mov (%rdp),%rcx

... that would pretty much sum up my long weekend... o_O

I ran into a serious assembly code bug when I tried building and running a month's coding changes under 64-bit openSUSE Linux.

Good thing that Rajah provided me with some very useful GDB debugging techniques before he went to Bohol for a vacation. :P

I spent most of the weekend, debugging, thinking, learning assembly, shopping for PC components, playing Guitar Hero, and more debugging... :D

And for some side stories...

My Inno3D video card fan stopped again, for the nth time this month. I took it out and went to PCX to have it checked or possibly replaced, but the tech support guy told me that they don't do replacement if the item was purchased more than a month ago.

Although the warranty still applies, the shop won't replace it right away, they had to ship it back to the supplier for testing, which would probably take 4 weeks, at the very least. o_O

He suggested that I check the IT shops in Gilmore to find a replacement fan, which I'll probably in the coming days. :D

Since I was expecting something like that to happen, I just bought some upgrade components for my desktop. Additional 2GB DDR2-800 memory modules. :P

==========

When I got home from PCX, I took a quick shower and prepared for a message massage session. The old masseuse was referred by my sister's boyfriend. Gene's family is a regular customer of the old lady. She was also here last week but I declined because I had to do some work.

After almost an hour of joint twisting, muscle bending, bone cracking, I was feeling relaxed and energized again... :P

The masseuse discovered my injured ankle which I myself never noticed. Although it's been aching from time to time, I just kept on ignoring it.

==========

Back to my work area, I installed the 2GB memory modules and booted my machine just to be greeted by a black screen and 100% CPU usage. I tried reinstalling the Linux NVIDIA drivers several times using different methods but all of them failed. :(

I resorted to re-installing Hardy Heron (Ubuntu 8.04) then installed the NVIDIA driver. But it failed again. :(

I spent another 2 hours searching for possible solutions in the forums. Tried several BIOS configurations like suggested in the threads, but they all failed. :(

With no concrete leads, I decided to revert back to my original configuration, then put the memory modules one at a time. The 2GB and 3GB configurations worked fine, so it's 4GB configuration that really screws my setup. >:(

I continued to search through the forums, this time with a specific issue. One thread mentioned something about upgrading the BIOS. Although it's for a different motherboard, I figured it might just solve my problem. O:)

After bumping my board's (GA-MA69GM-S2H) BIOS firmware to F5, the NVIDIA driver for Linux miraculously worked. Ha ha ha!

Next in Line

The endless cycle continues...

With most of my best colleagues leaving the company,
It makes me wonder, what's next for me and the rest
of us left behind?

The recent wave of resignations could have raise
some alarms among the ranks of the upper management.
Well, it should have. But what can they do?
What are they going to do? What's next for us?

Though I have no idea of what's gonna happen,
I would still want to see it.

From all these things happening in the workplace,
only one thing is really sure... change.

Change. Some hate it, some like it. Like or hate it,
you can't do anything to prevent it from happening.
But when it happens, you can always do something
about it, that is, if you want to.

Resignation has always been a popular topic in my
workplace. People will always find good reasons to
leave the office. May it be a financial necessity,
personal dream, office politics, family reasons, whatever.

To resign from a job is not essentially bad.
Although, why, when, and how you do it could define it.
In the end, it's still your right and it's your choice.

I'm not here to tell people why they should leave
or why they should stay. In my opinion, nobody should
tell anybody what should they choose.
This way, if something screws up, you can't blame
anyone but yourself. :P

Yes. I'm being selfish for saying this.
But it will be less complicated this way. :)

Resignation is simply a side-effect of change.
It results from changes, and it results to changes too.
When a person leaves, that person experience changes.
When people are left, they also experience changes.

No matter how small or big, it is still change.
And change is good, ideally speaking... :P

Change, is an opportunity to learn more, understand more,
give more, and grow more. But it's always up to the
individual whether he would want to do anything about it.

Ultimately, it's not about feeling sorry, bad, or angry
about what is happening or what is not happening.

Things would not always go the way we wanted it to be.
That's a fact. But you can always do something about it.

To leave is an option, to stay is an option too.
It doesn't matter what you choose today or tomorrow.

It is what you continue to do or not to do after
you made that decision that will matter most...

--------------------------------------------------------
So I sing this song to all of my age
For these are the questions
We've got to face
For in this cycle that we call life
We are the ones who are next in line.

http://www.lyricsdownload.com/after-image-next-in-line-lyrics.html