I completed the installation of Linux From Scratch!

With a little help from Brian, I got it to boot and everything looks good!

posted by MikeM at 10:24 AM    

 
Today is my brother's birthday! Happy birthday Greg!


posted by MikeM at 10:24 AM    

 
For the past week or so I have been working on a minor linux project - installing Linux From Scratch. LFS 5.0 is the one I am working on, and it is downloaded as either a PDF file or a text file. Yes - a text file. The file is a detailed list of instructions on how to download, compile, and install all of the bits and pieces you need to create your own linux system from source code!

I found all of the required source packages and patch files in one place, also on the LinuxFromScratch website - downloaded this and began the process on a P450 with 128mb ram and 2 hard drives, a 6gb and a 7gb drive. I partitioned the 7gb as ext2, all one partition. The 6gb I made into a 2gb swap and a 4gb ext2 partition.

After extracting all of the source tgz (compressed) files into their separate folders in the /source folder, I followed the instructions, configuring and compiling all of the tools, compilers, utilities, and other bits that you need to have a functional linux system. As of now I am compiling the compiler for the third time - this time with the system set to use the newly compiled tools exclusively (chroot). It's nice to know that I have done it correctly so far!

I did discover that when the instructions say 'It is now safe to delete the source and build folders for this package', that it isn't a suggestion, and you should immediately delete the source and build folders. Also, keep all of the compressed source files, you will need them.

You see, the first time you build GCC (the compiler), you patch the source with two patch files, then compile it. The second time, you need those existing source and build folders - it warns you not to delete them - and so the second time you compile the compiler with newly compiled tools and a fresher system. After the second compile, it tells you it is safe to delete the source and build trees.

Ahh - this is where I messed up. I didn't delete them, figuring on saving time and keeping them for the third go-round.

The third time, you are supposed to re-extract the source, patch it again with two patches (OOPS - two DIFFERENT patches than the first time), and re-compile. I missed the section where it warns you NOT to apply the patches from the first compile run. Argh.

So, the compile failed several times in a row, I researched it to no avail - seems that several people had the same error at the same point, but nobody could help them.

I just deleted the source and build folders, re-extracted the source, re-patched like the book says, and now it compiled fine.

*whew*

I'm on the home stretch! It has taken a long time though, mostly working as I find time during the busy days. It's a learning experience too, and I am definitely learning!
posted by MikeM at 8:30 AM    

 
Remember the arcade game Joust? Now you can play it in your browser online! (Shockwave required.)


posted by MikeM at 11:43 PM    

 
Great article!

EE Times - The trouble with Rover is revealed.

Now we know what happened - it could have happened to anyone! The more complicated the system, the easier it is to screw up.
posted by MikeM at 1:23 PM    

 
SecurityFocus HOME Columnists: A Home User's Security Checklist for Windows

Overall a good checklist, and a good place to go to learn all the technical computer stuff about how to configure your computer, browser, email client, and other items securely. Good resource.
posted by MikeM at 11:29 AM    

 
Here is an interesting news article about a recent problem in Las Vegas where many people had problems with remote control keyless entry systems for their cars - all at about the same time, and over a wide area. Military experiment? Terrorist jamming? Aliens?
posted by MikeM at 10:57 AM    

 
Oh lovely...

ScienceDaily News Release: Exposure To Low-level Magnetic Fields Causes DNA Damage In Rat Brain Cells, Researchers Find

posted by MikeM at 10:32 AM    

 
Yesterday we had a great dinner at a friend's new house. Brian & Marcia are great company and their two dogs, Sally and Lucy, are very friendly and didn't bark at all! I think we'll swap Maggie for Lucy and see if anyone notices...

Yesterday morning I helped some friends move a hot tub from the previous owner's backyard into a U-Haul that was literally only large enough by a fraction of an inch. Close tolerances. We actually thought it was stuck in the door, but it was the slim rubber gasket around the u-haul door - so we just all pushed and forced it into the truck. Getting it out will be fun...

Of course now that means that I am sore and stiff this morning - apparently manhandling a 7' square hot tub in its redwood sheathing is a bit much for my muscles, even with three other big guys helping! Aspirin time.
posted by MikeM at 10:32 AM    

 
They just delivered our new Precor 5.17i Elliptical machine! Nice unit - it is large and sturdy, and hopefully I will be using it quite a bit.
posted by MikeM at 11:39 AM    

 
IP Address - What is your Internet IP address? This link will quickly tell you what it is.

Note that if your internet access is through a firewall, you will most likely get the IP address of that firewall's NAT address, or the address it allows the outside world to see, as your IP address is hidden by the firewall.
posted by MikeM at 12:44 PM    

 
Here's a story about Hamster Music. These guys hooked a coupla hamsters up to a music machine and let the hamsters make music. You can hear it if you wish...
posted by MikeM at 9:41 AM    

 
ZDNet UK - News - Code for MSBlast variant posted online : This slightly misleading title warns that the threat of a new worm based on the recent MS ASN vulnerability.

Patch your systems NOW - go to the windows update site, apply ALL critical updates! If you don't, then in a few days when this source is used to develop a really nasty worm like Slammer or Blaster, your machine will be owned in mere moments. This is not just another patch - this is arguably more important than any patch in the last few years.

Remember, the CODE IS OUT - people have posted actual working code on how to exploit this vulnerability, and you know that the hackers have taken the code and will be developing a whole raft of customized viruses and worms to release that can do anything from crash your computer to completely take it over and use it to spread further, transmit spam to millions of people, or worse.
posted by MikeM at 3:00 PM    

 
When you update a major system, you have to expect little drawbacks - but hopefully you catch them sooner than this! Last friday we patched a major server running Solaris - upgraded all of its packages, etc. Including Sendmail. Well, this blew away the sendmail NIS settings and thus the aliases file - root mail was only going to one person, and nothing else was set for any of our users' aliases! We checked into it a bit, and from what I can tell, Sendmail just added a hardcoded setting to look for the aliases file in ONE PLACE, basically ignoring all others, including the NIS files. It also made that place its own folder, and helpfully provided a file for us - a default file - with only one alias for root and none other. Oh joy.

Fix? soft-linked the NIS aliases file to the /etc/mail folder where sendmail expected to see the aliases file, and ran newaliases to generate the db-style files sendmail needs. Fun.
posted by MikeM at 10:54 AM    

 
Wow. I just saw a report of a 2500 mile diameter diamond found. Now, to some this is unimportant, but for a few gamers out there that I used to hang with - it is pretty darn cool. You see, once a character of mine created a huge diamond the size of a moon, gave it intelligence, named if Lucy, and made it my 'familiar' (as in a Wizard's familiar). This was in a RuneQuest game way back in 1986 or so. Gay was the DM, and the players were Lee, Chuck, Gary, Bruce, Sharon, Alvin and I. Good times with good friends.

But how wierd is it that now they have found Lucy in another star system, and they even know her name! I wonder where the Newt is?
posted by MikeM at 11:03 PM    

 
Oh dear... County day care data mistakenly posted on Web. Seems a contracted programmer posted the entire database to a public tech-support website looking for help with it. Sheesh, what kind of idiot would do that? I can see asking detailed questions about something, but posting the actual database and asking for help? He got what he deserved.
posted by MikeM at 3:58 PM    

 
There is a good overview of the new Microsoft vulnerability at the Internet Storm Center. You really need to go to windows update site and update your system as far as possible - and do this immediately!

Within a week or so there very likely will be a new internet worm that will hit the net like Slammer did - and this time it will be able to affect ALL unpatched windows machines, not just those with SQL applications installed!

So - load Internet Explorer, click Tools, then Windows Update. Install all of the Critical patches - it might take several tries and reboots to get all of them, keep going back and checking until you get a clean bill of health - that is, no Critical patches remain to be applied. The Suggested patches are optional, but look through the list and apply the security ones as needed. You can safely ignore the .NET, Media Player, and Direct X installs if you want to.
posted by MikeM at 1:19 PM    

 


The new FireFox browser is out now. A streamlined version of Mozilla, cousin to Netscape and dire enemy of MS Internet Explorer!
posted by MikeM at 11:29 AM    

 
Just got an email from a good buddy...

When NASA first started sending up astronauts, they quickly 

discovered that ball-point pens would not work in zero gravity.



To combat this problem, NASA scientists spent a decade and $12

billion developing a pen that writes in zero gravity, upside down, on 

almost any surface including glass and temperatures ranging from 

below freezing to over 300 degrees Centigrade.



The Russians used a pencil.



Enjoy paying your taxes--they're due again.

posted by MikeM at 2:00 PM    

 
If you are an Outlook user for email, but use Netscape for browsing, you likely have encountered Netscape's irrational desire to use it's own email client when you click on an email link. Here is how to stop this:

To make Mozilla or Netscape use another mail program, type the following in your browser's location bar:

about:config

This will bring up a long list of parameters and settings.
Click on any one of the items to highlight it and then right click.
Choose from the pop-up menu New | Boolean.

It will give you a dialog box. Type :

network.protocol-handler.external.mailto

You will then get another dialog box asking for the value of the boolen you just put in. In this box, type :

true

and hit enter. The new value should appear in the listing, and now
netscape will use the system's default mail client when you click on a mailto: link.
posted by MikeM at 9:09 AM    

 
Feeling a bit better today - still a minor sore throad and drainage, with my ears a bit stuffy, but mobile and only a little bit 'medicated'.

Got in to work today to find that drive 2 in the library had failed - reset the drive and the library, and now it appears to be working OK. *sigh* And you thought rebooting only worked with Windows!

Checking the new packrat off-site backup unit, and noticed that it hadn't run any of the backups it was supposed to run. Well, almost - it ran one, but not the other two. I checked the crontab (scheduler) and noticed that the filenames in there did not match the filenames of the scripts. Oops. Fixed. Ran the backup manually once, just to update the data on the new server.

Over the weekend, I got most of the way done in Deus Ex 2 : Invisible War. Yes, I got all the way to the Antarctic, and I'm now in JC's lair. Woo. over 14 hrs playing over two days. Patty is a saint to put up with me.

Speaking of Patty, please go check out her website, as she has some new items up just in time for Valentine's Day!
posted by MikeM at 9:00 AM    

 
Sore throat and the voice of a frog - not good. It just keeps getting worse day by day until this morning I feel as if my throat is swollen shut completely - it hurts to drink, even. I''ll try some soup later. We are supposed to game Sunday - I will likely miss it. I worked several hours OT Monday and Tuesday, took part of it yesterday in the icy conditions. I went in to work 2 hrs late & left 1.5 hrs early because I felt so bad.

We got the backup server working fine - I learned a few things about rsync, one of which is VERY important:

If you rsync the root and several mounted volumes on the root, you MUST exclude them when rsyncing the root!

For example:
/dev/hda1 /
/dev/hda2 /opt
/dev/hda3 /usr

/opt and /usr are empty folders that DO exist on the / volume as mount points for the two volumes.

The rsync of / will backup the empty folders if you do not exclude them

Then when you rsync /opt and /usr, it works fine - but now those folders have data in them on the target.

When you repeat the rsync of /, likely the next day or week, it detects the data in those folders and deletes it all, as there is no data in the source...

This assumes you are using the following command or something like it:

rsync -ax --delete / /mnt/storage/servername/.

the x tells it not to follow links or mounts to other file systems, and the --delete tells it to delete files on the target that do not exist on the source - a true mirror of the source.

In any event, resolved a few issues, watched the sync work as it should.


I also converted a user from Netscape 7 to Outlook XP. Why are there NO tools to convert mail or contacts from Netscape 7 to Outlook? TO get the contacts, I had to export them into LDIF, then import them into outlook express, then import them into Outlook XP. How stupid is that? The only way to get the mail is by installing Netscape 4, manually copying the mail files into the Net4 directory structure, then opening Net4 to convert the files to Net4 format. After that, open Outlook Express, import them from Net4, then export to MS format, which can be read by Outlook XP.

I would think that Microsoft would be falling all over itself to come up with easy, fast ways to convert from Netscape 7. With it as hard as it is, I would think that many people simply wouldn't change!
posted by MikeM at 10:44 AM    

 
Tonight I'm feeling pretty bad - catching the creeping crud.

For the last few days we have been building and rebuilding off-site storage computers with several huge drives - and configuring rsync to mirror our data server off to it on a schedule, keeping multiple stages for posterity, etc. Today I spent trying to ensure that we are backing up all of the important servers, either by tar/smbtar/msbackup or rsync to a data server, and then the data server is rsynced to the new server offsite. Nice setup, thank Brian for the concept!

So while struggling with these servers & backup issues in a valiant effort to ditch Brightstor (tape backup system) completely, we get to meet with a couple of salesmen of... tape backup systems. *grin*

We listened to their spiel, gave them an overview of where we were and where we wanted to go, and for the life of me I still can't see why we would want to spend $50k+ on a library system that would mean we would still have to use BrightStor, or worse, buy some other backup software and use that.

Why, when we have onsite and offsite backup configured and automated (no human action required) for under $800?

The offsite box is a $400 dell server with four $98 Maxtor 120gb drives in it.

Heck, the onsite box is an inexpesive rack-mount 2u server with four $150 120gb drives in it. Bought them 2 years ago, that is why the expense.

For $1200 we can have a 1 terabyte external drive from LaCie, if we wanted it. Might get it later on if we need the capacity and don't have the time to build another station.
posted by MikeM at 7:43 PM    

 
Joe Siegler's comments on the SuperBowl halftime show... A Cup of Joe - Nipplegate. I agree with him on this - much ado about nothing.
posted by MikeM at 1:48 PM    

 
Roads today, as promised, were icy and treacherous - but only a bit. I made it in without major incident, although I did keep it below 35 the entire way. Near home I slid about a bit, mainly in turns or when I forgot to be careful. Roads are bad, but not to the point of no control at low speeds. I saw people zipping by at 50 or 60 where I was limited to 20 - I wonder if they were riding the razor's edge or were their cars really that good in the conditions that it was safe?

It is 30 right now, and will get to 46 or so today. This should melt off most if not all of the ice and snow that is still in the backyard and front driveway.
posted by MikeM at 7:41 AM    

 
Ooooo - FUNNY! Netcraft: www.sco.com is a weapon of mass destruction.

I like option 3 best.
posted by MikeM at 10:24 AM    

 
Yesterday was relaxing. I received a new book in the mail (well, new to me.) The Warhammer 40,000 Necron Codex. Now I'm coming up with a Necron army just for kicks. I already have a Tyrannid army, and I'll likely be pitting them against each other just to get a better feel for them and learn the rules of the game a bit. I might find someone in the area that plays W40K, but even if I do, there is no way I can invest the money and time into purchasing and painting all of the minatures. I'll end up using old Battletech and AD&D figures.

I finished Max Payne 2 - decent game. I'll play it over again once I get a new computer that can actually handle all of the neato gee-whiz coolness of the graphics and sound for the game. I had to drop most of the effects to off or medium to get a decent play speed out of it. *sigh* My 866 just isn't good enough anymore.

I finished Black Mirror some time ago, and installed Firewarrior and played it for a while, but got frustrated with the no-save options and very annoying restart points. If you die, you go back to the beginning of the level, unless you have made it an incredible distance, and then you might end up at the halfway point. If you exit the game, it does NOT save the last waypoint, you start the mission over. How stupid is that? I'll go back to it later. Maybe a patch will improve the level saving.
posted by MikeM at 10:46 AM