[Editors Note: This blog entry is also out of the archive of never-quite-published blogs of yesteryear. With DB of Tram Town donating some of his historical Mac hardware to an upcoming digital history exhibit at the Melbourne Museum, this entry I penned in January 2005 should see the light of day.]

I couldn't quite get my Apple //e card reading files off an AppleTalk server and couldn't find any reference material for the Apple //e Workstation card (which implemented localtalk and AFP network booting, printing etc).

But I did find this digest entry with a network that puts mine to shame:

I am sitting in my shop. Upstairs in the Library is a Mac 8500 that sports among other things a Sonnet Cressendo G3 450Mhz CPU upgrade and OS X running on a Conner 4 gig SCSI I recovered from a PeeCee, reformatted and installed in a 40 meg external case. That Mac is on my Network from Heck connected by way of a router to a LONG CAT5 wire and a hub to the basement shop. Down here I have a Quadra 950 running System 7.5.3 Appleshare 3.0.3 and Localtalk Bridge.

Also in the shop are 2 IIe(s) with Workstation cards a IIgs IIe upgrade ROM 1, and a ROM 3. Both IIe(s) are accelerated but the 2 IIgs(s) are running at standard speed. all IIs are hooked to a Localtalk network that also includes a IWII on a localtalk card, and a IWLQ also localtalk. Also in the shop are a Performa 6200CD (ethernet slot card), Performa 578 on an Assante EN/SC SCSI<>Ethernet box, a 8100 on standard 10BT, a 386 with a Appletalk ISA card, a Pentium II Pee Cee and a Laserwriter IIg hooked in to both the Ethernet AND the localtalk network (I found this far easier to print to via the IIs in that you don't need the LT Bridge that way)

Got all that?

At least Bart doesn't have any Un*x boxes, affording me one avenue of feeling superior ;)

PS: I made the cassette image with the awesome says-it.com cassette virtual cassette generator

Looks like I might be able to take tweezers on board my flight on Sunday after all as US Transportation Security Administration chief Edmund Hawley is expected to announce a relaxation of the post 9/11 ban on airline passengers carrying sharp objects.

Such common sense is generally applauded by the public and attacked (ie. made into a story) by the media, as witnessed in the frenzied response to Amanda Vanstones comments last month.

This time, however, the media seems to be taking a reasonable stance and it has fallen to the US Association of Flight Attendants to provide the silly response:

"When weapons are allowed back on board an aircraft, the pilots will be able to land the plane safely, but the aisles will be running with blood," said Corey Caldwell, a spokeswoman for the Association of Flight Attendants.

It just doesn't get much more hyperbolic than that!