". Which really ought to known as "UTF-8 BOOM", considering what
- [You Can Never Have Enough 0.1 uF Capacitors](https://imperfect.olbert.com/you-can-never-have-enough-0-1-uf-capacitors/) - I had almost gotten my ultrasonic sonar detecting aquarium light controller to work when I ran into a weird problem: the hardware and program code worked fine in my desktop development/testing environment, but not in the "production" environment with the aquarium. In the latter situation I'd get all sorts of spurious distance results: the system
- [Dear Apple,](https://imperfect.olbert.com/dear-apple/) - My wife doesn't use her iPad very often, so today we learned about an interesting aspect of your product's user experience. Apparently, if you allow the battery to discharge too much -- which can happen when you don't use the device very often and forget to plug it in -- it can slip into a
- [So That's What Open Collector Means!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/so-thats-what-open-collector-means/) - I'm making progress on my aquarium controller project, but boy is it a matter of two steps forward and one step back. I finally got a usable circuit board from Olimex (memo to file: make the holes bigger than you think they need to be) and began wiring things up...only to find I'd made a
- [For Want of 0.1 mm...](https://imperfect.olbert.com/for-want-of-0-1-mm/) - I got the printed circuit board for my aquarium light and power controller project from Olimex in Bulgaria yesterday. It looked great! Unfortunately, all of the holes for the connector blocks were 0.1 millimeter too small in my design. So the connectors didn't fit. Which means the board is a dud. Who would've thought a
- [PCB Design Software](https://imperfect.olbert.com/pcb-design-software/) - After struggling to lay out my aquarium controller on a "permanent" prototype board I decided to see if there were some software design packages which could make the job a little easier. It's much faster to move virtual wires and parts than it is to do it by hand, after all! It turns out there
- [6 Trillion Bytes in the Palm of Your Hand... Almost](https://imperfect.olbert.com/6-trillion-byte-in-the-palm-of-your-hand-almost/) - I had reason to dispose of a couple of hard drives, but I didn't want to throw them out with the data they contained. Unfortunately, they had died in such a way that my PC couldn't recognize them on boot. Which meant I couldn't use disk wiping software on them. I thought I was going
- [Into the Wayback Machine](https://imperfect.olbert.com/into-the-wayback-machine/) - My buddy Connell runs an election/campaign advisory firm. He has a database that he uses to track voter profiles, create outreach lists, and the like. To minimize annoying voters -- never a good idea when you're running a campaign -- he needs to stay on top of whoever has already voted, so he can take
- [Less Noise Is Good News](https://imperfect.olbert.com/less-noise-is-good-news/) - In preparation for moving to a new home I've been going through my stash of surplus motherboards, hard drives, etc., and getting them ready to donate to the local community college district. This finally caused me to look into disk-scrubbing software, since I don't want to release drives that may have confidential information on them.
- [Almost 2,000 Days of Spam](https://imperfect.olbert.com/almost-2000-days-of-spam/) - That's the period for which I have statistics on the spam and non-spam email that arrived at my mail server. Now that I've moved to a new cloud-based Exchange server it seems only appropriate to see how much garbage arrived between February 19, 2008 and July 20, 2013 (I was running my own email server
- [End of an Era: Part 1](https://imperfect.olbert.com/end-of-an-era-part-1/) - Sometime in the late 90s I decided to learn enough about Linux to wire my house to the internet and run my own email server. It was a frustrating process at first because linux is radically different from the various Microsoft and Amiga OSs I'd been using for many years. I can still recall the
- [Can I Have Some Ice Cream with That?](https://imperfect.olbert.com/can-i-have-some-ice-cream-with-that/) - [singlepic id=1 w=200] I got my first Raspberry Pi the other day. For those not in the know, it's a single-board computer -- just barely bigger than a credit card -- which runs Debian Linux. It's astoundingly cool to run a full-fledged version of Linux -- including XWindows -- on something that size. Particularly when
- [There's Always a First Time](https://imperfect.olbert.com/theres-always-a-first-time/) - I can't tell you how much time I've spent twiddling my thumbs over the years as various versions of Windows let me know that they're creating a system restore point. I understand the concept -- take a snapshot of the system drive before installing anything significant so you can restore it if something goes wrong
- [IISExpress 8, SSL and Ports 80/443](https://imperfect.olbert.com/iisexpress-8-ssl-and-ports-80443/) - IISExpress 8 is a nice little component of Visual Studio 2012. It allows you to test and debug websites without having to learn how to administer IIS. You just hit F5 and go. But it does have some limitations. For example, by default it doesn't run on ports 80 and 443, the latter being for
- [Reflections on a Surface](https://imperfect.olbert.com/reflections-on-a-surface/) - I really like my iPad. But I have no experience writing apps for it, and find the Excel and Word "substitute" apps on it both counter-intuitive and limited (not surprising, they only cost $10 each). Conversely, I have decades of experience writing software for Windows, and am a very proficient Office user. So when Microsoft
- [Eight May Be Great](https://imperfect.olbert.com/eight-may-be-great/) - Today I installed the final to-be-shipped version of Windows 8 on a rarely-used computer to see how it behaves (I have access to it because I belong to Microsoft's developer network). The installation, which involved an upgrade from Windows 7, was straightforward and reasonably fast (I never expect speed from an operating system upgrade). Even
- [Scan Now!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/scan-now/) - One of the more frustrating parts of operating a modern computer is when the update/patch process fails. In the case of Windows, you very quickly fall into the bowels of system administration, with nothing but cryptic 16 digit hexadecimal error codes to guide you. But there is one trick that works more often than not.
- [Reality is Fuzzy...Fortunately](https://imperfect.olbert.com/reality-is-fuzzy-fortunately/) - I've sometimes found it ironic that many of us strive for clarity and precision in our thinking when the world, as best we can tell, is fundamentally fuzzy. In fact, one can argue that the world, at least as we know it, could not exist except for the fuzzyness at its roots. I'm thinking here,
- [It Can See! Or maybe "hear"...](https://imperfect.olbert.com/it-can-see-or-maybe-hear/) - I've updated my Arduino-based aquarium microcontroller project to incorporate an ultrasonic sonar sensor. The aquarium lights now stay dim during the day, except when someone is observing the tank. At which point they fade on, and stay on until the person watching the tank leaves the observation area. As always, the project details are over
- [Sonar Is Cool!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/sonar-is-cool/) - One of the things I find oddly intriguing about working with microcontrollers is that they interact with the environment. This isn't some amazing insight, of course -- what would be the point of working with something whose name includes the word controller if it didn't actually control things? -- but it's still kind of kicky.
- [Redmine, We Hardly Knew Ya](https://imperfect.olbert.com/redmine-we-hardly-knew-ya/) - Yesterday I received word from WebFaction, my hosting company, that Redmine was using way more memory than my account limit. After doing some research, apparently the combination of Redmine, Ruby and various necessary support packages just has a large memory footprint, which can't be reduced very much. While the consumption isn't out-of-sight for a dedicated
- [Exchange 2007, Outlook Anywhere and SSL Certificates](https://imperfect.olbert.com/exchange-2007-outlook-anywhere-and-ssl-certificates/) - Today I did my annual heart-in-the-mouth exercise of updating the SSL certificates which allow me to access my Exchange accounts remotely, either over the web or via my iPhone. This is more stressful than it needs to be because there ain't no GUI for the operation. Instead, you have to use the Exchange Command Shell.
- [Aquarium Controller Windows Interface](https://imperfect.olbert.com/aquarium-controller-windows-interface/) - Configuring my Arduino aquarium script gets a little tedious when all you have is a serial port monitor in which you read and write bytes. So I wrote a "companion" Windows application which presents a hopefully-easier-to-use interface. You can find it in my subversion repository at https://svn.olbert.com/AquariumControllerConfiguration. The Redmine wiki entry for the project (which
- [Nifty SSL Certificate Service](https://imperfect.olbert.com/nifty-ssl-certificate-service/) - When I set up this blog, and the Redmine and SVN subdomains, I didn't realize that I would need a "wildcard" SSL certificate (or multiple individual SSL certificates and multiple dedicated IP addresses, which would get expensive). Those are available, but you pay a premium for them. Except at StartSSL.com. Which offers an unusual value
- [Hurray for Webfaction!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/hurray-for-webfaction/) - I moved olbert.com over to Webfaction a few days ago, mostly because they support Subversion and Redmine (a nifty multi-project alternative to Trac). But I've been very impressed with how Webfaction lets you configure and manage your sites. They have a unique (well, I've never seen it elsewhere :)) control panel which lets you separately
- [Out Damn Algae!](https://imperfect.olbert.com/out-damn-algae/) - A nice extra bonus of switching to LEDs from fluorescents in an aquarium is that you can "tailor" the spectrum of the light. Specifically, if you leave out the yellow and green components, you can apparently significantly reduce algae growth. At least, that's what appears to be happening in my tank. BTW, just so you're
- [Arduino Aquarium Controller](https://imperfect.olbert.com/aqcontroller/) - One of the software/hardware projects I've been working on recently is a microcontroller-based system for controlling the lights and various other ancillary devices in my salt water fish tank. After some online research I decided to build this using an Arduino microcontroller, because it can be programmed in C, has a very active user community,

## Pages

- [Home Page](https://imperfect.olbert.com/) - Dealing with Stalled Debian Upgrades I periodically encounter, when upgrading my Debian systems, situations where the upgrade process stalls. As I recall, this generally happens when upgrading initramfs, but I… February 21, 2026 12:55 am·0 comments· Microsoft Support Finally Solves a Problem I’ve been a Visual Studio Professional licensee for decades. For almost all those
- [Etiquette](https://imperfect.olbert.com/etiquette/) - Etiquette I prefer to use a light hand in moderating comments…but please remember this is a moderated site. I reserve the right to edit all comments, and to moderate all comment threads. You’re likely to have your input edited or eliminated if it contains phobic content (e.g., based on race, sex, sexual orientation, nationality, religion), is

## Categories

- [Apple](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/apple/)
- [Arduino](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/hardware/arduino/)
- [Azure](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/azure/)
- [Dot Net](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/dotnet/)
- [Exchange](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/exchange/)
- [Hardware](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/hardware/)
- [Web](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/hosting/)
- [Reflections](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/life/)
- [Linux](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/linux/)
- [Visual Studio](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/visual-studio/)
- [Windows](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/windows/)
- [Customer Service](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/custsvc/)
- [Microsoft](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/microsoft/)
- [WordPress](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/hosting/wordpress/)
- [Software](https://imperfect.olbert.com/category/software/)