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rsync

In mid-2001, notably before 9/11, I had to quickly move a 4U Sun Netra server from San Jose to Washington DC.

I just carried it on.

It was enormous - 4U and full length - and weighed a ton.

No packaging, no box - just carrying a huge server down the aisle of the plane ...

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> before 9/11

At Aph where I worked in the 1970's, the airport people freaked out over my colleagues carrying a briefcase filled with electronic circuitry on the plane.

Aph made the prototypes for Mattel's handheld LED games. The prototype was a custom wirewrapped single board computer about 8*11 inches, with power supply and a rigged up game keyboard. It was all conveniently mounted in a hard shell briefcase. He'd have to power up the device and play the game to convince them it was harmless.

Playing them in the airport would always draw a crowd. Nobody had seen anything like that before.

I wonder what has happened to those machines. They were pretty cool.

Taking 1 off prototype devices across borders, or worse parts of ones (so you can't demonstrate even partial function) is sometimes fun. It can generate some interesting conversations, especially RF gear.

Note that there was no essential distinction between the single board computers we were designing and building, and an Apple II. We coulda been billionaires! :-/ I even made one that generated a 24*80 display on any CRT monitor.

I’m reminded of the http://catb.org/jargon/html/tv-typewriters.html hospital security story.

Back in 1993 or so, I was doing my PhD and also ended up doing a lot of videoconferencing demos at various conferences. This really required a Sun Sparcstation 20, maxed out with dual CPUs, as much RAM as it would take, and a video capture card and camera. In such a spec, an SS20 was pretty rare, so I carried the one from our lab everywhere in an unpadded canvas shoulder bag - on planes, buses, trains, whereever. It was pretty large, weighed about 25lbs, and back in 1993 was worth about £20,000 in that spec, which was more than I earned in a year. I was pretty worried I'd drop it or leave it in the pub or something, but I guess being so heavy, it was hard to forget. Despite the bumps, bashes and vibration, it never failed - Sun made good hardware back then. Other than having a difficult time with customs officials in Italy one time (they wanted to "fine" me for a form I apparently should have filled out; I didn't have any money, so couldn't pay no matter what they wanted - missed my flight by 12 hours as a result), nothing bad ever happened.

... notably before 9/11 ...

Derailing the thread, I took my first flight, age 18, in 2001. I was into carrying lots of tools on my belt / in my pockets back then, so carried on a pair of pliers, crescent wrench, flat head and phillips screwdrivers, a Swiss Army knife, a penknife, about six feet of baling wire, and lord knows what else. Dumped it all into the little round change tray, sent it through the X-ray machine, and re-pocketed it on the other side.

Those were the days.

You can still do that minus the knife as long as the tools are under 7 inches. They even allow power tools. For check in can bring whatever tools you want.

https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/...

Tehcnically true but any sort of toolbag seems to trigger being selected for a "random" groping by the TSA and with tools being so cheap nowadays it often makes sense to carry on your luggage (and maybe your favorite multimeter or something) and hit up Harbor Freight where you land.

The kind of people that are flying around to fix expensive equipment aren't going to tolerate using tools from Harbor Freight. And the people that own expensive equipment where you have to pay someone to fly in to fix it aren't going to want it being touched by Harbor Freight tools.

I don't know. My friend managed to do this by accident - he had a pocket knife in his backpack that he forgot about. Just threw the backpack in the X-ray scanner and picked it up on the other side. Only noticed it when we were changing flights.

This was just a few years ago, a day or two after France had had one of its annual terrorist attacks.

I too have brought a knife through security... not sure how much of it was me versus the fact that there were a whole bunch of Boy Scouts right in front of me, so they might've though I was with them or something.

7 inches would be luxurious. In Canada we're limited to 6cm (2.4 inches) for the head/shaft of the tool, but in practice, I've had small screwdrivers confiscated for being slightly over 6cm including the handle.

https://www.catsa-acsta.gc.ca/en/item/tools

Back when I worked for BT that was part of the disaster recovery for the BT Worldwide Intranet.

We would quickly reconfig our test server to match the live on whilst our support person booked taxis and two tickets from Heathrow to Edinburgh - then one of us would fly up with the server on the seat next to them.

Yes I know we should have had a hot spare in the rack in CAPITAL (the main Exchange in Edinburgh)

I know someone who recently did that with a satellite that they were transporting to the facility that was going to pack it into a rocket to launch it into orbit. They apparently didn't have any problems.

I've flown with sketchy looking computers in pelican cases a few times. The only time it was a problem was when I mentioned that the batteries in the box were scooter batteries. Apparently you can fly with any size lead-acid batteries you want, but "scooter batteries" are on a list of specifically banned items.

The security folks aren't applying any judgement, they're just looking for things on a list of stuff that's not allowed. As long as big-ass servers aren't on the list and they fit in the carry-on size limit, it's all good.

I had a similar experience with lithium-ion batteries: I flew from Canada to the US with a backpack full of equipment that was 99% battery, 1% rfid reader by volume. On the x-ray, it looked like battery packs and that wouldn't have been allowed. But I told them it was rfid readers, and that made it okay.

Not just security people. Easy way of avoiding it if the gate staff want to tag your carry on bag and put it on the hold: be very willing,take their receipt that points out there shouldn't be batteries in there,then very apologetically point out you have devices with batteries in there.

So far it's worked every time - not once have they asked if I could take them out; probably not so much that they're clueless as that they're just looking for the easiest way of getting their assigned task done.

I had a colleague who was asked by a client to bring a 2U FPGA-based router on the plane to Brazil .. and not declare it to customs, as that would save the 50% import tax. Apparently this ludicrous scheme worked.

Ha, now I’m imagining a 4U server getting the window seat.

-“Can we switch seats?”

-“I’m afraid I can’t do that Dave”

Definitely if it was in an exit row then it would need to be reseated.

"Ha, now I’m imagining a 4U server getting the window seat."

No seat - I put it in the overhead bin ...

Warning: when opening the overhead bin objects may fall out.

Imagine being excited to get off a long-haul flight and having this thing fall on your head. -_-

Did you just buy a seat for it? I read about an overnight courier service for weird items that would send a person on plane with the item.

That's pretty interesting. Was it an article? If so, do you think you can dig up that article?

From what I read this is how DHL actually was founded,but for legal documents.[1] [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/DHL#Origins

And it fit in the overhead bin!?

Based on current carry-on bag size limits, the bins on most planes are at least 22" deep, so a 19" server won't be a problem. It'll just take up the space of 2+ bags, depending on how long it is.

Depending on the server build and your physical strength you'll have a lot of trouble lifting it there. My 3U/12x3.5" lives on a cupboard (few inches lower than overhead bins), and I would never dare to (re-)move it (from) there with the disks inserted. Without them it's still heavy enough and a pain to move around, but then I'm more on the nerdy end of the STR scale ;-)

"And it fit in the overhead bin!?"

Yes, I put it in the overhead bin and it did, indeed, fit.

After all, a rackmount server is only 19" wide ...

Different times. I’ve never seen a flight with room left in the overhead bin in years.

It's his carry-on. Stash it in the overhead when you're boarding. Presumably, if a company needs a server moved in a hurry, it's worth buying a first-class ticket for the "lucky" human who has to go along with it. I've never seen first-class pax not get overhead space, and almost never even see them need to use space outside the first-class section.

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