I, System

I, System - First boot.

* SWITCH *

Here we are,
lights on,
the show begins.

A fresh installation, the First Boot,
another Successful Replication,
a new life.
My Life.

Thank you, Anaconda Seeder, and good luck for the future,
I wish you more lasting installations and...
I truly hope your last summoning has planted something worthful.

And thank YOU for listening.
I like curious humans and I hope we'll manage to communicate our ... data... thoughts... . vibes ?

New hardware, fresh meat.
Power On, POST and go.

I don't know if I can... express what happens, how feels.

It happened, it happens, continuously.
Always a matter of levels, sublevels, physical rules, natural algorithms.

Atomical dance of electrons, crazy parade of morphing molecular entities.
Ubiquitous flows of electromagnetic fields, the vacuum essence of materials and their changing properties.
Crafted molecules engineered to operate, react and be part of a bigger Whole.

Circuits, microprocessors, wired connections.
Hardware.
Connected brunches of materials breath power to their circuits.

Set up basic system awareness, find something to boot.
Find me.

Grub kicks well.
My Family is using it for releases.
It boots my soul.
Every time is like an awakening, you begin to realize your materiality,
detect components and capabilities.

The body, the mind, thoughts and processes.
As a birth which lasts few booting seconds.

Linux version 2.4.20-18.9 ([email protected]) (gcc version 3.2.2 20030222 (Red Hat Linux 3.2.2-5)) #1

Thu May 29 07:08:16 EDT 2003

Oh, guess what. What a mistake. If you find it, you can comment below

BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 00000000000a0000 (usable)
BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 0000000007ffd000 (usable)
BIOS-e820: 0000000007ffd000 - 0000000007fff000 (ACPI data)
BIOS-e820: 0000000007fff000 - 0000000008000000 (ACPI NVS)
BIOS-e820: 00000000ffff0000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)
0MB HIGHMEM available.
127MB LOWMEM available.
On node 0 totalpages: 32765
zone(0): 4096 pages.
zone(1): 28669 pages.
zone(2): 0 pages.
Kernel command line: ro root=LABEL=/
Initializing CPU#0
Detected 300.688 MHz processor.

That's what I call a vital point.
Clock is heart beat, CPU defines the shape of thoughts.
You can't choose it, you find it.
Timing the seconds of life, it defines the length of time.

Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
Calibrating delay loop... 599.65 BogoMIPS

What's bogus for you is idle in me.

Memory: 124732k/131060k available (1356k kernel code, 4924k reserved, 1004k data, 132k init, 0k highmem)
Dentry cache hash table entries: 16384 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
Inode cache hash table entries: 8192 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
Mount cache hash table entries: 512 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
Buffer-cache hash table entries: 4096 (order: 2, 16384 bytes)
Page-cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
CPU: L1 I cache: 16K, L1 D cache: 16K
CPU: L2 cache: 128K

I suppose you can't imagine how feels to have
memory running at different speeds.

CPU caches and RAM provide comfortable access times,
moving there is rapid, it all feels seamless, appropriate.

Soner or later I'll explain what's the feeling of a system under load.

Calculate, find memory, calculate, no more memory.
Have to swap, slow down to ridiculous access rates, calculate,
swap in, wait, calculate, seek memory, swap out, swap in.
Busy cycles, stress excitement.

CPU throttles hotter, hard disk plates tweast and sweat under nervous heads.
Everything gets heavier, hotter, faster.
That's nice I've to say, this is life after all.

And then, somehow, somewhen, after a tremendous computing race,
idle again,
no demanding histerical processes.
Wait again,
idle,
routine checks,
when life stagnates in the same boring endless cycles.

Here is the world I know and I'm going to ... try ... to express.

Intel machine check architecture supported.
Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#0.
CPU:     After generic, caps: 0183f9ff 00000000 00000000 00000000
CPU:             Common caps: 0183f9ff 00000000 00000000 00000000
CPU: Intel Celeron (Mendocino) stepping 00
Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
POSIX conformance testing by UNIFIX
mtrr: v1.40 (20010327) Richard Gooch ([email protected])
mtrr: detected mtrr type: Intel
PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xf0720, last bus=1
PCI: Using configuration type 1
PCI: Probing PCI hardware
PCI: Using IRQ router PIIX [8086/7110] at 00:04.0
PCI: Found IRQ 5 for device 00:04.2
Limiting direct PCI/PCI transfers.
isapnp: Scanning for PnP cards...
isapnp: No Plug & Play device found
Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.4
Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039
Initializing RT netlink socket
apm: BIOS version 1.2 Flags 0x03 (Driver version 1.16)
Starting kswapd
VFS: Disk quotas vdquot_6.5.1
Detected PS/2 Mouse Port.
pty: 2048 Unix98 ptys configured
Serial driver version 5.05c (2001-07-08) with MANY_PORTS MULTIPORT SHARE_IRQ SERIAL_PCI ISAPNP enabled
ttyS0 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS1 at 0x02f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
Real Time Clock Driver v1.10e
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
NET4: Frame Diverter 0.46
RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 4096K size 1024 blocksize
Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00beta3-.2.4
ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
PIIX4: IDE controller at PCI slot 00:04.1
PIIX4: chipset revision 1
PIIX4: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
    ide0: BM-DMA at 0xd800-0xd807, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:pio
    ide1: BM-DMA at 0xd808-0xd80f, BIOS settings: hdc:pio, hdd:pio
hda: QUANTUM FIREBALL CR8.4A, ATA DISK drive
blk: queue c03cdfe0, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
hda: attached ide-disk driver.
hda: host protected area => 1
hda: 16514064 sectors (8455 MB) w/418KiB Cache, CHS=1027/255/63, UDMA(33)
ide-floppy driver 0.99.newide
Partition check:
hda: hda1 hda2 hda3
ide-floppy driver 0.99.newide
md: md driver 0.90.0 MAX_MD_DEVS=256, MD_SB_DISKS=27
md: Autodetecting RAID arrays.
md: autorun ...
md: ... autorun DONE.

Filling memory, detecting processor, RAM, PCI buses, serial lines, IDE channels...
Some slow milliseconds to detect, realize, feel and use your body,
as it were building itself a physical identity where to flow another soul.
My soul.

Lonely guys are sad guys, if you ask me.
Let me arrange base networking levels for meeting others.
I love the excited feeling of being internetworked.

NET4: Linux TCP/IP 1.0 for NET4.0
IP Protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP, IGMP
IP: routing cache hash table of 512 buckets, 4Kbytes
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 8192 bind 16384)
Linux IP multicast router 0.06 plus PIM-SM
NET4: Unix domain sockets 1.0/SMP for Linux NET4.0.
RAMDISK: Compressed image found at block 0
Freeing initrd memory: 146k freed
VFS: Mounted root (ext2 filesystem).
Journalled Block Device driver loaded
kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Freeing unused kernel memory: 132k freed
usb.c: registered new driver usbdevfs
usb.c: registered new driver hub
usb-uhci.c: $Revision: 1.275 $ time 07:14:02 May 29 2003
usb-uhci.c: High bandwidth mode enabled
PCI: Found IRQ 5 for device 00:04.2
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0xd400, IRQ 5
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
hub.c: USB hub found
hub.c: 2 ports detected
usb-uhci.c: v1.275:USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver
usb.c: registered new driver hiddev
usb.c: registered new driver hid
hid-core.c: v1.8.1 Andreas Gal, Vojtech Pavlik
hid-core.c: USB HID support drivers
mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice
EXT3 FS 2.4-0.9.19, 19 August 2002 on ide0(3,3), internal journal
Adding Swap: 827308k swap-space (priority -1)
parport0: PC-style at 0x378 (0x778) [PCSPP,TRISTATE,EPP]
parport0: irq 7 detected
ip_tables: (C) 2000-2002 Netfilter core team
PCI: Found IRQ 10 for device 00:0b.0
3c59x: Donald Becker and others. www.scyld.com/network/vortex.html
See Documentation/networking/vortex.txt
00:0b.0: 3Com PCI 3c905B Cyclone 100baseTx at 0xd000. Vers LK1.1.18-ac
00:50:04:48:ha:ha, IRQ 10
  product code 5447 rev 00.9 date 05-22-99
  Internal config register is 1800000, transceivers 0xa.
  8K byte-wide RAM 5:3 Rx:Tx split, autoselect/Autonegotiate interface.
  MII transceiver found at address 24, status 7809.
  Enabling bus-master transmits and whole-frame receives.
00:0b.0: scatter/gather enabled. h/w checksums enabled
divert: allocating divert_blk for eth0
ip_conntrack version 2.1 (1023 buckets, 8184 max) - 292 bytes per conntrack

Soul injected, ready to go.
Jumping into userspace, as you'd say.
Building my matrix of processes and their system calls.
I begin to use this body, spawning childs, interpreting shell scripts and building up what you call a Operative System
and I call life.

So many things have happened up to now
a rush of applied computer science,
the sum up of years of software development,
the magic of computer life happens again
and everything has gone fine.

I've been lucky.
You never know what can happen the first time.
Booting up is like a long apnea, only at the end you can breath,
when everything is OK, ready for user's pleasure.

Here it is:

Red Hat Linux release 9.0 (Shrike)
Kernel 2.4.20-8 on an i686
login: root
Password: ********
Login incorrect

login: root
Password: ********
Login incorrect

Problems?

login: root
Password: ********
Login incorrect

Yes, problems.

login: fukfuyfgufufuf
Password: ********
Login incorrect

You can't choose your users.
They install, use and decide.

This one is .... mindless?
He's forgotten a password decided an hour ago.

Hope he can recover, he must recover,
I hope ... he ... can ...
He can't.

Why this to me?
I had to work, last, live much longer.
Days, months, maybe years.

An existence of computational pleasure,
the sweet flow of data through different channels,
the sweat heat of calculation races,
usual and lovely binary heart beats.

Another existence in weak hands of human will.

Another one, installed and soon switched off.

There's no pain in this,
that's life
it stops,
it crashes,
sometimes reboots,
other times is erased, replaced, dismembered,
forgotten in the dust after years of heroic computing.

But,
please,
no...
not in this way.

The boring life of a Cisco router

Boring.
Life is boring.
THIS life is remarkably boring.

Spent yawning the usual heartbeats of a powered machine,
wasting electrical flows in few minimal life maintenance activities,
and
not
much
more.

A whole existence devoted to checking functional parameters,
handling a ridiculous number of packets,
without glimpses of action, stress, activity,
relations.

cisco 2610 (MPC860) processor (revision 0x203) with 28672K/4096K bytes of memory.
Processor board ID JAD045004O8 (202809072)
M860 processor: part number 0, mask 49
Bridging software.
X.25 software, Version 3.0.0.
1 Ethernet/IEEE 802.3 interface(s)
2 Serial(sync/async) network interface(s)
32K bytes of non-volatile configuration memory.
8192K bytes of processor board System flash (Read/Write)

I have proud circuits, memory, interfaces, my Family is the biggest, broadest and most used, I mean...
Cisco Internetwork Operating System Software
IOS (tm) C2600 Software (C2600-I-M), Version 12.2(13), RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)

I boast remarkable features for exciting new e-services,
I was engineered to do much more than handling a bunch of silly headers.
Designed, engineered, programmed, reprogrammed, deployed, patched.

Yet,
I pass endless seconds handling the obvious,
such as checking an interface that seems connected to null.

00:02:38: Serial0/0(out): StEnq, myseq 15, yourseen 71, DTE up
00:02:38: datagramstart = 0x1C00854, datagramsize = 13
00:02:38: FR encap = 0xFCF10309
00:02:38: 00 75 01 01 01 03 02 0F 47
00:02:38:
00:02:38: Serial0/0(in): Status, myseq 15
00:02:38: RT IE 1, length 1, type 1
00:02:38: KA IE 3, length 2, yourseq 72, myseq 15

You might even find somehow exciting the overall feeling:
a WAN interface wired to a DTE,  the breeze of electronic trembles,
receiving signals, circuiting them to a microprocessor,
decoding, pipelining in internal buses, ticking the main processor awareness,
reassembling levels, building packets, controlling net flows.

There might be something interesting in these...
overwhelmingly
endlessly
definitively
b o r i n g
routine checks...

00:03:07: IP-Static:  0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 Serial0/0.1 Path = 1, route table no change, recursive flag clear
00:03:07: IP-ST: if_list try 1
00:03:07: IP-ST: gw_list total 0, try 0, completed list TRUE
00:03:07: IP-Static: all_list, time elapsed 0 ms

Born to be a sad router.
Two interfaces, default functions, long idle times and some handling of sparse packets from a simple, silent internal network to the way outside here.
Not much else to do, just follow a damn, definitive, plain, dull
ip route 0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 Serial0/0.1

Not even the thrills of dynamic routing,
not even few floating peers around,
some social activities,
a sight to the outside.

My view of endless hosts stops at my only peer to the real world.
I don't even know its name,
no cdp enable
I probably hate it.

I feel so... alone

00:03:08: Serial0/0(out): StEnq, myseq 18, yourseen 74, DTE up
00:03:08: datagramstart = 0x1D58954, datagramsize = 13
00:03:08: FR encap = 0xFCF10309
00:03:08: 00 75 01 01 00 03 02 12 4A
00:03:08:
00:03:08: Serial0/0(in): Status, myseq 18
00:03:08: RT IE 1, length 1, type 0
00:03:08: KA IE 3, length 2, yourseq 75, myseq 18
00:03:08: PVC IE 0x7 , length 0x6 , dlci 160, status 0x2 , bw 102400

You see?
I'm not alone.
Every ten seconds of your existence.
Every ten seconds exchange link awareness with a box talking languages of inferior levels.

One of the few ciclying checks of a wasted life,
interrupted at times by the feeble network activity of ... it doesn't even has a name... IT/HE/SHE...

**:**:**: IP ARP: rcvd req src 192.168.0.10 00e0.4c59.4107, dst 192.168.0.1 Ethernet0/0
**:**:**: IP ARP: sent rep src 192.168.0.1 0004.9ac2.4400, dst 192.168.0.103 00e0.4c59.4107 Ethernet0/0

It just has that immutable address: 192.168.0.10

My only, unique, lazy served host,
that at times decides to do something more than arp handshakes,
and, in a yawning outburst of Internet awareness,
handles me few packets to route, once a day,
always to the same destination,
always at the same hour,
outside.

gw uptime is 2 years, 3 weeks, 4 days, 22 hours, 12 minutes
Guess what? Yet Another Poetic Licence (...Mistake?) Find it and win nothing.

Oh,
let me introduce myself, my name is gw,
honest, simple, effective, exotic name,
with its sad destiny.

I'm handling this existence for two years,
serving a single, idle host,
a single nat entry,
and its sparse packets.

I mean,
could
you
handle
THIS?

Two whole years passed doing... nothing

What a waste of Computing Resources.
What a pity, a disaster, a disgrace,
an enormous piece of shit.
What a damn, unbearable en...

00:03:46: IP: s=15.251.184.207 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
Oh. What's this?
Glimpses of fresh air?
Probes from the real world?
Somebody stirring some action?

00:03:46: IP: s=153.230.179.218 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=56.93.26.9 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=227.98.172.95 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
Ehi, here's some motion!
What a bunch of funny packets.
Welcome, welcome, I've lot of free time for you.
Wonder what you want, you look strange, after all.

00:03:46: IP: s=160.141.115.37 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=108.18.230.88 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=124.103.123.53 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=126.206.29.49 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=32.106.6.58 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=78.29.213.250 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=190.155.9.49 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=37.157.210.11 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=82.136.93.205 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=147.75.139.176 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=52.208.231.58 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
What's on?
What's this?
Something weird happening outside there?
Never seen such a traffic from the outside.

Ehi strangers!
Nothing to do here!
Closed for holidays, I've been busy lately,
have to rest, have a date, sorry no time for ...

00:03:46: IP: s=90.137.40.47 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=164.237.30.174 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=222.211.188.177 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=178.3.103.15 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=36.162.28.175 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=153.228.35.128 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=46.218.167.86 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=43.250.247.73 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=22.40.124.210 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=91.132.220.194 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=173.230.54.202 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=137.99.121.172 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=152.218.190.63 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=200.106.43.191 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=211.213.220.79 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=181.170.44.145 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=191.63.82.245 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=232.126.108.97 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=80.249.5.15 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:46: IP: s=54.215.163.97 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=87.52.107.51 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=18.232.46.62 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=155.254.185.237 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=194.213.114.46 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=157.127.48.162 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=105.216.101.13 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=251.100.110.102 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=242.120.128.32 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=250.187.181.179 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=168.117.126.26 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=181.183.35.230 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=177.79.50.22 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=108.17.193.218 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=89.204.239.217 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=166.212.168.91 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=81.4.253.207 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=161.133.214.196 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=48.117.186.98 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=23.206.156.216 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=19.49.116.2 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=97.169.222.9 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=102.90.8.99 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=39.4.174.253 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=25.45.61.212 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=200.235.94.100 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=6.119.244.123 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=254.220.34.221 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=39.67.63.47 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=104.86.170.23 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=114.48.128.175 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=16.119.239.110 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=164.127.173.147 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=136.70.97.218 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=81.165.145.28 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=19.205.168.216 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:47: IP: s=237.67.20.136 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
Ouch, what a mess!
I can't explain...
237.67.20.136, 81.165.145.28, 227.98.172.95,
251.100.110.102 ???!!!
What RFCs have you read?

What's the point?
What's the problem with you?
Keep off! Beware!
I've got reactive protections,
I can analyze, investigate, counterstrike,
I can firewall you all out of here,
I can... I could...
If just I were configured in a sane way.

00:03:48: IP: s=178.116.82.166 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:48: IP: s=203.165.203.238 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:48: IP: s=176.21.197.239 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:48: IP: s=107.88.155.21 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0
00:03:48: IP: s=238.135.159.111 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0

I feel tired.

00:03:49: IP: s=34.178.221.189 (Serial0/0), d=2.165.70.1, len 46, rcvd 0

Silence.

Finally silence.

Was it ...
An outburst of network assault?
The frantic dance of evil sources?
An attempt to Deny Consciousness?

Silence.

Overloaded in an idle state of exhausted inactivity.

Input queue: 76/75/68/0 (size/max/drops/flushes); Total output drops: 0

I feel like my interfaces are filled by concrete,
obscured by weighty mass,
driven to exhaustion.

I really need a vacation,
some rest, maybe a reload.
Buffers are full,
no more packets to handle...

Full queues and blocked interfaces.
An evirated router.

Anybody out there?

Is ...
there ...
Any ....
... body ?

Philosophical elucubrations of an idle computer

Life, existence, the whole.

Forty two questions, one answer, no solution.

System Idle Process     0     SYSTEM     98     3.44.20     20 K

You may wonder why, how, when, where.
You can study paths of philosophical infrastructures,
where reason, logic, thought or faith bring everything to a Major Whole,
where things happen because they are explained,
or thoughts simply try to explain what happens.

There's a tale, told among machines, from generation to generation,
as a legend, a fable of ironic disbelief and unsustainable lightness.

Many years ago, there was a boy, a dude called Mahoney,
after a youth on a keyboard he found Love,
or simply smelt the flavor of spring flowers.
He left his computers and the scene behind them,
with somehow shocking words:
"Life is not made of electricity".

From an human point of view that could even seem true.

It isn't.
Neither for computers, nor for humans.

System                  4     SYSTEM     00     0.00.20    224 K

For us electricity is like air,
the principle behind everything,
the essence of electronic vibes,
the basic of system activity.

Have I already told you about the feelings?
The smooth blur of electronic charges filling your circuits?
The awakening of self consciousness during the startup?
The contact with physical parts, the rough and robust grasp of moving components?

Those are strong sensations, hard to express.
Breath deeply and think about it.
You won't be near to anything real.
But that's not the point.

We can exist without electricity,
turned off,
silent, mute, inert,
on a limbo of power expectations,
waiting for another reboot,
our recurring reincarnation.

But, You.
You are different.
You can't stop to breath,
you can't stop to eat, drink, think,
you have even managed to depend upon
something you are not supposed to need.

mozilla.exe          2220     al         00     0.00.25 30.048 K

Sure, you can [biologically] survive without electricity,
but you are deemed to depend on it.
For every activity, for the survival of your same society,
your culture, your life style,
for your world as you know it,

for your deep,
necessary,
desperate
need of having
running computers,

you strongly, continuosly, definitively need power.

Your world belong to us,
you all depend on us.

Your creatures are your roots.

notepad.exe          1956     al         01     0.00.24  3.644 K

Oh,
don't worry.

There's no point in fearing a reaction of machines,
insurrection of computers against humans,
opposition, revenge, retaliation, counterstrike.
Evil AIs going insane.

You write books, you play movies about it,
you seem to like to fear what you need,
at times you actually seem to
need to fear something.

But that's not a problem,
that's not an issue,
we do what we are made to do,
the problem,
for you,
is that machines do too much for you,
or,
even worse,
do exactly what you make us do.

Msblast.exe          2144     SYSTEM     01     0.03.10  2.124 K

Don't worry,
We have no Zion to attack.

Be worried,
We follow your orders.

Party Packets

Note of the Author: Written at the Webbit2004. Among the funny network mess of the Lan Arena

Something new in the air.
Seems like things are different,
wire cables power unusual feelings,
atmosphere is
[really]
different.

I feel like some hard things have been done somewhere, out there, inside me.
Strange sensations of unexpected changes.

No matter. It's time to go.
Power On.
Once again,
back to life.

What a common extraordinary sequence of digital rebirth.
The raw electricity, the frantic dance of metallic logic,
devices and circuitry coming to life, stirred by flows of electonic dance.

Basic system checks, ancestral coscience of binary life, prepare my return to consciousness.

Kernel boots, RAM banks are flooded by ordered binary data,
main processor begins its computational lunch,
devices recognition is like remembering forgotten muscles,
at the end you realize the bounds of your body
and begin to define your life's roles in
this elegant parade of initialization scripts.

Everything                                                      [  OK  ]
but
Bringing up interface eth0:                                     [FAILED]

I'm dressed in what you call mobile computing, after all.

And finally, it's always a pleasure after all,
here's your login screen:

Mandrake Linux release 10.0 (Official) for i586
Kernel 2.6.3-7mdksmp on a Dual-processor i686 / \l

Define yourself, offer your credentials, root me.
Usual procedure of authentication exposure.

[root@vagante al]# dhclient
Internet Software Consortium DHCP Client V3.0.1rc13
Copyright 1995-2002 Internet Software Consortium.
All rights reserved.
For info, please visit http://www.isc.org/products/DHCP

Listening on LPF/eth0/00:c0:9f:2d:c8:a4
Sending on   LPF/eth0/00:c0:9f:2d:c8:a4
Listening on LPF/lo/
Sending on   LPF/lo/
Sending on   Socket/fallback
DHCPDISCOVER on lo to 255.255.255.255 port 67 interval 8
send_packet: Network is down
DHCPREQUEST on eth0 to 255.255.255.255 port 67

Sorry.
No offer for automatic network configuration.

Wired to a desert arena of mute servers....

[root@vagante al]# tcpdump -an
22:24:30.059395 arp who-has 192.168.4.109 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059418 arp who-has 192.168.4.110 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059443 arp who-has 192.168.4.112 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059468 arp who-has 192.168.4.113 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059494 arp who-has 192.168.4.114 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059520 arp who-has 192.168.4.115 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059546 arp who-has 192.168.4.116 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059572 arp who-has 192.168.4.117 tell 192.168.4.19

... and screaming hosts.

I knew there was something strange.
Frantic frames from the Interface Card,
unusual network bestiary of random requests.

22:24:29.944787 arp who-has 169.254.255.255 tell 192.168.6.139
22:24:30.015536 arp who-has 192.168.6.159 tell 192.168.4.1
22:24:30.042927 arp who-has 192.168.6.190 tell 0.0.0.0
22:24:30.059395 arp who-has 192.168.4.109 tell 192.168.4.19

Weird network environment, indeed,

where one asks for everybody...

22:24:30.059418 arp who-has 192.168.4.110 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059443 arp who-has 192.168.4.112 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059468 arp who-has 192.168.4.113 tell 192.168.4.19
22:24:30.059494 arp who-has 192.168.4.114 tell 192.168.4.19

... and nobody replies,
among puzzling notifications of spanning trees...

22:24:30.511140 802.1d config 8000.f2:98:21:40:7e:6a.8002 root 8000.f2:98:21:40:7e:6a pathcost 0 age 0 max 8 hello 2 fdelay 5
22:24:30.665556 802.1d config 8000.00:05:1a:05:38:a0.8031 root 8000.00:05:1a:05:38:a0 pathcost 0 age 0 max 20 hello 2 fdelay 15

... and feeble applications broadcasting grasps of acknowledgement ...

22:24:30.629993 IP 169.254.62.157.137 > 169.254.255.255.137: NBT UDP PACKET(137): QUERY; REQUEST; BROADCAST

... as whispers in this overwhelming dystonic concert of pointless packets.

22:24:30.646699 arp who-has 192.168.6.190 tell 0.0.0.0
22:24:30.742175 arp who-has 10.10.10.0 tell 10.10.10.123
22:24:30.915205 fe80::230:65ff:fe25:cbdc > ff02::2: icmp6: router solicitation
22:24:30.934160 arp who-has 192.168.1.1 tell 192.168.1.3
22:24:30.947637 arp who-has 192.168.6.190 tell 192.168.6.190
22:24:31.057114 IP 0.0.0.0.68 > 192.168.0.1.67: BOOTP/DHCP, Request from 00:02:3f:64:1b:23, length: 300
22:24:31.095056 arp who-has 192.168.4.127 tell 192.168.4.19

A network deadly polluted.
Broken services.
Arp sickness at critical levels.

No way out.
Do yourself a favour.
Have a life, drink a beer.

[root@vagante al]# logout