Category Archives: Random - Page 18

Proxmox (Ver. 2.1)

Posted by on September 10, 2012 No comments

So I have been playing with proxmox 2.x for a while now, and its pretty awesome compared to 1.x.  The layout and options are sweet (from the web interface).  I have since updated a client of mine from 1.9 to 2.1, and for the most part things went fairly smoothly.  Even windows server 2008 seemed to run better and not crash!  Big plus ^_^  But I did hit a snag when the backups no longer worked.  They would start but never finish past a certain point in snapshot mode, which of course was a problem … So after a few weeks of poking around, I found it was the LVM snapshot settings.  Had to adjust /etc/vzdump.conf to different size setting.  The config file was blank (so all defaults i guess), which should make the size setting 1024.  Changed to 8192 and now it works perfectly.  I'm not sure if it really matters having the setting that much higher .. but from my understandings, its just the size of space reserved for any changes made to the VM image while its being backed up.  AKA as far as I know, it stops writing to the main image, and writes all changes to a seperate "space" until the backup is complete, after which it merges.  So having it that big should only take that space away from other stuff … Since i have space to spare, should be good to go!  In reality though, this could probably be set to 4096 or 2048.  

Any way, if your looking for a Virtual Machine bare bone system, this is pretty rock solid and worth a look.  Especially if your budget is tight.  If you want to be sure things go smoothly, get the support contract with the company that maintains it.  It's always worth supporting companies that put things out for free any way!  

Xubuntu 12.04

Posted by on July 22, 2012 No comments

So I have been using Xubuntu 12.04 for a few days now.  Oddly enough, I think I like the Xfce desktop more so then unity and probably gnome3 … although gnome3 isn't bad.  I also installed it to a USB stick, so I can take my desktop around with me to almost any computer.  So far so good, but I'm getting a faster USB Flash drive to help out load performance and performance in general if I'm doing too much (like lots of chormium tabs open).  Xubuntu also seems to be glitching less.  For some reason Ubuntu 12.04 kept crashing a few things, especially empathy connecting to authorize my chat logins (facebook / gtalk).  Since xubuntu uses Pidgin, no problems, although I remember reading it saves passwords in plain text… so I did encrypt my home directory.  I also encrypted it because it is on a USB stick, and I didn't want to lose it and have some one get complete access to all my files!  

I found out a few other cool things today!  Like holding down the Alt and right mouse button and dragging from inside a window will actually resize it.  So you dont have to try and perfectly put the mouse on a corner or side!  SOO much easier.  I can't tell you how annoyed I got trying to resize something on a 1080p monitor with a decently sensitive mouse.  Finding cool things like this reminds me of the more time you invest in figuring out Linux in general, the more you are rewarded.  At first glance, you may not want to ditch windows or Mac for any variant of Linux, but the more time you spending learning about it, the more your going to love it!  The 3 bigest things I love about linux are

1.  Loads of choice!  There are thousands of apps you can use, to tweak the intire OS.  I love the fact you can install multiple desktop interfaces (gnome, xfce, unity, etc) and just pick what ever one you feel like using on logon.  

2.  #1 works right into #2, which is customization.  Most of any distro is Free Open Source Software, which means you can tweak the software any way you want.  This gives even more choice with all your choices!

3.  The majority of Linux software does not cost money! Only time to figure out and learn to use to its maximum potential.  

 

Remember kids, Linux is free to download, distribute and use.  It can also be run directly off the CD to try out or a USB stick.  So start playing around with it and have some fun!  Technology is cool 😀  

 

Been awhile since a post!

Posted by on July 16, 2012 No comments

Its been a while since my last post so… thought I'll just do a random post with misc. Updates. 

For starters, I am now using Ubuntu 12.04 as my primary OS for general use.  Its not bad, but it does crash randomly… not completely, in fact it seems to be mostly the google part of empathy, but also some random other stuff but not nearly as noticable (says chromium crashes, but it didn't).  I am also using Gnome 3 as my primary UI, as it seems more responsive and I like how it works more then Unity.  I also had issues with the nvidia close source driver, so I went back to the reverse engineered open source driver and it works better… in compatibility not performance.  

Hmm Proxmox has come out with 2.1 as well, which is a awesome upgrade over 1.9.  I have setup 2 of "servers" with it and clustered them (not with HA though… need extra equipment).  Its pretty awesome how its all laid out, and having the ability to "backup now" instead of trying to set a temporary backup a few min ahead is nice ^_^  

My friend matt has re-light my interest in Seti / boinc and I have setup a VM on both my Proxmox servers that run boinc now.  Should start cranking out a few more units (before it was pretty much just running on my step dads computer).  

Lastly for this post, I have got a e-reader (Kindle touch) and have been reading about liquid thorium reactors (safe nuclear energy).  Its actually really interesting and can solve a lot of the problems we have with current nuclear reactors (uranium light water reactors).  Other books I have been reading include Windows Server 2008 R2, Ubuntu desktop / server book (the "Official" ones).  

Any who, I'll try and get something "cooler" to post later.  

Critical thinking

Posted by on April 13, 2012 No comments

I thought this was worthy enough to post else where then on facebook.  This is a very good break down of critical thinking and things to watch out for when people are trying to convince you of something, or maybe you should re-think something  you 'think' you know, but in fact may not have the facts 🙂 

 

http://io9.com/5888322/critical-thinking-explained-in-six-kid+friendly-animations

Linux continues to please

Posted by on May 13, 2011 No comments

It seems like the more you figure out linux, the more you just love it. It is truly amazing at what you can do with it. When I found the screen program, that made me very happy when dealing with servers and SSH, now I’m happy about finding update-rc.d. This handy system prog allows you to run scripts on startup under a runtime level. If you don’t care to know too much about it, simply create your script, give it execute permissions and put it in /etc/init.d/ and run “sudo update-rc.d script defaults” (assuming your script name is “script”). Wala, it will now run automatically for you on boot. pretty spiffy eh? I just used it to bind some directories from my windows partition to my Ubuntu folders so my files stay up to date on either end, but you can do much more then that.

Kootenay Network cooperation

Posted by on May 12, 2011 No comments

I had this idea a little while back about getting the kootenay area computer techs together to share knowledge, idea’s, tips and tricks. I had just recently finished my all in one USB installer for windows and such as well, so I was eager to share that and help techs save literally hours of work every time they wanted or needed to reload a system. So I changed my other website (kootenay-networks.com) from my main business website, to a mix of business and the Kootenay Network cooperation. This was all done a few weeks ago.

So I fired off a bunch of emails to all the computer companys I could find online and in the phone book in the immediate kootenay area, as well as posted some free ad’s around the net. After two weeks, guess how many new members I had on the forums? … that’s right, 0. I saw a few views on the things I posted, but nothing major. I did however get a few emails of people thinking it was a great idea, but they just didn’t have the time to be a member, let alone a active one. This actually did make sense, because when I was working full time as a tech for another company, I did not have any time to learn new things during work, and sure didn’t want to spend all my free time doing more work… although I actually did 😛 but only cause I’m a major geek when it comes to computers and do really enjoy working with them. So this is where I am at. I’m just wondering how I could do things a bit different to make it easy for people to find information, so they don’t have to spend much time. I was thinking something more like a wiki as well as the forum, so people could at least get quick answers and then actually contribute / converse if they like on the forums.

If any one actually reads this, I would love to get some idea’s on getting more techs in a co-operative spirit to help better the standards of every one in the area.

Linux Screen application

Posted by on May 2, 2011 No comments

Wow, how have I not found the program “screen” until now? It allows you to manage multiple terminal sessions in one. Very useful, especially when your going through SSH and have frequent connection issues. Here’s a quick word from some other random dude who loves it.

Screen is best described as a terminal multiplexer. Using it, you can run any number of console-based applications–interactive command shells, curses-based applications, text editors, etc.–within a single terminal. The desire to do this is what gets most people hooked on screen. I used to start a half-dozen terminal emulators when I logged into my machine: I wanted one to read my email, one to edit my code, one to compile my code, one for my newsreader, one for a shell into my web host, and so on. Now I start one terminal emulator, and run screen in it. Problem solved.

The other main cool feature of screen is its ability to decouple the terminal emulator from the running programs. This means that you can use screen to keep programs running after you accidentally close the terminal emulator, or even after you log out, and later resume right where you were. It means that the idea of a “session” in which you are running a number of console programs is a free-floating entity that you can bind to any terminal anywhere, or no terminal at all if you want.

Updated Windows XP Install disk’s!

Posted by on April 24, 2011 2 comments

This has probably been on my to do list for years, but I have just now completed it! I have made a USB stick with the installation disks of XP Home (OEM/Retail) and XP Pro (OEM/Retail/Corp) on it! Now that’s nothing fancy, but having them completely updated to a few days ago and pre-done with almost every driver out there is! Not only that, but it also has the mass storage drivers built in to use when you first install it. What’s that mean? It means it can be installed on RAID and some special SATA interfaces without having to load drivers from a floppy!

Doing this was not a easy task. It took me 3 days of messing with a lot of programs to find the right ones and doing it in the right combinations. That being said I can now do a full reload with updates and drivers in under 30 min depending on the system 🙂 I also found a way to pre-load applications in there, but only added a few like 7zip, defraggler and VLC player.

Next step is doing it for Windows Vista and Windows 7! O yea, did I mention I also have Ubuntu 10.04-2 install ISO on there? 🙂 One usb stick to install them all! … Minus Vista and 7 due to lacking space…

Ubuntu 11.04!

Posted by on April 18, 2011 No comments

10 days away now and I’m a bit excited about this release. I have been using the beta for awhile now, and although it was pretty buggy at first (lots of crashes), it seems to be pretty stable now. There are a lot of things I like about the Unity interface and think its the right direction for sure. That being said I have also tried the new gnome3 and actually like it a little bit more (maybe because it was more stable at the time) but in time I’m sure they will both become very attractive for varying reasons.

I’m interested to see how the community reacts to this release, since its the first that will come default with unity.

New Remote Administration program

Posted by on March 21, 2011 No comments

I should be more specific, new to me remote program 🙂 I was first introduced to it when I was working for another company, and at the time it seemed… kinda clunky and the interface could use some work, but a lot of the options where there and pretty awesome. I have been using and still do use Team Viewer, mostly because of the ability for it to connect without the need to port forward and I could pay for it once and use it for ever… well 10 years at least. That being said it is lacking some features, such as the ability to do things beyond just a remote desktop. You have to connect every time you want to do anything like file transfers.

So what is this new program and what can it do you ask? It’s called Kaseya and the new version is pretty sleek. Some of the abilities are scheduled tasks, registry editing, command line access, event viewer and task manager. These are all accessed remotely without having to interrupt the user! It also has some nice tiers to it, such as a pay as you go at low costs, like $10 a month plus $1.50 per month for each computer you manage, a good way to start off with it. Some of the more advanced editions have things like image backup and update managers for groups of machines, as well as very detailed lists of software and hardware in the machine.

For now I’m sticking with Team Viewer because I have paid for it and don’t utilize the extra features enough to justify the cost, but when I start to get more managed services clients I will definitely switch them to it.

If you do remote computer work you won’t regret checking it out. There is also a free version with limited features. Kaseya