Lossage List

• 2026-01-09@22:55(Fri)
  Router light goes red. Connection is lost. Blinks Red a minute or so. Turns blue again. Connection is back and ssh still ongoing.
• 2025-11-26,27(Thu)
  Weather is fine, but internet connection is on and off. Router light stays blue. Continued slow or broken connections through 28 (Sat). It's mostly usable. Sunday (30) it's still flakey in the morning, but seems better toward evening. Will it last?
  — No. Monday (Dec 1) morning "Network unreachable"; re-connect; ping shows dropped packets. @13:15 connection to fcs1 stays up and reponsive, while I edit and send an email, but connect to 192.168.1.1 fails then after a minute works. Tues--Thu (Dec 2, 3, 4) again flakey in the morning; seems better later.
  Sun (Dec 14) its been sort-of working on Linux machine, but Windows has much trouble. On Linux it seems to drop out for a for a few seconds to half minute, then re-connect and continue. On Windows it may not re-connect. Zoom meeting was not working. Press re-boot button on SAX1V1K wireless router. It blinks turns blue and re-connects. It's no worse, but ping www.spectrum.net used to be about 20ms is now about 50ms.
  —Mon (Dec 15) Wow! For the first time in weeks the Windows machine works with internet. The Linux machine shows ping times have doubled, but connection seems rock-solid.
  —Thu (Dec 18) It continues to work. I was going to write that it's worth 30ms to do it right, but ping times have gone back down to 20ms. I'm calling it all fixed until next problem arises.
• 2025-09-06(Sat) 16:00EDT
  Thunder and wind outside. Blue light on wireless router turns red and internet connection is lost. It intermitently works, but not enough to use, except sometimes a little.

  … 17:20 — Try power cycle router. Goes blinking blue and then steady blue then red then blue. After 5 or 10 minutes it is blue and working. A couple minutes later red again. It goes back and forth until at least 24:00 (midnight).

  2025-09-07(Sun) — It's still doing it the next day.
  19:30 — Go through Spectrum web pages to reboot modem. Talk to chatbot which says it's all fixed, but router light turns red a minute later.

  IP 192.168.1.1 says:
  Your Spectrum Router Info
  Internet Status: Connected
  Cloud Status: Not Connected
  

  Now it's blue again—and red again.—and blue again.

  2025-09-08(Mon) 11:00 — Unplug modem; unplug router. plugin modem; wait for lights; plug in router.
  … 12:00 — It's still blue. I'm hopeful. … 12:45 — I don't know how long it was red before I noticed. I watched it for a second or two and it turned blue. … 13:30 — Blue. I'm going upstairs. … 16:00 — Blue. It's working. … 21:00 — It's red and broken a lot this evening. Sometimes it turns red, but still works. It might be when it's not connected to the "cloud", whatever that is.

  2025-09-09(Tue) 9:00… 23:00 — It's blue and working in the morning. I wasn't here all day, but it was blue every time I looked. A ssh connection to a computer in New York stayed open from 9am to 11pm.

  2025-09-10(Wed) It's blue and working. It's not clear whether the problem started 09-01(Mon) or 09-06(Sat), but unless the internet connection is lost again soon, I will say the problem was fixed 09-09(Tue). I didn't fix it; I assume Spectrum did something, but maybe it just took time for the wires to dry out.
  … 23:10 — The damned thing went red for a minute. It turns blue and works without breaking ssh connection. If I weren't sitting right here I would never have known. It goes red and blue five or six times in the next half-hour.

  2025-09-11(Thu) It's blue and working all day.

  2025-09-12(Fri) It's blue and working all day. If anything goes wrong in the future, I will call it a new problem and start a new list item. (See above.)

• 2025-09-01(Mon) 09:00EDT
  In the night ~4am, Red blinking light on modem. By morning it was Blue and working, but there were emails from Spectrum.

  We have detected an outage affecting Spectrum service in your area. Our crews are working to fix the disruption and estimate that your service will be restored by 7:00 AM.

• 2024-08-13(Tue) 22:09:09EDT
  While working a little window popped up saying "authentication required". Network is unreachable from fcs26 laptop, but other (Windows) laptop still has internet connection. Settings; Wi-Fi; says "no wi-fi adapter found. ensure it is plugged in." Nothing to "plug in"; it's inside the laptop ThinkPad. It starts working again; I don't know why. See fcs-readme/fcs26.
• 2025-07-01(Tue) 19:45EDT
  Blue light on wireless router turns red and internet connection is lost. Unplug and plug in again. It boots up and works again. There is a thunderstorm. Lights on answering machine are blinking. I didn't notice a power fail, but I suppose there might have been a short one.
• 2024-06-26(Wed) 13:30EDT
  While I was working on-line a little window popped up saying password needed to access web site. In fact internet connection was lost. Router has blue light, modem says on-line. Nevertheless, power cycle both router and modem. It works! Log into Afterburst again. Weather is fine.
• 2024-06-14(Fri) 21:30EDT
  DSL is gone. Using Spectrum cable. Rainstorms. Was working on internet all day; it went out. Down stairs found red light on wireless router. Power cycle router. It blinks blue for a while, then goes red. Power cycle both router and modem. It takes a while, but eventualy it's blue and online and it works.
• 2023-09-17(Sun)
  Install Spectrum coax/wireless. Details here.
• 2023-09-11(Mon) 23:20EDT
  Internet went out. I had been trying to get coax (Spectrum) to work so when it broke I desparately tried undoing everything I had done before I thought to reboot modem. It seems better now. It's raining.
• 2023-07-31(Mon) 12:50
  Internet went out. Reboot modem does not work. ping 8.8.8.8 does work!? Can also ping 76.14.78.135 and 111.70.7.139, which are addresses that connected to postfix while internet was out.

  Called GTT phone number I used last time. I got nothing but a recorded message that said they do not accept calls—use email or web site to report problems. Sorry no email or web. My internet connection is out.

  A friend sent an email to noc@gtt.net from a cellphone using an independant account. Got a phone call from them around 16:30. They asked permission to schedule a Verizon visit to my home. Verizon called to say the truck would come July 8(Tue).

  Sometime between 18:30 and 17:40 it started working again.

• 2023-07-21(Fri) 22:15
  Thunderstorms continue. Reboot modem. I think this is the first time I did it twice in one day.
• 2023-07-21(Fri) 20:00EDT
  Lost connection while in use. Reboot modem. Rainy and thunder.
• 2023-07-18(Tue) 16:15EDT
  Lost connection while in use. Reboot modem. Rainy. Down a few minutes.
• 2023-07-14(Fri) 12:00EDT
  Reboot modem. Rainy. Down a few minutes.
• 2023-06-18(Sun) 9:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Rainy. Down I think a very short time.
• 2023-04-18(Tue) 10:00EDT
  Reboot modem. Down since about 4am.
• 2023-04-17(Mon) 08:11:16EDT
  Reboot modem. Down all night, probably. No reason. That was scary, this is the first time the modem has been re-booted since the BIG problem below.
• 2023-04-07(Fri) 14:05EDT
  Well, the BIG problem that I have feared so long has arrived.

  GTT (gtt.net the ISP) sent me a >letter<. The letter does not mention it, but GTT has filed for bankruptcy protection. The letter is full of things that I do not fully understand, but the bottom line is: "We no longer want to do business with you. You have a few months to get a new ISP, then we will unplug the wire."

  More info >here<

• 2023-03-17(Fri) 7:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Down since about 3:30. No reason. This is the first time the modem has been re-booted since the big problem below.
• 2022-12-21(Wed) 17:30EST — This goes on the log of Bigger Problems.
  Lost internet. Reboot modem; the lights look like it is working, but no ping goes through. Martian packets only when modem is on.
  
  • • 20:52 Called GTT (ISP) give phone number, get ticket number;
  • 2022-12-22(Thu) 16:00
    • Call again. GTT says call back in 2hr. They must talk to Verizon.
    • 18:35 Call again. GTT says they will call me.
    • 20:30 GTT calls. They want OK to send Verizon to our home. OK.
  • 2022-12-23(Fri) 11:52 Call GTT. They say Verizon will come to our house 2022-12-27(Tue). I ask if I can talk directly. They give me Verizon phone and ticket numbers.
    • 12:23 Call Verizon. They confirm Dec 27 date, but say the FCC rules forbid them from talking to me.
  • 2022-12-24,25,26 (Sat,Sun,Mon) Nope. Christmas. Nothing happens. I call Verizon. Nothing.
  • 2022-12-27(Tue) 10:00EST Verizon truck came. Driver went up ladder and said everything is fine from here to their office at Chestnut and Elm (downtown Worcester).
    • 15:00 Call GTT. They say they have not yet heard from Verizon and ask for more time to talk GTT/Verizon.
  • 2022-12-28(Wed) 14:40 Call GTT. They will raise priority level and possibly send a technician to our house.
  • 2022-12-29(Thu) Spent some time swapping cables, trying to prove that ethdsl on fcs19 works. No Joy. I put it all back as it was. See fcs-readme/fcs21.txt.
    • 16:25 Call GTT. Many questions by both of us: Which modem? Which in use, which should be? Neither of us seems to understand. They are working on it. Will call.
  • 2022-12-30(Fri) 00:00 Just about midnight, I was shutting down my computer and about to go to sleep. I ping'ed the internet one more time and … It Worked!
  • 2022-12-31(Sat) It has been working all Friday and most of Saturday, but I have not tried to re-boot the modem, and can not get the ISP to say which modem I can use.
  • 2023-01-02(Mon) 13:20 GTT calls and sends email. They say: "The issue was related to GTT back-end radius server" I don't know what that means; I will Google it. The important thing is that they admit it was their problem, and they know what they fixed. They also now say that they gave me both modems and that I can swap them at will. So they take credit for what Speakeasy gave me twenty years ago. OK. Maybe they found the password and now own it again. OK.

    Did a Video conference. I get spam. It seems to all work again. RADIUS is a Remote Athentication … Server, which supports the theory that they found some kind of lost password,

    A copy of Ticket email is Here.

• 2022-11-17(Thu) 22:30EST
  Reboot modem. Down a few minutes. No reason.
• 2022-09-19(Mon) 20:45EDT
  Reboot modem. Down less that 1:30 hr. Thunderstorms continue.
• 2022-09-06(Tue) 11:00EDT
  Reboot modem. It might have been down since 3am or 7am. It's raining.
• 2022-08-27(Sat) 09:15EDT
  Reboot modem. It might have been down all night.
• 2022-08-26(Fri) 15:55, 16:05EDT
  Lost internet. Went downstairs and rebooted modem. It seemed to work, but quit again before I got back upstairs. Went back down and rebooted modem again. It's working now, but there are still thunderstorms out there.
• 2022-08-23(Tue) 17:00EDT
  The lights flickered; there was a buzzing sound, and the radio went off. Turned the radio back on; it worked, but was tuned to the wrong station. A few minutes later the power went off and stayed off for a minute or two.

  I spent an hour rebooting, repowering, and restarting various devices and software systems again and again in various orders. At 18:00 it seems to be all working again. There are still thunderstorms out there.
  18:15 The DSL modem needed rebooting again.

• 2022-08-07(Sun) 19:30EDT
  Thunderstorms. Reboot modem. Down a few minutes.
• 2022-06-19(Sun) 10:00EDT
  It was a dark and stormy night. Reboot modem.
• 2022-06-11(Sat) 21:44:05EDT
  Reboot modem. It was down less than an hour.
• 2022-06-05(Sun) 00:10EDT
  Reboot modem. It was working a few minutes ago. I got mail at 2022-06-04(Sat) 22:34:54, now it's working again.
• 2022-04-26(Tue) 22:23EDT
  Reboot modem. It was still up at 20:15:06.
• 2022-04-10(Sun) 10:24:54EDT
  Reboot modem.
• 2022-01-05(Wed) 21:13:14EST
  Reboot modem. Last connection from internet was Jan 5 18:10. I restarted the DNS named after this because of status: SERVFAIL, id: 65067.
• 2021-11-23(Tue) 14:00EST
  Power failure for a few seconds, while I am trying to get gateway/firewall/server properly rebooted, the power failed again. Start over again, back up by 14:30

  Got a few minutes to enjoy that. At about 14:45 another short power failure. While recovering from that, there was another (fourth) failure. Now it's 16:15 and back online.

  I did not finish typing that before it went out again. I lost count of how many times it has gone out; around ten times. Power goes out, stays off for about 15 seconds, then comes back on. It is 2021-11-23(Tue) 17:45:54EST. and working for now.

  It went out again around 19:00. Reboot. Finish cooking and eating dinner. It's still up at 23:00. Will it last the night?

  It did! It's now 2021-11-25(Thu) 15:55EST and there has not been another power failure. The next problem gets a new bullet and date and goes above here.

• 2021-09-12(Sun) 10:30:30EDT
  Internet connection lost about 1:30 in the night. Reboot modem; all is good again.
• 2021-07-02(Fri) 12:48:30EDT
  We are about to leave for a few days vacation. I decided to send one quick message first. Internet connection was lost. I went downstairs and power cycled modem, tried to ping three times. Don't know exactly how long it takes to reboot. Finally it worked. Went back upstairs; it didn't work. Went back down to try again. It was working _before_ I did anything. Back upstairs I type this. It has quit again. It went out again while typing this. Downstaits Reboot. It's working now. We are leaving.
  ⋅ 2021-07-04(Sun) 20:00:00EDT
  We are back. Tried to get it working; could not do it. Tried to call ISP; no dial-tone. That's a problem. Called Verizon. The robot will look into it by next Friday!
  ⋅ 2021-07-05(Mon)
  This is getting long. Details have been moved to other page.
• 2021-06-15(Tue) 8:30EDT
  Thunderstorms at night. Internet connection out in morning. Power cycle DSL modem again.
• 2021-06-14(Mon) 10:10EDT
  Thunderstorms. Internet connection went out about 8:30. Power cycle DSL modem.
• 2021-06-08(Tue) 23:20:EDT
  The lights seemed to 'wink" a few times. Everything kept working, even the answering machine, but not the internet connection. Power cycle DSL modem.
• 2021-06-08(Tue) 11:20EDT
  Lost internet connection sometime between 9:30 and 10:00. Power cycle DSL modem; all better.
• 2021-05-11(Tue) 15:39EDT
  Lost internet connection, which had been working all morning. Power cycle DSL modem; all better.
• 2021-03-10(Wed) 19:30
  Lost connection to from living room to basement. LinkSys Ethernet switch had goofy lights. Unplug powercycle repeatedly. Lights all blink on, then all blink off except for power light. It doesn't work.

  I take Ethernet hub from upstairs and put it in basement in place of LinkSys switch; plug one cable directly into wall upstairs. It works; but we can't use the printer without moving ethernet cables. Ordered two new, one 5-port, one 8-port. Free shipping in about ten days (they say).
  ⋅ 2021-03-16
  I ordered a
  Linksys - 8-Port 10/100/1000 Gigabit Switch - Model: LGS108
  Linksys - 5-Port Gigabit Ethernet Switch - Model: SE3005
  and they both arrived today.

• 2021-03-06(Sat) 20:00
  The kitchen light blinked off and on about five times in one second. The computers seemed unaffected, but the network did notwork and the telephone answering machine started blinking. Power cycle both LinkSys ethernet hub and DSL modem; now all is well.
• 2021-02-25(Thu) 11:30EST
  The printer did not work. Investigation revealed that the upstairs office was not connected to the internal LAN network. Went in basement and moved plugs around LinkSys. Things got worse; now the living room also lost connectivity. Found cable that should connect GFRS (fcs19) to the LinkSys on the floor. I must have unplugged it by accident. Plug things in, power cycle, it works again,
  ⋅ 2021-02-25(Thu) 22:30:28EST
  It went out again. All LAN connectivity lost; upstairs office and living room. Went downstairs and power cylcle LinkSys. It works again!
  ⋅ 2021-02-26(Fri)
  The ASUS wireless router kept turning itself off. I wiggled the power cord. Saturday it stayed up all day and night. It has other strange behaviors, but they don't seem to be related to network connectivity.
• 2021-01-04(Mon) 07:30
  Woke up early for medical appt. Found internet down; no time to fix it. At 14:20 came back, power cycle DSL modem, all better. There was snow and rain last night, but I wouldn't call it a storm. On the other hand, the news from WBUR Boston reports there was an internet outage in Worcester. They say Spectrum is fixing it, and I use Verizon, but everything is connected and it must have been big to make the news from Boston.
• 2020-10-07(Wed) 17:30
  Internet connection went down sometime between 17:00 and 17:30. When I noticed it was down, I started downstairs to see. Before I got to the bottom, all power went out. Power was off until 2020-10-10 T 10:00, about 60 hours. Internet still down, but after some fiddling, internal network seems to work.
  I power cycle LinkSys ethernet switch several times, but it does not work. Remembering what happened 2020-08-13 and 2020-08-10 I try plugging it into a different socket on the on the surge protector power strip. Now it works. WTFF??

  ⋅ 2020-10-11(Sun) 10:00EDT
  Verizon repair came and put the phone line back up. I expected to have to do some more fiddling, at least reboot modem, but it worked immediately. We are back online!

• 2020-09-03(Thu) 23:00
  I was working on the computer, looking at web pages, when the internet connection failed. Went downstairs, power cycle DSL modem, it works again. Out for about five minutes.
• 2020-08-13(Thu) 19:00
  Internet quit upstairs. This time I checked and dslcheck worked from fcs19. Lights out on LinkSys. Un-plug and re-plug transformer brought it all back.
• 2020-08-13(Thu) 14:30EDT
  It seemed like a power flicker. Internet went out upstairs. Reboot fcs19 (Firewall). I'm not sure I needed to do that. Fiddle about, got DSL working, but internal LAN not. Noticed lights out on LinkSys. Unplug transformer and plug back fixed it again. Can it be the surge protector somehow locking up?
• 2020-08-10(Mon) 18:00EDT
  I think it's back up. Power went out at 16:20 for about a minute. I was out, but got back about 16:30. Reboot firewall/server; fiddle about. Got DSL back up, but internal network did notwork. Power cycle LinkSys (internal router) by pulling out power plug on back; all lights but power-on went off. Pulling out wall-wart (transformer/plug) and re-plug-in fixed it! WTF?
• 2020-07-03(Fri) 08:57EDT
  Short power glich required all computers to be rebooted. Back up now, I think, down for about an hour only.

  Last connection to mail server 7:15. The power came on at 7:17. Hand restart at 8:28.

  Just in time. Mail came into mailing list 8:35. After one retry at gmail.com mail queue cleared at 8:58, except for utopianow.us, to which connection persistantly times out.
  R.I.P. Bruce. Rainbow love to you.

• 2020-04-13(Mon) 23:58EDT
  Big wind and rain all day. Sometime between 23:15 and 23:58 internet connection was lost. Reboot modem does not help. Can ping 66.92.74.1 (what is that?), but not 216.254.95.2 — the usual test.

  ⋅ 2020-04-14(Tue) 08:40
  Call ISP; get trouble ticket. An hour later they call back to say Verizon is working on it.

  ⋅ 2020-04-14(Tue) 12:30
  I get an email from ISP. The email is stupid, but the fact that I got it shows — It's fixed!
  PS: 66.92.74.1 = er1.nyc1.speakeasy.net, 216.254.95.2 = dns.nyc1.speakeasy.net
     But you need a nameserver and internet connection to know that.

• 2020-04-05(Sun) 09:21:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Down since 1:00 last night. Daylight saving came on.
• 2020-01-16(Thu) 15:30
  Came home to find various things not working, including the firewall/server. Had to reboot twice; first time it did not find the ethernet card. Also rebooted modem and fcs20. Telephone answer machine lost all messages.
  Even after it seemed to be working, had to restart named again.
  Up to at least 14:50 (last connection to mail server); down to at most 15:55 (first after restart).
  I think the power went off when someone cut tree limbs off the power lines and came back on at 15:10.
• 2019-11-13(Wed) Morning
  Trying to get a new internet host installed (new hardware with latest Debian), I moved some cables, and the old one quit working. I think I saw: the lights on the Ethernet card came on when the cable was in one position but not when it was bent the other way; errors on sda disk. It seemed to be working again for a few minutes, but then it crashed hard with some kind of double fault kernel panic. I had other things to do so left it not working and came back later...
  It's 2019-11-13(Wed) 23:34:11EST and the internet host seems to be working. I rebooted two or three times, the first couple of times it came up and complained that the ethernet card was missing, and tried to configure it out. On the third try I convinced it not to do that and...
     It worked!
  I will leave it running and see if it is still working in the morning.

  ⋅2019-11-15(Fri) 23:12:54EST
  It's still working. I want to get the new hardware installed, but right now I am afraid to touch it.

• 2019-11-07(Thu) 10:15EST
  Network connection is broken. I think it's been down since midnight. Try for hours to get it back...reboot modem, server, router...no joy.
  14:40 It just starts to work again, still a bit flakey, but it gets better over time. I can only assume that the ISP found something wrong on their end and fixed it without telling me. I'll probably never know.
• 2019-08-21(Wed) 09:50
  Reboot modem. Down 6 to 9 hours. Most of the night.
  ⋅2019-08-21(Wed) 18:30 Reboot again. Down about half an hour. There are lots of thunderstorms today, but I didn't think they were near here.
• 2019-07-29(Mon) 13:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Mail queue is stuffed with msgs that gmail repeatedly defers. Thunder storms start around 13:30, but they weren't here yet. None of that explains outage. Out about 15 minutes.
• 2019-07-22(Mon) 22:20
  Thunder storms. Reboot modem. Down half an hour.
• 2019-07-17(Wed) 17:00EDT
  Thunder storms. While checking http://www.intodns.com/ to be sure we are back on line after below trouble, internet connection dies. Reboot modem.
• 2019-07-17(Wed) 15:30EDT
  Power fail for about 1min. Reboot firewall, and restart by hand. The first time ping said "Operation not permitted"; I don't know why. Did shutdown -r now it was better when it came up, now I could ssh fcs19 from other computers, but had to service named restart yet again. After about an hour of groveling, it seems normal again.
• 2019-06-23(Sun) 12:50EDT
  Reboot modem. Monitor has message: ethdsl: Promiscous mode enabled
  That seems to be nothing. I ran tcpdump -i ethdsl yesterday. Tried it again today; dslcheck still works afterward.
  
• 2019-06-22(Sat) 09:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Was down a few minutes.
• 2019-02-20(Wed) 09:30
  Reboot modem. Was down several hours during the night
• 2018-12-11(Tue) 16:30EST
  Reboot modem which was down for less than an hour. (Was working at 15:46.) No idea why. Weather is good.
• 2018-10-06(Sat) 15:00
  Came home after a day away to find DSL modem needing re-boot. Down since maybe last night 2018-10-05(Fri) 20:28. Anybody who wanted to see the web page Saturday morning is not happy. Email should be resent automatically.

  Update 18:23: An email just went to the mailing list that was sent last night at 23:00 (11pm EDT).

• 2018-07-15(Sun) 19:15EDT
  DSL went out while I was watching. Re-boot modem; all is well again.
• 2018-05-19(Sat) 9:00EDT
  This morning the nameserver is not working. Why? https://intodns.com/nerflings.org looks OK.
• 2018-05-15(Tue) 18:00EDT
  Rain and thunder outside. Noticed internet not connected. Reboot DSL. Down since 16:30
• 2018-04-15(Sun) 10:45EDT
  Reboot DSL. Down since about 5:30.
• 2018-01-12(Fri) 11:10EST
  Reboot DSL modem. It might have been down since about 4:00am.
• 2017-10-27(Fri) 07:45EDT
  Electrical power went off, came back at 08:45. I can't find my instruction sheet with the commands to bring it up, but I did it anyway. Back on line for now, I think.
• 2017-09-25(Mon) 16:30EDT
  Came home to find internet disconnected. Since about 12:45 no email traffic. Power cycle modem; all better.
• 2017-06-27(Tue) 14:45EDT
  Thunderstorm outside. Lost internet connection. Reboot modem, back immediately.
• 2017-05-31(Wed) 21:15EDT
  Thunderstorm outside. Lost internet connection. Reboot modem, back immediately.
• 2017-05-03(Wed) 01:09:56EDT
  Replaced named.ca with named.root downloaded from https://www.internic.net/domain/named.root
• 2017-04-24(Mon) 10:30EDT
  dig aisnet.org; no servers could be reached; google and wpi work.
  restart named; now aisnet works. WTF?
  11:30 — it works then doesn't then works again, without me doing anything.
• 2017-04-05(Wed) 12:46:06EDT
  At 7:00EDT, when I first tried it since last night, the internet was broken. I could ping, get google search and wikipedia, but most of the rest of the net, including wpi.edu and microsoft.com and most others, seemed to have no DNS. About 12:00 I decided to call ISP, but first restarted named. That seemed not to help, but a few minutes later it started working again. Did I fix it? Did they?
• 2017-03-09(Thu) 22:15EST
  Power went out for a minute. Upon rebooting server, network was notwork. Names of eth were wrong. Reboot again with 'shutdown -r'. It works (don't know why), but named restart had to be done more times than make any sense.
• 2017-03-03(Fri) 00:35EST
  Internet went out. Reboot modem. Still about 30-50 percent packet loss on ping. It was very windy all day; trees down. Strange. If wires were blown down one would expect total disconnect.
  I went to bed and at 7:00 next morning it's all working again. Zero packet loss.
• 2017-01-22(Sun) 11:00–13:00&21:30
  For a few hours today, the internet connection was on and off. No ping goes through, then it does, then it doesn't. I do nothing, but after a while it starts working.
  Later it quits again.
  21:30 — Called ISP again.
  22:04 — DSL works! Then it doesn't, then it does, then it doesn't. It's a bit rainy now.
  • 2017-01-23(Mon) 04:00
  Got twitchy at night and went downstairs to reboot things. It doesn't work.
  07:20 — Diane gets email from web. It seems to be working.
  09:30–10:30 — It's flakey. But then starts working again.
  12:50 — ISP calls me on telephone to ask if it's working. I tell them about it. I think they said the 09:30 hour was when they were fixing it.
  20:00 — It has been working all afternoon. There's a big storm predicted tonight.
  • 2017-01-24(Tue) 12:45
  It made it through the night and is working all morning. Call ISP to tell them it's good. While I am on hold, I do a few pings. It's flakey again. I hang up without talking to them and go out.
  20:30 — It's still flakey. I call ISP to complain. They say the DSLAM is broken, they are sending field tech, will report back within four hours.
  22:30 — All pings fail 100% packet loss.
  • 2017-01-25(Wed) 01:30
  I call them, ask if they need me, tell them I am going to bed.
  07:30 — Seems to be working. Pings about 10% packet loss.
  • 2017-02-02(Thu) 00:30
  OK, it's been a week. It's working about the same, 0–10% packet loss. Next time it breaks it will be a new entry (see above).
  
• 2017-01-19(Thu) 17:00EST
  Came home; found dsl connection not working. Tried reboot modem; no joy. Called Global Capacity, they had nothing much to say but "error", and "authorize charges". Reboot firewall (fcs19), reinitialize. Doesn't work. Then it does. What was broken? What fixed it?
  °18:45 — Called back ISP to say it works now.
• 2016-12-16(Fri) 21:54:19EST
  Reboot modem. Was down since 20:00. Cold and windy, but otherwise good weather.
• 2016-05-29 T 23:30
  Tried to put a block on nuisance IP. Ran firewall.gw and everything broke. Up till 3:30 trying to figure what happened.
  ° 2016-05-30 Memorial Day to remember. Swap ethdsl with ethlan in /etc/udev/70-persistant-net.rules swap ethernet cables and reboot. Doesn't change anything. Can ping 66.92.74.1, can not ping 216.254.95.2 I thought this means problem in ISP, it really means a problem in routing on my machine.
  °2016-06-31 Called Global Capacity ISP. They made me unplug dsl splitter, plug it back. Tried stuff that did not work. Change /etc/rc2.d bind9 and openntpd not start on boot.
  °2016-07-01 ISP man came and told me it's working. He was right, I fixed the routing table, changed resolv.conf and it works.
• 2016-03-04
  About noon, there was a short power outage. The nerflings.org server refused to re-boot. I put fcs21 in place as firewall/server. Got it working by hand, but never tried to automate booting.
• 2016-02-25(Thu) 09:00EST
  Reboot modem. Was down since 06:45. Big rain and wind during night.
• 2016-01-11(Mon) 09:00EST
  Network connection went down again. Discovered it around 10:00. Called ISP after doctor appointment around 12:00. They blamed it on Verizon. It was down all night.
  • 2016-01-12(Tue) 12:30EST
  ISP called me to say the trouble ticket was mis-directed, not Verizon's problem. They are working on it and will call back in a few hours.
  16:30 — I called them and after about an hour on the phone they reset something and it started working again. (17:30)
• 2015-12-14(Mon) 18:00EST
  Discovered network connection is down. I think it's been since about 17:00. Called Global Capacity (ISP). It's a bit more of a production this time, because I have a broken leg, but around 20:20 I go downstairs and notice martian packets. It seems to require 'ip link set ethdsl down' to make it work again, but who knows. I also did ./firewall.gw, ifup, ifdown, and power cycle modem several times with no joy.

  update: 2015-12-14(Mon) 22:36EST - discovered while dorking around that ntpd was not running, and probably had not been for a long time. After I started it, the time jumped by 15 minutes.

• 2015-11-22(Sun) 12:30EST
  Discovered network connection is down. Called Global Capacity (ISP). They blame it on Verizon, but say it is a known problem they are working on. It's probably been down since about 17:30 yesterday (Sat). Around 17:40 I notice martian packets on the DSL, I restart ethernet interface (ifdown; ifup) and it works.
• 2015-11-02(Mon) 09:00EST
  Reboot modem. It was out since about 1:30. No obvious reason: weather is fine, though Google search was not working yesterday afternoon until about 23:00 yesterday.
• 2014-10-16(Thu) 11:30EDT
  Power failed a few minutes before 8:00EDT. Firewall down until I noticed it a little after 11. Reboot, restart firewall. At shell, "service named restart" did not work. Must kill and start. Start dovecot and httpd.
• 2014-08-24(Sun) 06:45EDT
  Power outage of a few seconds. Firewall did not reboot itself. Found out about it at 10:30, reboot, ethernet seems not to work, fiddle with it, it works, not sure why, time seems to be off by four hours, ntpd fixes it by magic in a few minutes, probably hardware clock and OS disagree on UTC vs EDT, not sure how to fix that.
• 2014-07-23(Wed) 20:25EDT
  Restored this list from a backup and entered the most recent complaints.
• 2014-07-14(Mon)
  This afternoon I was sitting peacably in front of a computer when everything went black. Power outage. A few seconds later it came on again and the computers began to reboot. Joy.

  I few seconds later the power went on and off several times in a second. I ran to throw off circuit breakers. I heard noises from the backyard. The power company "repair man" was replacing the electric meter. We had words; he went away.

  The main server at nerflings.org would not reboot. Fortunately, I had a backup standing by. Unfortunately, it had never been tested—well it was now. It didn't work. I fiddled with things. It mostly works, but some of the more recent changes have been lost.

  In the mean time Someone provided a test of the mailing list.—It's torqued up. In particular, the email went back to sending through Megapath's broken servers. I fixed that again, I think.

• 2014-03-07(Fri) 07:30EST
  Reboot modem. Down since 4 am? Added 31.210.91.0/24 31.210.82.0/24 to /etc/firewall/firewall.banned. Thay have been making futile connections with bogus sender domains to the mail server every minute for days.
• 2013-12-26(Thu) 22:55:16EST
  Reboot modem. Down since 4:00am, I think.
• 2013-09-12(Thu) 22:13EDT
  Reboot modem and router. There is a thunderstorm, but it doesn't seem that bad.
              22:23EDT — Reboot again. Sleep. In the morning it is still working.
• 2013-09-01(Sun) 11:20EDT
  Reboot modem. Down since 3 or 4 am. There were thunderstorm in the night.
• 2013-04-21(Sun) 11:30EDT
  Reboot modem. Down for half an hour I think. No obvious reason.
• 2013-02-09(Sat) 00:03:34EST
  Reboot modem. It went off line while I was using it. If that's the worst that happens, I'm happy. Snowstorm of the decade is happening now.
• 2012-10-31(Wed) 01:14:48EDT
  Power cycle DSL modem, which quit while I was web browsing. Offline for a few minutes. This is the day after hurricane Sandy, not bad really; still water coming into the sump.
• 2012-08-19(Sun) 11:30:32EDT
  Reboot Linksys interal router after power flicker. The Internet connection and firewall were OK.
• 2012-08-02(Thu) 01:21:34EDT
  reboot server after I accidentally shutdown the wrong computer
• 2012-04-27(Fri) 16:51:53EDT
  Set up a new server machine. It has stayed up for a couple of days. It has a reboot log of its own.
• 2012-03-23(Fri) 11:49:14EDT
  I made a reboot log which lists the times the server has rebooted.
• 2012-03-20(Tue) 17:27:10EDT
  Sick of that, I kludged up a script that restarts the network and servers on re-boot. I don't really understand how it works, and it certainly won't work if the modem quits, but it may save the bacon in some cases. It worked once when I tested it by
  shutdown -r now.
• 2012-03-20(Tue) 16:58:36EDT
  Again restart firewall, which rebooted at 16:10
• 2012-03-20(Tue) 11:12:12EDT
  Again restart firewall, which rebooted at 08:55.
• 2012-03-19(Mon) 16:42:42EDT
  Again restart firewall, which rebooted at 14:45.
• 2012-03-14(Wed) 20:25EDT
  Oh no, not again. Restart firewall, which spontaneously rebooted at 19:27:46, so it was off-line for an hour.
• 2012-03-12(Mon) 10:45EDT
  Restart firewall computer. Rebooted again at about 2:30. Down about eight hours.
• 2012-02-29(Wed) 10:00EST
  Restart firewall computer, which rebooted for no obvious reason. Down for a few minutes.
• 2012-02-22(Wed) 11:30EST
  Restart firewall computer, which rebooted for no obvious reason. Down for five minutes.
• 2012-02-17(Fri) 10:30EST
  Reboot DSL modem. Off line since about 04:02 this morning.
• 2011-11-11(Fri) 15:02:13EST
  Reboot everything after power flicker at 14:20EST
• 2011-10-22(Sat) 17:45EDT
  Reboot everything after 500ms power outage.
• 2011-10-12(Wed) 04:20:41EDT
  Very strange. It was chugging along, I was on my way to bed about 1:30. DSL just stopped working. I tried rebooting modem, computer, swapping cables, changing configurations. Nothing worked. I just got up in the middle of the night to try something else, but it had fixed itself.
• 2011-09-29(Thu) 18:20:44EDT
  Reboot everything after ten second power failure.
• 2011-09-18(Sun) 17:11:01EDT
  Reboot DSL modem and Linksys after power flicker. (Down just a minute.)
• 2011-09-15(Thu) 05:51:41EDT
  Reboot DSL modem. It was working at 02:00 before the thunderstorm.
• 2011-09-08(Thu) 11:30EDT
  Reboot DSL modem. It was down since about 8:00 this morning. Heavy rain last night.
• 2011-09-05(Mon) 21:12:59EDT
  Restart everything after 15 second power outage.
• 2011-08-31(Wed) 06:00EDT
  Restart server. Yesterday, 2011-08-30(Tue) 09:00EDT, the power went off. It stayed off until more than twenty-one hours later, 2011-08-31(Wed) 05:30EDT. This was strange, because the skies were blue and wind mimimal.
• 2011-08-29(Mon) 19:58:39EDT
  Restart firewall/server after 15 second long power failure. (again)
• 2011-08-29(Mon) 19:24:33EDT
  Restart firewall/server after 15 second long power failure.
• 2011-08-28(Sun) 16:40:31EDT
  Reboot modems, Not bad, given that hurricane Irene just went through. No power loss, just a quick flicker and crackle. It did that about every hour for the rest of the afternoon and evening. Sometimes the DSL modem needs re-boot, sometimes only the Linksys. The computers never need re-boot, guess they have power supplies worth more than a dollar.
  • 2011-08-25(Thu) 13:55:23EDT
    Reboot modem. Storm coming.
  • 2011-08-25(Thu) 22:33:40EDT
    Reboot modem, Good grief! Twice in one day. It'll never make it through the night.
  • 2011-08-25(Thu) 22:41:23EDT
    Reboot modem six or eight more times, probably should just give up.
  • 2011-08-26(Fri) 01:45:19EDT
    It seems to have been running for a couple hours without problem. I am going to bed. Strange, it didn't seem like such a big storm, Little rain, maybe there was lighting near the other end of the line.
  • 2011-08-27(Sat)
    Still running. All better?
• 2011-08-21(Sun) 15:30:47EDT
  Reboot modem and router after power glich sometime around 11:00.
• 2011-08-17(Wed) 08:01:45EDT
  There was a short power failure about 5:00am. I happened to be awake and brought it back up almost immediately. It must have happened again because I had to bring it back again at 8:00am.
• 2011-08-10(Wed) 05:06:15EDT
  Reboot modem after thunderstorm.
• 2011-08-05(Fri) 09:30EDT
  Power went out for a few seconds. I was at the computer when it happened, so I knew it and immediately set about resetting the servers. Just finished that when power went out again. Rebooted everything again, and it has been fine all day.
• 2011-07-19(Tue) 10:29:21EDT
  Reboot DSL modem after it quit in the night.
• 2011-07-14(Thu) 07:44:14EDT
  Restart after short power out in night at about 4:55.
• 2011-06-23(Thu) 09:30...16:00EDT
  Power was out for about six hours for scheduled maintance.
• 2011-03-27(Sun) 22:14:28EDT
  Power went out for about thirty seconds. Reboot and back online in five minutes.
• 2011-01-05(Wed) 08:15 EST
  Reboot computer after 5 or 10 min power outage during the night. I think the power failed shortly before midnight (2011-01-04 23:56).
• 2010-12-30(Thu) 10:00 EST
  Power failure in the night. Reboot computer.
   ⋅ 12:13 EST Web server was not started, so I started it.
• 2010-12-08(Wed) 01:30 EST
  Reboot modem.
• 2010-10-19(Tue) 09:19 EDT
  Reboot modem.
• 2010-09-27(Mon) 19:30 EDT
  Reboot modem. It disconnected while I sat here, so it was just a few minutes. Kind of wet out.
• 2010-08-31(Tue) 10:16 EDT
  Reboot modem. The weather is fine. No idea why it quit. It was working until midnight last nignt.
• 2010-07-21(Wed) 17:20 EDT
  Power went out and stayed out until about 19:20EDT. Reboot everything. It still seems to work.
• 2010-06-01(Tue) 16:55 EDT
  Reboot modem after big rain and lightening storm. Down since about 15:00.
• 2010-05-24(Mon) 10:01:32EDT
  Restarted service after a five second power failure around 9:00EDT
• 2010-03-03(Wed) 14:12 EST
  Modem rebooted itself. How often that happens I do not know, but I just watched it happen.
  

  $ dslcheck
  ping  66.92.74.1
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 05:21:32 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:23:05 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:26:32 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:26:41 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:27:11 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:27:22 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:27:29 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:27:49 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:28:12 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:41:58 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:42:07 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:44:34 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:44:41 PM EST: DSL works!!
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:47:44 PM EST: >>> ERROR  1 <<<
  Wed 03 Mar 2010 14:48:47 PM EST: DSL works!!
  

  And so on.
  That's getting boring. I should figure out how to write a script that logs changes. I should tell Speakeasy.
  • 2010-03-03(Wed) 18:34:50 EST
    Called Speakeasy. They think it's my wiring.
  • things seem to have gotten better since I called

     ping -c 1 -w 2 -q 216.254.95.2
     Wed 2010-03-03 23:28:07 !!DSL works!!
     Wed 2010-03-03 23:37:34 !!DSL works!!
     Thu 2010-03-04 00:00:49 !!DSL works!!
    

    Times are in EST. That's late enough. Maybe somebody just fixed the damn thing, and then torqued the paperwork.
  • 2010-03-04(Thu) 08:17:32EST
    Reboot modem. It didn't make it through the night.
  • 2010-03-04(Thu) 10:30 EST
    Speakeasy (Chad) called back. They want to set a time for the locals to check the wire.
  • 2010-03-05(Fri) 10:30EST
    Speakeasy called to say that the wire outside my house had been repaired. It seems to be working. Have not rebooted since Thursday, as recorded above.
  • 2010-03-16(Tue) 00:29:54EDT
    It's been raining for days. Wind and flood warnings. The sump pump has been working overtime, but the DSL line stays up. Let's say we fixed it.
• Mon 2010-03-01 11:31 EST
  Reoot modem. Down since about 11am. Sleet outside.
• Mon 2010-01-25 21:22 EST
  Reboot modem. Went down while I was sitting here. Very Rainy.
• Tue 2010-01-19 22:21:09 EST
  Reboot modem. Snow all day.
• Tue 2010-01-19 09:27:30 EST
  Reboot modem. Down in the night. Snow.
• Wed 2009-12-23 08:30 EST
  Reboot computer. Short power failure during the night.
• Sun 2090-12-13 23:30 EST
  Reboot modem twice. A wet day. Down a few hours, and then down again immediately.
• Thu 2009-011-26 19:01:15 EST
  Reboot modem. Kind of a wet day. Down all day—since about midnight.
• Sat 2009-11-0 7 22:56:15 EST
  Reboot modem again.
• Tue 2009-11-03 11:49:03 EST
  Reboot modem. It was down since about 23:00 last night.
• Sun 2009-10-18 10:00 EDT
  Reboot modem. Hard rain last night, it was down probably since about 1:00 am.
  On the bright side, the machine itself has been chugging along for months.
  nerf]# uptime
  13:39:17 up 107 days
• Sat 2009-08-15 22:46:14 EDT
  Reboot modem again. Why? It's not even raining.
• Thu 2009-08-13 10:00 EDT
  Reboot modem. It went out during the night of rain.
• Sat 2009-07-18 00:09:41 EDT
  Reboot modem during thunderstorm and much rain.
• Sun 2009-07-05 18:00 EDT
  Resart httpd, smtpd, etc. Power went off for a short time probably Thursday evening. We were out of town and didn't get back till Sunday evening. There were thunder storms.
• Wed 2009-07-01 18:24:24 EDT
  Reboot modem. It went down sometime after 14:00 this afternoon. Rainy.
• Mon 2009-06-15 11:00 EDT
  Reboot modem. It went down during the night. (Rainy)
• Sat 2009-05-30 10:00 EDT Reboot modem. It went down during the night(again). I don't know when, but after midnight.
• Thu 2009-05-28 11:00 EDT Reboot modem. It went down during the night. I don't know when.
• Mon 2009-05-25 18:00 EDT Reboot modem. Also reboot internal router. It looks like it may have been offline since about Sun 2009-05-24 06:00 EDT, It was unattended since about 2009-05-22 mid-afternoon.
• Wed 2009-04-22 11:30 EDT Reboot modem. I think it was off since about 1:00 this morning.
• Tue 2009-03-17 18:00 EDT At approximately this time my ISP Speakeasy had major trouble. I don't understand really, but basically the internet crashed. About six hours later, Wed 2009-03-18 00:30, things began to work better. It quit again immediately and totally. It's hard to know how much is working. At 1:30 I go to bed. There is nothing for me to do, they fix it when they fix it. It seemed to be back by 4:30, but who knows?

  Here is what Speakeasy says:
  03/17/09 05:25:18 PM) SOLVED: Nationwide Connectivity Issue
  Region : All
  E.T.A. : (none)
  Services Affected : Voice and data services
  Speakeasy is aware of a network issue affecting connectivity nation wide. We are investigating this issue and appreciate your patience.
  
  Update: 03/17/09 06:46:25 PM
  We are still experiencing issues in the NYC area. All other locations are believed to be up and passing traffic as usual.

• Wed 2009-03-11 11:30 EDT
  Found DSL had disconnected in the night. Power cycle modem.
• 2007-10-25 &helip 2009-03-09 Power fails and modem reboots, nothing interesting happens,
• (Wed 2007-10-03) The power went out in half of the house. The computer was in the half that had no power. I ran an extention cord to the other half of the house, re-booted, and tried to figure out what was going on. I was about to call an electrician, but saw a National Grid truck a few houses away. The men in the truck said that wires had burnt.

  Power went off after that to the whole house, and so I re-booted when it came back. The problem with the Linksys yesterday may have been caused by power glitches. It seems better now.

• (Tue 2007-10-02) I thought the internet connection was lost and re-booted the DSL modem. That did not fix it, but obscured the actual failure. It seems that the internal network was hosed. I fixed it by re-booting the Linksys switch.

  It broke again. Confirmed that DSL is still up, but local network is down. Fix by re-boot of Linksys. The telephone answering machine is blinking, indicating a short power outage that did not affect the computers, but crashed the switch.

• (Mon 2007-03-26 20:12:35) This morning Diane's email did not work.  Power cycle of modem fixed it.
  After years of near flawless connectivity, the modem began locking up, needing restart by power cycle by hand.
  • (Tue 2007-03-27) The DSL modem (PRESTIGE 600 series) seems to be locking up from time to time. This has happened a few times per year, and I just assumed it was caused by lighting storms or something. In any case, it was not often enough to worry about it much. It was hard to debug, because it was rare. Yesterday (Tue, 2007-03-27) it happened about six times.
  • between 2007-05-13 and 2007-09-25 restart modem about 10 times
  • (Sun 2007-04-01) Modem began restarting itself repeatedly.
    I was going to wait until Monday business hours to call the 800 number, but what have I got to lose now. I called it and got nothing but put on hold.
    If you time it right you can get one ping through, never two.
  • Next morning 2007-04-02 it was working.
    I thought maybe the problem was fixed, though I still want a proper splitter.
    Needed a hand restart during the day. In the evening it started auto-restart again.
  • (Tue 2007-04-03 00:08:07)
    $ ping -c 1 66.92.74.1
    --- 66.92.74.1 ping statistics ---
    1 packets transmitted, 0 received, 100% packet loss, time 0ms
    Dead. Power cycle.
    
  • (2007-04-07) I fixed the problem by surgery on the wires.
    I traced some Neolithic wiring in my basement, found something sketchy, and cut it with knife and dikes. That was late at night. Just before I cut the wires it was acting up, in the week since (this is written 2007-04-11) it has been working well. More details about what I did can be found here.
    The gist of it is the slogan: RJ31X must die!
• 2003-09-05(Thu)
  I sign up for Speakeasy Classic ADSL Basic 1.5/256 Self-Install. They say:
  

      You will receive the following hardware: ZyXEL 645M
      Your ip address(es) will be: 66.92.74.188
      Your gateway will be: 66.92.74.1
    

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