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10369 discussions

Probably asked this before...
by Anthony Anson 01 Feb '12

01 Feb '12

I want to make a bootable USB memory stick with the Eee's operating system so I can run down my use of Xan-Dross. I've changed the root password so I can now tell it to do all those things it has steadfastly refused to do until now. What do people recommend? Ideally, a mirror of the HDD would be best. Now to discover how to devastate the unwanted pogroms... The next question is, what distro to put on the Eee instead of Xan-Dross, bearing in mind I use Debian as my main OS -- Tony Anson www.girolle.co.uk/

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Re: [ALUG] Does anyone else miss the pull-down list that used to be adjacent to the Back button in Firefox?
by John Woodard 27 Jan '12

27 Jan '12

Cool I'd wondered where that had gone. Cheers, BJ

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Does anyone else miss the pull-down list that used to be adjacent to the Back button in Firefox?
by Chris Green 27 Jan '12

27 Jan '12

Back around version 3.x and before of Firefox there was a V symbol (i.e. a down pointer) next to the < (Back) button that would provide links back to the last few pages viewed before the current one in the same TAB. I used to find this very useful if one wanted to go back to a page before, for example, filling in a form. Using the Back button produces all those warnings about having to resend information. This has disappeared in current versions of Fifefox, has it gone for ever? -- Chris Green

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Mint Issues
by Paul Grenyer 26 Jan '12

26 Jan '12

Hi All I've come back to the Linux fold, mostly because I'm developing in Java again. At the recommendation of a friend of mine I've installed Mint Linux 12 (Gnome) and I really like it. However, at what seems like random intervals I am unable to click anything. So I can't change between applications, I can't scroll scroll bars, I can't pull down, menus, etc. I can move the mouse and I can turn caps lock on and off. I'm running on a 2007 Think Pad T60. Has anyone else seen this problem or know what it might be? -- Thanks Paul Paul Grenyer e: paul.grenyer(a)gmail.com b: paulgrenyer.blogspot.com t: pjgrenyer

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RAID Problems
by steve-ALUG＠hst.me.uk 26 Jan '12

26 Jan '12

Hi Gnu Grub Gurus! I've just spent an unpleasant evening getting my server to boot again. Ubuntu Server 10.04 LTS, fully patched and up-to-date. Running Raid 1 with 2 active disks. Historically, got a error reported on 1 of the disks, so brought some bigger ones. Marked one of the old disks as "Failed" and added one of the new ones. Waited for it to synch. Marked the other old disk as "Failed", added the other new one. Waited for it to synch. That left me with 4 disks in the raid array, 2 new ones active, the old two marked as failed, but still connected. Was meaning to reboot this when I had time to fix any problems that may occur on rebooting. Tonight, I forgot that and rebooted the machine after something crashed. Then the machine wouldn't boot. Got all the bios screens, disks recognised etc, then I got an error along the lines of udevd-work mdadm --incremental /dev/sdd1 unexpected exit with status 0x000b Managed to boot from a live cd. Hacked around a bit, discovered I hadn't marked the new disks as bootable, and the partition type was wrong - Raid, as opposed to Raid-autodetect. Changed that disconnected the old disks, rebooted, and after the bios screens, where I would hope to see the grub boot menu, I just got a flashing cursor. This is the problem I want to solve - how to get it to boot with just the new disks in it. I shut it down again, reattached the old disks. Rebooted. It now has 4 disks, 2 new ones active, 2 old ones as spares (not synched). Could my problem be that Grub is not installed on the new disks. If that's the case, how can I check. How can I fix it if this is the problem. NB I'm using grub legacy (V0.97) If that's not my problem, what is my problem and how do I fix it? Something like what's listed here? http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1360445&highlight=grub2+fakeraid <http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1360445&highlight=grub2+fakeraid> Any help appreciated! Steve

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Is there a utility to spot missing/out of sequence files?
by Chris Green 24 Jan '12

24 Jan '12

I suspect I'm going to have to write a utility to do this for me but there *might* be something to do it for me. I want to spot files missing from a sequence, e.g. if I see:- dscf1253.jpg dscf1254.jpg dscf1256.jpg dscf1257.jpg dscf1258.jpg dscf1259.jpg I want to be told that dscf1255.jpg is missing. -- Chris Green

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How to execute something from a web page (i.e. hung on a button) without affecting the web page?
by Chris Green 24 Jan '12

24 Jan '12

I want to have a button on a web page that executes some code (currently a bash script) but which isn't 'real' CGI in that it doesn't send anything back to the web server. I want nothing at all to happen to the web page when the button is clcked. Is there some sort of CGI 'output' which does nothing at all? -- Chris Green

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"unwritable" external USB drive
by Ted.Harding＠wlandres.net 23 Jan '12

23 Jan '12

Greetings All. I wonder if anyone can give me some advice! Seeking a device to take backups onto, I bought a Western Digital "My Passport Essential" external USB hard drive (500 GB, USB 2.0 and 3.0). When I plug this in (Debian Lenny) I get a pop-up which says: Cannot mount volume Invalid mount option when attempting to mount the volume 'My Passport' dmesg | tail -35 gives: usb 4-3: new high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 9 usb 4-3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice scsi8 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices usb-storage: device found at 9 usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning usb 4-3: New USB device found, idVendor=1058, idProduct=0740 usb 4-3: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=5 usb 4-3: Product: My Passport 0740 usb 4-3: Manufacturer: Western Digital usb 4-3: SerialNumber: 575839314138315934373632 usb-storage: device scan complete scsi 8:0:0:0: Direct-Access WD My Passport 0740 1003 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6 scsi 8:0:0:1: Enclosure WD SES Device 1003 PQ: 0 ANSI: 6 sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Spinning up disk....ready sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] 976707584 512-byte hardware sectors (500074MB) sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Write Protect is off sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Mode Sense: 47 00 10 08 sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] 976707584 512-byte hardware sectors (500074MB) sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Write Protect is off sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Mode Sense: 47 00 10 08 sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Assuming drive cache: write through sdc: sdc1 sd 8:0:0:0: [sdc] Attached SCSI disk ses 8:0:0:1: Attached Enclosure device fdisk /dev/sdc gives: Disk /dev/sdc: 500.0 GB, 500074283008 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60797 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Disk identifier: 0x00038a56 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdc1 1 60798 488352768 7 HPFS/NTFS Then, as root (remote login): mount -t ntfs /dev/sdc1 /mnt apparently mounts OK, and then: ls -la /mnt gives: drwx------ 1 root root 4096 2012-01-19 13:11 . drwxr-xr-x 21 root root 4096 2009-04-17 19:52 .. drwx------ 1 root root 4096 2011-03-10 00:48 Extras drwx------ 1 root root 0 2012-01-19 13:11 $RECYCLE.BIN drwx------ 1 root root 0 2012-01-19 13:10 System Volume Information drwx------ 1 root root 0 2011-03-10 00:48 User Manuals -rw------- 2 root root 3290480 2011-03-09 22:43 WD Quick Formatter.exe drwx------ 1 root root 4096 2011-03-10 00:48 WD SmartWare -rw------- 2 root root 4246384 2011-03-09 22:43 WD SmartWare.exe drwx------ 1 root root 0 2011-03-10 00:48 WD SmartWare for Mac and I can read the user manual under "User Manuals". However, I want to make a new directory on the USB disk, so as a test I try: mkdir /mnt/Test which gives: mkdir: cannot create directory `/mnt/Test': Operation not permitted (despite the fact that /mnt, and /mnt/Test and all subdirectories, apparently have write permission for root). Also, in /media I have: -rw------- 1 root root 0 2012-01-23 18:37 .hal-mtab-lock which was not there before I plugged it in (well, it was from a previous session, but I deleted it before starting this test). SO: How do I make this thing writeable??? (This is the first time I have had a USB drive so this on me). With thanks, Ted. ------------------------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)wlandres.net> Date: 23-Jan-2012 Time: 18:41:46 This message was sent by XFMail -------------------------------------------------

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A very simple/silly HTML question about 204 response
by Chris Green 21 Jan '12

21 Jan '12

I want to have a CGI script return a 204 response so that the calling page doesn't change but I can't get it to work cleanly such that I don't get an error as follows:- Internal Server Error The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request. Please contact the server administrator, webmaster@localhost and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error. More information about this error may be available in the server error log. The CGI script is currently just:- echo HTTP/1.0 204 No Change echo Content-type: text/html echo The apache error log says:- [Sat Jan 21 16:19:24 2012] [error] [client 192.168.1.4] malformed header from script. Bad header=HTTP/1.0 204 No Change: wikiedit.cgi, referer: http://wiki/info:money:jessica?do=edit Removing the "echo Content-type: text/html" makes no difference at all. According to what I can find on Google about "204 No Change" it's all I should need. Any ideas? -- Chris Green

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Wifi access point recommendation for use outside?
by Srdjan Todorovic 21 Jan '12

21 Jan '12

Hi all, I just got a call from my dad asking about a wifi access point that: 1. is good (how does one quantify this?) 2. has a 30m range (wikipedia suggests 32m indoor range, and 95m outside as normal ranges for b/g) 3. can support 10-20 connected peers on the wifi interface (I'm guessing there would be a resource limit, but I don't know what it would be, or what is normal) 4. can be used for yard applications a) either is rugged / waterproof enough to be mounted outside, with power and ethernet pulled outside, or b) would be effective enough mounted on the side of the window indoors and remain hidden from view, and the antenna can still pick up wifi peers, and the wifi peers can pick up the AP signals. 5. secured - most should support WEP and WPA, but I'm not sure what the actual requirements for this are - depends on what encryption the users would have, but I'd hope they'd all support WPA-PSK as a minimum. I suspect most wifi access points would satisfy all of these requirements (except maybe ruggedness in case it was to be mounted outdoors). Does anyone have any suggestions for a wifi access point that would meet these requirements? Thanks, Srdjan

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SQL question - any other way to do this?
by Chris Green 21 Jan '12

21 Jan '12

I have the following typically horrible bit of SQL to get a result I want:- SELECT Date, Description, Credit, (SELECT SUM(Credit) FROM jessica j2 WHERE j2.Date <= j1.Date ORDER BY j2.Date) AS TotCredit FROM jessica j1; This is actually slightly simplifed but illustrates the problem. It works OK if run as shown but unfortunately I don't actually have the ability to create the whole thing in the application where I'm using it. All I can do is specify the SQL for the individual selected colums, I *can't* specify the final "FROM jessica j1", it's actually just "FROM jessica". So, what the application executes is:- SELECT Date, Description, Credit, (SELECT SUM(Credit) FROM jessica j2 WHERE j2.Date <= Date ORDER BY Date) AS TotCredit FROM jessica I can change the (SELECT SUM(Credit) FROM jessica j2 WHERE j2.Date <= Date ORDER BY Date) to anything I want, can anyone suggest a way to get the running total that I want just by adjusting this part of the SQL? -- Chris Green

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Evolution oddness
by Bev Nicolson 20 Jan '12

20 Jan '12

To be honest Evolution's been odd for a while but anyway. Opening it up I wasn't asked for my password (I don't login to my computer now. No idea why. If anyone's got a cunning way of changing that, do tell. The request to put my p/w in comes randomly.) Today I can't open any emails. Essentially it's behaving as though there's not internet access (though as you can see, there is, cos I'm typing this.) I see others have had problems like this with too on the Ubuntu forum. Hmm.

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Text editor that can edit columns easily/well?
by Chris Green 20 Jan '12

20 Jan '12

Does anyone know of a text editor that will edit columns of text well? By this I *don't* mean one that can handle rectangular areas, my preferred editor (vile/xvile) can already do that easily. What I want is a text editor that will maintain existing columns while allowing one to add/edit/delete text within them. E.g. if I have:- Some text in column Text in column two Column 3 column 1 continued and more in here etc etc bla bla bla goo goo goo ding ding ... and I edit it as follows:- Some more text in column Text in column two Column 3 column 1 continued and more in here etc etc bla bla bla goo goo goo ding ding I want it to maintain things as above without me having to delete the four extra spaces between columns one and two. I want to be able to add text to a line in a column and have it expand the whole column down the file. I.e. there is some sort of 'virtual' delimiter between the columns which is kept vertically aligned, I'm quite happy for this to be an actual character although I'd prefer it to be invisible like a TAB if possible. Thus the above *could* be:- Some text in column | Text in column two | Column 3 column 1 continued | and more in here | etc etc bla bla bla | goo goo goo | ding ding ... and I edit it as follows:- Some more text in column | Text in column two | Column 3 column 1 continued | and more in here | etc etc bla bla bla | goo goo goo | ding ding ... then add even more text:- Some more text in column | Text in column two | Column 3 column 1 continued | and more in here | etc etc bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla | goo goo goo | ding ding with the editor keeping the |s vertically aligned for me. The 'table' add-on for Emacs almost does this but it's for a table (as in text in boxes) rather than text in columns. Searching for 'text edit columns' just comes up with loads of editors that can handle rectangular areas which I can already do. -- Chris Green

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Can I switch these off?
by Chris Walker 17 Jan '12

17 Jan '12

The store I'm using is an Edimax NS2502 and I'm connecting to it using lines like this in the /etc.fstab file :- //storage_server/FTP_RAID_C /media/linux_Share cifs user,credentials=/etc/samba/auth.storage_server.Mandriva 0 0 The auth file just contains a userid and password. Like others I've found online, my NAS drive is creating 77 cifsxxx files as soon as I delete them. Is there a way to stop this? One person thinks this is a bug - https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=740572 but that was in 2009 and it still seems to be occurring. Am I doing something wrong here? Perhaps I should explain that these files are in the /media/linux_Share/Linux_Backups/hourly.1/localhost/usr/bin/ directory and I'm trying to remove everything from the Linux_Backups directory prior to initiating a backup procedure using drakbackup.

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Re: [ALUG] cp -a puzzle
by Ted.Harding＠wlandres.net 16 Jan '12

16 Jan '12

On 14-Jan-2012 James Bensley wrote: > rsync has this option Unfortunately rsync is not present on that system (SuSE Linux 8.2 installed in 2003). I should add that I'm doing this for a friend (predominantly a Windows user) who wants to dispose of the machine, but keep the files. I do not have access to the installation disks (and they may well have gone into a black hole by now). Thanks for the suggestion! Ted. > On Jan 14, 2012 9:12 PM, "Ted Harding" <Ted.Harding(a)wlandres.net> wrote: > >> Greetings All, >> I am currently engaged in copying files from a desktop >> machine to an external USB hard drive. >> >> The machine has both Windows 98 and Linux on it, and >> dual-boots. Because Win98 does not recognise the external >> drive, while the Linux installation does, I'm booting >> into Linux to do the copying. >> >> The objective is to transfer every file on the desktop >> onto the external drive. The external drive is mounted >> as /media/sda1 in Linux, and has a vfat filesystem. >> >> The Windows drives \C, \D, \E, \F are mounted, when the >> machine is booted into Linux, as: >> >> /windows/C /windows/D ... /windows/F >> >> With the Windows files, no problem: I make the directories >> /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/C >> (and similar for .../D, .../E, .../F, these being all the >> Windows drives). Then I do the likes of: >> >> cd /windows/C >> cp -a * /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/C >> >> (and similar for D, E and F). This has worked fine. >> However, I now want to copy over all the Linux files >> as well. I have made a directory >> >> /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles >> >> but now, of course, >> >> cp -a /* /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles >> >> will not work, because the external drive is mounted >> under / and so will be itself copied and recopied in >> an infinite recursion. There would be no problem if >> there was an "exclude" option for 'cp' (say "-X") so >> that >> >> cp -a -X /media /* /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles >> >> would inhibit anything under /media from being copied. >> But I can find no such option for 'cp'. >> >> So how to proceed??? >> >> With thanks, >> Ted. >> ---------------------------------- >> E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)wlandres.net> >> Date: 14-Jan-2012 >> Time: 20:49:49 >> >> This message was sent by XFMail >> ---------------------------------- >> >> _______________________________________________ >> main(a)lists.alug.org.uk >> http://www.alug.org.uk/ >> http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/main >> Unsubscribe? See message headers or the web site above! >> ---------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)wlandres.net> Date: 14-Jan-2012 Time: 22:07:57 This message was sent by XFMail ----------------------------------

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Naive spreadsheet question - how to produce a running total?
by Chris Green 16 Jan '12

16 Jan '12

I'm a total newcomer to spreadsheets but I think/hope a spreadsheet is what I need to fulfil a very simple requirement. I want to maintain a simple balance of income and outgoings, e.g.:- Date Description Credit Debit Balance 1/1/2012 Monthly charge £200.00 -£200.00 5/1/2012 Received cheque £200.00 £0.0 21/1/2010 Miscellanous expense £5.00 -£5.00 .... etc. I can manage the various data entry columns in Gnumeric but what formula do I need in the Balance column? Firstly I can't find the syntax for "all cells to the end", all the Help seems to tell me is how to enter a range, i.e. C2:C12 means the range from C2 to C12, but how do you say "to the end"? Secondly how do you get a running balance without having to re-enter the formula in the Balance column for every row you enter? -- Chris Green

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cp -a puzzle
by Ted.Harding＠wlandres.net 15 Jan '12

15 Jan '12

Greetings All, I am currently engaged in copying files from a desktop machine to an external USB hard drive. The machine has both Windows 98 and Linux on it, and dual-boots. Because Win98 does not recognise the external drive, while the Linux installation does, I'm booting into Linux to do the copying. The objective is to transfer every file on the desktop onto the external drive. The external drive is mounted as /media/sda1 in Linux, and has a vfat filesystem. The Windows drives \C, \D, \E, \F are mounted, when the machine is booted into Linux, as: /windows/C /windows/D ... /windows/F With the Windows files, no problem: I make the directories /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/C (and similar for .../D, .../E, .../F, these being all the Windows drives). Then I do the likes of: cd /windows/C cp -a * /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/C (and similar for D, E and F). This has worked fine. However, I now want to copy over all the Linux files as well. I have made a directory /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles but now, of course, cp -a /* /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles will not work, because the external drive is mounted under / and so will be itself copied and recopied in an infinite recursion. There would be no problem if there was an "exclude" option for 'cp' (say "-X") so that cp -a -X /media /* /media/sda1/WinLinMachine/LinuxFiles would inhibit anything under /media from being copied. But I can find no such option for 'cp'. So how to proceed??? With thanks, Ted. ---------------------------------- E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <Ted.Harding(a)wlandres.net> Date: 14-Jan-2012 Time: 20:49:49 This message was sent by XFMail ----------------------------------

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[ALUG Announce] 3rd Monday Monthly Ipswich Social Meeting : McGintys, Northgate Street
by samwise 13 Jan '12

13 Jan '12

ALUG Announce Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce ----- The monthly "Third Monday" ALUG Ipswich Social Meeting is back this Monday, 16th January, at 20:00: P J McGinty & Sons 15 Northgate Street Ipswich Suffolk IP1 3BY Tel: 01473 251 515 Map/Directions URI: http://maps.google.co.uk/?q=IP1+3BY WWW: http://www.pjmcgintys.co.uk/ McGintys pub is in the centre of Ipswich. It's directly opposite the town's central library and has a reputation for good Irish beer. We're usually to be found in the lowest section of the bar, near the library entrance to the pub. All are welcome, novices and experienced users. Feel free to ask for further information on the Main ALUG mailing list. ** I should be there this month to welcome in a new Linux year, after last month's absence. Hope to catch some of you there! ** Peter. ----- 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

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bandwidth throttle needed
by mick 11 Jan '12

11 Jan '12

Hi Guys I have recently devoted a VM to tails (tails.boum.org). That VM appears in a DNS round robin with five other servers. When I first offered the server, trials showed I could expect to see outbound around 20-30 GB per day. I can live with that. Unfortunately, the traffic has now jumped to 150-180 GB per day. I can't live with that. It will cost me too much. So I need some advice on bandwith shaping. Can anyone recommend any tools which will allow me to set limits so that I can throttle web traffic to around 30 Gb per day (or 250 GB per week or 1000 GB per month for example). Cheers Mick --------------------------------------------------------------------- The text file for RFC 854 contains exactly 854 lines. Do you think there is any cosmic significance in this? Douglas E Comer - Internetworking with TCP/IP Volume 1 http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc854.txt ---------------------------------------------------------------------

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Web photo management - are there any simple systems?
by Chris Green 10 Jan '12

10 Jan '12

I have a couple of family members who have photo albums on the web which I host. For the past two or three years I have been using gallery2 to do this but I'm getting increasingly fed up with the hassle involved whenever anything changes. A recent OS upgrade has made the gallery2 installations fall in a heap yet again and I'm wondering if I might find something easier than gallery2. Apart from not being easy to upgrade it requires quite a few non-standard changes to php.ini which I'd prefer to avoid if I can, and it uses a mysql database which I'd also like to avoid if I can. My two users don't need most of gallery2's abilities, all they want to do is to be able to upload photographs and organise them into albums with (presumably) thumbnails to select them. There's no need for multiple users, no need for tags, no need for extra information, just the EXIF and IPTC from the image files. So is there anything out there that can do this with as little hassle as possible? -- Chris Green

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This apache2 default (maybe ubuntu's doing) seems a bit unhelpful
by Chris Green 10 Jan '12

10 Jan '12

In the default apache2 installation on Ubuntu you get the following setting in the default virtual host:- ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/ This means that CGI scripts are in the /usr hierarchy which doesn't seem very helpful. Is the the norm for apache2 or is it just Ubuntu's doing? I'm thinking I either want to point it to some suitable /home/<user> directory or possibly somewhere below /var/www, is there anything wrong with doing either of these (assuming suitable security protection of course). -- Chris Green

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Is there a known security weakness in gallery2?
by Chris Green 10 Jan '12

10 Jan '12

Well after having decided I don't want to run gallery2 any more I have another question related to it. I'm getting hundreds of hits (well, attempted hits, it's no longer there) on the old gallery2 site, logged by logwatch as follows:- /mandy/gallery2/main.php?g2_view=shutterfl ... en=26321822fb67: 1 Time(s) I seem to get thirty or forty every day and today's logwatch has logged well over a hundred. It's not a issue really as it's not eating much bandwidth or loading my web site significantly but I was just wondering if anyone knows whether it's a well know security weakness in gallery2 or what? Or is someone just very desperate to look at the pictures on Mandy's blog? :-) Maybe I should put a note at /mandy/gallery2 saying that the pictures have moved. Though come to think about it the link from the blog now points at where the pictures really are so whatever is hitting that gallery2 URL must be pretty mindless. -- Chris Green

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Is there anything better than 'locate'?
by Chris Green 10 Jan '12

10 Jan '12

I find (pun not intended) the locate command very painful, it rarely produces anything useful when I use it and its command line options don't seem to help very much. First problem is that by default it returns every single file that has the search expression in its path, so if I search for 'home' for example I get thousands and thousands of lines returned because it lists every sub-directory and file under /home. Surely it would be more useful if it just returned /home plus any files (or other directories) actually called 'home'. As it is the default is nearly always not what one wants. Secondly I want a search for 'home' to return files and directories called 'home', not ones called 'homeAndAway' or anything else with 'home' in them. If I'm searching for something which has 'home' in it then I'll search for '*home*'. I know there are ways of getting over the above two problems but IMHO the syntax to do so is a bit clumsy and inconvenient. The man page gives the syntax (in the only example it gives, maybe suggesting others have the same complaints as I do) :- locate -b '\home' Finally I want some way to exclude large chunks of my system from the search (or to *include* specific areas), my short-term backups are on my desktop system under /bak. As a result locate finds dozens of hits for any file which happens to be in the incremental backups. If only locate worked the same way as find does, find does almost exactly what I want most of the time (but is very slow of course because it's not got a cron built database). I guess I'm going to write a custom script round locate that makes it produce results much like find, but quickly. I'm just wondering if someone happens to have done it for me already. -- Chris Green

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[ALUG Announce] ALUG Norwich Pub Meet Thursday 12th January
by Viperfang 09 Jan '12

09 Jan '12

ALUG Announce Please send announcements to Announce(a)lists.alug.org.uk Unsub, change settings via http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce ----- Hello Norwich Aluggers, Our monthly ALUG Norwich social meeting will be held this Thursday, 12th January 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 http://lists.alug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/announce

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Fwd: [Gllug] OSHUG #15 — Wireless (Hacking Commodity Wireless, Practical Wireless, Contiki OS, CWIG) — Thursday 26th January
by Richard Lewis 08 Jan '12

08 Jan '12

Hi ALUG, It's not local, but the next meeting of the Open Source Hardware User Group may be of interest to some here. It's near King's Cross Station, and a quick trip round the Circle Line from Liverpool Street. Best, Richard -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Richard Lewis ISMS, Computing Goldsmiths, University of London JID: ironchicken(a)jabber.earth.li http://www.richardlewis.me.uk/ -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- > OSHUG #15 — Wireless (Hacking Commodity Wireless, Practical Wireless, > Contiki OS, CWIG) > > On the 26th January 2012, 18:00 - 20:00 at Centre for Creative > Collaboration, 16 Acton Street, London, WC1X 9NG, (51.529049, > -0.116436) > > ** Registration: http://oshug.org/event/15 ** > > At the fifteenth OSHUG meeting we'll be taking a look at wireless > technologies. We will hear how you can repurpose low cost commodity > equipment, we will be given an introduction to RF basics, we will > learn about the Contiki operating system, and we will be introduced to > Ciseco's new Wireless Internet Gateway. > > - Hacking Commodity Wireless > > Many people build their hacks from the ground up, but those short of > time sometimes prefer to repurpose cheap off-the-shelf components that > can be made to fit the bill. A good example being a wireless > thermometer for external use, where an off-the-shelf device provides > an inexpensive option complete with the requisite weatherproof > packaging. However, such devices typically use proprietary protocols > and good documentation is rarely available. This talk will look at how > to interface such devices where a degree of reverse-engineering is > frequently required. > > Paul Tanner is a consultant, developer and maker in wood, metal, > plastic, electronics and software. His day job is IT-based business > improvement for SMEs. By night he turns energy nut, creating tools to > optimise energy use. Paul graduated in electronics and was responsible > for hardware and software product development and customer services in > several product and service start-ups, switching to consulting in > 2000. > > - Practical Wireless > > Adding wireless connectivity to your latest open hardware project is > not difficult, provided that you take the time to understand some of > the principles of RF communication. In this talk we will learn about > the basics of wireless propagation, and take a look at some of the low > cost modules which now make adding wireless even easier. > > Ken Boak joined BBC Research Department after graduating and worked on > digital picture processing of HDTV images, and coding algorithms for > video distribution around studios. Since then, Ken has worked in > laboratory instrumentation, telecommunications, low power wireless and > consumer electronics produced in the Far East. With an interest in > renewables, Ken now develops laboratory instruments to teach > undergraduates the principles of photovoltaic and wind power. Outside > of work, Ken is interested in smart wireless sensors, open source > hardware and low cost solutions for the Internet of Things. > > - An Introduction to the Contiki O/S > > This talk is aimed to introduce the Contiki OS and some of the > development hardware. We will learn about the process of bootstrapping > the development environment and there will be a hands-on tutorial. > > Ilya Dmitrichenko was born in Soviet Latvia in 1985, grew up and > attended a secondary school there, and moved to UK as soon as Latvia > joined the EU. He attended the biggest university in London and was > rather disappointed with the education, but nevertheless carried on > and had fun working on a final year engineering project which served > as an introduction to the topic of this talk. Ilya is interested in > various aspects of hardware and software, spanning from WSN to DSP and > several other random fields. > > - CWIG — The Ciseco Wireless Internet Gateway > > The CWIG is a new open hardware device that is designed to be the "one > and only" platform you'd need for a wireless gateway. It employs the > same ATmega328 microcontroller that is familiar to Arduino users and > supports Ciseco's TI CC1110-based XRF module, XBee, Bluetooth, RFM12B, > X10/HomeEasy, FRAM, SD, Ethernet and over-the-air programming with > AVRDude. It's sized to be housed in a low cost, compact enclosure and > to be cheap to build using through-hole components. In this talk we > will be given an introduction to the CWIG and also to the XRF wireless > UART and programmable RF module. > > Miles Hodkinson's twenty-odd year relationship with IT ended around > six years ago when he decided that it was time to do something > completely different. He had looked around without success for > something to log and control his wind turbine, solar panels and Lister > single cylinder engine, and found that nothing was flexible enough for > the money he wanted to pay (tens of pounds per device), so he decided > he would try and build it himself. After a number of years working on > a human-focused method of networking originally built using XBee > modules and now termed LLAP, his company developed the TI CC1110-based > XRF module. > > Note: Please aim to arrive for 18:00 - 18:20 as the talks will start > at 18:30 prompt. > > ** Registration: http://oshug.org/event/15 **

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