Umbral Echoes Blog

This post relates to Subversion, a version control system. This is used most commonly in programming to allow multiple programmers to work on the same set of files at the same time without stepping on each other’s toes. It also lets you “roll back” your code to any point in time, so if you screw something up, it’s ultra easy to go back to the point before that.

Some writers also use this sort of things to keep copies of their writing, and then if they change/remove something that they later decide they shouldn’t have, it’s easy to peek back at what it was like.

Anyway, sometimes when dealing with Subversion, you might get an error like this when trying to run svn update:

svn: Checksum mismatch for ‘/path/to/repository/.svn/text-base/some-file.php.svn-base’; expected: ‘e5b110ec4409891e81f38203d45e4f5d’, actual: ‘c84a851f87b9b62934b44adc457dcfd0’

There are two fixes for this.  The first is to just delete the directory containing the code where the checksum mismatch is (including the .svn directory below it), and run svn update again from one directory up. But if, like me, the checksum mismatch is in the base directory and it’s inconvenient to do that*, there is another solution. Basically you will check out a fresh copy of the affected directory, and copy over the SVN file with the checksum error.

1. Check out a new copy of the repository in some other directory. If the problem is in a subdirectory, you only have to check out that subdirectory.
2. Rename the file mentioned above (the one with the checksum error, /path/to/repository/.svn/text-base/some-file.php.svn-base in this example) to add -bak on the end of it.  It’s always good to have a backup.
3. Copy that file from the working copy you created in step 1 to your “real” repository location.
4. Run svn update to see if it works. If not, make sure that in step 3 you copied the file to the correct directory (it needs to go under the .svn/text-base/ directory).
5. Once that works, you can delete the other working copy you checked out, as well as the -bak file you created.

I’m putting this here in the hopes that Google will index this, and someone else with the same problem might find it useful.

* In my case, I have a lot of images and other things that need to be there, but that aren’t in the SVN repository, so just wiping it out and checking out a whole new working copy of the repository doesn’t really work.

A few weeks ago, I went to a MySQL training seminar focused on developing and tuning high-availability applications with MySQL, hosted by Percona and paid for by my work. It was an extremely informative seminar. We’ve hired the people at Percona before as our database ninjas, as I like to call them. They are not at all cheap to hire for consulting, but they are absolutely worth every penny. These guys live and breathe MySQL.

Anyway, I took away some good tidbits from the session, but more than that I gleaned some good general philosophies. For example, when diagnosing a problem first make sure it’s really a problem. If only a few users are experiencing it intermittently, then maybe it’s not worth 40 man-hours to investigate and fix. Another tips is: have good instrumentation. Don’t take educated guesses as to what might be slow — build in some metrics so that you can see exactly where a problem is.

A lot of this stuff is still sinking in, but I’ve already started putting some of it to use immediately. Good company investment, and a good personal investment too.

I was supposed to be in… well, Paris right now. We had scheduled a work trip to London, Paris, Toulouse, and Madrid from the 15th through the 24th. However, the volcano gods of Iceland had different plans. By the way, have you seen some of these pictures? They’re surreal.

Because London was shut down, I had them reroute me to France, but the next available flight there wasn’t until the next day. So I got stuck in Chicago overnight, but that was actually sort of fun since I got to see a couple of friends that I’d not seen since GenCon, Alix and Mark, and got to meet both Alix’s husband John and her good friend Dave. Alix and John were nice enough to put me up for the night, and there was much drinking of beer and geeky revelry (my favorite kind!). I even helped Alix play Magic, which I haven’t touched in… man, probably about 8 years now.

Anyway, this might work out for the better anyway; we’re attempting to reschedule for June, so the weather will be much better. In the previous trip, half of it was screwed up due to mis-schedulings, and we can avoid that this time around. Also, my Hotwire-fu failed and we ended up getting a hotel in London that was a mile from the tube — definitely suboptimal. I’m not even sure if we’ll hit London the next time around, since that was a somewhat last-minute change to hit a wargaming convention anyway (which we learned was actually the next weekend). I hope we’ll be able hit it next time, and on a Saturday since there’s apparently some great goth club action in London on Saturday nights.

On the downside, American Airlines lost track of my luggage. There were some expensive articles of clothing in there, the total value of everything in the four-digit range. I can’t really blame them too much, since the cancelled European flights caused all sorts of chaos. On the upside, as of today they finally found the luggage and it’s on its way back to me.

In late April (edit: Yes, April — I originally said August, but it is April), my boss is going to Europe to talk to some European publishers. I will be coming with him to answer tech questions.

The plan is to fly into London, take a train to Paris, train to Toulouse, train to Madrid, then fly back home. The trip will last about 10 days total, and with nearly 5 days of that being taken up with flying/trains, that doesn’t leave much time to spare for fun stuff and sightseeing. But, we will do our best to squeeze some in, and I will post pictures as I can.

I didn’t go to a single damn panel this year. There was lots of partying, drinking, and… well, that sort of thing.

We stayed in the Hyatt this year, and I have to say that having a balcony is very awesome. It was good for socializing so that everyone wasn’t in one loud heap, and also let the smokers go out to smoke without having to leave the room. I have heard good things about the Westin though, and from a brief stint there trying to find a room party (and failing), it looked to be quite a nice hotel. So perhaps I’ll have to have a look at their rooms and prices for next year. Would also be nice not having to deal with the convention elevators. This year the Hyatt updated their elevators I think though, because when we had a full load it went straight to the bottom floor instead of stopping on every single floor as in years past. Made the elevator wait time more like 15 minutes instead of 30-45 minutes.

Sean doing body shots off of Cary

I didn’t really expect my room to be a party room, but these things happen. I could not have predicted some of the things that happened, as seen to the right, but everyone had fun. 🙂 I was very glad to see my GenCon friends Daniel (aka Frodo) and Lia there, as well as Stephanie and Shawn, and Kirstie and Shaun, and Corinne and Sean and… holy crap, I know too damn many of those Sean guys, and every damn one of them spells it differently! Sean Fannon was holding the Court of Bedlam, in which I was bequeathed the Count of Carousing, and also assistant barkeep. I mixed some drinks, and they were… well, let’s just say stronger than I intended. However, that was perfect for the Court. These are not amateur drinkers. They like their vodka crans to taste like vodka with a hint of cranberry.

I think the most memorable night was MC Chris’s birthday party on Sunday night. I had just the right amount of booze for a good buzz, the atmosphere was very high-energy, I saw an old friend from Colorado, hung out with Loryn and other good friends, and afterwards my friend DJ Catt Ninetails spun some 80’s music, and there was impromptu dancing by attractive women on stage. I’m a sucker for cute dancers, especially if they’re in thongs.

I won’t bore you with the mundane details, but some other random highlights include my (well technically, Loryn’s) luggage breaking due to being overloaded with booze, condom balloons, and finding that there is a leather clothing maker about 1/2 mile from where I live.  Also, chicks kissing.  Can you dig it?  I said, “CAN YOU DIG IT?!”  10 movie geek points if you get the reference without doing a web search.

Yes, I hardly blog any more.  Just don’t have the drive — mostly it’s my own OCD that demands I include various pictures and so forth, which honestly just takes a lot of time.  However, a friend asked if I had blogged about GenCon, and maybe the other two of you who read this might like to see some pictures and hear about it too.  So I blog.

Dicebagging

This year GenCon was a little different for me.  In previous years, I’d gone with Lydia and Dustin, and awesomeness ensued.  The picture at left has a brief story behind it, for example.  First night of GenCon, and our room was making a ruckus.  A random passer-by (who we now know as Frank) with an amazing beard and mustache popped his head in and said, “You people sound like you’re having fun; mind if I join in?”  Of course we invited him in.  At some point a few minutes thereafter, someone (I think it was Frank, but I can’t remember for sure) suggested the idea of dicebagging.  Like the geek version of teabagging, you see.  I jumped up, and proceeded to dicebag the hell out of Lydia — what a great sport she is!

This is just one example, and Lydia and Dustin seemed to be co-catalysts to many fun and zany moments such as this.  This year, neither were there — Lydia because she is doing noble things with the Peace Corps in Swaziland, and Dustin due to monetary issues.  There were other awesome cohorts there, sharing hotel space, but they tend to do their own thing, as do I, and our paths cross at irregular intervals.

So, lacking my Dustin and Lydia, I did more work-oriented things this year.  There were several sushi dinners, and things of that nature, but I’ll just hit the notable points.

Thursday night was BeerCon (yes, I said BeerCon), hosted by OneBookShelf and Goodman Games, held at The Slippery Noodle.  On the downside, I had to miss True Dungeon to do it.  there was a small SNAFU at the door — apparently it was a blues night with a cover charge, whcih caused some confusion.  Also, the BeerCon event was quite popular, and the downstairs room we were in was packed to the gills, and pretty noisy.  On the good side, there were cool people there, and I got to have a few drinks on the company (as did everyone else).  Talked to Eddy Webb at White Wolf, my coworker Sean Fannon — no wait, that’s Sean Patrick Fannon.  He really should introduce himself that way, a la James Bond.  “Sean Fannon.  Sean Patrick Fannon, at your service.”

Brave New World concert

Friday night was the Brave New World concert hosted by Reactor 88 Studios and Matt Forbeck, featuring some video previews of the movie and a live performance by Makeshift Prodigy.  The band was decent, but the lead singer actually had a pretty good set of pipes (in my admittedly unprofessional opinion).  After that there was a get-together at Subterra Lounge.  It was a trendy club, pretty small, but the drinks weren’t too expensive, and the bartender was good about getting drinks.  For me, anyway — it helps to tip well. 🙂  Got to talk to some old acquaintances, like Will Hindmarch, former Vampire developer for White Wolf.  He’s doing some independent projects right now, which seem to be getting a fair amount of traction.

After that, we (my boss, Will, and a few others) went and had some drinks at a cigar and scotch bar with the White Wolf crew.  I had some Oban, which is a single malt scotch that I remember being very smooth.  What I was given at this place did not taste smooth, to the extent that I wondered if it was Oban at all.  It tasted more like a Jameson, or maybe even Laphroaig, but definitely not Oban.  I managed to pace myself to avoid drunkenness at least.

Here you might note that so far, I haven’t mentioned playing any games, or anything other than drinking or carousing.  Well, that’s because I pretty much drank and caroused all weekend long.  I played one game, the card game Munchkin, on Saturday for the first time ever.  That was the only gaming I did.  However, that was quite fun, and I got some random swag from it due to a passing-by staff member who was giving swag to whomever was currently winning games.  I played with hotel room-mate Mark, and his friends Paul and Alix.  We had lots of fun with it, though we didn’t have long because of the weekend’s big event: the White Wolf party.

Alix and Me

Yes, the White Wolf party.  The highlight of GenCon.  The night where the drinks are free, the hot goths are out, and inhibitions are hiding in the corner curled up into a little ball.  Within the first five minutes I was groped, and had my ass critiqued by a group of people whose goal in the night was to get their friend laid.  I try to stay away from former coworkers though.  Except Chris McDonough.  If you’re reading this Chris, you know I always reserve the manlove for you.

The club had two floors, various beds and sofas, and a dance floor on each level pumping the goth/industrial/new wave/whatever.  I think I’m developing a tolerance to Captain and Coke, because after 5 of them (not lightly poured, either) in fairly quick succession, I was barely feeling buzzed.  I mingled, drank, and dragged Alix onto the dance floor.  Okay, she was willing, but it sounds better if I say I dragged her onto the dance floor.  Caveman style.  Our friend Mark was apparently having a rough night, but I’ll be damned if I let anyone not have fun around me, and Alix and I managed to cheer him up some.  Kung Fu makes everyone happy, I’m just sayin’.  I also forced Paul to chug water.  He doesn’t drink, he is skinnier than I am, and he was tore up.  I knew he’d be hating himself the next day, and sure enough, I got some profuse thanks for practically forcing the water down his throat.

Mark and Cate

Overall this year’s party was more tame than in previous years.  There was no impromptu photo shoot like last year, wherein I was told to get my ass over there, take off my shirt, and pose with random goth girl.  There were no antics with kickballs and street signs that had been drunkenly torn up out of the street, nor breaking into hotel swimming pools and proceeding to breaking the pool.  There was, however, an afterparty for a limited number of people in the penthouse suite at the Omni, which was fun but crowded.  A couple of friends I brought with me designated themselves as bartenders, and apparently were very well-liked for that — also, they got a fair chunk of change in tips.  Broken bottles notwithstanding.  The suite was well-stocked with alcohol and mixers; these people are professionals.  Nothing of note really happened there, other than it being packed like sardines, and security being called for the noise disturbance and breaking up the party.  Oscar Garza has a psychic sense about these things — a few minutes before the pigs came, he said, “I’m leaving before the police get here.”

Sunday, as per usual, was pretty low-key.  People leaving early, checking out of hotels, some farewell dinners and so forth.  It was sad to say goodbye to friends both old and new, but several of them will be at DragonCon.  And that, my friends, is where the real party is at.

Featuring our beloved PhotoGnome.

I haven’t really felt like writing much recently — I suppose I’ve just been preoccupied with too many other things in life.

The big news is that my company has decided to ditch the office, so I am now working remotely full-time.  I’m still doing a weekly face-to-face lunch meeting, because I think face time is important, but other than that I’m chillin’ at home during the workday.  This week has been the first week of that, and it’s definitely taking some mental adjustments, but I’m really happy about this change.

This also means that I will have much more flexibility to visit a lot of my friends.  Aside from those weekly meetings (which I can skip from time to time), it really doesn’t matter whether I’m working from my house or Istanbul, as long as I can keep the same working schedule as the other employees.

In other news, I was invited to a Halloween party at the Playboy mansion.  Sadly, it’s a bit late notice and the person who invited me really didn’t have his ducks in a row, so I’m not going to be able to make it.  Which is a pity, since it looked quite cool — professional set creators had designed a haunted house, actors walking around in zombie makeup, Paul Oakenfold spinning (though I am told by a very reliable source that Oakenfold got pwnt by the DJ Sarah Collins when spinning in a club in Seattle), and of course boobs galore.  I was seriously considering getting a captain’s hat and going as the Motorboat Captain.  Feel free to use that one at your own Halloween parties — so long as it’s not one I’ll be at, in which case I reserve the right to that idea.

On the plus side, this guy pretty much has a standing invite, and the New Years party is looking good.

I’m getting more into World of Warcraft, and will be even more so when Wrath of the Lich King comes out.  When I went to Doug’s wedding in Louisville a few weekends ago, the old gang decided to get back together in an online fashion on the Baelgun server.  I’ll have to roll a Deathknight so I can get a head-start to 55, but I was wanting to do that anyway.  It will be awesome to be in better contact with the guys again.

I hear Fable 2 is the new hotness.  I wish I had more time for gaming.  But when faced with the choice of going out with friends or staying at home and watching a TV screen, I generally take the former.  And in the case of the latter… well, aforementioned Warcrack tends to take up that time.

Anyway, if you’re reading this, and would like me to come visit at some point, toss me an email and I’ll work something out.  Sis, you’re at the top of my list.

After having gone through a metric fuck-ton of resumés, many first-round interviews, and a sum total of only three people who got to the technical interview (two of which bombed it), it’s become apparent to me that my current workplace simply can’t replace me.  At least, not without a lot of luck — it’s nearly impossible to find someone with the necessary management skills and tech skills, who will be willing to work for the salary that they can afford.  They got lucky with me originally because I was a White Wolf fan boy, and not quite yet out of engineering school when they hired me.  So I was willing to take (far) less-than-average pay for the job.

So, seeing the writing on the wall, I gave the company owners two options.  One: July 30th, hell or high water, would be my last day.  Two: I remain with the company, contingent upon certain non-negotiable demands being met.

They chose option 2, and I’m satisfied that I will be able to find the personal and professional growth that I’ve felt has been lacking in my current position.  In fact, they went above and beyond my demands — for example, I demanded a raise, they gave me a bigger raise, saying they thought I deserved more.  As well as the promise of “decent-sized raises, especially in the next two review periods.”

This was a really tough decision to make — the White Wolf guys really are like family to me, and I’ve always wanted to be a game programmer (specifically, for RPGs). And the perks of working for White Wolf are nothing to sneeze at: on-staff chef providing free breakfast and lunch daily (and dinner two nights a week), cool-ass custom-made gothic “cubicles” (more like 4-man work areas), the most awesome work environment in the history of man, full benefits package with healthcare included in salary, a gym, a never-empty keg fridge in one of the conference room named “The Enabler,” monthly alcohol-soaked cookouts, etc. And more than anything, I miss my old boss, Chris McDonough. Having an awesome boss makes any job palatable, and having an awesome boss at an awesome company is exponentially better.

It is still possible that I might go in that direction eventually; I’ll be keeping my ear to the ground for possible college grads whom we might be able to train up to replace me. But if that does happen, it won’t be any time soon.

This does take a lot of stress off of me, though. In addition to everything else that’s been weighing on me lately, I was trying to learn a new programming language, and I’ve felt split in too many directions at once. That’s really been getting to me these past few months — I really can’t accept performing at anything less than my best, and I’ve been too unfocused to do my job as effectively as I can. Also, I won’t have to worry about money quite so much any more, which is another big weight off my shoulders. This means that I should be able to visit some of you that I wouldn’t otherwise be able to, even if it’s just for a weekend trip.

Overall, I feel as if there’s a weight off of my shoulders, but at the same time I feel a sense of loss.  But though I won’t be around the White Wolf crew on a daily basis, I am still invited to the company parties at least.

So tonight, for the first time in… I don’t know how long, I had a meal that wasn’t microwavable, drinkable, or even fast-foody.  I also learned that every Tuesday and Thursday night, White Wolf provides a very tasty home-cooked dinner for any employee who wants it.  This is in addition to providing breakfast and lunch daily.  Good food and balanced meals, not just standard cafeteria faire of soup, sandwich, and meatloaf.

It is amazing what a difference a good meal can make.  Physically, I feel better than I have in months.  Psychiatrists prescribe people pills to make them feel better because no one is willing to eat a healthy, balanced diet, and exercise regularly.  I’ve got the exercise down, but honestly I am pretty damn lazy when it comes to cooking.  Spaghetti is about as non-pre-prepared as I get.  I cook a mean chili, but it’s been years (and that’s not exactly “healthy,” either).  Which is all a  shame, because I love food.  Absolutely love to eat, to taste.  Must eat about every 2-3 hours in fact, or my body rebels.
Maybe it’s time to fire up the grill.

Okay, so it took me longer than planned.

Video – Chris McDonough deepthroating a corndog:

Video – The crew singing some Pat Benatar:

Pictures below the cut, so I don’t spam people’s friend page. Full gallery here.

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