polywogsys

Heh, I just realised this from sourceforge...

# Joined: 2000-01-30 (10 years ago)
# User ID: 9776 

OMG. o_0

So, Fedora 12 (Constantine) came out on time and I have to say that I am rather impressed. They have these releases down to a science. Instead of doing an ordinary install, I did an upgrade install. It was even easier than I've previously written up.

• Basically download and install yum-presto. The Presto plugin for yum takes advantage of the delta-rpm (drpm) package format. Delta RPMs basically are diffs of the version installed on your system, and the updated version on the server. They can reduce a 500M download to a 30M download. (Useful to have in any case).
  
  • yum -y install yum-presto
• Then download the tool which will do the job called preupgrade
  • yum -y install preupgrade
• Run an update to make sure you're at the latest version of your fedora 11 installation.
  
  • yum -y update
• Lastly run the preupgrade utility. Make sure you're at 1.1.2-1 or higher. Previous versions failed to detect whether there was enough room in your /boot partition for the upgrade boot image and kernel. The GUI version of the preupgrade utiltiy kept failing on me, so the CLI seemed to work the best. YMMV.
  
  • rpm -q preupgrade
  • preupgrade-cli "Fedora 12 (Constantine)"
• Go make some coffee and come back later! :)

I am running it on my laptop now, and I've already done it at work with no issues. Also when done, run a check to see what orphans are left in your system and remove them at will. You can run that with the command:

• package-cleanup --orphan

You might have some Fedora 11 packages laying about.

OK, so this should be simple right. Just follow the directions on their website and you should have a fully operational bootable Parted Magic USB Key. FAIL! Granted most people don't putz with their USB keys the way I do. For example clobbering the mbr by writing data directly to the drive (with tar or dd, or truecrypt, etc.) but it shouldn't be that unusual. First off follow the directions here: http://tinyurl.com/lfaz7j
If you're using windows, then it should be super easy because you create the master boot record (mbr) with "-ma" options which are not available under linux.
If you're using syslinux (and you've compiled your own version - though this info is irrelevant to our dilemma) then the following should work:

dd if=/path/to/syslinux/mbr/mbr.bin of=/dev/sdd

If you've installed your package manager's syslinux then it might be under "/usr/share/syslinux/mbr.bin". Remember that /dev/sdd should be whereever your usbkey is.

Had lunch with the Bradius today at El Fuego on 21st Street. On the way back this guy on a bike got hit by an SUV. A block down the road, the guy was arguing with the SUV driver, and all of the sudden the biker reaches in and punches the guy in the face. I was like dzang. I am not saying I support the guy, but I am saying I understand the frustration against drivers who think they own the roads.

This morning on the way to work an impatient driver was fully stopped and decided to go around another car. It didn't turn on its signals or even LOOK to where it was going. It almost hit this other bicyclist in front of me. Drivers are just so unaware of their environment. AND THEY DON'T SIGNAL!! No kiddies signalling doesn't happen when you're in the MIDDLE of the turn, it happens well ahead of the turn so that you don't end up running into a bicyclist in the lane. If you're not going to look where you're going, at least let other people know your intentions.

So today's our Ten Year anniversary. Sheesh, I have until 7pm tonight to decide if I should go back to reading my "McDonaldization of Society" book and get a trade in for a shiner newer model or renew the lease. ;) We joke like that all the time. But seriously, of all the things that can go badly, I think I am getting sick. My ears feel clogged and the back of my throat is super dry. Fail!

We're thinking of hitting up Bindi, the new Indian place in the Gayborhood (I refuse to call the gayborhood MIDTOWN VILLAGE). Will let you all know how it goes.

On an unrelated note, I spent three hours last night trying to figure out why Wordpress was broken on the Green Party's host. Here it's just that wordpress is broked with Firefox 3.5.3 when run on PHP 4.4.2 and MySQL 4.1.22.

I was leaving Seattle a couple of weekends ago and as I go through security I realized that I had left something. Yes, indeed I left it at the hotel. You know those times when you feel as if you've left your bag or wallet in some restaurant ... that heart stopping sinking feeling. Yes, I had one of those moments. Except usually when I have one of those moments, I realise that I've just placed my phone in another pocket, or my wallet is in my jacket instead, or that on this rare occasion I have left home without my bag. My heart continues to beat, and life goes on.

This wasn't one of those moments. This heart stopping moment was quickly followed by a washed out sepia mental image in my head of exactly where I had left it: draped over the back of a chair in my hotel room.

You see, it would normally be no big deal leaving an article of clothing. Brad has left many an article of clothing at hotels. You can probably even count the number of vacations we've had by the conspicuous absence of a favourite shirt in his closet. Not that it would put a dent in the amount of clothes in his closet. His wardrobe is very much like the mythical Hydra - that monster from Greek mythology who had nine heads and when one was cut two would grow in its place. Unlike the mythical Hydra, this monster's replacement are more than two items of what he would leave at the hotel. And it wouldn't be a for like replacement: a pair of shoes, a jacket and a couple of shirts for his one blue shirt - even if he'd find that same shirt at a later visit to the hotel some time later. In any case, while the Hydra might be this ugly reptilian like monster, he'd always manage to pick out the best stuff. Some of the best clothes I have now were picked out by him.

Yet my wardrobe still manages to leak like a sieve and leaving Seattle would be no exception.

While you can time the number of trips by Brad's lost articles, with me, you can time it based on jackets! What started as a utilitarian purchase during one trip abroad has turned into an almost subconscious obsession. I say subconscious because I haven't quite determined if my brain decides to fool me into being unprepared for the weather at my destination.

The jacket that I left in Seattle I picked up in Reykjavik, Iceland.

Technically I was still in Seattle, even if it was at the airport and I was on my way out. I could just as easily jettisoned the object, declared a new reason to return to Iceland and purchased a jacket there. It would be easy to say as a reason that it was the cost of the jacket or the great deal I got. You see, when I bought this jacket at $360US in Iceland their economy was tanking (and so was ours for that matter). Speed of light and credit didn't save that one transaction to turn into a $175US purchase. Going to 66 Degrees North's website still has the same jacket listed in their NYC store for that price.

No, that would be too easy to use as an excuse. So I *could* have just jettisoned the jacket if that were the only reason. But I am much like those weirdo packrats you read about on the news, never throwing away anything, having twenty million pets, and everything having some strange OCD sentimental value.

I called the hotel. After a grueling three phone calls with housekeeping I was able to ascertain that they indeed find the jacket and that they would be mailing it to me. I say grueling because just to get the address across was like an exercise in futile elocution lessons combined with facial calisthenics.

"No, no, eight, eight, eeeeeiiiighhht...
what?
yes, thirty three...
three, three...
No, no, not 88833, eight hundred thirty three...
Not Brad, that was reservation name, this is going to be mailed to me.
OK, EEEEEE emmmmmm..."

It would be mailed out and should get there by Thursday I was told. I call back in the middle of the week to find out where the package is...

"Oh, yeah, I remember you, we mailed it out last Friday"

I hadn't checked out until Monday. Unless there's some weird time zone differential in that block of Seattle...

"OK, let me check"
Elevator music...
"You're Bradley, um, E...?"
No you primordial sludge I thought we covered this before! But after all they still had my jacket so I had to be 'super nice' to them.
"Oh, OK, what's the name then, I'll write it on the box. and the address is 80033 Walnut..."
OMG, I was about to go play in some traffic, that would at least have been mildly less stressful.
"All the packages go out on Friday, yeah, they'll go out and you should get it within a couple of days then."

A week later, still no package. I dread having to have to call again. I can feel my patience waning just thinking about it. And worst of all, I have to be super nice. They have the upper hand. They have something I want. Suffice it to say that the fifth conversation with the guy was much less stressful. I didn't have to convey any information. Except...

"80033 to a Brad..."
OMG the man sent it to the wrong address.
"Well, this is just what's on my sheet, yeah, it was right on the box tho'"

I am never going to get my jacket back.

And then the cold rain sets in... that cold chilling rain like in ... ICELAND! And guess what I don't have... my Iceland jacket. It finally arrived though today... just in time for Day Two of cold chilling rain and urban strolls.

Nice... at one point the uptime did surpass 1024, but we had to move the server... :(

[root@ldap root]# uptime
 10:19:15 up 475 days, 20:33,  1 user,  load average: 0.03, 0.01, 0.00

[root@ldap root]# cat /proc/cpuinfo 
processor	: 0
vendor_id	: GenuineIntel
cpu family	: 6
model		: 1
model name	: Pentium Pro
stepping	: 9
cpu MHz		: 199.747
cache size	: 256 KB
fdiv_bug	: no
hlt_bug		: no
f00f_bug	: no
coma_bug	: no
fpu		: yes
fpu_exception	: yes
cpuid level	: 2
wp		: yes
flags		: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 mtrr pge mca cmov
bogomips	: 392.19

I noticed (if not for the first time) that VirtualBox's RPMs now come signed. Here are the steps to import VirtualBox's public key into your system:

1. Get the virtual box public key ID from the website: http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian/sun_vbox.asc
2. Import into RPM: sudo rpm --import sun_vbox.asc
3. Confirm it imported with: rpm -qi gpg-pubkey-6dfbcbae
4. Then check the package with: rpm --checksig VirtualBox...rpm
5. Import into gpg (for mailing lists and security advisories) with: gpg --recv-keys 6dfbcbae

URG. This is getting very frustrating. Once again, my graphics is screwed up by a yum update. Could you PLEASE STOP FSCKN with the packages. IIBDFI!!! If anyone has any idea, I am running the proprietary NVidia drivers, everything was working fine, until I got a yum update yesterday. When I start openoffice and attempt to go to "Format" -> "Page" the following image appears. Also, Firefox is broken. The widgets seem to clip themselves.

So I joined Identi.ca a couple of weeks ago - reluctantly because I already had Twitter. Why would I need another micro-blogging site?
In checking it out, I noticed that they had groups. So I joined a couple of groups with low volume. Indeed I was duly impressed today when a co-worker wondered if there was any mp3 tagging software for Fedora. I tweeted (if I can use the generic term) the question onto Identi.ca and within seconds I had 5 people respond. Very cool!

I have this keyboard/mouse sharing program called synergy. It's pretty cool, you run the server on a machine, you tell it all the other clients which will be connecting and where they are in relation to your main display. (To the left, to the right, etc.) Then when you move your mouse off the left edge or the right edge, the clients which are connected to the main machine will gain control of the mouse. It works really well between the Mac and my linux box.

I wanted to set up the mac so that when I booted the machine it would automagically start the program. Lo-and-behold, they could not just do a sysv init startup sequence. Instead they use something called launchd. **shudder**

The synergy client program is compiled from source and located at the path /usr/local/bin/synergyc It takes argument to point it to the server (the machine with the physically attached keyboard and mouse).

LaunchD has a couple of caveats. For example, the program you wish to launch can never daemonize or launchd will think that it crashed. Since I want it to start before user logins, then I have to create a property list file and place it in /Library/LaunchDaemons. It must be named the same name as the program and have a plist extension (full path would be /Library/LaunchDaemons/synergyc.plist). Editing the plist is easier if you have the Xcode tools installed with a utility called Property List Editor.




www.polywog.org/pictures/plist_edit.png

Going over the arguments in detail:

1. Label: A required argument is the "Label" this is a unique name for launchd internal processes. It should be the basename of the program.


2. Program: the full name/path of the program. They say it's optional, but for me it was required. This will be the first argument passed to execvp(); (or argv[0])


3. ProgramArguments: is what it says. The first is always the full name of the program. The rest are the various arguments as they will appear on the command line if there's a space in between. In this particular case, I had to give it the "-f" and "-1" args because I didn't want it to daemonize, and I didn't want it to restart if it crashed. Launchd will take care of this for us.


4. OnDemand: set to "false" or unchecked tells launchd that this will NOT be a program which will start on demand.


5. RunAtLoad: tells launchd to run the program as soon as it starts up

The problem I am now getting is that the window server will not allow synergyc to control various aspects of the keyboard/mouse *before login* because it's an "untrusted application". So I'll have to figure out how this is going to be done, there's prolly a file or setting somewhere which marks this as a trusted app.

I hope this is useful to someone wanting to make their own LaunchD autostart item because I just spent two hours trying to get this to work. Some useful tools included the "Console Log", "Xcode", "launchd.plist" man page and Apple's developer site particularly the start up sequence documentation. http://developer.apple.com/mac/library/documentation/MacOSX/Conceptual/BPSystemStartup/Articles/LaunchOnDemandDaemons.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40001762-BCIEDDBJ

Is there a mobile blackberry app for identi.ca?
How the heck do I deal with git:// references?
Does laconi.ca tie into SMS?
What is status net? And why does it sound so familiar?
Why does marinara sauce, tons of pepper and tons of Tabasco sauce mixed together taste so good on fried cheese?

Were that I had my french roast, I would look these up; Off to find some.

... me at a ballgame.
Apparently I figured that we'd be the only chartered bus. Boy was I wrong there are almost (and still coming in) fifty charter buses - all phillies fans. Is this what I missed at the last businessman's special. I have to admit I've been very good about pacing myself with the sly fox pilsner, duck rabbit amber, lagunitas just got tapped!
Now that we're tailgating, all is out the window. :)

So I found out that the SDHC slot in my Blackberry Bold is NOT b0rked. It ended up being that the card itself had deformed plastic, so it wasn't 'clicking' all the way in. Also found out last night that my lappie supports all these media card types. I knew it had an SD-MS/PRO-MMC-XD slot, but I didn't recognise any of the acronyms. After a 10 second Google/Wiki search I found out it can read everything I may have at home except for Compact Flash.
The compact flash came from the Nokia Firewalls at work. There was a replacement of the flash cards because they would spontaneously erase. This happened to me on one firewall, it sucked.

So I was putzing around with SSHFS. It never occurred to me that I could have my entire music library, with me here at work. Thanks to SSHFS, and Comcast upping their upstream speeds to 2Mbps I can!
There are some caveats though: if you have firewalls that tend to age idle connections, you might need to add a couple of command line options to keep the filesystem mounted.
So far, this is what's worked great for me in a script:

fusermount -u /home/polywogAtWork/Music/HomeComputer
sshfs polywog@HomeMachine:/myExternalDrive/MyMusic /home/polywogAtWork/Music/HomeComputer/ -o reconnect,ServerAliveCountMax=3,ServerAliveInterval=15

First I make sure that it's not already mounted, then mount it with the "reconnect" option (reconnecting in case you get dropped). Set ServerAliveCountMax which, according to the man page, it's the max number of consecutive encrypted "are you there" messages which the server has to fail to respond to before SSH drops the connection. ServerAliveInterval is the number of seconds between each message.
So if my home, or corporate firewall decides to drop my connection, it'll be 15*3 seconds before SSH closes the connection. Then SSHFS reconnects automagically when I go an use the filesystem next.

To send REQUEST headers other than the default, you'll need the pecl_http module. Basically the httpd server has main control over the request header. If you've landed on an existing php page, the webserver will send a 200... even if later on in your script (say during a failed database insert) you want to report a 500 error.
You'll need the php-pear RPM installed. Then grabbing the pecl module is easy:

pecl install pecl_http

.
Next either in your php.ini or in your script via dl(); you include something like "extension=http.so". Since I didn't want it loaded all the time, I included it at the top of the php page in which I would be using it via 'dl("http.so");' which tells it to load the http.so module. Using it after that is easy:

$myRequest = new HttpResponse();
$myRequest->status(403);
exit;

Which would send a Forbidden error code.
I use a Firefox add-on called "LiveHeaders" which works great for inspecting behind the scenes stuff between the webserver and browser. Bringing up "View Page Info", then clicking on "Headers" icon, I can see that the 403 RESPONSE code came up.

Logging your commands and output to a file from a terminal, and replaying them back (visually replaying the session, not actually executing the commands again), is easy with the "script" and "scriptreplay" command.

bash$ script -t complex_install.script 2> complex_install.timing

Basically tells the script command to store all your keystrokes and output to a file called complex_install.script. "-t" tells it to output the timing information (how quickly, and when stuff happens on the terminal) to standard error (STDERR). "2>" redirects STDERR to a file called "complex_install.timing". When you're done, you can do CTRL-D or "exit" and the recording stops.
Replaying everything back means that it won't EXECUTE the commands, but will use those to files to "replay" what just happened.

bash$ scriptreplay pear_install.timing pear_install.script

You can speed up and slowdown the replay via a third argument where the speed is multiplied. So 2x as fast is "2", where as half as fast as you typed everything in would be ".5".

First I made sure I downloaded Sun Java and set my /etc/alternatives to use the Sun version of Java. It's not necessary per se, but it's the way I got it to work on my system. YMMV. Check this link for more information you should just be able to copy/paste the monospaced bits if you installed it in the same locations... http://tinyurl.com/mk3veg

1. Help -> Software Updates
2. Manage Sites...
   
   1. Enable: http://download.eclipse.org/releases/ganymede (Ganymede Project Updates)
   2. Add... > add the DLTK 1.0 interim site: http://download.eclipse.org/technology/dltk/updates-dev/1.0M4-PDT-2.0/
   3. Add... > add the PDT 2.0 interim site: http://download.eclipse.org/tools/pdt/updates/2.0/
3. Select for installation the PDT necessary packages.
   
   1. Click on "Dynamic Langugages Toolkit (DLTK)" -> "Dynamic Languages Toolkit - Core Frameworks SDK"
   2. Click on "PDT Update Site" -> "PDT SDK 2.0.1" -> "PDT SDK Feature"
4. Click on "Install..."

After a restart you should be on your way. Please note that much of this information was culled from the following sites:

• http://wiki.eclipse.org/PDT/Installation#From_Update_Site
• http://www.eclipse.org/pdt/downloads/
• http://wiki.eclipse.org/IRC_FAQ#I_just_installed_Eclipse_on_Linux.2C_but_it_does_not_start._What_is_the_problem.3F

Many Bothans died to bring us this information...
1) You can download the necessary oracle instant client files from here: http://tinyurl.com/4b7pq
2) The Oracle Technet article which is spot on: http://tinyurl.com/enrtj
3) A simple shell script to make your travails easy: http://elmo.pastebin.com/f20e948d8 or ( Click Here )

Checkpoint's (Pointsec) Media encryption data scan sucks. They have 83 file types, but if it even detects something that *might* be zipped, it tries to unzip it and always chokes, crashes, and dies hard (i.e.: Open Office files, and RPM Packages). The way around this is to add the signature for the filetype to be scanned in a special XML file.

First find the filetype you wish to have added to the signature db. In this case, I wanted to add RPM's so I found a couple of different RPM's laying around. I then ran a hex dump on each of the RPM's. I was only interested in the first couple of lines, so I piped it through 'head':

$ hexdump -C VirtualBox-3.0.2_49928_rhel5-1.x86_64.rpm |head
00000000  ed ab ee db 03 00 00 00  00 01 56 69 72 74 75 61  |..........Virtua|
00000010  6c 42 6f 78 2d 33 2e 30  2e 32 5f 34 39 39 32 38  |lBox-3.0.2_49928|
$ hexdump -C VirtualBox-3.0.2_49928_rhel5-1.x86_64.rpm |head
00000000  ed ab ee db 03 00 00 00  00 01 56 69 72 74 75 61  |..........Virtua|
00000010  6c 42 6f 78 2d 33 2e 30  2e 32 5f 34 39 39 32 38  |lBox-3.0.2_49928|
$ hexdump -C opera-9.64.gcc4-shared-qt3.i386.rpm |head
00000000  ed ab ee db 03 00 00 00  00 01 6f 70 65 72 61 2d  |..........opera-|
00000010  39 2e 36 34 2d 32 34 38  30 2e 67 63 63 34 2e 73  |9.64-2480.gcc4.s|
00000020  68 61 72 65 64 2e 71 74  33 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |hared.qt3.......|

I noticed that all the files tended to start with "ed ab ee db 03 00 00 00 00 01". So that's what I was going to use as my signature. I opened the file "C:\Program Files\CheckPoint\Pointsec Protector Client\CheckDatProfiles\CheckDat.XML" in my favorite editor, and added the following near the top.

<record><Type param="1"/>
<Pass param="1"/>
<Offset param="0"/>
<Sig param="EDABEEDB030000000001"/>
<Description param="RPM file"/>
</record>

Where "Type" 1 means by signature (type 2 is by extension). Pass param means, it's OK to allow these files. Offset is for when the signature is embedded deep within the file. The sig param is obvious, and a description. I rebooted the box, and the next time I inserted the USB key, the program didn't crash and my USB key was approved.