14 oct 06
Onions and Routers
an event brought forth a revelation. two events in tandem, actually: 1) comcast replaced my router, and 2) someone asked me a question about onions.
my internet stopped working for three days, and i suspected that a broken router was responsible for the problem. a technician came to the house, and didn't try this solution. he couldn't find anything wrong (replacing the router seems part of basic troubleshooting to me), and of course defaulted to "it must be some spyware on your computer". a second comcast "technician" tried this solution out, and it worked.
the bit about spyware is what the techs say if they don't know what's going on -- a form of "blame the user". the people who come to your house to set up your internet are for the most part entirely clueless, except for a tiny cache of knowledge they're fed during their "training". the phenomenon is very much like the mcdonalds cashier from el salvador who can speak fluently about cheesburgers and fries, but has no idea what "have you heard what the weather's going to be like?" means -- an culture-specific patois, such that the culture in question is restricted to mcdonalds. or, in this case, a "patois" of solutions that apply to two or three likely problems with comcast internet.
the patois applies nicely to the two or three problems, but when an issue enters an uncertain world that requires some diagnostic troubleshooting, the comcast technician is up a creek. replacing the router seems like it should be part of the training vocabulary, right along with "you must have some spyware", so i'm surprised (and maybe slightly disturbed that) the first guy didn't try this solution. my mom was home when the tech came over to work his magic, and she told me that she got a macho sort of vibe from him, as if he didn't want to admit "i have no idea what the problem is, because i use AOL at home, and watch 'america's top model'".
the second tech wasn't as dumb and replaced the router. comcast calls routers "gateways", which i believe is technically correct-ish. i don't quite understand the difference, and i think it might be a somewhat subtle one. nor do i understand what a switch is, and how this differs from a router. but, i don't care -- it's not my responsibility to be competent with every aspect of computing. there are people who devote their lives to networking (which i suppose by definition includes the internet). i feel that i don't really "do computers", and am not really a "computer guy", although i might appear that way to the less-advanced user (ahem).
there are people who register an account on blogger.com or build a web page in dreamweaver who are considered by some others to be computer geniuses. so, like wealth, it's all relative. however, also like wealth, there are some practical limitations: you can be in the top .01% of wealthy world-inhabitants, just like you can be the guy who's designing circuits and programming in machine code. diggity-doo.
my revelation was that i have this router, this new router from comcast, that is extremely weird, small, and cute, and i wanted to take a picture of it and post it. however, it's somewhat unlikely that someone is going to submit "show us the new router", even if i had mentioned it in a previous document. but i wanted to show you the new router! so, i snapped a picture of it, and was going to stick it in the next answer. problem is, i'm still uncomfortable sticking unrelated content into some poor innocent reader's question, which in this case was about vidalia onions vs. walla walla onions -- he wanted me to tell him which he likes better, which is a nice concept.
i will repeat the two causes of my revelation: 1) wanting to show you my router, and 2) getting in the mail a question about onions. i want to show you my router, and i don't want to answer that question (vidalia onions are good, are not as strong as white onions,and are sweeter than white onions, but i have no idea what walla walla onions are, or how they taste, and furthmore i'm not going to research it or go to the grocery store to buy one and do a taste test, which is something i might have done in the early days of "ask the box").
the revelation is that i'm going to do a combination of "blog" and "ask the box". and the first thing i shall do under this new format is show you my router:
it's 6.5 inches long, and has only the one antenna. it looks like it was designed by apple or some similarly design-obsessed company. it's tiny, white-and-gold, has rounded corners, and has something like a filligreed edge. "my" old router (actually leased from comcast) was made by linksys, and was a black, angular atrocity with two loosely-attached antennae that flopped all over the place, like a dachshund's ears.
this new "netgear" router broadcasts a very effective wireless signal, which reaches all the way downstairs, so i can check the online tv guide while i watch tv. my aunt actually uses the signal to check her work email when she's over here, so broadcasting it is not entirely useless and bourgeois. plus, a wireless signal is part of the package deal with a router from comcast -- i don't think you can get a router without an antenna.
i know this is all fascinating.
you're still welome to submit questions (or whatever) on the index page. or, you can mail me something specific about a particular doc in the form below; hopefully having the form right here under the text will encourage lazy internet users, who don't like to click or scan. of course, you can submit comments on the index page's form, too. just send me anything anywhere. it makes no difference. i just thought that putting a form on every page would increase the number of submissions.
so how 'bout it? type something in the box below and hit the button. you know you want to.