From owner-freebsd-current Thu Apr 20 23:24:18 1995 Return-Path: current-owner Received: (from majordom@localhost) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.10/8.6.6) id XAA29694 for current-outgoing; Thu, 20 Apr 1995 23:24:18 -0700 Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by freefall.cdrom.com (8.6.10/8.6.6) with SMTP id XAA29687 ; Thu, 20 Apr 1995 23:24:16 -0700 X-Authentication-Warning: freefall.cdrom.com: Host localhost didn't use HELO protocol To: Joe Greco cc: gpalmer@freefall.cdrom.com (Gary Palmer), current@FreeBSD.org, jkh@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: wcarchive down In-reply-to: Your message of "Thu, 20 Apr 95 11:13:05 CDT." <9504201613.AA10822@brasil.moneng.mei.com> Date: Thu, 20 Apr 1995 23:24:16 -0700 Message-ID: <29684.798445456@freefall.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: current-owner@FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > As I also recall, I offered a 386sx/16 at one point in the past to "the > Cause". This machine can be outfitted with a little extra circuitry to > provide a hardware reset output. I will donate a 2-port 16550 card for this > box, and one for wcarchive, if need be, and a cable. You then wire the > serial ports together, and the 386sx/16 has console control over wcarchive. > The 386sx/16 can reset wcarchive. From this perspective, you can do > ANYTHING to wcarchive that does not require physical hardware muckymuck. Yes, you did offer that and I'm still grateful for the offer. I haven't taken you up on that offer yet due to the twin reasons of severe time pressure (we haven't been thinking much about it lately, though it's always somewhere in the back of my mind) and basically my disenchantment with the whole idea of adding an entire extra machine to do this. Where this arrangement with wcarchive and BARRNET is concerned, the simpler the solution the better! I don't want another machine to manage and worry about if I can help it, and the solution we've come up with is rather more simplistic. What I'm going to do is get a cheap cellular phone and a basic rate service with a local provider (I've verified good reception at that location with my own cell phone) and hook it to a ready-built DTMF decoder of the type various HAM enthusiasts use to control remote repeaters (in fact, I count on buying it at the local HAM shack), and we're going to reset that baby by calling it up and punching numbers at it. It's cheap, it's simple, it can be literally bolted to the side of the existing system (we'll work out something creative - there's even room inside some of the disk cases; we could run a wire out to the CPU module.. :-) Jordan