August 2015 - main

Satnav updates
by James Freer 07 Mar '16

07 Mar '16

Just wondering what folk use. One can use the Garmin/Express updates on windows but I was thinking of a way in Linux. I gather one can use a VM but then also have a windows version after Vista in order to do so. The only way I have found is to use maps from Openstreetmap.nl and copy to a mini SD card. Seems ok but not as good as Garmin/Express - is there a better way using linux. james

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PC slow to boot prt 2
by Bev Nicolson 06 Dec '15

06 Dec '15

I asked about my slow to boot (and sometimes slow to shut down) pc a while back now and have htop installed. I should have asked this then but which bit of the info it gives me do I need to give you lot in order to diagnose the problem? Bev.

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LVM /home partition not mounting at boot
by Richard Lewis 08 Sep '15

08 Sep '15

Hello ALUG, For a couple of weeks now I've been getting this problem on my Debian "unstable" laptop. I use LVM for the partitions on my HDD and I'm finding that, maybe three out of four boots, the partition where /home is mounted doesn't get activated. It uses systemd for booting. The boot sequence continues as normal (AFACT) until after [ OK ] Mounted /boot Then it waits for a bit, then I see: [****] A start job is running for dev-mapper-slab/x2dhome.device (42s / 1min 30s) Then after the alloted time, it drops me into "emergency mode". I enter the root password and I can then get the logical volume for /home to mount: # vgchange -ay slab i.e. I set the slab volume group as active and all its logical volumes become active. I can also see from here that, while the other two logical volumes in my volume group are both LV status available (these are /dev/slab/root, where / is mounted, and /dev/slab/swap_1 which is where swap is), the /dev/slab/home logical volume is: LV status NOT available After I issue the vgchange command, I see the kernel message: EXT4-fs (dm-2): mounted filesystem with ordered data mode. Opts: (null) I can then exit "emergency mode" and booting proceeds to the login prompt. From then onwards everything is normal. I've been looking for possible solutions to this and I've tried: * adding lvmwait=/dev/mapper/slab-home to the kernel boot options. This didn't make any difference. * checking the auto_activation_volume_list. At the moment it's undefined, which apparently means that any (all?) volumes can be auto-activated which sounds fine. Any ideas what's going on here? I've been using this LVM set up since the laptop was new (so for 2.5 years) and I've not had this problem before. I tend to keep my packages fairly up-to-date by upgrading every week or so. I guess it's possible some recent upgrade has changed something, but I can't think what. And if it was something that affected lots of people, you'd expect the Web to have some evidence of that, and for there to be some fix on the way. I'm also slightly concerned by the intermittent nature of this (about three in four boots) that it could be a hardware fault. Any thoughts? Richard -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Richard Lewis j: ironchicken(a)jabber.earth.li @: lewisrichard http://www.richardlewis.me.uk/ -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

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hosts.deny
by steve-ALUG＠hst.me.uk 05 Sep '15

05 Sep '15

Hi y’all! Could someone enlighten me about hosts.allow & hosts.deny please? I was reading up on linux networking, and it said I should consider the contents of these files. So networking aside, I've read up a bit and am a lot confused. As far as I can find, 1) if there's an match in hosts.allow an address is allowed to contact the machine. 2) if no match in 1), then if there's a match in hosts.deny, then the address is not allowed to contact the machine 3) if no match in 1 or 2, then the address is allowed to contact the machine. Is this right so far? If so, what's typically in hosts.deny? I ask because I've obviously edited this in the past - I have a vague recollection of doing it because I couldn't get anything working and I just stripped it all out - I know - a very very bad idea. All I've got in there is: ALL: ALL: ::1 As far as I can figure out, the first line, ALL: would do nothing. ALL: ::1 I think would block all IPV6 addresses from contacting. Is my interpretation of the above right? What's typically in the hosts.deny for a server? If it's set up to block by default, then what should I enable? Is it sufficient to use netstat to work out what's listening for a conversation and just allow these things if I think they should be allowed. If so what's the correct use of netstat to find out? If I have things running as cron jobs rather than as a daemon to check things, do I have to specifically allow these to contact the outside world, or is hosts.allow/deny just for daemons? Lastly, does this work like a firewall? As I have firewall already set up, is it a good idea to spend time on hosts.allow/deny as well? Any advice appreciated muchly! Steve

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Want an application for scanning and maximising WiFi signals
by Chris Green 30 Aug '15

30 Aug '15

I'm currently playing with an Alpha Networks external/outdoor USB WiFi device. It's essentially just a WiFi dongle with an aerial in a waterproof box on the end of a long USB cable. Thus you can position it in a window or up a pole outside to get a connection to a fairly distant WiFi source. I need a way to find and then maximise WiFi signals, you can't really just use Network Manager as there no easy way to monitor a signal while waving the aerial around. I have found wpa_gui which isn't very good, I can't get it to scan repeatedly at any reasonable rate. I have also tried iwScanner which is better but is no longer maintained and crashes at intervals, it would be nice if it could scan faster too. Can anyone recommend a good tool for this job, just needs to allow one to select a WiFi signal and then show its signal strength as a bar which is refreshed reasonably frequently. -- Chris Green

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Sort of OT (off Linux) but still - outdoor router that supports EAP-SIM authentication
by Chris Green 16 Aug '15

16 Aug '15

It's not really specifically Linux but it's computery. Does anyone know of an outdoor WiFi client box (i.e. something similar to the TP-Link TL-WA7210) that supports EAP-SIM authentication? EAP-SIM is authentication using data from a SIM but authenticates a WiFi connection. There are descriptions of how to do EAP-SIM authentication via wpa_supplicant in a Linux box but that requires the WiFi hardware to be in (or directly connected to) the Linux box. I'm after a way of doing it in a remote outdoor router connected by ethernet to my Linux box. I'm already investigating the alternative way of doing this with an outdoor USB WiFi adapter plugged into the Linux box. This is possibly the way to go but it's not all that straightforward getting USB WiFi adapters to work with Linux so the above external router method might be easier. -- Chris Green

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Exploit
by Anthony Anson 13 Aug '15

13 Aug '15

Can't remember where I saw this, but in case it's news to anybody: https://blog.mozilla.org/security/2015/08/06/firefox-exploit-found-in-the-w… -- Tony http://www.girolle.co.uk/

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[ALUG Announce] ALUG Norwich Pub Meet Thursday 13th August
by Viperfang 12 Aug '15

12 Aug '15

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, 13th August 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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Huge file transfers?
by John Cohen 07 Aug '15

07 Aug '15

Apart from dropbox and other proprietary syncing software, how do you share large files (Say, 30 or 50GB) easily and securely with another person/client? I could buy wetransfer plus etc but I'd rather keep the files under my roof, saving time (not having to upload them somewhere else before sharing them) and not worrying about privacy issues. I have an FTP server which works fine, but when it comes to customers and other teamworkers who aren't that tech savvy, they just prefer using wetransfer or similar services, where files are dropped and uploaded on a browser and users notified by mail with a download link. (plus FTP isn't secure, and SFTP is complex if using keys when sharing with customers) I've tried the the following F*EX Pros: 1) pretty good because it's not PHP based and therefore hasn't got php / apache upload limitations. 2) The system feels pretty robust after trying it out and uses minimal resources. Cons: 1) Pretty ugly, and customization is basic unless you're a guru (which I'm not) 2) Relies on a mail server. I have postfix installed but I'd rather not have to rely on it as it's another layer of complication (namely emails arriving in clients spam folders, etc) Zendto Pros: 1) looks much more sophisticated in terms of functionality 2) looks very slick. Cons: 1) Php based. upload limits are 2gb unless tweaked, but even then not a great way to serve VERY large files (customers download interruptions etc) 2) Still relies on installing a mail server for notifications Owncloud Pros 1) Has a sync client for huge files, good for file sharing between work colleagues 2) easy to use for everyone 3) can send notifications with external mail server Cons: 1) Bit of a resource hog as it's designed for file syncing, not sending a large file from A to B 2) When sharing with others outside the team (via links), apache and browser limitations still exist. I can't guarantee clients have an up-to-date browser, and I wouldn't rely on sharing a file that large via php. Is there any other open source solution that you've tried which is both robust for huge file sharing and easy for the average folk to use? Any personal experiences? John

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How to prevent Google redirects to www.googleadservices.com?
by Chris Green 06 Aug '15

06 Aug '15

I use Google Shopping quite a lot but I'd like to prevent the redirects that record one's clicks through to sellers' web sites. These redirects also occur on the advertising links returned when you do a normal Google search. E.g. if you search for 'Sandals' in Google you will see a number of adverts (for places selling sandals amazingly) down the right hand side with a little yellow "Ads" at the top. I want to be able to click on these adverts and *not* get redirected via www.googleadservices.com. This is the default means by which advertisers see that you have clicked through from a Google search. Some advertisers don't go via www.googleadservices.com (e.g. eBay and Amazon), presumably they do their own thing somehow. Anyway I just want to go direct to the advertiser's/seller's site when I click the link, both for provacy and for speed. Surely there's a Firefox add-on that does this for me, all it needs to do is extract //www.toolandfix.com/carters-862e28-replacement-spade-and-fork-bent-taper-t-shovel-handle-28.html%3Futm_source%3Dgoogle_shopping from http://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/aclk?sa=L&ai=CPuTM3g-5VdO6NKLk7gb16a… -- Chris Green

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2600 meeting at 18:00 on Friday the 7th August.
by Viperfang 04 Aug '15

04 Aug '15

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

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