In the story relating to release upgrades for Ubuntu, below the end-of-life table for the Ubutu Releases from the Ubuntu Wiki – just to have it all in one place; I’m only including the LTS (long-term support) editions, as these should be the only ones deployed on live production systems. In the meantime, Maverick Meerkat is due in October 2010, supported for 2 years. (more…)
Archive for the ‘open source software’ Category
Firefox 3.6.6 Crash Protection – crashing?
2010
06.28
06.28
Is it just me or is the new version of Crash Protection which pushed itself via a new release of Firefox up to 3.6.6 marking every instance of Flash as crashed? On the one hand, this may be a little salute to the Flash – Apple situation (though I hardly think it likely).
Am I the only one who’s experiencing this? Hmmm…
Oh, yes – remember to make sure your add-ons are up-to-date…
[SOLVED] phpSysInfo – failed to open stream on Ubuntu 10.04?
2010
06.15
06.15
phpsysinfo eval : 2 Message : parse_ini_file(/usr/share/phpsysinfo/data/distros.ini): failed to open stream: No such file or directory File
There is a simple fix for this in version 3.0.5:
(more…)
Maverick Meerkat Alpha 1 (Ubuntu 10.10) is out
2010
06.04
06.04
Quick note – Ubuntu 10.10 – Maverick Meerkat is out. Mark Shuttleworth had already given a vision for it back in April 2010.
Let the “light”ning commence! 
“Maverick Meerkat” is the code name for Ubuntu 10.10, scheduled for release on 10 October 2010. See the Maverick release schedule. A quick sketch-up roadmap is over here.
Security Summit 2010 Wrap-Up
2010
05.14
05.14
So the Security Summit 2010 has come to an end. Featuring speakers such as Moxie Marlinspike, Joe Grand and Jeremiah Grossman (again), it’s a pity to say that there wasn’t much new that was presented. With repeated concerns about input- and output-validation, as the OWASP Top 10 for 2010 highlight and were used as a repeated example, and a call for a holistic approach to a company’s security posture, the idea of making the thought (and practice) of security part of the organisation’s culture came through over and over again. (more…)
Ubuntu Lucid Lynx (10.04) LTS is out
2010
04.29
04.29
They’ve passed their RC status and have moved into full Long-Term Release for Ubuntu Lucid Lynx — local mirrors are still showing the RC version, but it’s out!
What’s new?
- F-Spot replaces the GIMP
- PiTiVi video editor added
- GNOME 2.30
- New themes: Ambiance and Radiance
- New wallpaper
- Linux kernel 2.6.32
- New nVidia hardware driver
- Gwibber social media application
- Faster boot time, with a different look and feel on the bootsplash screen
- Ubuntu One adds contacts and bookmark sharing
- Ubuntu One music store integrated into Ryhthmbox
- Ubuntu Software Center 2.0
I’ve only played with the 10.04 Server edition so far, and the faster boot time is definately a big win (though some regressive network driver support still needed to be ironed out – hopefully sorted for the final release…)
Yay!!! Well done, guys!! Thanks for a new, even more sparkly LTS!
Clamav errors on upgrade to 0.96 clamd and clamav-milter
2010
04.03
04.03
Some updates to the yum-sent clamav-milter.conf and (to a lesser extent) clamd.conf may be necessary.
After an automatic yum-update of the clamd family on RHEL, there’s a disparity in the way clamav-milter listens and clamd services the socket or port connection — clamav-milter doesn’t know what to go with (local socket on unix:/tmp/clamav.socket or tcp:127.0.0.1) – so you need to tell it. Otherwise, you get messages such as the below in you clamav-milter.log:
clamav-milter[5149]: No clamd server appears to be available
ERROR: Failed to initiate streaming/fdpassing
So make sure the ClamdSocket in clamav-milter.conf points to the LocalSocket that clamd.conf says it’s broadcasting on. So if clamd.conf is
LocalSocket /tmp/clamd.socket
clamav-milter.conf should have
ClamdSocket unix:/tmp/clamd.socket
Else, if you’re on LocalSocket on 127.0.0.1 on the default port, just set ClamdSocket as below:
ClamdSocket tcp:127.0.0.1
Also, be sure to do an sa-update
Simple, eh? But you knew that already!
KnowledgeTree 3.7.0.2 Document Indexing and Indexer issues (SOLVED)
2010
03.22
03.22
Argh. Well, it’s really not quite out of the box, at least on Ubutu Server 9.10 (after reinstallations required after initial failures…), so this is just a selection of the fixes that made the import and indexing of the 160 000 files at 102GB possible. So for KnowledgeTree 3.7.0.2 Commercial Edition (the same holds true for the Community Edition), the following should help:
- Use the best-practice advice when doing the local file system import – rather do 10 000 files at a time rather than 100 000 at once. Really. Trust me. It defeats the whole idea of just running a batch job. Completely. As you’d expect the option of saying – just transfer all data in directory X. But alas, that doesn’t work. So do it in batches. Manually.
- Tika Apache Indexer for Lucene – not so much on PDFs, Docs, XLS or PPT files. Install catdoc (which includes
catpptandxls2csv) andpdftotext(which you’ll find inxpdf-utils).apt-get install catdoc pdftotext- modify
knowledgetree/search2/indexing/extractors/TikaApacheExtractor.inc.phpand comment out the mime types that are affected above from the returned array ingetSupportedMimeTypes()– PDF, XLS, DOC and PPT: (more…)
KnowledgeTree 3.7.0.2 reinstallation site startup failure (SOLVED)
2010
03.21
03.21
OpenOffice.org startup failures, indexing issues and other niggles forced me to re-install KnowledgeTree 3.7.0.2 Commercial Edition (the same holds true for the Community Edition) more than once during setup. I was met with this delicious error notification which killed all further activity on the site (and prevented the startup of /setup/wizard/, control.php, browse.php, login.php — well, everything, really):
Warning: include_once(DB/.php) [function.include-once]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/pear/DB.php on line 371
Warning: include_once() [function.include]: Failed opening ‘DB/.php’ for inclusion (include_path=’/usr/share/knowledgetree/search2:/usr/share/knowledgetree/ktapi:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/xmlrpc-2.2/lib:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/simpletest:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/Smarty:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/pear:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/ZendFramework/library:.:/usr/local/zend/share/ZendFramework/library:/usr/local/zend/share/pear:/usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/pear’) in /usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/pear/DB.php on line 371
Warning: Cannot modify header information – headers already sent by (output started at /usr/share/knowledgetree/thirdparty/pear/DB.php:371) in /usr/share/knowledgetree/config/dmsDefaults.php on line 299 (more…)
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS now in beta
2010
03.20
03.20
Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (beta) now out...
Ubuntu 10.04 went beta yesterday afternoon, with downloads at http://releases.ubuntu.com/10.04/, otherwise from the download mirrors. Lucid Lynx, as it’s called, enjoys LTS support (ie 5 years out the box).
This version promises as a better (and faster) boot experience, new themes, version 2.6.32 as the Linux kernel, Firefox as default browser — with default browser page changed to Yahoo! (that’s new!) nVidia hardware support using open source drivers has improved, and a whack of new features for the Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud have been included. (more…)
HTML5 takes over from Google Gears
2010
02.20
02.20
Google Gears is reportedly being relegated to the bench by the Campus (Google, that is, as mentioned in a range of comments before) in order to allow the fun-filled featues of HTML5 to replace the functionality required. Makes sense – why have a fully fledged custom system when a specification exists that covers most of the features that Google Gears encompasses. Also, this makes sense with the editors for the HTML5 spec (of at least the API vocabulary for HTML5) being Ian Hickson from Google, Inc. and David Hyatt of Apple, Inc. fame. (BTW – there’s a good presentation on the features from GoogleIO: GoogleIO presentation on Gears vs HTML5) (more…)
And it’s time for 2.9.1
2010
01.06
01.06
After a few reported issues with prior WordPress version upgrade 2.9, 2.9.1 is here to save the day (full version, not even RC
From the source:
This release addresses a handful of minor issues as well as a rather annoying problem where scheduled posts and pingbacks are not processed correctly due to incompatibilities with some hosts.
Yipee!!
Knowledge Tree 3.7 Community Edition released
2009
11.25
11.25
PBGVVH25US66 They released the Knowledge Tree 3.7 RC Community Edition some time ago, which now runs on the full Zend-Server stack! Infrastructurally, this is the biggest changed; PHP-based setup wizards also feature, and sure – you can now run it on IIS6/IIS7, but that switch to the Zend stack with use of Optimiser features most highly for me on this development. But you knew that already!
Curious to see the feedback from Steve Briggs from iBurst about their KnowledgeTree (not necessarily their whole CRM solution) usage and implementation experience at iBurst, after the chat I had with him yesterday…
nginx on Windows Vista / Windows 7 with php
2009
11.22
11.22
You can get the latest stable version of a Windows compile of nginx (0.7.64) here.
Setup is quite straight forward; you’ll need the php-cgi.exe downloaded (copy the libmysql*.dll to the Windows system directory – quickest but dirtiest solution) and tied in; I assume that you can download and run the mysql application yourself?
You may need to run the startup as a batch file (f: below is the drive installed on, php has been extracted into the php under nginx as you can see). PHP is set to listen on port 9000, which nginx interfaces requests to below. (more…)
Trac and remote SVN servers
2009
09.17
09.17
Do the SVN server Trac relates to have to reside on the same as the Trac installation?
At present, alas it seems so. (If you’re new to Trac and need a one-stop-shop of commands, look here.)
http://trac.edgewall.org/ticket/2828 points to and abstracts http://trac.edgewall.org/ticket/493
Seems like Trac and remote SVN is not happening yet, though SVN replication is an option… There is also an obscure comment some two years ago about a remote plugin, which was at alpha, but the project seems to have since disappeared/moved…
Sigh…
OpenVPN on Vista (32-bit and 64-bit)
2009
09.15
09.15
Once and for all (as I keep forgetting):
- modify the actual ovpn file by adding the following:
route-method exe
route-delay 2
- Use openvpn-2.1_rc19
- Make sure you install as Administrator
And that’s it – you’re done!
Wipe all mp3s and avis from the filesystem
2009
09.08
09.08
So you want to run a script that removes all mp3 and avi files off the filesystem. One way (in bash) as below. Comment, suggestions and feedback are welcome Using $EUID to check for root user, and $IFS to check for line breaks as the file names has spaces in them. IFS is saved to a temp variable, reset and then re-instated afterwards. C is the counter. Got two litte for loops in bash with backtick execution.
New ClamAV / clamscan / freshclam on old Ubuntu (Feisty or the like)
2009
09.07
09.07
A typical situation – you get to audit a server setup which hasn’t seen a apt-get update / apt-get upgrade or even apt-get dist-upgrade since Netbooks were a pipedream.
“Please don’t change anything, we only want a virus scanner, but the update cache is busted,” they say. That you see a whole bunch of 404‘s in the apt (or aptitude) feedback is normal — there is no active repo for this flavour anymore! Long-gone!
So – what to do? As you would, you compile from source. Ha — one gotcha — zlib‘s probably not installed (compression library, as you know).
So – quick move to virus scanning happiness (on the latest version):
