hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr0246.txt

Episode: 246
Title: HPR0246: Whats in My Toolkit Part 3
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr0246/hpr0246.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-07 14:44:42

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Let's talk later.
This is Tiger Public Radio, I'm Dee Wick and inspired by 330 in CyberCod and I suppose
ultimately Dave Yates, this is what's in my toolkit.
My toolkit is a laptop backpack, so we'll start here.
The inner big pouch, there's obviously a protected area for my laptop which is sitting in front
of me at the moment, it's actually not my laptop, it belongs to my work but it's for work
and personal goes with me essentially everywhere.
Also in the large interior pouch is a, you should call it a portfolio, leather portfolio,
folder, where I carry papers, I still have to carry papers around so there's some letters
in here, schedules, it's a big folder full of new programs stuff, I have a ladder for
my CTCM, you don't care about that, but anyway that's what I carry my papers around in,
basically at the end of the day at work, I just go through all my workspaces, collect
all the papers, shove them in there, bring them home, and then do the same thing when
I go from home to work.
There's also a little note pad in there with a to-do list on it, okay, so that's all
that's in the interior pouch, in the middle pouch, lots of, sorry about that, lots of small
little tidbit type things, a wallet, headphones for my MP3 player, these are maxell over the
head type, head earbuds, they're not particularly good for listening to music but I mostly just
listen to podcasts and they're fine for that, there's the MP3 player, it's a creative
Zen Nano Plus one gigabyte, there's a little note pad that I got at the High Linux
Fest at the e-commerce booth, it's a nice little note pad I carry around to take notes
at meetings and whatnot, there are some icebreaker breathments, there's a phone, oh there
is a harmonic, there are two, count them one, two, pen, ballpoint pens, slash laser pointers,
they're really nice little inexpensive laser pointers that I use in class, cost me $3.99.
What else is in here? Oh yeah, I have three USB sticks, I just recently purchased a new
one, kind of tough to get at here, there we go, Sandisk, one gigabyte, a Sandisk, eight gigabyte
that's the new one, and a Dell 64 megabyte, I'm going to give that one to my wife, the only
other thing in here is 3, 4 I guess, 3 or 4, triple A batteries, that for my MP3 player,
okay that's the middle pouch and I have I think four outside pouches, so we'll start, there's
a small portable, portable umbrella, and then in this pouch I carry basically all my cabling
and external stuff for my laptop, there's a little power adapter, there's a little mini mouse,
there is an external VGA, remote control, a short very very short probably two feet, ethernet cable,
which I really just carry for emergencies, in case I'm in a hotel or somewhere where wireless
may, may not work, I would have to sit right next to the ethernet port to use it, but I haven't
used it for a long time, a long audio extension cable with either end of female to female
adapter, and a small USB cable for camera and MP3 player, and a SATA cable, and that's probably
should probably shouldn't be in there, that was from a remnant of, I just built my father
a new computer, the hardware is all done, I'm working on the software right now, but that's
how that got in there, and that's it in that pouch, another side outside pouch, a pair of sunglasses,
and a pair of reading glasses, I just bought those, I'm getting old man, just starting to lose my,
not lose my sight, but needing reading glasses for some things, particularly like small prescription
bottles or from retrying to read instructions on a aspirin or something, how man, the other outside
pouch has various toiletries, some karmex, lip balm, just a little container full of pills,
all over the counter and leave all I suppose, maybe some sweet breath peppermint drops, I recall
330 carries deodorant, I carry obviously deodorant for my mouth, you never know when you're going
to want to kiss somebody, or breathe on somebody heavily, and some my drops, and that's it for the,
the pouches on the backpack, the other thing I carry, although not all the time, I have a little
exterior additional bag, it's a small little, probably, about 12 by 12 inches, it was probably
once a purse, I don't know, I picked it up at a garage sale, but it's perfect for stuff I don't need
every day, but that I often need to take a long, so the first thing in here is a bamboo pen tablet,
which I got last summer, when I taught an online course, I used it for that, and there's
the USB cable that goes with that, and there's the pen, if you have a pen tablet, it helps
to have a pen that goes with it, not just any old pen, let's see what else is in here,
ah, a CD case, usually carry this in my backpack, but let's see what's in here, a bun to
8.04 already here, an ultimate boot CD, which I have not, I downloaded when I have
this in December Cudd's HPR episode, and he recommended that, I have not used it yet, there's a blank
CD, there is a Gen2 Linux 2006.1 Live CD, there's a decent little story with that, I was at a,
a lug meeting, and a guy brought in a really old piece of hardware, I don't remember how old details,
but he brought it in because the only thing he could get installed on it, or to boot, in particular,
was puppy Linux, and he wanted to see if anybody had any suggestions about how to install something
else on there, and people, we all tried for a long time, and I finally whipped out my Gen2
Linux 2006.1 Live CD, and by God the thing booted, it was the only other thing we could get
to boot on that machine, so I think the guy was pleasantly surprised that it booted, but a little
bit disturbed, that his and now his other alternative was Gen2, but anyway, I carry that around
because it's just a magic CD, you never know. I also, let's see, a bun to 8.10, Maple 9,
which is a computer algebra system, I use for work, at work, for work, G-parted Live, obviously,
it's a nice one to have, and a blank DVD, which I use for backing up stuff, and a DVD,
I call the D-Wick Intrepid 1.0, which is a live DVD that I customized from Intrepid, obviously,
using Uck, the Ubuntu customization kit, and it's awesome. If you're interested, go to
D-Wick.org, there's a blog entry there about why I did that, and what's on there, and what I'm
going to use it for. Let's see, I also have edge Ubuntu add on 8.10, I've got a DVD full
of just Ubuntu ISOs just to back up, a bunch of different ISOs, a backup DVD with just data
and stuff, open Solaris, another backup DVD, Fedora 9, four-site, and another Ubuntu 8.10,
and that's what's in my CD case, and let's see what else we got in this extra pouch.
The last thing I have, this is my last piece of equipment that I want to share, and it's fairly new.
I got it probably about a month ago, and I love this thing. It is a Baltic Lansing IM207.
It's a small portable speaker for MP3 players and laptops and whatnot.
I've been looking for something like this for a long time, bought something maybe two years ago,
I think in RCA, and it was a piece of crap, and if you look for something like this,
they all have docking stations for iPod. I know you can probably plug in external MP3 players
to most of these things, but I don't want something with an iPod docking station for Christ's sake.
So this thing is, it's a cylindrical sort of, it's about maybe an inch high, about maybe four inches in diameter.
It's just, and it's lightweight, and it's sweet, it runs on three AAA batteries,
and the reason I got it is because it has power, it blasts, and I don't particularly, again,
like my headphones don't necessarily care about the quality as much, because what I use it for is the listen-to-podcast,
and what I've been using it for mostly is the listen-to-podcast in the bathroom,
while I'm showering and whatnot in the morning, and it's perfect for that.
I just hope I don't ruin it with, by getting damp in the bathroom.
But anyway, that's the last thing I have. I think, you know, that's my toolkit.
I'm D. Wick. This is Hacker Public Radio. Sayonara.
Thank you for listening to Hacker Public Radio.
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