main April 2017

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13 participants
9 discussions

USB Backup Disk problems
by steve-ALUG＠hst.me.uk 08 May '17

08 May '17

Hi Geniuses! I have a 2TB Seagate USB disk that is being used with backuppc to store daily backups. However, almost every day the backup is failing, and attempting to ls the drive gives "input/output error". Looking through DMESG shows multiple problems reading sectors on the disk, but I've yet to find a particular cause. If I reboot the machine, the drive immediately starts working again. If I fsck it, it reports no errors. The disk has two partitions on it, and the 2nd partition is used by SimpleBackup, and this seems to work fine. I'm currently backing up the backup before I do some more in-depth testing on it, and possibly reformat it. I forgot to mention that both partitions are encrypted. Do people think the disk is broken (bad sectors or hardware problems), or if not, any idea what's going on? On to the next problem. I bought a different 2TB Seagate USB 3 disk which I was intending to use to replace the problematic disk. I managed to set up encrypted partitions on the new disk, and configure the computer so that they would automatically mount on boot.... so I tried to boot the machine and.... the BIOS screen appeared, then it said detecting devices... The old faulty drive is detected, but then the USB 3 Driver is not detected and the machine hangs. It's simple, with the drive connected at boot, the machine won't boot or detect the drive. Without the USB3 drive connected, the machine boots fine. I'm guessing that the machine, which is quite old, can't cope with something about the new drive, perhaps it's slightly too big (although they're both ~2TB), or because it's USB3, and I think the old one is USB2. The old one has a power supply, but the new one doesn't, but I tried connecting it via a powered hub, and no difference. Is there any way round the machine not booting? I don't think there's a updated bios for this old machine. Any ideas, straws to clutch at? Steve

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DNS lookups with systemd-resolve (Ubuntu 17.04)
by Mark Rogers 24 Apr '17

24 Apr '17

I have a local DNS server, and in it are several hosts, specified both with and without a domain name. Eg: $ dig @192.168.1.5 myhost ... ;; ANSWER SECTION myhost. 0 IN A 192.168.1.123 ... $ dig @192.168.1.5 myhost.mydomain ... ;; ANSWER SECTION myhost.mydomain 0 IN A 192.168.1.123 However, if I don't specify the DNS, the first query (myhost) times out, where the second (myhost.mydomain) still works fine. My PC gets its DNS settings via DHCP. /etc/resolv.conf contains only 127.0.0.53 which as I understand it is systemd-resolve. /run/systemd/resolve/resolv.conf contains only 192.168.1.5 (my DNS). So, in the case of a query for "myhost.mydomain", systemd-resolve is correctly passing the query on to my DNS. But in the case of "myhost" it is not (I don't know what it is doing instead). If I try "ping myhost" I get "Name or service not known". Similarly, if I try ssh mark@myhost. Suggestions? -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0844 251 1450 Registered in England (0456 0902) 21 Drakes Mews, Milton Keynes, MK8 0ER

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Mesh wireless
by Mark Rogers 24 Apr '17

24 Apr '17

I started looking at a few commercial mesh wireless products, which typically retail at around £300-400 for a typical house. I then Googled and discovered a few Linux mesh wireless projects, such as might suit running on a Pi. Anyone here have any experience of such things? (The biggest obstacle with the Pi is likely to be the slow Ethernet port but there are faster single board computers around that might work better. Regardless, the Pi might be a good place to start playing.) -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0844 251 1450 Registered in England (0456 0902) 21 Drakes Mews, Milton Keynes, MK8 0ER

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Pub meet + GPG
by Bill Hill 13 Apr '17

13 Apr '17

It has been a while - GPG key signing? -- Red to red, black to black, switch it on, but stand well back.

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Shutdown!
by Michael Goddard 12 Apr '17

12 Apr '17

Using Mint 18.1 on my laptop, when using 'shutdown' it does just that, but then reboots a few seconds afterwards, every time recently! Tia, Michael -- Michael Goddard <emmjee(a)mypostoffice.co.uk>

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[ALUG Announce] ALUG Norwich Pub Meet Thursday 13th April
by Viperfang 10 Apr '17

10 Apr '17

ALUG Announce Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk Unsub, change settings via https://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce ----- Hello Norwich Aluggers, Our monthly ALUG Norwich social meeting will be held this Thursday, 13th April at The Coach and Horses (82 Thorpe Road, Norwich, NR1 1BA). The meeting officially starts at 8pm, although some people may arrive earlier. More information on those people can be found on the list and the IRC channel. If you are unsure if you will recognise us then make yourself and your intent to attend known by either posting on list or visiting us on IRC so we can look out for you rather than hiding in the corner. Optionally you could ask at the bar if they know where the geeky computer weirdos are and they'll point you in the right direction (seriously!). Another possibility is look for heaps of electronics on a table that may possibly look like movie props that would used for detonating explosives. Feel free to bring electronics/laptops/gadgets to the meet, you will by no means be alone. Ben Bewick aka Viperfang NB: This mail is automated, please refer to the usual sources for more information. ALUG Contact Details: Website : http://www.alug.org.uk/ IRC : #alug on irc.alug.org.uk List : http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo Twitter : http://twitter.com/anglianlug Identica: TBA Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2381613902 ----- Send discussion replies to main(a)lists.alug.org.uk (Reply-To set) Unsub, change settings via https://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce

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Writing to Google Sheets from bash
by Mark Rogers 07 Apr '17

07 Apr '17

I don't suppose anyone here has any experience of writing to Google Sheets from bash? (Specifically, I'm trying to use curl to write values into a pre-existing spreadsheet.) I started with a fairly simple aim: To have a few Linux boxes (servers, Pi's, etc) periodically update a central spreadsheet with stuff like disk utilisation, updates pending, O/S version, etc. However I haven't had to deal with OAuth2 before and I'm going round in circles trying to find out exactly what authentication I need to configure. My attempts at Googling have lead me into most of those circles without getting me out again! It seems like a useful concept to pursue but I have to admit I'm just way out of my depth! -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0844 251 1450 Registered in England (0456 0902) 21 Drakes Mews, Milton Keynes, MK8 0ER

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Strange PC lock-up
by Mark Rogers 05 Apr '17

05 Apr '17

Several times over the past few weeks I've had my PC (Ubuntu 16.10*) apparently lock up: desktop stops changing (clock stops updating) but the mouse (usually) continues to move. Sometimes I can SSH in, although more often I can get as far as entering username/password but never reach a terminal prompt. It can happen while I'm actively using it (mid-sentence), or if I go away and come back it could have locked in my absence, often relatively shortly after it was left (the stopped clock is quite handy...) I found messages in syslog relating to nouveau so I replaced the graphics card (as a fairly cheap swap out). That made no difference (actually if anything it got worse, although I'd hesitate to say so for sure). Rather than mess around I bought a new PC and transferred my system disk to it, still figuring it felt like a hardware issue. Except that the problem has followed across onto the new PC. The only things moved across are the new graphics card and three hard disks. It no longer feels like a hardware issue.... How do I diagnose? Or am I just looking at a re-install? * Note that this PC has been upgraded through several versions, it wasn't a clear 16.10 install. The only "major" change recently has been a shift from Chrome to Opera as the primary browser (and since I tend to have dozens of tabs open and most of my work involves a browser in some way that does count as a major change). Mark -- Mark Rogers // More Solutions Ltd (Peterborough Office) // 0844 251 1450 Registered in England (0456 0902) 21 Drakes Mews, Milton Keynes, MK8 0ER

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2600 meeting at 18:00 on Friday the 7th April.
by Viperfang 04 Apr '17

04 Apr '17

Quick heads up about this months Norwich 2600 meeting, more info at http://www.norwich2600.co.uk

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