main

main@lists.alug.org.uk

10369 discussions

Weekly IRC reminder
by Brett Parker 30 May '05

30 May '05

This is the automated ALUG IRC meeting reminder sent to remind you that there is an IRC meeting tonight (Monday) at 8.00pm. The meeting takes place on the irc server irc.alug.org.uk in the #alug channel. Most IRC clients should allow you to get there with the commands "/server irc.alug.org.uk" and "/join #alug". Popular IRC clients include tkirc, bitchx, xchat and EPIC on Unix, and Mirc under windows. Here are some links to help you get started with irc. Unix http://www.xchat.org/ http://freshmeat.net/ http://www.epicsol.org/ Windows http://www.mirc.com (loads of help with irc for newbies!)

1 0

Use PC as a traditional phone
by Steve Fosdick 27 May '05

27 May '05

I'd like to use the PC as a phone, i.e. transmit sound from the mic-in on the soundcard to the phone line, have the sound received from the phone line available for mixing in the sound card's headphone out and be able to dial from software. All this, of course, under Linux. Does anyone know what hardware I should look for for this. I am assuming some kind of modem or modem card but these seem a bit of a minefield. Does the little link cable that runs from a PCI modem card to the sound card do everything I need or do I need to be able to copy data digitally? How can I tell which modem chipsets have enough support to be able to do what I want? TiA, Steve.

2 1

BBQ on the 28th
by Martijn Koster 25 May '05

25 May '05

You're all invited to a BBQ in Wymondham on the 28th (Saturday after next), from 15:00 onwards. If you're planning on coming, please let me know by the 25th (Wednesday after next). Star attractions: we're hoping to see Bea, and it appears that iDunno may interrupt his UK'05 tour and make a brief appearance. For more details see http://www.greenhills.co.uk/mak/alug/20050528-bbq.html Can someone with privileges add a suitable link from http://www.alug.org.uk/meetings? -- Martijn

2 2

Kit queries
by Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk 25 May '05

25 May '05

Hi Folks, I'd be grateful for comments on possible solutions to the following things I'm thinking of looking for. 1. "Mini-laptop" I'm interested in something hand-held which is very easily carried from point to point, with a keyboard that is easy to use for entering textual information (there will be a lot of this, and accuracy is important). Needs to be connectable to "mainframe" box via ethernet (or USB at a pinch). A standard laptop is rather too cumbersome and awkward (needs to be stood on something and the fold-down screen would tend to flap around; also it would very much be on the heavy side for what I have in mind. I'm envisaging using this while standing, walking around, or even crouching.)[**1] Probably the "PDA" type of thing is too tiny for my spatulate fingertips, but that's the sort of size (or somewhat bigger) which I have in mind. And linux-capable of course! 2. Headless and handless (and legless -- just a tube up the bum) Here I'm interested in a simple small silent box with a full-scale computer inside it that doesn't need a screen or a keyboard, but will simply sit in a small corner of a shelf and be networked to others (either of a similar kind, or standard PC/laptop). And it should stay cool, preferably. Basically, somthing on the lines of "laptop with no screen or keyboard" gives the idea of what I have in mind. (Probably would need to be connectable to extrenal monitor and keyboard for initial installation purposes, but the intention is that this shold be a transitory situation. Must be linux-capable.) The idea here is that they would be "server" boxes (1 or 2 or even 3 of them), to which user access would be via a networked laptop or similar (e.g. the outcome of query #1). All coments and suggestions gratefully welcomed! Best wishes to all, Ted. [**1] No, I'm not setting up as a Traffic Warden/Parking Attendant/ Tesco Stocktaker. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 25-May-05 Time: 10:51:21 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

9 15

MS Hell
by Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk 25 May '05

25 May '05

Folks, maybe you have been there before me. But I was browsing on www.gnu.org (as we all should from time to time) and felt curious about what GNU humour might be like. Here's one which I hadn't come across before. Bill Gates eventually arrives at the seat of judgement. St. Peter greets him, and explains that while he did contribute a lot of money to charities, he also ripped a lot of people off when they were forced to pay for his software if they wanted to buy a piece of hardware from a store. St. Peter says that under the circumstances, he will give Gates the choice of going to heaven or going to hell, and offers a tour. Gates accepts, and first St. Peter takes him to heaven. In heaven, Gates sees a very serene place, with people discussing philosophy and walking together through a wooded landscape. They then move on to hell. Gates sees a big beach party, with everyone fornicating, smoking cigarettes, eating gourmet food, and drinking. When Gates is asked, he chooses to go to hell, and is immediately plunged into a fiery furnace with the screams of tortured souls deafening him. "Hey, St. Pete, what's all this?" screams Gates. "Where's the beach party?". "Oh, I only showed you the demo version." St.Peter replies. Best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 25-May-05 Time: 20:43:37 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

1 0

Re: [ALUG] Kit queries
by John Seago 25 May '05

25 May '05

On Wednesday 25 May 2005 12:31, "Adrian F. Clark" <alien(a)essex.ac.uk> wrote: > > Here I'm interested in a simple small silent box with a full-scale > > computer inside it that doesn't need a screen or a keyboard... > > ...you could also consider the Mac-mini which is linuxable... But wouldn't that need a keyboard? -- John Seago GNU/Linux User #219566 http://counter.li.org AFFS http://www.affs.org.uk/

2 1

54mps wireless cards (PCMCIA and PCI)
by Martyn Drake 25 May '05

25 May '05

Can anybody recommend a good all rounder 54Mbs PCMCIA and/or PCI desktop card that works with Linux like a comfortable slipper and supports a good range on it? I've had enough of Netgear cr*p to last me a lifetime. M. -- Martyn Drake http://www.drake.org.uk

4 4

HTTP security (or otherwise)
by Chris Green 25 May '05

25 May '05

It's me with still more questions (I'll stop soon I expect). I'm aiming to provide a webmail server on my home Linux machine, probably with SquirrelMail, this is why I've been asking questions about IMAP servers, security, etc. I have SquirrelMail working already, very simple it was too, I was just asking about daemons etc. for information really. After a little thought (and reading) I realise that the IMAP server doesn't have to be visible to the outside world if the only access is to be via SquirrelMail. I know it's possible (and intended even) that IMAP should be used by remote MUAs with IMAP capability but since I won't be doing that and neither will my other users I don't need to worry about the security implications of making IMAP (or POP3 for that matter) visible outside the LAN. It means that making the web server visible to the outside world is where security matters though. Are there any other ways apart from full blown certificate based SSL/TSL to make an apache server a bit more secure? In particular is there a simple ways to encrypt passwords as they pass across the 'net? The sort of level of security that ssh provides would be ideal, however expecting users to set up an ssh tunnel whenever they want to read their mail is probably a non-starter. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

3 3

IMAP subscribe/unsubscribe
by Chris Green 25 May '05

25 May '05

I've posted a similar question on the comp.mail.imap newsgroup but maybe someone here can answer the question. What are the IMAP subscribe and unsubscribe functions for? I don't mean what do they actually do in any particular mail client, I mean what is their intended purpose and use? I can find nowhere that offers a good overall description of IMAP and how it's supposed to work even after spending quite a while Googling. There's the RFC of course but that's hardly user (or even techie) friendly. Apart from that there are lots of descriptions of specific server and client implementations but since they all differ in quite significant ways in the way they handle subscribe/unsubscribe they don't really help a great deal.

1 1

Thunderbird question
by Chris Green 24 May '05

24 May '05

I'm playing with Thunderbird as an 'alternative' GUI mail clinet to mutt. I have it configured OK and reading a remote IMAP server. The one thing I want to do that I can't see how to do at the moment is copy a folder (or even better a folder hierachy) of messages from the IMAP server to a local folder. Dragging and dropping the Inbox copied it and the mail messages in it but dragging and dropping other folders seems only to copy the folder but not its contents. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

1 0

GUI mail client for Linux/Unix mbox delivery (i.e. not POP3)
by Chris Green 24 May '05

24 May '05

Are there any GUI mail clients that read Linux/Unix mailbox file mail delivery? I use mutt for most of my mail reading but now that I can do all my mail reading on my home machine it would occasionally be useful to read my mail with a GUI mail reader (e.g. for the very occasional HTML mail that says something useful with the HTML, and/or to look at attached pictures). All the GUI clients I have tried in days gone by have assumed mail comes from a POP3 server and/or munge the local mail spool with specialised indexes etc. that break it for other (better behaved) clients. It doesn't even have to be a Linux program as my Win2k machine has access to the mail on the Linux box. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

7 9

Fetching with fetchmail versus sending with SMTP
by Chris Green 24 May '05

24 May '05

I currently read (nearly) all my mail on a remote system (this one) where I have a Linux shell login. I log in to the system using ssh and read my mail using mutt, this gives me access to my mail from anywhere with little hassle. Since we now have broadband at home I can transfer this process (remote ssh login and use mutt) to my home Linux machine. This gives me a couple of extra advantages - virtually unlimited storage space and the ability to use a GUI/HTML mail reader when I'm at home if I want to. The question is should I simply move all my fetchmail bits and pieces from the system where I currently read my mail to my home system or should I receive the mail using SMTP? I already run a Postfix SMTP server on the home system for people to send mail to the outside world, I see no need to authenticate local users, if they can get into my house I may as well allow them to send mail! Would it actually be easier/safer to collect all the mail using fetchmail (much of it is collected on the hosting service by using fetchmail to get it from other places) or does SMTP actually confer any advantages? It would actually be pretty easy just to transfer my .fetchmailrc file from where it is now to my home Linux box and not bother with SMTP at all. If I open up the SMTP port to the outside world what issues are there? I want to deliver mail from my hosting service which handles all mail for my isbd.co.uk and isbd.net domains, I have a web configurator which will let me forward all this mail to my home machine (which is a subdomain of isbd.net). I can thus limit connections to just the hosting service so that will probably deal with most of the security issues, I will also obviously check that relaying is not allowed (I'm pretty sure it isn't now). I will still need to run fetchmail to get mail from a few old POP3 hosts where I get the odd message still. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

2 3

[ALUG Announce]BBQ on the 28th
by MJ Ray 24 May '05

24 May '05

ALUG Announce Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce ----- I have added a link from http://www.alug.org.uk/meetings/2005/ to this. For more details see http://www.greenhills.co.uk/mak/alug/20050528-bbq.html -- MJ Ray (slef), K.Lynn, England, email via http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ ----- Send discussion replies to main(a)lists.alug.org.uk (Reply-To set) Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce

1 0

How can a user unmount something mounted with smbmount?
by Chris Green 23 May '05

23 May '05

I am using 'smbmount' to mount a Windows file system on a directory in $HOME on my Linux box. This works for a user if smbmount is SUID. However I don't seem to be able to umount the file system except as root, it just says:- umount: /home/chris/win is not in the fstab (and you are not root) The umount executable is alread SUID but this doesn't seem to help. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

3 5

thanx tony
by thedeceiver 23 May '05

23 May '05

thanks for the welcome, i practice my daily rituals i black notley,essex.kneeling to face pluto, leftthumb in right ear,right toe in left ear whilst chanting Suse Suse Suse,thus begins mt linux day (only joking ;) ) andy -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.322 / Virus Database: 266.11.15 - Release Date: 22/05/2005

2 1

Further to ssh security without a passphrase for the key
by Chris Green 23 May '05

23 May '05

I was reading the ssh (and other ssh utilities) manual pages just now and it would appear that hostbased authentication offers an improvement on 'no passphrase' user keys. As I understand it what it does effectively is make a key for the host you are connecting from rather than the user. This key can then be protected from casual access by being owned by root (or even better a special user) and a utulity program ssh-keysign which is suid is used to access the key. If your host machine is reasonably secure and you have root access (or a friendly sysadmin) this does offer a step up in security, though maybe not quite as good as using ssh-keygen - it depends on the way you use ssh. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

1 0

Suse 9.3 changes to xdm login
by Nick Daniels 23 May '05

23 May '05

Hi I am running Suse 9.3 on two machines, and the login, seemingly at random changes to xdm. I have tried editing the etc/sysconfig/displaymanager to kdm but about every 4th boot it changes back I have come across reference to it here http://forums.suselinuxsupport.de/lofiversion/index.php/t14756.html but I do not use Nvidia cards Any ideas would be appreciated Regards Nick Daniels

2 3

/etc/shadow - password field
by Chris Green 23 May '05

23 May '05

I was looking in my /etc/shadow file to see which users had passwords (so I could change them to something more secure, I know some are rubbish at the moment) and now I'm not sure what the password field is signifying. Most of the non-login 'system' accounts like 'bin' have a password field of '*', but there are a couple ('postgres' and another) which have a password field of '!'. Do both '!' and '*' indicate no password? -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

2 1

Weekly IRC reminder
by Brett Parker 23 May '05

23 May '05

1 0

Backing up IMAP mailbox
by Ben Francis 22 May '05

22 May '05

Eventually I hope to run my own mail server at home, but at the moment I use IMAP with my broadband ISP. I use IMAP because it let's me keep track of what I have and haven't read between work, home and my girlfriends house and a central store for all the emails I've sent. The amount of space on the IMAP server I use is starting to get quite large because of a lot of attachments and I'm paranoid that my ISP is going to notice and delete some of my emails without informing me first. I've been backing up my inbox by downloading the emails via pop3 in Thunderbird to my desktop computer but leaving a copy on the server, but this only backs up my main inbox, not all my subfolders and sent and drafts folder. How can I backup all my IMAP folders remotely? Thanks Ben -- Ben "tola" Francis http://hippygeek.co.uk ---------------------------------------------------- COMPUTER SUPPORT for small businesses and home users http://tolatech.co.uk ----------------------------------------------------

3 2

Restricting ssh logins to certain users (not root)
by Chris Green 22 May '05

22 May '05

Is there any simple way of restricting ssh logins to a system to prevent remote root logins? I'd like to do this to add a little more security so that one has to login as a non-root user and *then* su to root (if you want root privileges for some reason). This would mean that an intruder would need to guess/hack two passwords to get root access. -- Chris Green (chris(a)areti.co.uk) "Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

4 4

Welcome
by andy 22 May '05

22 May '05

thanks for the welcome folks,nice to see there are other users in my area. felt a bit lonely as most of the people i know use winbloze software. mention linux to them & they go all glassy eyed or stare at you as if you're from another planet. i sometimes feel as if i'm a scientist who has made a great discovery & no one is listening!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! andy

2 1

Moving Mozilla config etc to Firefox
by Ted.Harding＠nessie.mcc.ac.uk 22 May '05

22 May '05

Hi Folks, As mentioned in another mail just composed, I run Mozilla on a somewhat puny laptop. I also have Firefox installed, which is a much more compact and nippy program. The main reason I still keep running Mozilla is that I have a massive collection of bookmarks on Mozilla, built up over the years, and also an assortment of auto-login data for certain websites (userids & passwords), and an unknown number of cookies also accumulated over time. Not forgetting sundry plugins. In order to switch cleanly and conprehensively over to Firefox, I would need to transfer this lot from wherever Mozilla looks for it to wherever Firefox would look for it. I have not succeeded in sussing this out. Nor do I wish to re-create it all by hand! Any tips? (Are the two even totally compatible in this respect?) With thanks, and best wishes to all, Ted. -------------------------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)nessie.mcc.ac.uk> Fax-to-email: +44 (0)870 094 0861 Date: 08-May-05 Time: 13:38:52 ------------------------------ XFMail ------------------------------

4 4

Re: Humongous computing with Windows XP 64bit Edition
by tom potts 22 May '05

22 May '05

Just a comment on linux memory use vs windows. If I remember rightly the file system on linux tends to keep files in memory until it needs the space so the memory usage goes up so when it says your using 700meg of ram this may actually mean your only using 200 meg for the system but there are 500meg of closed files. Windows seems to scrabble every last bit back and still suffer. I have an amd with 256MB ram with w2k it struggles to get started but isnt too bad after that even though I use VS.NET but it does seem to choke a lot. Running RH9.0 it almost seems to get bored. You can run suse9.2 in 16MBytes Ram but you seem to need 64Mbytes to install it using the graphical interface. Same for RH9! Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

2 1

new member
by thedeceiver 22 May '05

22 May '05

hi my names andy, & i thought i'd join your lug mailing list as i have been using linux for about 3 years,mainly suse,mandrake & fedora core.i'm not the greatest user but if i can help in any way i will. i currently run suse 9.3 on my laptop & dual boot on my main p.c.mainly for the kids as they are used to winbloze software. gradually working them to a switch. i also help out in my local school as i am fairly well versed in most i.t. issues. if i don't know the answer i can always find out. thanks for letting me join your lug hope to hear more from other members Andy -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.0.322 / Virus Database: 266.11.12 - Release Date: 17/05/2005

4 3

Jump to page:

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

main