Off the Rails

Today the entire Junior Honours network was brought down by a dancing penguin.

We had been having problems over the last few days to do with the space on the JH server being entirely filled, and even though we're only given a meagre 10GB between all of us, no one had enough space used to be filling the disk. Apart from Steve, that is - his directory was moved to a different server because it was so gigantic. But that failed to solve the problem - soon the drive got to maximum capacity again, despite Roja trying to assume command of things by appointing himself as network monitor and shouting at people to cancel their print jobs.

It turns out that Iain, who had been quietly keeping to himself, was running a small innocent Linux "software tool" (a penguin that wanders around the desktop) which was generating its error logfile, or some such thing, at such a high rate that it had filled the disk - it was 12.3GB by the time it was eventually discovered. Quite how a 12.3GB file fitted on to a 9.6GB disk is beyond me, but it's best not to ask these things.

Even after the network was fixed and I could log on, I still have very little idea of what to do for my database practical. I had a quick look at the MySQL application and it's more complex than I thought, mostly because it doesn't really give you any kind of visualisation of what you're doing until you ask it to. I had a brief flash of inspiration while downloading some less useless TTD road vehicles and thought I could do a transit company as my "unique and unusual" database, but I think it might be a bit too simple. We'll see.

I have had an extremely productive day, or at least what passes as one for me. I was in town before the first lecture, during the afternoon, and this evening I purchased two train tickets to Cambridge so that Whitney and I can visit friends there. Guess which one of those caused the most stress. Here's a brief summary of the online adventure that I've just had, after the failure of going to buy them in person.

1. See ticket for £84 on the site, but no mechanism to buy it.
   
2. Phone up GNER.
   
3. Wait for five minutes on hold while listening to terrible lift music.
   
4. Give up.
   
5. Phone rings.
   
6. It's my mum telling me to get organised about getting train tickets.
   
7. Do my best not to hang up.
   
8. Get off phone and go back to site.
   
9. Find an alternative £84 ticket and go to Purchase.
   
10. Realise that none of the Purchase buttons on the site do anything at all.
    
11. Find another site.
    
12. Find the ticket on that site.
    
13. Watch the spinning clock indicating the search is in progress.
    
14. It only gives me the option of getting single tickets.
    
15. Search again.
    
16. Watch the spinning clock.
    
17. Find only a ticket for £114.
    
18. Wonder idly if there's a "Kill webmaster" button.
    
19. Look on the GNER site itself.
    
20. Realise that all these sites connect to exactly the same database.
    
21. Register at GNER.
    
22. Am told "Thank you for registering - now purchase your tickets and breeze through the station."
    
23. Suppress manic twitching.
    
24. Find that the cheapest ticket it has is £185.
    
25. Decide that everyone at GNER should be boiled alive in a volcano.
    
26. Go back to the second site.
    
27. Search again.
    
28. Watch the Rotating Clock of Despair.
    
29. Find the ticket for £114 again.
    
30. Decide to give up and just go for that one.
    
31. Click the button and it says the train doesn't exist.
    
32. Start the search again.
    
33. Watch the Gears of Madness grind upon my very essence of being.
    
34. Find the £114 ticket and Continue.
    
35. It tells me I have to register with them.
    
36. Register and log in.
    
37. Click "Purchase this ticket".
    
38. It dumps me back at the "Where do you want to go?" page.
    
39. Become unable to type due to convulsions.
    
40. Start the search... again.
    
41. Spin, spin, spin.
    
42. It can't find the ticket.
    
43. Contemplate suicide.
    
44. Start again.
    
45. Shield my eyes from the timekeeping device of Lucifer.
    
46. Find the £114 ticket.
    
47. Buy it, quick, before it breaks again.
    
48. Print out confirmation. Collapse in to quivering heap, my only consolation being that the saga will make quite an entertaining Livejournal entry.