Linux-Misc Digest #831, Volume #27 Fri, 11 May 01 16:13:02 EDT
Contents:
My solution to bootable CD conundrum ("Robert Laing")
Re: No Java in Mozilla 0.9? (Stephen Cornell)
Re: Netfilter, IPtables... what the heck is going on? (Brian)
Re: disappearing hard disk space (Lew Pitcher)
Re: RH 7.1 iptables with insmod errors ("AC")
Re: Automatic Login to Console (LFessen106)
power management and "halt" (Dave Brown)
Re: Linux in college & high school (Matt Renquist)
Re: time adjustment ('Dungeon' Dave)
Re: load average (Michael Heiming)
Re: cdrecord and fifo memory (Bill Unruh)
Re: Netscape helper applications? ("ThanhVu Nguyen")
Re: Linux in college & high school ("Edward Rosten")
Re: Utility for parsing RPM database? ("Chris Divine")
Re: Utility for parsing RPM database? ("Chris Divine")
Re: load average (John Hasler)
Re: Failover with 2 NIC's ? (Michael Heiming)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Robert Laing" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: My solution to bootable CD conundrum
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 18:05:41 +0200
After battling away with various techniques to make a bootable Linux CD,
I've come up with the following plan which seems to work OK.
Step 1: Compile a Kernel with "Virtual memory file system support"
selected.
I also selected "/dev file system support" so as to be able to call the
root device "/dev/cdroms/cdrom0" instead of "/dev/hdd". I hope that will
result in the CD working on other machines where the CD drive may be
/dev/hdb or hdc or whatever.
Step 2: Use SysLinux instead of LILO as the boot loader.
SysLinux is found at
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/boot/syslinux/
SysLinux includes isolinux.bin which cures the headaches caused from
thumping against the El Torito one floppy limit. Thanks to this nifty boot
loader, you don't have to trim your kernel down. You also don't need to
worry about creating an initial ram disk. The system on your CD can be
pretty much exactly the one on your hard disk (provided it fits into the
650Meg CD capacity limit.)
isolinux.doc which comes with SysLinux explains what to do. Here's a short
precis:
2.1 In whatever directory is going to be the root of your bootable CD,
create a directory called isolinux.
2.2 Copy isolinux.bin and bzImage into isolinux 2.3 Create a file in
isolinux called isolinux.cfg Mine looks like this:
default bzImage root=/dev/cdroms/cdrom0 label bootcd
kernel bzImage
append devfs=mount
Step 3: Modify your /etc/rc file
To avoid the dreaded "can't write /etc/mtab" hang, we need to recreate
/etc in RAM.
I achieved this by copying the files in /etc to a new directory I called
/etc-cd
The start of /etc/rc (or whatever the file your init first loads is
called) needs to do this:
mount -n -t tmpfs tmpfs /etc
cp -a /etc-cd/* /etc
mount -av # Modifications to fstab are explained in Step 4
mkdir /var/adm
touch /var/adm/kernlog
touch /var/adm/syslog
touch /var/adm/maillog
touch /var/adm/authlog
touch /var/adm/news
touch /var/adm/daemon
touch /var/adm/lpd-errs
touch /var/adm/sysdebug
mkdir /var/run
mkdir /var/log
mkdir /var/lock
mkdir /var/lib
mkdir /var/tmp
mkdir /var/spool
mkdir /var/mail
Step 4: /etc-cd/fstab
/dev/cdroms/cdrom0 / iso9660 defaults 1 1 proc
/proc proc defaults 0 0 tmpfs
/tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0 tmpfs /var
tmpfs defaults 0 0
Step 5: Once /etc-cd and the rest (/bin,/sbin,/lib..) are in the "isotree
root", then run the following command which has been shamelessly cribbed
from isolinux.doc:
mkisofs -o bootcd.iso \
-b isolinux/isolinux.bin -c isolinux/boot.cat \ -no-emul-boot
-boot-load-size 4
-boot-info-table .
Step 6: cdrecord -v speed=2 dev=0,0 bootcd.iso
That's it. All it seems so easy in retrospect. But it's taken me hours of
false starts with trying to copy hard drive images and stuff to work this
-out. If you have any tips on making this even simpler or much better,
please share them and I'll put them into a mini howto.
------------------------------
From: Stephen Cornell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: No Java in Mozilla 0.9?
Date: 11 May 2001 17:14:56 +0100
"lobotomy" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> You can get the plugin off of sun's website and install it manually,
> and it should be equivalent to the auto-install (if that isn't
> working), however if you do it manually you may have to mess around
> with the paths to get it to work.
Thanks - luckily, the Sun website contains good (and simple)
instructions on how to get it to work, and everything is now fine.
Seems to load/run faster than old versions, too.
--
Stephen Cornell [EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel/fax +44-1223-336644
University of Cambridge, Zoology Department, Downing Street, CAMBRIDGE CB2 3EJ
------------------------------
From: Brian <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.setup
Subject: Re: Netfilter, IPtables... what the heck is going on?
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 16:30:06 -0000
Short and to the point. This works for me:
echo "1" >/proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
/sbin/iptables -t nat -F
/sbin/iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -s 192.x.x.x -j MASQUERADE
(where 192.x.x.x) is the IP you want to masquerade.
this seems to work the same as:
/sbin/ipchains -A forward -s 192.x.x.x -j MASQ
This should get you Masquerading. You can play with the other options.
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
grooveman wrote:
>
> Hi.
>
> I have been struggling with this for several days now.
>
> I installed RH 7.1 to act as my gateway/router using IP masq for my
> internal machines.
>
> Low and behold, what do I find -- RH 7.1 kernel 2.4.x does not like to
> support ipchains! Now, I know, I know... It has legacy support for
> this, however, I could not get ip_always_defrag and ip_masq_ftp going on
> it. I have tried the stock kernel, and even recompiled my own -- and I
> configured just about every networking option as a module, and these did
> not show up anywhere on my system.
>
> Ipchains is not much use to me if I can't use ftp! I looked around on
> the web and lurked in groups and found people with the same problem --
> but no real solutions were offered.
>
> So I made it my mission to learn iptables --which IS natively supported
> by 2.4.x. After going nuts looking for ipnatctl (which is referenced in
> the iptables-howto), I finally found out that it has been incorporated
> into iptables (only lost a day or two there!) So, how do I masq with
> iptables? I looked around some more and found that the homesite of
> NETFILTER doesn't appear to be functioning (at least in the last few
> days) http://netfilter.kernelnotes.org .
>
> So -- My question is this: How the heck are we supposed to know what to
> do with iptables? The man page is almost useless here... it is simply
> too complex to contain in one man.
>
> Also: Can anyone tell me how to get my machine to masq without having a
> forward policy of ACCEPT?
>
> Also: What is the equivalent in IPTABLES of ipchains with a -y flag?
>
> IS THERE ANYWHERE A PERSON CAN GO TO ON THE WEB, OR IN THE BOOKSTORE TO
> LEARN HOW TO USE THIS TOOL?
>
> I know that I cannot be the only one frustrated with this.
>
> Thank you all! (I feel a litte better now :0) )
>
> Chris
>
>
--
Posted via CNET Help.com
http://www.help.com/
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Lew Pitcher)
Subject: Re: disappearing hard disk space
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 16:38:16 GMT
On Fri, 11 May 2001 11:35:34 -0400, "Sudhakar R."
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>could you please explain what you mean by "recycle the logs"
Cause the program doing the logging to write to (extend) a different
file.
For instance...
mv /var/log/messages /var/log/messages.old
touch /var/log/messages
# but syslogd is still writing to the old messages
# which is now called messages.old
kill -SIGHUP <pid-of-syslogd>
# tells syslogd to close it's file and open /var/log/messages
# so now it's writing to (extending) the new messages file
Most daemons that log to file use similar methods of 'recycling' their
logfiles.
>thanx
>-sud
>On Fri, 11 May 2001, Lew Pitcher wrote:
>
>>On Fri, 11 May 2001 10:28:43 -0400, "Sudhakar R."
>><[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>>>I've noticed that everytime I login to my RH 7.0 system a good chunk of
>>>hard disk space is used up (usually around 0.15 MB) everytime. this space
>>>is not released again. so my / partition is close to running out of
>>>space(6MB free now!!)
>>>
>>>/home is mounted on a different partition...so i know that is not the
>>>problem. can some1 help me figure out what's going on here before my
>>>system crashes.
>>
>>Have you recycled your log files? Take a look in /var/logs and see
>>what syslog, messages, debug, etc. have in them.
>>
>>Have you cleaned out your /tmp directory lately?
>>
>>>thanx. any help will be highly appreciated.
>>>-sud
>>>
>>
>>
>>Lew Pitcher, Information Technology Consultant, Toronto Dominion Bank Financial Group
>>([EMAIL PROTECTED])
>>
>>(Opinions expressed are my own, not my employer's.)
>>
>
> \////
>------------------------------------------------0 0 .)-------
> :-( SMILE ! It increases U'r Face Value :-) ~..)
> / \
>Name : Sudhakar R. Add: #2920 Scioto St., Aprt #1112
>Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cincinnati, Ohio 45219-2072
>URL : http://www.geocities.com/sudh0 Ph: +1-(513)-556-7981
>Voicemail: 1-800-699-2466 (mailbox no: 513-556-7981)
>
>
Lew Pitcher, Information Technology Consultant, Toronto Dominion Bank Financial Group
([EMAIL PROTECTED])
(Opinions expressed are my own, not my employer's.)
------------------------------
From: "AC" <$-xenite9@my-dejanews-com-$>
Subject: Re: RH 7.1 iptables with insmod errors
Date: Thu, 10 May 2001 23:48:23 -0400
Thanks guys, "rmmod ipchains" in rc.local fixes the problem.
-AC
"BetrOffDed" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> IIRC, the default install of RH7.1 is setup to run with the ipchains
> compatibility mode. Make sure no modules or services pertaining to that
> are already inserted or running (can't have both at the same time).
>
>
>
>
> In article <9defi9$9ff$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "AC"
> <$-xenite9@my-dejanews-com-$> wrote:
>
> > Hello,
> >
> > I have an iptables problem. I just installed Redhat 7.1 with kernel
> > 2.4.2-2 that supposedly has iptables kernel support. I have a modem on
> > the external and NIC on internal. The modem works fine when I run
> > wvdial or similar. I simply want to run IP masquerading for my other
> > machines and share the connection. First I went to
> > http://linux-firewall-tools.com/linux/firewall and built my script using
> > the iptables option. After I was greeted with an awful scrolling screen
> > of errors, I was displeased. Below is the output from iptables -F to
> > give a TASTE of the problem:
> >
> > [root@firewall /root]# iptables -F
> > /lib/modules/2.4.2-2/kernel/net/ipv4/netfilter/ip_tables.o: init_module:
> > Device or resource busy Hint: insmod errors can be caused by incorrect
> > module parameters, including invalid IO or IRQ parameters
> > /lib/modules/2.4.2-2/kernel/net/ipv4/netfilter/ip_tables.o: insmod
> > /lib/modules/2.4.2-2/kernel/net/ipv4/netfilter/ip_tables.o failed
> > /lib/modules/2.4.2-2/kernel/net/ipv4/netfilter/ip_tables.o: insmod
> > ip_tables failed
> > iptables v1.2.1a: can't initialize iptables table `filter': iptables
> > who? (do you need to insmod?)
> > Perhaps iptables or your kernel needs to be upgraded.
> >
> > And when I manually try the insmod ip_tables:
> >
> > (From insmod /lib/modules/2.4.2-2/kernel/net/ipv4/netfilter/) insmod
> > ip_tables.o: init_module: Device or resource busy Hint: insmod errors
> > can be caused by incorrect module parameters, including invalid IO or
> > IRQ parameters
> >
> > IRQ and IO problems? The modem works fine when I dial out, so I don't
> > think it's that. I must be missing something. All I want to do is
> > masquerade and firewall my home LAN. Any ideas? Thanks.
> >
> > -Adam
> >
> > Below is the a snippet from /proc/pci, if that's of any help.
> > ---------------------------
> > [root@firewall /root]# cat /proc/pci (snippet) Bus 0, device 8,
> > function 0:
> > Serial controller: US Robotics/3Com 56K FaxModem Model 5610 (rev 1). IRQ
> > 11. I/O at 0xe000 [0xe007].
> >
> >
> >
> >
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (LFessen106)
Date: 11 May 2001 16:55:17 GMT
Subject: Re: Automatic Login to Console
>
>When the system boots, how does one cause a process to automatically log
>in to a console and run a program? I'm running Redhat 7. I now start a
>series of programs from rc.local, but one of the programs doesn't run
>correctly when it doesn't have a console. The system is remote and
>unattended so I need to do this without operator intervention.
>
>Thanks for any help,
>
>Peter Hollenbeck
http://thelinuxlink.net/linc/linuxcar.html should help ya out. Look at the
bottom half of the web page... Works for me every time.
-Linc Fessenden
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 11:44:21 -0500
From: Dave Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: power management and "halt"
I've got an ASUS P-5A ATX motherboard in a system with a "wake-on-lan"
ethernet
card.
Wake-on-lan works... if I power-down with the power-off button on the
system.
...works, if I use Win98 "shutdown".
But does not work if I do a "shutdown -h now" or "halt". "halt" will
power-down the system, but the "magic-packet" sender to the ethernet
card
can't seem to get the system to come back on line unless I use the
front panel button or Win98 to power-down.
Is there a solution--(maybe I picked incorrect options in Power
Management
in compiling the 2.2.18 kernel that's running)? Or is there another
command
I can use as part of the shutdown process?
Please reply by e-mail also, as I'm having to travel this morning.
------------------------------
From: Matt Renquist <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Linux in college & high school
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 17:30:04 -0000
At UC Davis, the math department's undergrad lab is linux based...2 servers
with Red Hat with ~30 dumb terminals...software includes the usual linux
stuff + Mathematica, Matlab,
Maple...http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/computer/ulab.html
The physics dept. just added a computational physics major...as such they
just installed a lab of ~30 pentium 3 800s all running redhat, the dept.
server is redhat as well...
Just my personal experience....
--
Posted via CNET Help.com
http://www.help.com/
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 19:02:04 +0100
From: 'Dungeon' Dave <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: 'Dungeon' Dave <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: time adjustment
.. and it came to pass that wroot <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> uttered forth:
>Hi,
>
>I've heard that there are time servers or something that a UNIX system
>can
>connect to to adjust its clock. Is it true and is it possible to do it
>under Linux?
>
Yes. The command "rdate" will synchronise the clock to an ntp time
source, eg:
rdate -s ntp.demon.co.uk
(I think the -s option sets... no option only interrogates the ntp
source for the time/date).
--
"Dungeon" Dave, in anti-harvest mode...
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 20:10:26 +0200
From: Michael Heiming <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: load average
Dustin Puryear wrote:
>
> On Thu, 10 May 2001 01:04:29 +0200, Michael Heiming <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >The machine should just not swap to disc and it will run without any
> >problems,
> >even with loadaverage > 50.
>
> I assume you mean 5.
Nope, I meant what I wrote, 50. Sure you won't reach this on a desktop
system,
but for a server it's no problem, but one should consider to change
something.
However Linux runs just fine with this load, I've read somewhere, Linus
would test kernels with a loadaverage of 100, don't know if this is
true...But the kernel
is robust enough to handle this easily...:-)
Michael Heiming
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bill Unruh)
Subject: Re: cdrecord and fifo memory
Date: 11 May 2001 18:09:00 GMT
In <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Widgeteye) writes:
Have you checked /dev/zero? Does it exist? Does it have read permission
for everyone?
------------------------------
From: "ThanhVu Nguyen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Netscape helper applications?
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 14:28:25 -0400
I have the Acrobat Plugin file nppdf.sl in the plugins folder of
netscape - it works fine.
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "Bill Simpson"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I am running Netscape 4.7 under Linux. I am having problems getting
> Netscape to automatically open .pdf files when browsing.
>
> I go to preferences/navigator/applications/ choose: Portable Document
> Format
> insert the helper application: acroread On my system acroread will start
> up acroreader.
>
> When I have done this, and am browsing a pdf file with netscape, it will
> start up acroreader BUT the acroreader window is empty. It doesn't
> automatically open the file I am browsing.
>
> Can anyone tell me how to get it set up properly? I am finding more and
> more that people are putting .pdf links up instead of html and it is too
> painful to have to download each .pdf and then start up acroread
> manually.
>
> Thanks very much for any help!
>
> Bill
> _______________________________________________ Submitted via
> WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com
>
------------------------------
From: "Edward Rosten" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.advocacy
Subject: Re: Linux in college & high school
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 21:31:09 +0100
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, "Christopher Corbell"
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I'm looking for leads to information, statistics, or just individual
> testimonials about the use of Linux in educational settings,
> particularly in high school, community college, university, and grad
> school settings. Does anyone out there know of any general sources of
> information on the use of Linux in these settings? I would especially
> be interested in the use of Linux in math & science education. Also,
> I'd like to know about any advocacy groups, PC 'salvage' groups or
> similar organizations that are active in getting Linux used in schools.
My university uses a cluster of Linux peecees for the main mail server
(~10,000 users, mabey more). There's quite a lot of UNIX floating around,
they have 2 large 4 processor DECs (now quite old) as the UNIX
services servers. The engineering dept uses mainly Solaris, Solaris/Intel
and IRIX.
-ed
--
You can't go wrong with psycho-rats.
u 9 8 e j r (at) e c s . o x . a c . u k
------------------------------
From: "Chris Divine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Utility for parsing RPM database?
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 12:23:03 -0700
"Robert Lynch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Chris Divine wrote:
> >
> > Last night I was working on updating about 50 RPMs on my RH7.1 system. I
> > found it tedious to do an "rpm -qa | grep xxx" for each one to see if
the
> > version I already had installed was the same as or newer than the one I
was
> > about to download. I found I could modify the looks of the outpur from
the
> > rpm query and even pipe the output to a text file which I later imported
> > into a spreadsheet for sorting and printing (15 pages). However, I
figure
> > someone has to have developed a utility that will stomp through my RPM
> > database, grab just the info I want (RPM name and version), sort it
> > alphabetically and display or print it in easy-to-read format.
> >
> > Any ideas?
>
> You could fiddle with something like this script I occasionally
> use to print when (all) RPM's were installed:
>
> #!/bin/sh
> # 10-18-99 useful but tedious by hand
> /bin/rpm -qa --queryformat '%{NAME}, installed
> %{INSTALLTIME:date}\n'
>
> $ when_rpm
> august, installed Mon 03 Apr 2000 07:51:45 AM PDT
That's almost perfect for my purpose. I substituted '%{NAME}, Version:
%{VERSION}-%{RELEASE)\n' for the %{INSTALLTIME:date} in yours. Now if I
could get the output to be sorted alphabetically by RPM name, I'd have it.
------------------------------
From: "Chris Divine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Utility for parsing RPM database?
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 12:35:07 -0700
This works the way I want! Two simple commands.
rpm -qa --queryformat '%{NAME}, Version: %{VERSION}-%{RELEASE}\n' > rpms.txt
sort -o rpms.sorted rpms.txt
Then I just print "rpms.sorted" and it looks the way I want it to.
Now I just need to learn how to put both commands in one "batch file"
(sorry, too much old DOS days) that I can run by issuing one simple command.
Then later develop a (maybe java) GUI to run it and display the output. My
first "idea" for an open-source project!
"J Hayward" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:SZiK6.16$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Hello,
>
> No programs that I know about, but it is a good idea. However this will
> output a sorted list that you can print.
>
> rpm -qa | sort -o rpmlist.txt
>
> Regards,
> Jim H
>
>
> Chris Divine wrote:
>
> > Last night I was working on updating about 50 RPMs on my RH7.1 system. I
> > found it tedious to do an "rpm -qa | grep xxx" for each one to see if
the
> > version I already had installed was the same as or newer than the one I
> > was about to download. I found I could modify the looks of the outpur
from
> > the rpm query and even pipe the output to a text file which I later
> > imported into a spreadsheet for sorting and printing (15 pages).
However,
> > I figure someone has to have developed a utility that will stomp through
> > my RPM database, grab just the info I want (RPM name and version), sort
it
> > alphabetically and display or print it in easy-to-read format.
> >
> > Any ideas?
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
------------------------------
From: John Hasler <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: load average
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 18:34:44 GMT
Michael Heiming writes:
> Nope, I meant what I wrote, 50. Sure you won't reach this on a desktop
> system,...
When I compile a kernel with 'make -j' I usually see loadaverages of 35 or
more. Desktop performance is not perceptibly slowed.
--
John Hasler
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (John Hasler)
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, WI
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 11 May 2001 21:58:27 +0200
From: Michael Heiming <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Failover with 2 NIC's ?
Michael B wrote:
>
> Is it possible with two nics (In the same linux box), to have them both
> connected to the same switch (Only one sending/receiving data), then if
> the primary nic dies, the other nic takes over (takes the other nics IP
> and/or mac address)?
>
> HA network cards ?
There are other points of failure to a machine then only the NICs,
check linux-ha.org for info on Linux & high availability.
However, you could do what you want, with some small scripts
and the program arping.
Michael Heiming
------------------------------
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End of Linux-Misc Digest
******************************
