Monday, July 28, 2003

More essential software for a home linux server



Time to (re)install an IMAP server on the home server. Using

mu
tt
-f {homeserver}inbox

is much nicer than the
m
ail -f
~/ImapFolders/inbox


uw-imapd - remote mail folder acc
ess server


While the debian package will create its own certificate, take a look
at my old
note at how to create a self signed certificate for IMAP
.




squid also needed a little configuration to allow for the Using
ssh to pierce corporate firewalls
hack.

In /etc/squid.conf, add a line like this:


http_port 127.0.0.1:3128


Now this works again:


ssh -f -C -L 8080:127.0.0.1:3128 -l marc 192.168.1.200 sleep 1000


John Edwards for President Rally in Nashua, NH

We happened by the John
Edwards for President
rally in Greely park yesterday and stopped
in to her his stump speech. We liked what we heard.


width="450" height="287"
src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/nozell-thomas-family-at-john-edw
ards-rally.jpg">

Senator John Edwards at rally in Nashua, NH and the Nozell/Thomas family<
/b>


Sunday, July 27, 2003

More essential software for a home linux server


Amphetadesk is essential
to keep abreast of the news/memes of the day. It isn't yet a debian
package, so you have to manually track down dependancies -- which are:

libcompress-zlib-perl - Perl module for creation and manipulation of gzip files
libtime-modules-perl
- Various Perl modules for time/date manipulation
www-perl - WWW client/server libr
ary for Perl (aka LWP)
libxml-sax-expat-perl - Perl module for a SAX2 driver for Expat (XML::Parser)






Friday, July 25, 2003

debian/linux home server essentials


First pass at getting the re-installed debian home server back to
being productive -- a whole raft of tools for admin, web, printing,
email, genealogy, palmpilot, monitoring tools, music, etc.



apache — Versatile, high
-performance HTTP server
aptitude — curses-based ap
t frontend
atop — Monitor for system reso
urces and process activity
bittorrent — Scatter
-gather network file transfer
blosxom — A lightweight y
et feature-packed weblog application
cdrecord — A command line
CD writing tool
cupsys — Common UNIX Pri
nting System(tm) - server
cupsys-client
Common UNIX Printing System(tm) - client programs (SysV)
darkstat — a network traff
ic analyzer
emacs21 — The GNU Emacs e
ditor.
ettercap — Multipurpose sn
iffer/interceptor/logger for switched LAN
ethstatus — Console
-based ethernet statistics monitor
fetchmail — SSL ena
bled POP3, APOP, IMAP mail gatherer/forwarder
gkrellm — Multiple stacke
d system monitors: 1 process [client]
iptraf — Interactive Col
orful IP LAN Monitor
jpilot — A GTK app to mo
dify the contents of your Palm Pilots DB's
jpilot-plugins
Plugins for jpilot (Palm Pilot desktop)
lifelines — Text-ba
sed genealogy software
lifelines-doc
Documentation for lifelines, a genealogy software system
lifelines-reports
— Reports for lifelines, a genealogy software system
links — Character mode
WWW browser
lm-sensors — Utiliti
es to read temperature/voltage/fan sensors
mutt — Text-based mailreader s
upporting MIME, GPG, PGP and threading
netjuke — Web-Based Audio
Streaming Jukebox
ndiff — Compares two nm
ap scans
pilot-link — Tools t
o communicate with a 3COM Pilot PDA over a serial port.
popularity-contest
— Vote for your favourite packages automatically.
samba — A LanManager li
ke file and printer server for Unix.
smartmontools
control and monitor storage systems using S.M.A.R.T.
smbclient — A LanMa
nager like simple client for Unix.
snmp — NET SNMP (Simple Networ
k Management Protocol) Apps.
snmpd — NET SNMP (Simpl
e Network Management Protocol) Agents.
snmptrapfmt — configu
rable snmp trap handler daemon for snmpd.
spamassassin — Perl-ba
sed spam filter using text analysis
spamc — Client for perl
-based spam filtering daemon
squid — Internet Object
Cache (WWW proxy cache)
ssh — Secure rlogin/rsh/rcp r
eplacement (OpenSSH)
sudo — Provide limited super u
ser privileges to specific users
swat — Samba Web Administratio
n Tool
tightvncserver
Virtual network computing server software
usbutils — USB console uti
lities
wget — retrieves files from th
e web


Post install steps:


  • run defoma-psfont-installer

  • edit apache's configuration to set hostname

  • edit squid.conf to set visible_hostname

  • edit snmptrapfmt to catch traps from linksys router

LinuxWorld 2003 preparations are complete!


This morning the rack that I've been building out for LinuxWorld has
started its cross-country trek. Putting together a couple of 1u
servers, a bunch of blade systems of various types, iSCSI router, SAN
storage, switches, with the appropriate software was fun, but a bit of
work. Stop by and say hello August 3-7 at the Blade System
Architecture for Linux
section of the HP booth.

Debian/sarge homeserver reborn.


The home linux server has been rebuilt there were enough extra pieces
to build a second PC that the kids will use.




Since the debian needed to be reinstalled, I'm going to start tracking
package additions here. Perhaps some other debhead will find the info
useful/helpful and it will be handy to have around the next
time I build a home server. So bookmark
here




Hardware configuration:


  • AMD 1.8Ghz

  • 384MiB memory


  • ASUS KV7-333 mobo


  • 2x40GiB disk. Disk 0 has 8G for /, 512M for swap and the rest is
    /home. The second disk is in to 20G partitions, one for images (I've
    been scanning old snapshots) and music (I've been ripping our
    collection of CDs and using netjuke)


  • two crappy CD drives

  • old floppy drive

  • old floppy drive

  • cheap tulip-based NIC



Started the install using dwhedon's debian install
cd
(only 10M) and pulled the rest across our DSL. So far just a
minimal installation with no Gnome/KDE/X stuff since this server will
spend most of the time headless.

Wednesday, July 23, 2003

Nozell genealogy manuscript is in the mail

I just mailed out my updated 'Nozell Genealogy' to all known
descendants (only 19 families!) of Anthony Vincent Nozell (b. ca
1875). A whole raft of little ones have been born since it was last
sent out in 1994.





Geek Note: No Microsoft products were used in the creating of
the booklet. GNU based toolkit: debian/linux, lifelines, LaTeX, cups,
emacs, imagemagick, etc


Updated to blosxom 2.0

The update from blosxom 2.0rc3
was pretty painless. There were only a couple plugins (clicktrack,
breadcrumbs) that were newer than what I was running.

Great job Rael!

Wednesday, July 16, 2003

Fellowship Baptist Creation Science Fair 2001

From href="http://boingboing.net/2003_07_01_archive.html#200443661">boingboing.neta>
a link to the hilarious href="http://objective.jesussave.us/creationsciencefair.html">"Fellowship
Baptist Creation Science Fair 2001". I like the first place
winner at the high school level "Using Prayer To Microevolve Latent
Antibiotic Resistance In Bacteria".

Saturday, July 5, 2003

Pictures of national and NH politicians and the family


Merrimack, href="http://www.ci.merrimack.nh.us">NH always has politicians to
our Fourth of July parades. Someone in town said it was because we
have a good sized town, well educated and reasonably upper-middle
class population and the pollisters think it gives a clue on how a
candidate will play nationally.




This year's parade included the NH Governor href="http://www.nh.gov/governor/">Craig Benson (R), href="http://www.joe2004.com">Joe Lieberman (D-CT), and href="http://www.grahamforpresident.com/index.html">Bob Graham
(R-FL). The campains for John Kerry, Howard Dean, Dick Gephardt, John
Edwards had a presence, but the candidate wasn't there.




Here are some pictures we got with the ones that made it.




height="400" width="400"
src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2003-07-04-craig-benson-and-noze
ll-thomas-family-small.jpg">

NH Governor Craig Benson and the Nozell/Thomas family



height="400" width="400"
src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2003-07-04-joe-lieberman-and-noz
ell-thomas-family-small.jpg">

Joe Lieberman and the Nozell/Thomas family



height="400" width="400"
src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2003-07-04-joe-lieberman-nh-car-
small.jpg">

Cool Joe Lieberman car




height="400" width="400"
src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2003-07-04-bob-graham-and-nozell
-thomas-family-small.jpg">

Bob Graham and the Nozell/Thomas family






Back in 2000, George W. Bush and Pat Buchanan were at our local
parade. Bush blew us off, but Buchanan stopped over to say hello.


src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2000-07-04-george-w-bush-in-merr
imack-parade.jpg">

George W. Bush but not the the Nozell/Thomas family



src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2000-07-04-pat-buchanan-in-merri
mack-parade-1.jpg">

Pat Buchanan and the Nozell/Thomas family (1)


src="http://www.nozell.com/marc/blog/data/2000-07-04-pat-buchanan-in-merri
mack-parade-2.jpg">

Pat Buchanan and the Nozell/Thomas family (2)