I am thinking to add an usb webcam and to use it as a monitoring system.

I updated Debian “squeeze”, which is running on an 8G SDHC card, but I got the error:

After this operation, 0B of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
Setting up lighttpd (1.4.25-2) …
Starting web server: lighttpd2010-01-22 23:13:31: (network.c.345) can’t bind to port: :: 80 Address already in use
failed!
invoke-rc.d: initscript lighttpd, action “start” failed.
dpkg: error processing lighttpd (–configure):
subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
lighttpd
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
sheeva:/home/ionut#

I didn’t have anything running and listening on port 80, so, it seems that it is a known bug, http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=564556 and the solution is here:

Add in /etc/lighttpd/lighttpd.conf:

server.use-ipv6 = “enable”

And add in /etc/sysctl.d/bindv6only.conf:

“net.ipv6.bindv6only = 0“

Even if there are many ready-to-go NAS solutions I decided to build myself one and having the HTPC on the same machine. Here is mainly what I wanted:

• low powered system (64-bit microprocessor)
• used as a media server (stream movies/music)
• to be used sometimes as a HTPC, so I wanted HDMI (for HD video)
• ZFS file system with all its goodies
• gigabit ethernet interface to take advantage of the network bandwidth
• nice chassis with four hot-swappable 3.5″ SATA HDD (I am using just two HDD right now because the motherboard has only 3 SATA)

My NAS/HTPC specs are here:

• Chenbro ES34069 chassis
• Zotac ION-ITX-A Wi-Fi Dual Core 1.6GHz motherboard
• 2 GB Kingston DDR2 800MHz RAM
• 2 x Western Digital Caviar Green 1.0 TB
• 1x Toshiba 2.5″ HDD 100 GB (for OS)

I choosed FreeBSD as operating system, because I am more familiar with it than with Solaris. I recompiled mplayer with vdpau support (for HD video).

Here are the steps:

• download the latest mplayer snapshot from their website
• download these two files (ftp://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/vdpau/include/vdpau/) and put them in /usr/include/vdpau (create that directory)
• ./configure –disable-x264-lavc –disable-x264 -–enable-vdpau
• gmake
• gmake install
• check to see if you have vdpau support with: “mplayer -vo help“. If you see something like: “vdpau VDPAU with X11” then everything is ok.

Some additional steps/configs:

• add zfs_enable=”YES” in /etc/rc.conf
• add  the following in /boot/loader.conf:

vm.kmem_size_max=”1024M”

vm.kmem_size=”1024M”

vfs.zfs.arc_max=”100M”

• zpool create storage mirror ad4 ad10
• zfs create storage/archives
• zfs create storage/backups
• install samba, duplicity, rsnapshots, rsync, unison, ushare, …

Right now, everything is working very well, I am very happy with the setup, but I still didn’t manage to have sound over HDMI, so, a temporary solution will be to connect an additional speaker system to it.

I don’t need any fancy remote control, I have a logitech wifi keyboard/mouse, because I like to be able to read the news in the morning (during cofee time) using google reader

The total power consumption is about 35W idle / 45W load which is pretty good, I think.

I still can not use special Fn keys and also I receive a warning message when my encrypted home partition is mounted (after I introduce the passphrase), but not for swap partition. It says something about not finding the module padlock-sha.

I didn’t have too much time to look around to see why, but it seems that as well other people are experiencing the same issue:

http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=43705
http://groups.google.com/group/linux.debian.bugs.dist/browse_thread/thread/7e2cda1e525f6cf3/c5ee7253a6f92620?lnk=raot&pli=1

Anyway, thanks again for that great release, I am really happy what I see in 11.2.

“Zimbra software is open source, meaning we make both the software code and the application itself available to anyone at no charge. Also, Zimbra Desktop is a full version; there are no missing features or catches”

For a complete list of features see this link: http://www.zimbra.com/products/desktop_features.html

If you have any issue with it you can find the answer on their wiki.

Here is just a screenshot:

1. create a full backup of your vps (databases, websites, accounts, emails, …). I have used “tar” command for that.
2. in plesk 8.1 control panel, do a complete backup (you need plesk backup module to be installed), or if you prefer the command line you can use the following command:

1

# /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskbackup all <backup-file>

Since version 9.x, the structure of Parallels Plesk Panel backup has been changed. Plesk backup created with Plesk Backup Manager is not just one file but a number of files and directories under backups directory /var/lib/psa/dumps. So, you will need to convert your backup file created in plesk 8.1 to be compatible with plesk 9.x. It’s a very simple process, see step 3.

3. convert the created backup file to be compatible with plesk 9.x

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# /usr/local/psa/bin/pre9-backup-convert -v convert -d /var/lib/psa/dumps/ <backup-file>

where /var/lib/psa/dumps/ is backups directory on the server with Parallels Plesk Panel 9

4. restore the backup files to use them with plesk 9.x. It can be done using the web interface, Home -> Backup Manager -> Server Repository, click the backup name to enter the backup details page and select the required restoration options and click Restore to start the restoration process.

If you would like to use command line to restore your domains, clients, server configuration, … then you can use the following command:

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# /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskrestore --restore /var/lib/psa/dumps/<your backup xml file> -level server -verbose -debug

You can restore only clients or domains, for more options see:

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# /usr/local/psa/bin/pleskrestore --help

Note: I had a small problem and I found that it is not possible to have a client with the same name as your name in Plesk Admin Profile. Maybe it is stupid, but I had some errors and only after I changed the name in Admin Profile (in Plesk control panel) to be different, I could restore without any problem everything.

I think that’s all what I did, from what I remember. If something is missing I am sure you can find a lot of useful stuff using our friend google.

Other useful stuff:

1. Plesk 9.x support as well postfix, so if you want to change from qmail to postfix, try that:

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# /usr/local/psa/bin/autoinstaller --select-release-current --install-component postfix

if you are not happy, you can switch back to qmail:

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# /usr/local/psa/bin/autoinstaller --select-release-current --install-component qmail.

If you are not sure if you are using qmail or postfix there are many ways to find that, one is to look in Plesk Control Panel on the Services management page {Home -> Services Management} if you have SMTP Server (Postfix) or SMTP Server (QMail)

If you decide you want to switch back, simply, do it, the emails are not lost, don’t worry.

2. Replace Horde webmail with AtMail

One of the many new features of Plesk 9, is the option to choose a different webmail client. The default webmail client Horde can be replaced if you are looking for something a bit lighter, AtMail. You need to install from Plesk Control Panel, both webmail clients, and to switch between them:

• Log into Plesk.
• Chose the domain which you want to use another webmail, enter on “Mail Accounts” page
• Click the “Mail Settings” icon
• Switch the “WebMail” to “AtMail (default is Horde)
• Click “OK”

If you decide you want to switch back, simply reverse the procedure, the emails are not lost, don’t worry.

That’s all.

References:

http://kb.parallels.com/en/5819
http://kb.parallels.com/en/5801
http://kb.parallels.com/en/952
http://kb.parallels.com/en/5969
http://kb.parallels.com/en/5864

I was running Avogadro on my openSUSE 11.1 box, but I have got a “segmentation fault”. If you have the same problem, in order to solve the issue just update your python-numpy package. That’s all.

If you don’t know what Avogadro is:

“Avogadro is an advanced molecular editor designed for cross-platform use in computational chemistry, molecular modeling, bioinformatics, materials science, and related areas. It offers flexible rendering and a powerful plugin architecture.”

and three nice pictures:

The phone Nokia E71 is declared one of the best mobile phones along with INQ1 and G1 (see more here: http://www.globalmobileawards.com/winners.shtml)

“Email is made easy with the Nokia E71. The world’s thinnest mobile QWERTY device, the Nokia E71 is designed for easy setup and use, offering access to a wide range of personal and professional messaging needs – including Microsoft Exchange, the world’s most widely adopted corporate email solution – as well as thousands of ISPs.
Designed for a busy mobile lifestyle, the Nokia E71 provides one-touch access to email, calendar and contacts. ”

So, why I choosed Nokia E71 and not iPhone 3G?

Here is what I wanted:

• a slim phone
• a ssh client (I am using pine to read my email, and I need remote access to my servers)
• querty keyboard which I consider that is better then on-screen keyboard
• fast internet, 3g
• to use my phone as modem/dongle/wifi-hotspot for my notebook (hotel, train, airport, …)
• proper nav app (with audible announcements) – GPS built in
• not very expensive
• easily unlockable to other networks
• multi email support
• messenger, skype, good music & video capabilities
• radio built in
• Wifi, GPRS, UMTS,
• USB connection and bluetooth
• pdf and word reader (complete office suite)
• task manager and sync with google calendar
• video capture
• real on phone voip (Gizmo)
• The Symbian OS is one amazing piece of software

So, Nokia E71 can offer me everything what I need in the above list.

Just to mention iPhone 3G features over Nokia E71 – (pro and cons):

• large screen
• has arguably the best gui of any phone on the market right now
• two times more expensive then Nokia E71 (considering the same data/internet and voice plan for let’s say 18 months)
• bigger then Nokia E71
• Apple App Store and Applications for iPhone
• doesn’t have a decent bluetooth implementation.
• I can’t send mms.
• I can’t use videophone.
• I can’t use it for connecting my laptop
• I can’t forward a simple message
• Safari on the iPhone is nice

I prefer to have a full featured device then to be cool and trendy

Some applications which I use on my Nokia E71: Putty, Skype, Opera Mini, Messenger, Fring, Nimbuzz, Google Maps, Google Mail, Youtube, JoikuSpot (a cool piece of software which transforms your device in a Wifi hotspot), KeePassMobile, YahooGo. I am still looking for new applications which can be useful.

I am very happy with my choice and I am stil exploring the capabilities of this great phone.

1
2

error: Failed dependencies:
        libsane.so.1 is needed by picasa-3.0.5744-02.i386

so,

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sudo zypper install sane-backends-32bit

should solve the problem.

Here are the steps to encrypt the hdd:

1. be sure that the device is not part of filesystem

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umount /dev/sdd1

2. Option 1: write some random data on hdd if you had critical files before

1
2

#slow method to fill hdd with semi-random data
dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sdd1

3. Option 2:

1
2
3

#use next two commands to fill the hdd with "zero" data, much faster
dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sdd1 count=2 bs=1M
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdd1

3. start the encryption setup

1
2
3

cryptsetup -v --key-size 256 luksFormat /dev/sdd1
cryptsetup luksDump /dev/sdd1  #details for encrypted partition
cryptsetup luksOpen /dev/sdd1 buffalo

4. format hdd as ext3

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/sbin/mkfs.ext3 /dev/mapper/buffalo

5. mount the encrypted hdd

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mount /dev/mapper/buffalo /mnt/buffalo

6. add the entry in /etc/fstab

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/dev/mapper/buffalo     /mnt/buffalo      ext3    acl,user_xattr        1 2

7. Optional step: try tune2fs -L MYLABEL /dev/mapper/buffalo if you want a nice label for your hdd.

Enjoy!

1
2

$ sudo dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sdd1
$ sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdd1

and I would like to see the progress of dd command. So, do the following:

1. open a new terminal/console and type:

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$ sudo killall -USR1

2. open the terminal/console where your dd is running and you will see something like this:

1
2
3

2242867712 bytes (2.2 GB) copied, 396.007 s, 5.7 MB/s
5625297+0 records in
5625297+0 records out

Anyway, your dd command will continue without any problem.
That’s all!