One of the perks about Leopard (OS X 10.5) is that it comes with a feature known as “Time Machine“. Basically, it is a built-in backup solution, runs in the background, and mirrors your drive to another drive via USB or Firewire, and even over your network, if you have Apple’s Time Capsule.

Personally, I have no need for another wireless router, even if it comes with a hard drive, as it is one more thing on my network to worry about, maintain, and the thing ain’t cheap to begin with. Yes, this is a gadget that I decided NOT to get due to cost. How weird is THAT!? 

Anyway, last week, the drive for my work Macbook died. When I say ” it died”, I mean the type of drive death where it clicks, clunks, grinds, and won’t mount. Basically, I can’t do anything with it, so everything I had on it is gone. Was I backing it up? Nope. After setting up everyone else’s machines to backup their data, I never got around to setting up mine. Not much is gone, I use IMAP at work so my email wasn’t stored locally, but all the images, documents, and other things I’ve worked on for the last 3.75 years was lost. Either it hasn’t hit me yet, or I just don’t care. Dunno. But, it made me paranoid about my own machines, so I figured I might as well set up Time Machine at work, ensure it does the trick, and then set it up at home.

I heard rumours about people being able to set Time Machine to use standard SMB (Samba) mounts using 10.5.2 or higher, which makes sense, as OS X is based off Unix, and pretty much operates within the same standards. Sure enough, I came across this site, and it was easy as pie:

http://www.stocksy.co.uk/articles/Mac/getting_time_machine_to_work_how_i_want/

A quick snippet of what was involved:

Within Terminal:

sudo defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1

Then:

sudo hdiutil create -size [number_in_GB]g -type SPARSEBUNDLE -nospotlight -volname “Time Machine” -fs HFS+J -verbose ~/Desktop/[mac_network_name]_[eth_mac_addy].sparsebundle

Transferred *.sparsebundle to desired remote directory.

As I have a few Linux boxes that are there only for storage, it made sense to set up Time Machine on my Mac Mini to use one of them rather than spending a chunk of cash on a new device. I had to reinstall Leopard as years of upgrading left me with an operating system that had issues with permissions over network mounts (the weirdest thing), so I backed up my Mac Mini to my Macbook, and started from scratch. After Leopard was installed, it took no time to set up Time Machine. The initial backup took FOREVER, as was expected, but since then, all has been well. I’ll move over the important documents as time goes on, but for the moment, only 14GB on the Mac Mini was used. I’ll have to clear some more space to be able to back up the Macbook via Time Machine, but that shouldn’t be too difficult.

So, long story short: if you’re not backing up your data, you might want to look into that. If you want to use Time Machine, and you have a machine on the network that you can use as a network mount via SMB, check out the link above, and save yourself some cash. Why Apple doesn’t allow you to do this by standard, who knows, but I’m glad that the process to do so wasn’t too much of a hack.

Thanks to Stocksy for the instructions.  

Breakfast

• Protein shake (shared)
  • Two scoops of MuscleTech Nitro-Tech Hardcore – vanilla
  • One banana
  • 250ml 2% partly-skimmed lactose-free milk
  • Frozen strawberries
  • Frozen blueberries
  • Frozen raspberries

Activity

• Rode the bike to work (6.1km)
• Rode the bike to Dominion, then over to Strachan, down to the Princes’ Gates, through the CNE, and back up to the office (4km)

Snacks

• One Interactive Nutrition Low Carb Bar – iced dream

Dinner

• Shoeless Joe’s
  • Canadian burger with peameal bacon, onions, a pickle, and lettuce topped with ketchup, mustard, and relish
  • Side of fries with ketchup
  • Two pitchers of Rickard’s Red (shared)

Activity

• Rode the bike home (6.1km)

Breakfast

• Three hard boiled eggs
• A cup of Lipton Earl Grey tea with 2% milk and seven packets of raw brown sugar

Snacks

• One Interactive Nutrition Low Carb Bar – chocolate fudge delight

Lunch

• Matt’s place
  • Some shrimp with seafood sauce
  • Salsa and chips
  • Pumpernickel bread chunks with spinach dip
  • A giant piece of cake
  • Three Keith’s Pale Ale

Dinner

• Swiss Chalet
  • Small Caesar salad

Living Life

• Owen’s place
  • Three Dad’s chewy oatmeal chocolate chip cookies
  • One Grolsch Premium Lager

Snacks

• A bowl of buttered and salted popcorn

Breakfast / Lunch

• Dr. Generosity
  • Burger with cheddar cheese, bacon, onions, lettuce, red pepper mayo, ketchup, Dijon mustard, and relish
  • Fries with ketchup
  • One sliced pickle
  • Glass of Tropicana orange juice – no pulp

Activity

• Molly and I rode our bikes down the bike path and through the city to her office, and then through the city again to my office (12.8km)

Snacks

• Two light Babybels

Activity

• Molly and I rode our bikes home from my office (6.1km)

Dinner

• Whelan’s Gate
  • 3lbs of hot wings (shared)
  • Celery and carrot sticks with blue cheese
  • One pitcher of Creemore (shared)
  • One pint of Guinness
  • One last pint of Creemore

Greedy bastards.

So, here in Canada, we’ve been itching to get out hands on the iPhone since it was released in the States. Some even went so far as to get one anyway and have it hacked to work upon the Rogers network. On June 9th, Apple announced that the iPhone would officially be coming up to Canada (and the rest of the world). Needless to say, this will be the hot item of the summer around the world, if not the entire year. It was no surprise that Rogers would be the carrier in Canada; they’re the only one up here who has the infrastructure. This roughly translates to them having a monopoly, which again roughly translates to them being able to charge whatever the fuck they want.

Many thought that this would be the turning point for Rogers… that Apple would pressure them into FINALLY having an unlimited data package for a decent price. For a time, it looked like this might be a possibility. Rogers caving to demand for fair prices. Ha.

Guess what? Rogers said “bollocks” to that (yes, they used that word), and released the following:

400MB per month at the lowest rate? It’s not like I’d be surfing a lot on the thing, but I don’t want to have to worry about paying extra should I go over, especially at $0.50/MB. That shit adds up. I also have the “$20 Value Pack” already with my Nokia 5300, as I like being able to send txt msgs without a cap, and the early evening calling is nice (usually their unlimited evenings and weekends starts at 9pm?! WTF?!), so I would need that too with the iPhone. Right there: $80/month. Then, their system access fees, and taxes, blah blah blah… I’ll be paying close to $100 per month for the damn thing.

But you know what? As much as I bitch and whine about the prices, I’m going to be paying them, as I want the iPhone… and Rogers knows this. Sure, they throw in unlimited Hotspot access, which is cool of them, but how often will I hang out at a Second Cup? Almost never.

It’s so fucking irritating that Rogers gets away with this. Looking at the rates down in the States, this hardly seems fair. Rogers makes hand-over-fist in cash, and they still feel the need to squeeze even more pennies out of the average customer. Sure, it’s all about business, but this goes beyond that. This is just simple greed.

All said and done, though, I can’t wait to get the iPhone.

Update (July 3rd, 2008): To hell with Rogers. I’m not going to get roped into a three-year contract where I essentially agree to pay ridiculous prices just to enjoy an innovative device. I’m going to sit back and wait for the competition to get their act in gear and offer the iPhone on their network. Rumour has it that Telus is working on this for early 2009, and I’ll be taking my number over to them if they’re successful.