Sneakernet

Yesterday I had both of the computers on my desk going at the same time and it was great. One of my computers has two monitors and so I hardly ever run out of screen real-estate making it a rarity that I actually need to use both computers. However yesterday was one of those unique times where I actually needed both machines.

My primary desktop is a Linux machine and is good for about 90% of the work I do. That other 10% is relegated to my MacBook laptop due to software being unavailable for Linux or for when I am traveling. Yesterday I was using Remote Desktop Connection on my Mac to work on a Windows machine located in San Francisco. I was putting together some documentation that required me to take some screen shots and include them in a technical paper. Since I like to do all of my image editing on Linux but word processing on the Mac, it required a lot of transferring of files.

To complicate things, My Mac was using Juniper Networks software to create a virtual private network (VPN) with the office in the Bay Area. Sometimes that means I can't access any of the computers in my home office without turning off the VPN. Since that slows things down a lot, I decided to resort to an tried and true method of networking: sneakernet.

Sneakernet is basically copying files to a removable medium and walking to the computer where you wish to copy that file. When sneakernet first got its name, people used floppy disks to transfer data. Now we use flash drives, CDs, or DVDs. If anyone ever needs to sneakernet data from here to Hawaii, I'm more than willing to be the one carrying the data.

Since my desktop and laptop are within easy reach of eachother, using sneakernet to transfer files didn't involve using my sneakers at all. I could copy from one computer to the other without even getting out of my chair. I transfered files all afternoon and was thinking I had an elegant solution and was rather smug. I didn't quite dislocate my shoulder patting myself on the back, but probably came close.

At the end of the day I decided to try a little experiment. I had been using sneakernet because I though the VPN would make it impossible for my Mac to see my Linux desktop. I thought I would give the network connection a try anyways. I assumed it was going to give me an error and wanted to know what that looked like in case anybody ever asked me, "What does this error mean?" Much to my surprise it actually worked. It turns out that both myself and the office in San Francisco had configured our networks in such a way that computer IP addresses remained unique.

My smugness quickly disappeared and I regretted not making the simple test earlier in the day. Now I know and can put away my sneakernet until the next time it is needed.