Free Techie Blog » openSUSE & SUSE

Puppet 2.6.0 on SLES 11 SP1

ben.kevan — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 04:46:59 +0000

Recently my orginization signed a contract with Novell to implement some SLES. With this I decided to start implementing puppet (learning it first) along with setting up SMT repositories and the such. fruit bouquet . townhouses for rent . However, the puppet package that shipped with SLES 11 and eventually SLES 11 SP1 were the 0.24 branch, 0.24.8 to be exact. However, the said version didn’t include the zypper definition which is now in puppet 2.6.0, and if you upgraded to the 0.25.4 version in the system:management repository, you will have realized that it’s quite broken due to a few issues which I found. I’ve since then modified the .spec, and modified the upstream server.init and client.init to work and build correctly on SLES 11 and openSUSE 11.x. I’ve also put upstream fixes to the puppet 2.6.0 branch to fix their upstream server.init, client.init, puppet.spec and to update the conf/suse directory to include the required default conf files. I’ve also created a Novell bug for the system:management repository to be fixed, but don’t imagine that will be fixed anytime soon (I haven’t been able to get a response from the maintainers). With that said, the repository I’ve created in the buildservice can be found here: http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/eclipseagent:/puppet/

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openSUSE Weekly News 118 Released

ben.kevan — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 17:09:57 +0000

The openSUSE team has released affective immediatly their weekly news release labels #118. In the release notes you can find the following from their site Welcome to issue # 118 of openSUSE Weekly News. Now the fourteenth Week goes to the End, and we are pleased to announce our new issue. From this issue on, we have a new Layout. We have more Teamreports, an Kernel Review (WIP) and the Sections From the Ambassadors and openSUSE in $Country. In that Place every Translation Team can post local Events and other stuff. Also we have changed anything in the publishing Process. massachusetts family law . In the past we have just posted the table of Content into news.opensuse.org. This means, that the Reader must click an next one. From now on we publishing the full Content direct to news.opensuse.org. So were hoping, that you like the new Weekly News. We wish you many joy by reading itYou can read te whole article with translations and all here

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openSUSE 11.2 Video – eWEEK Labs

ben.kevan — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 17:05:20 +0000

eWEEK Labs’ Jason Brooks and Andrew Garcia discuss Novell’s latest community-oriented Linux OS, OpenSUSE 11.2.From www.eweek.com:

eWEEK Labs’ Jason Brooks and Andrew Garcia discuss Novell’s latest community-oriented Linux OS, OpenSUSE 11.2, which is packed with official OpenSUSE versions of the latest and greatest of what the open-source software world has to offer. anthem blue cross blue shield . Where OpenSUSE 11.2 sets itself apart from its Linux rivals is its focus on highlighting community software contributions alongside the official distribution-provided packages. This community software focus, combined with the long time “power user” orientation of SUSE distributions, makes OpenSUSE 11.2 a very configurable–but potentially confusing–Linux-based operating system option.

You can watch the video here.

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Jeff Jaffe – Novell CTO Leaving

ben.kevan — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 23:24:07 +0000

A few days after the news from Zonker, we get the news that Jeff Jaffe, Novells CTO, is also leaving the company for new ventures in life after 4 years. What does this mean to the company? What really is going on at Novell? Here’s some of the postings from Jeff’s Blog:

Nostalgia. Im writing as I complete my four years at Novell. A great deal achievedbutas with any company still more to do. Here are my thoughts as I move to my next opportunity.The Innovative People of NovellUnquestionably, the greatest satisfaction comes from working with the innovative people of Novell. We are a diverse global community. Open source luminaries. Inventive people who write more software patents per capita than anywhere else. Technology expertise across software domains. This technical diversity has contributed to incredible breakthrough as Ill mention below. I thank my closest colleaguesNovell Fellows, Distinguished Engineers, Business Unit CTOs, architects, programmers, engineers across several continents individually and collectively for their partnership and fellowshipbut will not mention names for the fear of omission.The Business of NovellIve been honored to work with my colleagues at Novell on its business progress. Weve witnessed a return to profitability. We saw 8% growth in product revenue in 2008before the recession arrived. Growth in Linux market share. southfield chrysler jeep . Recognition of analysts. Incredible progress on business metrics.This progress is not a numbers game. Weve delivered great products. Breakout moves. The right partnerships in the industry. If I look at where my time has been spenta huge fraction has been cultivating significant partnerships; notably with Microsoft, SAP, and IBM.The Microsoft partnership has been the most fascinating. An arch-competitor. Building bridges between proprietary and open source. Enormous financial benefit for Novell. Viewed as controversial by some. Two companies kept their focus on the ultimate end goalmeeting customers needsand struck an agreement for everyones benefit. wedding rings . My participation in the cultivation and creation of this relationship is my most lasting contribution to our shareholders and personal growth.

I hope they can make it… I’m rooting for Novell, but things haven’t been looking on the up and up recently, and these high profile positions leaving just makes it feel like it’s falling apart from the inside out.

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Installing Wine Development 1.1.37 on openSUSE Linux

ben.kevan — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 17:36:01 +0000

Recently the Wine HQ team announced that Wine Development Branch 1.1.37 has been released. engagement rings . You can read more about the release hereThis tutorial will show you how to install the said version of Wine on openSUSE Linux, 11.0 – 11.2). Add the Wine Emulator Repository and set to Auto Refresh:

su -c ‘zypper ar -f http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/Emulators:/Wine/openSUSE_11.2/ openSUSE 11.2 Wine’

Upgrade to packages in the new repository:

su -c ‘zypper dup -r openSUSE 11.2 Wine’

If you haven’t yet installed Wine, you can do so with:

su -c ‘zypper in wine’

Note: If you want to install wine on 11.1 or 11.0 replace 11.2 with your version.

Installing Oracle (sun) Java 1.7u1 openSUSE 12.1

Installing KDE 4.4 RC2 on openSUSE and Kubuntu Linux

ben.kevan — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 17:22:52 +0000

Today was the announcement of the release of KDE 4.4 RC2 which provides you, the user, with the ability to try out this great release candidate on some of your favorite distributions. Today, we’ll show you how to setup the repositories to upgrade to KDE 4.4 RC2 on openSUSE and Kubuntu. mcc . For openSUSE 11.2First add the required repository (KDE:KDE4:Factory:Desktop a.k.a KKFD)

su -c ‘zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Factory:/Desktop/openSUSE_11.2/ openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Desktop’

You can set this repository to auto refresh (this is optional).

su -c ‘zypper mr -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Desktop’

Now upgrade to everything in this repository

su -c ‘zypper dup -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Desktop’

This is highly suggested to get all the upgraded community based packages. Now add the Community Repository:

su -c ‘zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Community/openSUSE_11.2_KDE4_Factory_Desktop/ openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Community’

Again this option step of making it automatically refresh:

su -c ‘zypper mr -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Community’

Upgrade to everything in this repository

su -c ‘zypper dup -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE4 Factory Community’

For openSUSE 11.0 and 11.1, just replace the 11.2 in all the above commands and you’ll be set. plano dentist . The above steps could be done in the GUI using YaST and its Repositories Module and Software Installation Modules.For Kubuntu:Add the required Kubuntu Beta Repository:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/beta

Update the repository:

sudo apt-get update

Upgrade to the packages in the repository:

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

openSUSE Weekly Ners, Issue 106 is out!

ben.kevan — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 16:29:12 +0000

Issue #106 of openSUSE Weekly News is now out!

openSUSE News: OBS supports new branch and merge handling
Unixmen/srlinuxx: Five useful extensions for Openoffice
Jussi Kekkonen (Tm_T): KDE Software Compilation 4.4 RC1 Codename “Cornelius” released
Sirko Kemter: Building an openSUSE Art-Team
TuxRadar: The best Linux desktop search tools

For a list of available translations see this page:

http://en.opensuse.org/OpenSUSE_Weekly_News/106/Translations.

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Reminder: openSUSE Weekly News Team Meeting

ben.kevan — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 21:45:56 +0000

The next openSUSE Weekly News meeting will take place tomorrow (Saturday January 16) at 14:30 UTC. As always, the meeting will be held in IRC on the #opensuse-newsletter channel on Freenode.

Please add your topics to the meeting wiki page at:

http://en.opensuse.org/OpenSUSE_Weekly_News/Meetings/Topics_current

We using for our Meeting the Meetbot. Please check http://wiki.debian.org/MeetBot for the commands.

Please add topics as soon as possible. Also, if you have questions for the meeting, but can’t attend (we know that the meeting times can’t work for everyone) please add them to the agenda as well.

For more on IRC meetings, see: http://en.opensuse.org/Meetings/About.

As always, we meet in #opensuse-newsletter on Freenode. Fire up your favorite IRC client and head over to #opensuse-newsletter.

Not familiar with IRC? A good overview can be found at irchelp.org. This site is not affiliated with openSUSE. For more information on Freenode, see http://freenode.net/.

Wondering what meeting times are? Check the openSUSE Meetings page. All project meetings and team meetings should be listed there.

on IRC meetings, see: http://en.opensuse.org/Meetings/About.

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MSI and Novell Team Together to release Moblin Netbook

ben.kevan — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 16:06:39 +0000

Recently announced was news that netbook maker MSI and Novell would be working together in addressing a growing demand for Notebooks. The new netbook will be shipped with SUSE Moblin preloaded on a new line of netbooks model MSI U135. This is the first OEM release that will provide Moblin 2.1 on Intel Atom netbooks directly to the customers. Here are some words from people at MSI and Novell:

“Customers today are looking for devices that give them mobility and flexibility,” said Sam Chern, director of Global Marketing at MSI. “MSI netbooks, in combination with SUSE Moblin, provide an innovative interface and robust computing capabilities as well as the cost-efficiency that our customers are looking for in these new devices.”"The Moblin project has the potential to become an accessible and widely used computing platform,” said Ram Peddibhotla, Open Source Business Director, Intel Software and Services Group. “We have worked closely with Novell in refining the current Moblin version 2.1 for the netbook. We are pleased to see companies like MSI and Novell embracing the technology, contributing to its development and bringing it fully-supported to customers.”Markus Rex, general manager, Novell Open Platform Solutions, said, “Novell is pleased to be working with MSI, a leading hardware vendor, to make SUSE Moblin the most user-friendly Linux netbook option for consumers. We have the most comprehensive Linux desktop portfolio available and with the growing interest in netbooks, we are continually improving SUSE Moblin to meet the demands of mobile computing users and expand the possibilities for Linux.”

Note: I would love to blog about Moblin & the MSI Netbook, however I don’t have a netbook to do this with.. winrar free download win7 . cosmetic dentist los angeles . If you visit some of my affiliates and purchase stuff through their sites anything above what covers the cost of hosting my site will be used towards a netbook. However, unfortunately that hasn’t yet happened… Someday maybe.

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Setting Password Complexity SLES 11

ben.kevan — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 19:39:04 +0000

Recently I got a copy of SLES 11, that I decided to setup to compare against the RHEL I’m running in the enterprise space (for a possible migration path). One of the first things I checked up on, was local password complexity to adhere within SarbanesOxley (yes.. the biggest pain in the world). In my RHEL implementations I’ve set system-auth to use pam_cracklib.so and use ucredit, lcredit and ocredit. However, SLES 11 ships by default with pam_pwcheck.so, which does password checking, but does not have an option for the credits, or minclass for that matter. ac repairs . So to implement password checking with the following criteria: Min length of 63 of the 4 Character SetsRemember 1 passwordI did away with pam_pwcheck.so and implemented pam_cracklib.so and pam_pwhistory.so. My /etc/pam.d/common-password looks like so:

password requisite pam_cracklib.so retry=3 minlen=6 minclass=3password required pam_pwhistory.so remember=1 retry=3password required pam_unix2.so use_authtok nullok

This was done with pam-config using the following as root (or with sudo):

/usr/sbin/pam-config –delete –pwcheck/usr/sbin/pam-config –add –cracklib –cracklib-retry=3 –cracklib-minlen=6 –cracklib-minclass=3/usr/sbin/pam-config –add –pwhistory –pwhistory-retry=3 –pwhistory-remember=1

I went with the above since a combination of pwcheck and cracklib was not working, with or without implementation using pam-config, as pam-config would remove cracklib and use pw_check with cracklib implementation (which just checks against dictionary). richmond storage . If you have other requirements like password aging, you can set those defaults in /etc/login.defs, and check / change password aging using the chage command. If you want to know more about chage, you can use man chage, or let me know and I’ll write up a little about it. hanson brothers . Note: For those of you who have previously used pam_unix.so, you can still use pam_unix.so for remembering. This is done with

pam-config –unix-remember=2

. You’ll have to first remove unix2 to use pam_unix.so

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KDE 4.4 RC1 Released – openSUSE 11.2 Build Service

ben.kevan — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 06:45:25 +0000

Here’s an excerpt from KDE’s release notes for KDE 4.4 RC1:

January 8th, 2010. Today, KDE has released the first release candidate of the nextversion of the KDE Software Compilation (KDE SC). KDE SC 4.4 Release Candidate 1provides a testing base for identifying bugs in the upcoming KDE Software Compilation4.4, with its components the KDE Plasma Workspaces, the Applications powered by KDE,and the KDE Development Platform.The list of changes between 4.3 and 4.4 is especially long. Important changes can beobserved all over the place:The Nepomuk Semantic Search framework has made leaps: A new storage backend makes ita lot faster. New user interfaces to interact with the Nepomuk database are firstdelivered with KDE 4.4.0. A timeline view of your files makes finding files used inthe past easier.The Plasma Desktop has been further polished. Many user interface elements havereceived attention by developers and designers. vrcc . The new widget explorer provides aricher experience for managing desktop widgets. Plasma widgets can now be shared withother users over the network and the handling of storage devices in the desktop shellhas been streamlined. Also, in 4.4 Plasma’s little sibling, the Netbook shell debutsas a technology preview.New applications on the horizon range from Blogilo, a rich-client blogging tool toCantor and Rocs, two scientific applications for advanced math and graph theoryneeds. Many other applications, such as the Gwenview image viewer and the Dolpin filemanager have been further improved.The KDE Development Platform adds the new KAuth authorization framework for easy andsecure privilege escalation, printing of odd and even pages, scanner support for theWindows platform and the first pieces of integration of the popular webkit renderingengine.These are only some of the new features one can expect from the new KDE SoftwareCompilation 4.4, there is also a longer list of the changes. The long list of changesalso comes with an even longer list of smaller and bigger bugfixes and performanceenhancements which lead to a noticable improvement of the user experience.The release is named after Cornelius Schumacher, who is and continues to be one ofthe cornerstones of the KDE community.

To install on openSUSE, we’ll use the openSUSE KDE Factory Build Service.To add the repository do:

sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Factory:/Desktop/openSUSE_11.2/ openSUSE 11.2 KDE Factory Desktop

I also recommend adding the community repository by doinig:

sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/KDE:/KDE4:/Community/openSUSE_11.2_KDE4_Factory_Desktop/ openSUSE 11.2 KDE Factory Community

If you wish, you can set both repositories to refresh automatically by doing:

sudo zypper mr -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE Factory Community && sudo zypper mr -r openSUSE 11.2 KDE Factory Desktop

Now you can update your installation by doing:

sudo zypper up

You’ll now have KDE 4.4 RC1, and best of all, if you read my repost of kde repositories explainedyou’ll nove that this repository will have the final KDE 4.4 when it’s released. jewelry stores .

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openSUSE KDE 4 Repositories Explained

ben.kevan — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 18:02:22 +0000

Thanks to Tejas Guruswamy for a very good write up on build service repositories for KDE. The following is from the kde mailing list

+1.Enough ranting, the anger/accusations is misplaced and way over the top.READ THIS SUMMARYIf all you want is a workable version of KDE, stick with what came withthe distro when you installed it. Everything else can break your systemat any time with no warning because it *will* always be changing.If you want the latest released version of just the applications (e.g.amarok, digikam) use just KDE:Backports.If you want the latest released version (including betas and RCs) of theKDE Desktop _and_ applications use KDE:KDE4:Factory:Desktop.If KDE makes a release when KDE:KDE4:Factory:Desktop is busy, the KDEteam may choose to create an additional repository (e.g. KDE:42, KDE:43)in order to package that latest release.Once KDE:KDE4:Factory:Desktop is free again, these additional temporaryrepositories *will disappear*.If you decide you absolutely must have the latest version and switch tothe version specific repos, be aware that they will disappear again in afew months.* That means if you absolutely must have the latest KDE at all times youWILL have to change your repositories occasionally, there is no wayaround that. Development for the next release, not current users takespriority in these repositories. To keep up with upstream you have toswitch from KKFD to KDE:{version} and back to KKFD every few months. Rustic . *If you want to keep it simple just stick with KKFD until it startsmoving again.That is all you should need to know. Normally the only availableversions of the KDE desktop you can expect to be available will be1) The version that was in the last released distro in STABLE2) The latest released version in FACTORY3) The bleeding edge in UNSTABLEAny other repository is temporary and there is no guarantee it willstill be there tomorrow, if you use one of them it is your job to keepalert of any changes to it. Just stick to the above and you’ll be fine.If you choose to use the temporary repositories because you *must* havethe latest version please don’t complain about the repository layout,the alternative is not to provide the extra repositories at all.END OF SUMMARYIf you must know the details:The layout for the KDE *desktop* package repositories is:STABLE (what was released in current openSUSE)what you’ve already got in 11.2 plus some extra fixes which arebeing currently tested e.g. for online updateFACTORY (going into next version of openSUSE)what is going into the next version of openSUSE and will most likelybe the latest released version from KDE (except very close to a openSUSEdistro release).UNSTABLE (absolutely bleeding edge straight from KDE trunk, doesn’t evenbuild half the time)not for normal usersAs you can see, there is not much reason to use STABLE (you’ve alreadygot it if you are running 11.2) or UNSTABLE (it will eat your children).As I said above, if KDE has a release whena) openSUSE Factory is in version freeze in preparation for a distroreleaseb) KKFD has already moved on to the next major beta release (e.g. itis now on KDE4.4 beta/rc)the KDE team may create a temporary version specific repository (e.g.KDE:42, KDE:43).The reason we have these is because people wanted for packages of thelatest released KDE, not because the KDE team is masochistic or sadistic.Now that FACTORY is moving again (release of 11.2) (and also KDE hassaid that there will not be another 4.3.x release) *these repositorieswill disappear*. aveda . Their purpose was to provide the latest releasedversion while FACTORY was busy, that reason is gone, there is no morereason to keep them hanging around.Meanwhile, applications which are released separately (amarok, digikam)have their own repositories because they are not related to the KDE*desktop*.1) KDE:Backports contains the newest released versions of these appsbuilt against the base distribution. No KDE upgrade needed to run these.2) KDE:KDE4:Community contains applications/utilities e.g. fromkde-look.org that people outside the SuSE KDE team package.3) KDE:KDE4:Playground contains experimental/bleeding edge/unstableversions of the apps in Community and Backports.Regards,TejasFWIW, all of this information could have been gotten by a thoroughreading of the wiki pages.P.S. I suggest that at some point the KDE4: prefix needs to be droppedfrom the repository names like it has been from Backports.

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Installing Google Chrome – openSUSE Fedora Repository RPM

ben.kevan — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 16:54:30 +0000

wholesale loose diamonds . storage units . atlantic city hotels . Recently someone emailed me and said they couldn’t get Google Chrome installed on their openSUSE 11 box. Build Website . Charter Communications . newark airport . jewelry stores . state bar of texas . limos . atlantic storage . maine mall . moving storage . So I decided to write up a little installation using Google’s repository and zypper (zypper for opensuse and yum for fedora).To setup the repository in openSUSE add the repository with:

sudo zypper ar http://dl.google.com/linux/rpm/stable/`uname -i` google-chrome

You can then install google chrome with:

sudo zypper in google-chrome-beta

orsudo zypper in google-chrome-unstableUnstable are snapshot builds of Chrome, whereas Beta are more structured and tested released milestones.If you have any questions, or get any errors running this please let me know.I’m currently running version Google Chrome Beta 4.0.249.43, and while writing this the current unstable version is 4.0.266.0)

Installing Oracle (sun) Java 1.7u1 openSUSE 12.1

KDE 4 Windows Switching Preview – openSUSE

ben.kevan — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:22:56 +0000

I decided to check out the different Windows Switching options in KDE 4, and decided I’d give a little preview of the 5 different methods which are:

No Effect
Box Switch
Present Windows
Cover Switch
Flip Switch

I found my favorite to be “Cover Switch” for some unknown reason.

Here’s a screenshot of each one (Minus the No Effect):

These are configured in systemsettings under “Effects for window switching as shown below.

=-=-=-=-=
Powered by Blogilo

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Amarok 2.2.1.90 KDE 4.4 – Track Progressions

ben.kevan — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 04:48:00 +0000

Recently I upgraded to Amarok 2.2.1.90 from 2.2.0 while testing out some KDE 4.4. However, when I first started listening to the music I realized that my tracks were playing continuously and not randomly. So I went to the menu’s to change this setting (this is where I had previously changed it). But to my surprise there was nothing in any of the menu’s. wa state child support . So what gave? This surprised me in a major way. So I poked around a bit and it’s now been moved solely to the playlist module and seems to have been removed from the menu. With that said this is a pre-release version, and the Track Progression feature may be re-added to the menu’s, but I haven’t added a feature request to ask for this. With that said everything else with the every advancing Amarok has been quite pleasant.Here’s a screenshot for those that have their doubts. (Just the default theme, with slim toolbar and changed playlist groupings). I’ll talk more about features / fixes in 2.2.2 shortly. I’ll talk more about installing it on openSUSE 11.2 in one of the following blog postings. fish in the sea .

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KDE 4.4 Beta 2 Released – openSUSE

ben.kevan — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 23:37:11 +0000

From the KDE.org Website:

December 21st, 2009. law firm . Today, KDE has released a second preview the KDE Software Compilation (KDE SC), 4.4 Beta 2. landscape ideas . chicago chiropractor . mobile grooming tampa . The second beta version of KDE SC 4.4 provides a preview and base for helping to stabilize the next version of the KDE Plasma Workspaces, Applications and Development Platform.The list of changes this time around is especially long. phoenix real estate . carpet cleaning dallas . air duct cleaning . Important changes can be observed all over the place:The Nepomuk Semantic Search framework has made leaps: A new storage backend makes it a lot faster, new user interfaces to interact with the Nepomuk database are first delivered with KDE 4.4.0 and a timeline view of your files makes finding files used in the past easier.The Plasma Desktop has been further polished. equity . seatac . Many user interface elements have received attention by developers and designers. martin chiropractic . The new widget explorer provides a richer experience for managing desktop widgets. enter . lead generation . Plasma widgets can now be shared with other users over the network and the handling of storage devices in the desktop shell has been streamlined. diamond rings . JCK Show . air conditioners . Also, in 4.4 Plasma’s little sibling, the Netbook shell debuts as a technology preview.New applications on the horizon range from Blogilo, a rich-client blogging tool to Cantor and Rocs, two scientific applications for advanced math and graph theory needs. Many other applications, such as the Gwenview image viewer and the Dolpin file manager have been further improved.The KDE Development Platform adds the new KAuth authorization framework for easy and secure privilege escalation, printing of odd and even pages, scanner support for the Windows platform and the first pieces of integration of the popular webkit rendering engine.

I’ll be writing a little bit about blogilo, which I have used since it’s inception and find it quite compelling.Plasma for Netbook is a great step forward, however I do not have a netbook nor the funds to purchase one to give it a shot, therefor I will not be able to comment on that much.I’ll be talking about some more updates and give more insight of changes .. car repair . uncle bobs storage . like the ones done to Krunner (nothing super exciting, but hey.. change is cool).After the next release (RC) I’ll post on how to upgrade to it, as I don’t like recommending to a large number of people to upgrade to the latest version. Not to mention there is a pretty big regression with QT which keeps global shortcuts from working correctly with KWin.

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KDE 4 Dolphin Terminal Integration Introduction

ben.kevan — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:36:44 +0000

If you follow my blog you’ll know that I’ve recently switched backed to KDE from GNOME, and I recently found a feature that I really have fallen in love with, when it comes to Dolphin usage.

The feature I will talk about today is Dolpin and Terminal Integration. First I must admit, I found this feature on accident as usually if I wanted to open a shell while in a directory to do certain tasks, I typically just did a “Shift+F4″, which opened a terminal of my current location. However, one time to my enjoyment I guess I didn’t press the “Shift” key, and went directly to “F4″. This brought up a new panel rightfully named Terminal.

I resized the terminal and was overjoyed to see that I now had a terminal within my dolphin window. How freaking cool was that.

Here’s some screenshots of where you’d configure and how the GUI looks with it integrated.

Now the integration goes as step further. As you change directories and do certain tasks like change directories, your terminal will also change directories and your current working directory will be the same ) ..

For the people who haven’t seen this feature, I hope you enjoy it.

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Patching Linux Servers in the Enterprise

ben.kevan — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 19:32:56 +0000

Do you do it? Is the process automated? What updates do you apply?So recently a discussion came of patching some Linux servers in the enterprise with some Unix administrators. Their stance was “we don’t patch our servers, unless there is a reason to upgrade the version for application compatibility”.I found this compelling as many of the updates pushed out are related to vulnerabilities which have been released. Which brought the question back to me, where I answered with “Yes, I patch”. dallas tree service . I was then asked how I patched. So here it is:Yes, I do patch. But not all packagesYes, I have the process automatedI apply patches quarterly (Feb, May, August and November).Currently I have setup 4 different install groups (test group, which are non impact server, which are typically used for administrative reasons, low priority server, medium priority server and high priority servers).The patches are downloaded on the 1st of the month indicated above. handyman atlanta . These are pulled via mrepo (currently I’m in a RHEL shop). In my mrepo pulling script, I log what’s pulled down and updated and email that to myself, and stash it on my admin server for publishing via html page for application owners.The test group installs these updates as they are released, and this includes all packages (kernel, httpd (apache), tomcat etc etc). chiropractors . I log what was updated on the server along with some very basic tests (ie ping success etc), I then stash that log for audit reasons and change control processes.The next groups install on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Saturday’s of the month.This is achieved with the following crontab:

#(Low Value – 2nd Saturday)0 15 8-14 2,5,8,11 6 /opt/scripts/bin/installupdates.cron#(Medium Value – 3rd Saturday)0 15 15-21 2,5,8,11 6 /opt/scripts/bin/installupdates.cron#(High Value – 4th Saturday)0 15 22-28 2,5,8,11 6 /opt/scripts/bin/installupdates.cron

the script installupdates.cron has the following:

if test `date +%a` = “Sat”; thenyum update -y # (you can add –excludes=packages here)fi

If you need a little more explanation on how it works, please feel free to ask.On the Low – High servers, I do not update httpd, tomcat, kernel, bind etc automatically and those are scheduled to be done manually.Also, since these are rpm’s after the installation is done, I check to see if any config files were changed and moved due (ie search for rpm.new etc). If it is, I’ll replace the newly written file with the previous config file.There is obviously much much MUCH more to this automated process. But wanted to know what you guys do for your patching, and wanted to know how you tackled it. I wanted to write much more detailed entry, but had some stuff come up. I’ll try to elaborate much more, with more of the detailed scripting too.

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64-Bit Native Linux Macromedia Flash – openSUSE, Fedora, Ubuntu

ben.kevan — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 18:40:28 +0000

bounce house rentals . Recently Adobe released a native 64-Bit native version of the popular Flash plugin.Here’s an excerpt from their site:

Furthering Adobe’s commitment to the Linux community and as part of ongoing efforts to ensure the cross-platform compatibility of Flash Player, an alpha refresh of 64-bit Adobe Flash Player 10 for Linux operating systems was released on December 8, 2009 and is available for download. florest . This offers easier, native installation on 64-bit Linux distributions and removes the need for 32-bit emulation.

You can download the packages here.On my openSUSE installation I went ahead and removed the currently installed flash, that were installed via RPM:

sudo zypper remove flash-player pullin-flash-player

I then downloaded and installed flash plugin, into my browser-plugins directory:

wget –directory-prefix=/tmp http://download.macromedia.com/pub/labs/flashplayer10/libflashplayer-10.0.42.34.linux-x86_64.so.tar.gzcd /tmptar xvf libflashplayer-10.0.42.34.linux-x86_64.so.tar.gzsu -c “mv libflashplayer.so /usr/lib64/browser-plugins/”

Now you can verify in your browser (Opera or Firefox at least) that your plugin was installed by going to about:plugins”In Opera I now see:

Shockwave Flashapplication/futuresplashsplapplication/x-shockwave-flashswf/usr/lib64/browser-plugins/libflashplayer.so

and I verified it by going to the site:and seeing:

Installing Oracle (sun) Java 1.7u1 openSUSE 12.1

Installing openSUSE 11.2 Walk Through – VirtualBox

ben.kevan — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 22:12:47 +0000

I went ahead and just did a quick screenshot walk through of installing openSUSE 11.2, and some possible points of interest for anyone that may need help understanding the steps.

I will try to do the same thing for each distribution, and each release of the major distributions (and possibly Arch Linux).

So here we start:

I am going to assume you know how to download and burn an ISO to a DVD (I am using the DVD), so I will not walk through that process. Once you insert the DVD into the drive, and boot up to the DVD, you’ll first be welcomed with a menu with a few options. For this instance, we are going to select Installation

This will bring you to a status window, if you would like to know “what’s going on behind the scenes” you can press your “esc” key at this time.

After loading of all the required modules, and drivers the installer will start, and the first page is where you’ll choose your language and keyboard layout. Note: There is a license agreement listed, but it is not a requirement to “accept it”, notice there is no accept / do not accept button? Choose your desired layouts, and click “Next”

That will bring you to the portion where your machine hardware is “probed” or better defined as detected. This will also detect previous installation of openSUSE, Windows, or other Linux Distributions. When this is completed, click the “Next” button

To be brought to the “Installation / Upgrade / Repair” Window. Since I have no previous installations detected, I do not have an option to Upgrade or Repair.

Now we’ll decide what time it is, which should be quite simple since you can find the time at your local digital or analog clock

This next one is one of the major ways openSUSE and popular distribution Ubuntu differ. As you see, openSUSE allows you to choose which desktop environment you would like to use. I prefer KDE, which was the default selected and went ahead and used that for the purpose of this walk through.

After choosing the Desktop Environment of your choice (again if you would like to know more about them please let me know, I’d be willing to do a comparison of the 2). You’ll be brought to the partitioner. Most likely you’ll keep defaults, however, if you want to have added abilities to later shrink / resize / remove / add partitions within a single drive, I’d recommend using “LVM Based” Partition, which is what I did for the purpose of this walk through. Once you decide, and have completed your partitioning click “Next”

Now tell the installation who you are, what password you want to use and indicate if you want to use that same password for the root (semi-equivalent to Windows Administrative rights).

I went ahead and just did a quick screenshot walk through of installing openSUSE 11.2, and some possible points of interest for anyone that may need help understanding the steps.

I will try to do the same thing for each distribution, and each release of the major distributions (and possibly Arch Linux).

So here we start:

This will bring you to a status window, if you would like to know “what’s going on behind the scenes” you can press your “esc” key at this time.

To be brought to the “Installation / Upgrade / Repair” Window. Since I have no previous installations detected, I do not have an option to Upgrade or Repair.

Now we’ll decide what time it is, which should be quite simple since you can find the time at your local digital or analog clock

Where you’ll be greeted with the last stop saloon. Here you can review the options you have chosen, along with changing some of the setting like disabling the firewall, enabling ssh, and opening port 22. When you’ve verified all your settings feel free to click install.

Which is when you’ll be brought to the very very last saloon where there is no turning back. Click Install on the Installation Confirmation and you’re ready for a cup of coffee, a beer, or a nice Extra Dirty Extra Dry Martini (with 3 Olives)..

Sit back enjoy your drink, and the slideshow. I haven’t yet taken the time to read what cycles through, but I’m sure they are quite exhilarating . So any feed back of cliff notes would be welcome.

For some reason I left out the final completed screen (yeah.. seriously wtf was I thinking.. It’s like having …… ok never-mind, I’m not going to go there).

Once your done, and your computer reboots (remember to take out the disk so you don’t boot to it, but even if you do, don’t panic just choose the option “Boot From Harddisk”.

Your screen may flash a few times while it does some final configurations and you’ll be booting in no time with the familiar openSUSE style splash screen.

After the computer boots I am brought to the very bland (sorry guys, seriously it is a pretty bland screen) KDM (we’re using KDM since we chose to install KDE for our Desktop Environment, and KDM is default for that). Put in your username and password that you used in the previous step

You’ll then be greeted with a nice KDE Splash Screen, and finally the desktop for your first initial login.

And believe it or not, you’re pretty much set to do as your little heart desires.

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