Network Connectings

The way computers and networks interact can be surprising.

The library uses an Access based interlibrary loan (ILL) program that sends out e-mails notifying students when a book arrives for them. Yesterday (Wednesday), between 3:00 and 3:30, the program suddenly couldn't send the e-mails to students. When an e-mail went out around 3:35 from our net admin about an e-mail change for Blackberry users, there was no logical connection, but the timing was suspicious. Troubleshooting this morning determined that an exception with no apparent connection to the Blackberry change had been lost. Restoring the exception fixed the library's e-mail problem (and I expect a few others).

About a week ago, I went ahead with the WinXP SP2 update on my laptop at home. Since then, I've noticed that my wireless connection doesn't always work. Tonight, it was saying that no wireless network was detected. There were lights on at my neighbor's (where the base station is) and I thought about calling. But I put it off. Just after the lights went off, my computer connected to the wireless network. Is the problem related to the update? Surely turning off the lights wouldn't change my ability to connect, but is there another explanation?