JDPFu.com 2025

11/2018 Update

For Ubuntu 18.04, the commands have changed for network setup thanks to netplan, but the major ideas are still the same.
Hammond is active on the Ubuntu Forums. He has many server setup guides

6/2016 Update

Nothing major, just minor tweaks and a few details added.

4/2015 Update

Seems that lots of people are interested in extremely basic security of Linux systems and would like to see what others do initially on their fresh servers or VMs. So, I did a little googling (DRY, right?) to see what a few others are doing and to compare that with my setup steps. We all come from different places, backgrounds, and have different things we want out of our servers.

This is about basic, first-pass security, not securing Apache, MySQL, Tomcat, email, or any webapp. The box has an ssh-server, known login, DHCP IP and is ready for other stuff. That is our starting point.

Let’s get started.

Recently update the System Maintenance for APT-based Linux PCs article here. Seems that some things that used to be handled automatically are NOT handled automatically anymore.

BTW, the article was published on Lifehacker a few years ago. I based it on their Maintenance for MS-Windows PC article. As you know, maintaining Linux systems ist 100x easier than maintaining MS-Windows.

Has anyone checked out OwnCloud?

Did an install a few days ago. Of course, used MariaDB instead of MySQL. Haven’t had a chance to try everything or even the synchronization across more than 1 machine, but I did try the photo gallery, music files and fought to get contacts into the system – LDIF is not a supported contact file type?

Anyway, any tips?

10 Reasons You Should build your own cloud

There are many Metro Atlanta Linux Groups.

• Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts – ALE – be certain to sign up for the “ALE Mailing Lists” to stay informed. Emory area.
• Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts-Northwest – ALE-NW and http://tomshiro.org/twiki/view/ALE/AleNwOrg As a sub-group to ALE, be certain to sign up for the “ALE Mailing Lists” to stay informed. This is my home LUG near SPSU in Marietta and Kennesaw
• Northeast Georgia Linux User Group – NEGALUG and their own redirect page
• GA-400 Linux Group – meets near I-285 and Powers Ferry Rd SE.
• Georgia Tech LUG
• Newnan Linux User’s Group
• Classic Hackers UGA Linux User Group – CHUGALUG – Gussing this is Athens
• Middle Georgia Linux Users Group – Macon

Other Georiga LUGs are listed here

Drop me a comment if you’d like your LUG added.

Do not assume a meeting location based on the LUG name!

• ALE Central tends to meet at Emory Law School.
• ALE-NW tends to meet at SPSU (South Loop 120 exit in Marietta)
• GA-400 LUG has meetings at a few different locations – near the top I-285 perimeter at Powers Ferry.
• NE-GA LUG meets at different locations and is experimenting with Google Hangouts.

A few of these were new to me – I just googled and looked that they had recent meetings. One even meets nearby, but the name threw me off their true location. You can google too.

Seems that we can all work together to have an organized installFest Saturday every quarter. Just a thought.

Ubuntu, Redhat, CentOS, Arch, Slackware, Debian, SUSE are the most popular distros used in these groups.

All computers have network problems from time to time. Usually everything works fine, but sometimes something goes wrong. The first step to determining what to fix is to determine where the issue lies. Below is outlined the first troubleshooting steps to determine where the problem lies.

Have you checked the system logs?

$ sudo egrep -i ‘error|warning’ /var/log/*log

will find issues in the logs.

Almost any issue will leave a trace in the system logs.
Start with that to see any issues.

Log files are usually protected for security reasons, hence the need to use sudo.

Of course, sometimes it isn’t a system problem, but an application issue, so the important log file(s) will be with the application or in /tmp/ somewhere. Not all applications provide logging by default, but many support increased logging levels through an application setting. Sometimes an option passed into the program will control verbosity.

$ program -v 

or

$ program -vvv 

enable and increases the amount of logging output by the program. For some programs using more v s means more verbosity.

For networking issues, check the logs on other devices, especially the router.

If the commands above are not understood, then you probably should ask for more individual help from someone knowledgeable who can be in the same room. Getting help like that is possible from your local LUG, Linux Users Group. Also check with your local university or college for a LUG.

I attended a local Ruby Meetup last week where they showed how to get all the dependencies for a smart RoR setup on Ubuntu. I’ve only tested it on 12.04 myself, but something similar should work for 10.04. I have doubts whether installing on 8.04 is this easy for the current versions of RVM, Ruby and Rails.

The installation instructions came from a gist from Cajun_Code. Following those instructions makes this process fairly straight forward. We’ll install RVM, Ruby v1.9.3, Rails, SQLite3, nginx and thin to get started.

Updated for Rails4 and Ruby 2.0.0 at the bottom of the article.

It has been many months, so I figured an update could be helpful.
I ended up not following the original plan for media center deployment.

Here are the highlights:

• Already had a KVM virtual server running on Ubuntu Server 10.04 LTS x64
• Created a virtual machine to hold Windows7 x32 ultimate thanks MS for the free Ultimate license
  • Created a 40GB OS/apps HDD (virtual); it barely fit
  • Created a 50GB Data/TV HDD (virtual); this is a 2nd HDD container; easily resized
• Bought and installed the networked HD-Homerun HDHR3 (dual ClearQAM tuner); actually had this about 6 months earlier
• Switched to Limited Basic CableTV ($26/month); No CNN, TVGuide, FoxNews, ESPN, etc. That happened in 2010.

The Checklist

1. Stable / Works Every Time
2. Automatic
3. Different Storage Media
4. Fast
5. Efficient
6. Secure
7. Versioned
8. Offsite / Remote
9. Restore Tested

When you are looking for a total backup solution, those are the things you want from it.

For all you fellow Perl lovers, Chromatic has posted an update to the old Modern Perl book. Get the 2011-2012 version there.

I haven’t read the new version yet, but have dropped it onto my tablet for those times when stuck waiting someplace. It should be considered alpha, so expect typos at this point. Read it for the ideas, not to copy/paste code.

Perl Dancer WebApp Framework

If you would like to use a really solid, web-app creation, perl module, I can completely recommend Perl Dancer. Wrote a little server a few months ago and it has been running non-stop without issues all this time. It makes the simple things trivial and … well, I’ve only done simple things so far. ;) That entire app (including the DBIx backend) is only 350 lines of code. Modern Perl rocks.