Linux Blog

You have to admire the open source community. With such a diverse group of people all kinds of things can happen. One thing that cracked me up today was the language used in the NetBeans project (see image.)

I’m a big fan of the project don’t get me wrong, I just thought it was funny. I actually have a personal encounter with something similar when I was the developing a project. I was coding some error handling procedures on a website where all invalid input (temporarily) got directed to an obnoxious error page that read “Error!” with a bright yellow background and black text. When a end user accidentally typed a url in wrong it created the error. Since this website was for a bunch of writers they didn’t like this too much, so they picked on me until it was fixed.

This is part of the problem with the open source community. When an application is created often not enough thought is put into the interface and terminology used or the thought process of the low tech end user. It is different when a company develops an application because they can spend money on designers, interface experts and writers. In the open source community there is a lack of resources and collaboration to make this happen.

Even with well established organizations like Tigris (subversion) cryptic messages that appear in certain products can be difficult to decipher for problems as simple as permissions issues.

I don’t think it is a good idea for every one to “wait a while” to solve this problem because its not going to fix its self. So in closing I propose the question:

“what can the open source community do to solve this problem?”

Please discus.

I was reading articles from one of my local libraries online resource of Linux Journals (they have every issue) and found an article on a comic book store (It can also be found here.) I  read the entire article and have to say that it was a good look back in history.

In regards to quick and dirty scripting not much has changed in the 14 years since this article was written. Any one can learn how to program or write a script. The owner of this business looked at the process and then looked at ways he could automate it. His method worked out well, when after 3 years his small shop grossed 1.5 million in sales.

I think it is quite amazing that a small comic book store was able to gross this amount in the first quarter only 3 years after opening. I wonder if this would have been achieved if the store had to purchase or pay a third party to develop software. It is fortunate that the writer of the article was interested in Linux and pursued scripting. Since this was written in 1994, he was in the right place at the right time. I am sure that if he expanded his system enough he could have possibly done automated phone sales, mail order and online sales. All with simple shell scripts.

If you get a chance try reading some of the old articles from LinuxJournal.com. I think I’m going to continue reading these old articles from the library since they have no ads. I find them very interesting and who knows maybe they will inspire me to do something.

If you run into the following problem:

VMware Server is installed, but it has not been (correctly) configured
for the running kernel. To (re-)configure it, invoke the
following command: /usr/local/bin/vmware-config.pl.

and then try to issue the vmware-config.pl command and get something similar to the following:

/tmp/vmware-config1/vmnet-only/bridge.c: In function ‘VNetBridgeUp’:
/tmp/vmware-config1/vmnet-only/bridge.c:949: error: implicit declaration of function ‘sock_valbool_flag’
make[2]: *** [/tmp/vmware-config1/vmnet-only/bridge.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** [_module_/tmp/vmware-config1/vmnet-only] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/kernels/2.6.25.10-47.fc8-i686′
make: *** [vmnet.ko] Error 2
make: Leaving directory `/tmp/vmware-config1/vmnet-only’
Unable to build the vmnet module.

Then try to use the VMWare any patch from: http://groups.google.com/group/vmkernelnewbies/files
I had used the patch before to get my VMWare Server up and running but did not realize that you had to use the patch after kernel upgrade or your VMWare server will no longer work.

Who knew?

Firstly, I’d like to start off by saying that all of the concepts in this post should have been covered in other posts, so I will not go into great detail on the specifics of this script. If you need to know more information about any of the commands, check the man page section at the bottom of this page, from the man pages will be examples of other posts covering similar topics.

The purpose of this script for me was to time my reboot times. It could be modified to log the time it takes to replace hardware or add memory, but thats another post. Since we are logging reboot times, we are (hopefully) dealing with small numbers and therefore don’t have to deal with formatting time (at least not for now.)

The script should work on multiple systems that have bash. There is nothing too special about it. It uses the reboot command so the user this is launched as will have to have access to that command. You put the script in the users bin directory and chmod it. The user must also have write access to this. Also, they must have write access to their home directory, but this should not be a problem for most. Line 8 of the script needs to be changed to the user you plan on running this as.

After that test that the timereboot command works by typing timereboot:

[owen@linuxblog ~]$ timereboot
Usage: /home/linuxblog/bin/timereboot {time|ttime|back}

Once that is done, thats a pretty good indication that the script is working. Next, I suggest commenting out the reboot command on line #25 if this is a critical mission and you don’t want to reboot multiple times to get it working. If not go ahead and try the time command. Once your system is back up and your logged in you type the “timereboot back” command, it will then tell you the time taken since your system was done.

Once you have verified that the time works, you can go ahead and add it to your bashrc to automatically perform the action once your logged in. All you need to do is add a line like this:

home/linuxblog/bin/timereboot back

Now, if you want you can try again and see the results automatically.

“Thats great, but how do I post it to twitter?”

Well, there is one last thing that you have to do to get your reboot time posted to twitter. Edit line 55 and change to your twitter username and password. Do the same thing as before to reboot, but use the ttime parameter to log to twitter.

This script, does not post to twitter that you are rebooting (although it could) nor does it format the time, but it works and should give you a starting point if you are interested in doing this. It doesn’t really serve a real purpose other than to inform people how quickly or how slow you reboot. Also, please note that this is not a start up time. This times from when you issue the command until you issue the back command, or log in using the .bashrc method.

If you have any questions about this script or any other idea’s let me know and I’ll be happy to help or implement them for fun.

And here is the Twitter reboot script

In response to Jeremy Allison from ZDNet’s Blogs who claims not to be a blogger! Sorry, I thought about saying I have a “column” too but it just doesn’t work when you have “blog” in your URL. But onto the main topic of this post: LinuxHater!

I’m read linuxhater and I’m still a luser. Linux is the operating system that people love to hate. If you haven’t ever read http://linuxhater.blogspot.com before I’d give it a look. Its a great read, and I don’t think that Linux users should take it to heart, I can understand that some people may get upset from the effort that they personally put into a project, but if your not willing to admit your flaws where is the room for growth?

To improve criticism is needed and the LinuxHater blog definitely has lots to say and doesn’t always go about discussing the issues in a dignified way, but if you read it in good fun its great!

Yum stands for “YellowDog Updater Modified”

Yum is a standard way to update multiple distributions.

The openSUSE build repository uses the yum updating system

Yum was written in Python.

If you install the yum-utils package you can download yum rpm packages by running:

yumdownloader –source yum

There are graphical front ends to YUM

Yum is maintained by the Linux@Duke project, thats right the basketball team you love to hate: The Blue Devils.

Changing virtual terminals is almost essential for the Linux system administrator. If you don’t know what I mean by this then try pressing CTRL+ALT+F5 once you are there press CTRL+RIGHT ARROW until you get back to your display (should be two or so times depending on your distribution)

Until a few minutes ago I didn’t know that this could be done by the command line. chvt is a nifty command to change virtual terminal. Basically all you have to do is type “chvt 2″ to change to tty2. I found it while I was looking for a solution to open up a view of other active terminals.

This could be handy if your on a laptop or your function keys are missing / broken.

I made a tweet yesterday about how once every so often I get obsessed with certifications. Even though I normally get around to studying let alone sitting the test. I was wondering if this is a problem for any one else. Certifications to me are so tempting, but finding the time to actually do it is another thing. If there is an multiple choice exam for a certification given time any one can take the test, so why isn’t every one qualified?

I can’t speak for every one but I know why I don’t hold as many certifications as I would like.

1) Money
Firstly money comes into play. Even if you self study, buy books or from reading free certification guides and objectives online you still have to pay for the exam. This is a big factor when coming to get certified. Even if sponsorship from an employer or other organization is available this can still be a problem.

2) Time
I for one do not like to fail exams, therefore I like to study to make sure I’ll pass. Making the time needed to study for an exam is often a challenge. Things come up which distract me from studying, or scheduling an exam.

3) Return
This is one of the major reasons for obtaining a certification. Whats in it for me? After all why am I going to get a certification if it is no benefit to me. The return on some certifications is not measurable. Its hard to look into the future and say,
“Wow, it was a good job I got Linux+ certified”
When or if the time comes for a job change certification’s are a great tool, even if they are not well respected in the industry. For example take MCSA and LPIC, if a systems administrator holds just one of these certifications and is applying for a position that requires Linux and Microsoft experience, their chances of getting assessed for the position by human resources would be less than the chances of one who has both. I also think that the return is a major reason I don’t hold more certifications. If everyone knew that taking an exam would be of great benefit who wouldn’t study and sit an exam?

Some people say that most certifications are a waste of time, but I don’t think that they are if all of the above factors are reasonable. Any one else have thoughts?

I decided not to go ahead and purchase an iPhone just yet. What that means is I will not have a need for a SSH client. Once I get an iPhone its my first thing to do. The client would probably be released for free, or with optional support / donation.

So,  if there are any companies or organizations that need an iPhone SSH client, consider sponsoring the development in the form of an iPhone. In return I will give the community a free SSH / SCP client and that the donor free lifetime support.

This post is an update to: http://www.thelinuxblog.com/iphone-ssh-client/

I don’t keep up with releases of new Linux distributions really. If I did then I probably wouldn’t have time to write on this blog, but I noticed that Gentoo was released on Sunday the 6th of July (http://www.gentoo.org/news/20080706-release-2008.0.xml) I’ve never been a big Gentoo guy, I’ve dabbled with it but it never really caught my attention. I think it may be time for me to revisit Gentoo, at least in a virtual environment to check it out again. I do have a need for a small footprint, easy to maintain and expandable operating system. I have been using Slackware for simplicity and small footprint, but it is not the easiest to maintain or expand. Gentoo on the over hand can be configured well, updates easily and is pretty expandable through portage and emerge. The only thing that concerns me is the compile time, often the reason I want a minimal installation is for a project that has to run on less than adequate hardware. Using Gentoo rather than another distribution could be a problem since it seems like it takes for ever to install by copying and extracting files, let alone compile them.

Anyhow, have fun with the new Gentoo!

Had a great time yesterday, a friend of mine came over. After dinner he was looking at some t-shirts since an advertisement had distracted him from his initial IMDB search. Some how this made him decide he wanted to make my desktop background a BSOD. I’m a big fan of the BSOD screensaver, and think its funny, whats even funnier is he figured out how to change my background on KDE (although it’s not that hard)

I saw the BSOD with the horrible background just staring at me. It was the classic, “there was an error processing your error”. I never see such things on my Linux box, I’m more used to failed reboots from failing to compile a kernel feature, so jokingly I click on the message box while laughing:

“Why won’t this go away”

Some people find humor in other peoples agony, this is why the TV series (and movies) Jackass do so well. I find humor in BSOD’s and hope that other Linux admin’s do to. But having a BSOD on your Linux box that’s not a screen saver is quite annoying, its like “Gates strikes back”

Here’s a poster I found amusing the other day:

Credit http://www.joyoftech.com/