curious onloooker

the thin myth-tv frontend

2011-11-22T03:01:00.000-05:00

Running a thin myth-tv frontend:
-------------------------------

Here's how to setup a thin frontend for mythtv with minimal config and filesets.

Install mythtv frontend and socat on your machine.


# apt-get install mythtv-frontend socat


Create a file called ~/bin/thin-myth.sh:
(in my case, the IP of my backend server is 192.168.1.100)


#! /bin/bash
log="~/myth-tv.log"

#set the IP of your backend server.
IP=192.168.1.100 

xrandr >> $log
socat -b 128000 -d -d -lmlocal2 TCP4-LISTEN:3306,fork,reuseaddr  TCP4:$IP:3306 &
socat -b 128000 -d -d -lmlocal2 TCP4-LISTEN:6543,fork,reuseaddr  TCP4:$IP:6543  &
/usr/bin/mythfrontend -l $log


Ensure that DBHostname in ~/.mythtv/config.xml and ~/.mythtv/mysql.txt is set to 127.0.0.1:

$ grep 127.0.0.1 config.xml mysql.txt
config.xml:        127.0.0.1
mysql.txt:DBHostName=127.0.0.1


Launch ~/bin/thin-myth.sh and enjoy.

How does it work?
-----------------
socat listens on 3306,6543 for mysql and mythbackend ports respectively and relays those onto your 
mysql and mythbackend ports on your backend server.

more here..

Wifi recommendation for HD streaming

2011-02-07T13:26:00.005-05:00

I stream HD media over wifi, lots and lots of it. I live in a rented apartment where there're no wired ports available. I tried Belkin Ethernet over power adapter to carry my HD traffic, it failed miserably. Then I tried to bridge my wireless G usb dongle along with my wired nic - it never worked.

Then I went onto buy a "NETGEAR WNDR3400-100NAS IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n 2.4/5GHz Simultaneous Dual Band N600 Wireless Router" and a "NETGEAR WNCE2001 Wireless 802.11b/g/n Ethernet Port Universal WiFi Internet Adapter" as my bridge.

Sadly the bridge is in 2.4Ghz spectrum, and is susceptible to interference, even to microwaves. (2.4Ghz is such a crowded space - microwaves, garage door openers, cordless phones all use it - compared to that, 5.x GHz spectrum is squeaky clean..!)

I returned the 2.4Ghz WNCE2001 bridge and got a "Cisco-Linksys WET610N Dual-Band Wireless-N Gaming and Video Adapter" from Amazon - as implied, this bridge can talk in the 5.x Ghz spectrum. It has been almost a month now, and my HD streaming is working smooth.

Gist: For HD streaming over wifi - go for Wireless N devices in the 5.x Ghz spectrum, you will be happy!

keywords: mythtv wifi recommendation, hd streaming over wifi

rsync delta-transfer algorithm

2011-01-24T14:13:00.005-05:00

rsync delta-transfer algorithm is pretty cool, reduces the amount of data sent over the network by sending only the differences between the source files and the existing files in the destination.


export alias scpr='rsync -av --partial --progress --rsh="ssh -c arcfour -o compression=no -o StrictHostKeyChecking=no"'

myhost:/tmp# ls -ltrh somefile
-rw-r----- 1 root root 2.3G Jan 24 11:53 somefile

myhost:/tmp# time scpr somefile somehost:/tmp/
somefile
  2452194584 100%   67.76MB/s    0:00:34 (xfer#1, to-check=0/1)

sent 2452494012 bytes  received 31 bytes  65399841.15 bytes/sec
total size is 2452194584  speedup is 1.00

real    0m37.408s
user    0m22.341s
sys     0m5.624s

append some data to somefile:

myhost:/tmp# dmesg >> somefile


myhost:/tmp# time scpr somefile somehost:/tmp/

somefile
  2452249209 100%  137.71MB/s    0:00:16 (xfer#1, to-check=0/1)

sent 266589 bytes  received 396255 bytes  20395.20 bytes/sec
total size is 2452249209  speedup is 3699.59

real    0m32.525s
user    0m16.521s
sys     0m0.484s
myhost:/tmp#

rsync just sends out the delta(!), 2452494012 bytes the very first time vs. 266589 to accomodate delta.

scp: transfer speed & compression

2011-01-24T13:43:00.004-05:00

With compression:


$ time scp -c arcfour -C somefile somehost:/somewhere 

real    47m30.974s
user    46m18.974s
sys     1m4.040s

Without compression:


$ time scp -c arcfour  somefile somehost:/somewhere 
real    10m41.195s
user    2m41.142s
sys     0m51.611s

details of somefile:


$ file somefile 
somefile: MySQL MISAM compressed data file Version 1

Gist: if a file is already compressed, scp-ing with -C (compression) rightly slows down the transfer.

suggestion to shareholic/boxee

2010-12-31T16:24:00.005-05:00

I use shareholic to add items to boxee, and have a suggestion to make:

currently shareholic cannot find boxee-able itmes in pages like http://www.asianetglobal.com/ShowVdo.aspx?GlHID=2008, but can be easily fixed.

if you look closely, from,


http://www.asianetglobal.com/flvplayer.swf?videoURL=http://videos.asianetglobal.com/flv/asianet/VdoGallery/KKandathum2712.flv&thumbURL=Images/VdoGallery/Kettathum%20Kandathum.jpg

you should be able to extract just the flv url fairly easily,

http://videos.asianetglobal.com/flv/asianet/VdoGallery/KKandathum2712.flv

I'd love to see this added to shareholic

Microsoft LifeCam Cinema

2010-12-11T14:18:00.004-05:00

So far this has been the best webcam I've ever used. It's an HD webcam, 720p HD widescreen, even works on ubuntu (lucid) linux right away under uvcvideo. It also has a microphone, and the audio quality is very clear.

[ 26.861845] uvcvideo: Found UVC 1.00 device Microsoft® LifeCam Cinema(TM) (045e:075d)
[ 26.911241] input: Microsoft® LifeCam Cinema(TM) as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:0b.1/usb1/1-3/1-3:1.0/input/input6

$ lsusb |grep -i microsoft
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 045e:075d Microsoft Corp.

Above all, it is priced reasonably.

vital specs:

720p HD Widescreen Video
Auto Focus
High-precision glass element lens
ClearFrame Technology for smooth, detailed video
Digital, noise-canceling microphone

more here..

tl;dr: here's a good HD webcam for almost all operating systems. works with skype and other IMs.

nokia sale shrinks in india - here's why

2010-11-23T03:33:00.001-05:00

here's why: shown is a nokia cellphone right after 12 months of purchase, few days outside the warranty period. what you see is 2 ginormous black dots on its color lcd screen.

in case you didnt know it already nokia, we indians like products which are durable. stop stealing from us, stop dumping flaky stuff on indian markets.

Microsoft Corp. LifeCam VX-7000

2010-10-09T01:36:00.011-04:00



Microsoft Corp. LifeCam VX-7000 is an "OK" usb camera. here's the amazon.com page with more details



Technical Details
Model: CEA-00001
Audio Input: Built-in microphone
Video Capture Resolution: 1600 x 1200
Image types: JPEG
Image Capture Speed: 30 fps

here's the lsusb o/p against this webcam:

Bus 001 Device 003: ID 045e:0723 Microsoft Corp. LifeCam VX-7000 (UVC-compliant)

It also works on linux. I used Lifecam VX-7000 to make video calls on skype on linux. I start skype as shown below, and it works great:

$ cat /usr/bin/start-skype.sh
#! /bin/bash

bash -c 'LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/libv4l/v4l1compat.so skype'

So in short, if you're looking to buy a good cam which would work in linux, go for VX-7000.

hdhomerun single doing multirec

2010-09-26T01:23:00.003-04:00

hdhomerun single doing mulirec (record multiple channels on the same DVB multiplex) on my lucid. (http://bit.ly/9hcBeo)

to setup this feature, do the following: (ref)

1. Exit the myth frontend.
2. Stop the myth backend (ALT-2)
3. Start mythtv-setup (ALT-s)
4. Select "2 Capture cards"
5. Select your capture card. Remember, it must be a digital tuner.
6. Hit the "Recording Options" button.
7. Increase "Max Recordings" from 1 to the number you want to allow.
8. Exit mythtv setup
9. Restart mythth backend (ALT-3)
10. Restart the front end (ALT-m)

Belkin 1000Mbps Gigabit Powerline HD Starter Kit review

2010-09-07T01:59:00.004-04:00

So today i brought from Frys "Belkin 1000Mbps Gigabit Powerline HD Starter Kit for High Definition Video Streaming" - hoping that I get to watch HD mythtv recordings on my mythfrontend without the annoying pauses.

Needless to say, it gave me pain already, it would freeze up on me. I had to unplug the receiving end a couple of times to get past the hiccup.

Before returning it, I chose to attempt a f/w update against the latest and greatest from their web-page. I found this detailed instructions. When I run the thingy downloaded from the website, it seems like it downgraded my f/w version.

Before the "upgrade":

After the upgrade:

as you can see, i got downgraded to 2.0.9 from 2.2.0 although the svn branch got hiked to 25645 from 25122 -- looks like Belkin does not have much of a grip on cohesive version control.

Either way, for my own selfish sake, i hope this fixes the random hiccups i've been experiencing on these device.

Enabling display acceleratiun on Lenovo ThinkPad T500 2242-CTO

2010-07-10T03:02:00.001-04:00

So I got a Lenovo ThinkPad T500 2242-CTO running 64bit lucid. Boxee, and Hulu refused to run on it citing lack of acceleration/ direct rendering.

T500 2242-CTOs come with Integrated Intel GMA 4500MHD, also known as "Intel Mobile 4 Series" (http://bit.ly/9lU6Wp)

Odd thing was despite having an Intel display adapter, the libGL.so.1 was linked to some nvidia nuisance (highlighted below)

$ ldd `which glxinfo`
linux-vdso.so.1 => (0x00007fff27fff000)
libGL.so.1 => /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so.1 (0x00007f6f64bb0000)
libm.so.6 => /lib/libm.so.6 (0x00007f6f6492d000)
libX11.so.6 => /usr/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00007f6f645f6000)
libpthread.so.0 => /lib/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007f6f643d9000)
libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00007f6f64056000)
libXext.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXext.so.6 (0x00007f6f63e43000)
libXxf86vm.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXxf86vm.so.1 (0x00007f6f63c3d000)
libXdamage.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXdamage.so.1 (0x00007f6f63a3a000)
libXfixes.so.3 => /usr/lib/libXfixes.so.3 (0x00007f6f63833000)
libdrm.so.2 => /lib/libdrm.so.2 (0x00007f6f63628000)
libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00007f6f63424000)
libxcb.so.1 => /usr/lib/libxcb.so.1 (0x00007f6f63207000)
/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007f6f64e54000)
librt.so.1 => /lib/librt.so.1 (0x00007f6f62fff000)
libXau.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXau.so.6 (0x00007f6f62dfa000)
libXdmcp.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.6 (0x00007f6f62bf4000)

That does not belong there, and here's how I fixed it:

# mv /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so.1 /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so.1.junk
# ln -s /usr/lib/libGL.so /usr/lib/nvidia-current/libGL.so.1

After a reboot, direct rendering is enabled:

$ LIBGL_DEBUG=verbose glxinfo | grep "direct rendering"
direct rendering: Yes

Also Ref:
[ubuntu] client glx version string: SGI with NVIDIA drivers?!? - Ubuntu Forums

test

2009-05-14T01:55:00.011-04:00

test post

vide here.

How NetGear Forum Saved me money.

2008-03-11T22:21:00.005-04:00

I've two Linux PCs in my living room - among many roles, one is the myth backend, and the other is the F/E. The F/E is connected to my Samsung 32" LCD. They both are about 15m apart, and are "wired".

When I was installing the latter, I had the RJ45 cable in handy and decided just to use that cable. Of lately, I been toying with the idea of buying a USB Wireless adaptor, just for the heck of it.

I wanted to buy a NetGear USB adapter, which would have costed about $60.00.

Then I tumbled upon this post, in Netgear's Forum:

That saved me from blowing $60.00 something on NetGear USB adapter. Ah, the sweet feeling of not having to buy hardware which has no Linux support. (ndiswrapper, no thanks..!)

Suck it, NetGear...! As a buyer, I am glad I chose not to buy your crap, NetGear.

Why one should not use globe7?

2008-03-08T14:40:00.001-05:00

globe7 is a voip thingy for Linux.

Don't bother installing it, as they are yet to learn how to create a decent deb package which would not screw your linux system up.

Here's an example:

# dpkg -r globe7 (Reading database ... 124718 files and directories currently installed.) Removing globe7 ... dpkg - warning: while removing globe7, directory `/usr/local/share' not empty so not removed. dpkg - warning: while removing globe7, directory `/usr/local' not empty so not removed.
globe7 - DO NOT USE THIS VOIP APPLICATION

.

Using Skype to call India

2008-03-08T11:45:00.010-05:00

I like Skype - especially because Skype has Linux Clients, and they simply work, unlike Google Talk, Y messenger etc, on Linux. (In case you're interested to run Skype client on Linux, go for the latest Linux Beta Clients from this page)

But, what is preventing me from using Skype as my long distance/International Call Carrier?

Their rates, of course...!

Rates to India from Skype - 15.0 ¢ per minute
Rates to India from elsewhere - 6.2 ¢ per minute

Do the math...!

Skype rates:

Calling Card Rates:

How to ensure Set-Top-Box (STB) is Powered On?

2008-01-10T13:18:00.002-05:00

.

How to ensure Set-Top-Box (STB) is Powered On?

STB - in most cases, Set Top Boxes are the boxes the Cable/DishTV companies leave at your place with a remote control for you to flip channels. STBs are external, and in case of models like mine, there appeared to be no reliable method to ensure that it is powered on (Like in case of small power disruption. The computer would probably boot back up, but what about the dumb STB?. Read more about the uncertainity here in this thread. Or, here.)

I initially proposed something naive like this (alt link here) and went on to finalize this working script.

Requisites:
You will need ffmpeg and jp2a installed. On my Ubuntu 7.10, they were installed by running:

sudo apt-get install jp2a ffmpeg

check_stb

#! /bin/bash

# Authored by Evuraan_AT_gmail_DOT_com

# ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by
# applicable law.

# YMMV.
# Use at your own risk.


pvr="/dev/video0"
t="$RANDOM-$RANDOM"
out="/tmp/$t.mpg"
mark="1727"
blank="0"
say="/usr/bin/logger -p info -t mythstb-check"
POWEROFF="0"
POWERON="0"
wakeup="/usr/local/bin/irsend SEND_ONCE blaster1 POWER"
info="/usr/local/bin/irsend SEND_ONCE blaster1 DISPLAY"



send_power_on() {
$say "`date` STB seems to be turned off, last count was $blank, attempting to Power it on" &
$wakeup 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null || :
sleep 2
}

scan_images(){
for i in `echo /tmp/$t*.jpeg`
do
if [ -s "$i" ]
then
#blank="`jp2a $i --invert --size=72x24 | sed -e 's/./& \n/g'|grep -c "M"`"
blank="`jp2a $i --invert --size=72x24 | sed 's/W/M/g' | sed -e 's/./& \n/g'|grep -c "M"`"
 rm -f "$i" 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null || :
else
 :
fi
[ "$blank" -gt "$mark" ] && export POWERON="100"
[ "$blank" -le "$mark" ] && export POWEROFF="100"
done
if [ "$POWERON" -eq "100" -a "$POWEROFF" -ne "100" ]
then
# its off
send_power_on
else
# power is on, non blank frames
$say "`date` STB seems to be turned on, last count was $blank"
:
fi

}

purge_stuff(){
[ -f "$out" ] && rm -f "$out" 1>/dev/null >/dev/null || :
}

#ivtv-tune -c 3 -d "$pvr" 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null &

cd /tmp
$info &

dd if="$pvr" of="$out" bs=64K count=2  1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null

if [ -s "$out" ]
then
ffmpeg -i $out -f image2 -vcodec mjpeg /tmp/$t%d.jpeg 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null
[ -s "/tmp/${t}1.jpeg" ] && scan_images
else
$say "`date` Unable to query $pvr, as it seems to be in use."
:
fi

purge_stuff &

The Idea:
The idea is pretty simple - read from your ivtv device using dd. ffmpeg then converts them into jpeg files (1 per frame). jp2a analyses each of those frames to check whether they're blank or not.

Implementation:
I placed this in my channel change script (example ), so mythtv ensures that the STB is powered on before changing channels. You can also cron it, but it is better to call this in the beginning of your channel change script, as that way, you have a higher chance of unhindered read access to $pvr.

This can be downloaded to your machine as:
wget http://malayalam.homelinux.net/evuraan//check_stb.txt -O /tmp/check_stb

To suite specific needs/situations, one may accordingly need to change the parameters pvr, mark and wakeup.

Feedbacks are welcome.

Living in Arverne NY, a bloggers review.

2008-01-08T19:54:00.000-05:00

If you're considering living in Arverne (11692 NY) this review may be helpful.

Just don't. Just fucking don't.

Unless you work in Arverne itself, or are retired, or you work for Far Rockaway MTA, this is not the place to live.
Especially if you have to commute in Manhattan, you will have to either drive in, or depend on Public Transportation, aka MTA.


MTA subway A line comes this way, and is the longest route they have, with the oldest, dirtiest trains and slowest too.
Two express buses QM17 or QM16 and other local MTA routes does not make the commute any easier either. Reality is, MTA sucks ass.

Period.

Here's a better sounding analogy about living in Arverne - you live in the fucking boondocks, pay NY City taxes, and have a 
two hour commute to the city, and on top of everything  you pay the same for decent housing. 


Labels: Living in Arverne, Commute from Arverne, Arverne to Manhattan.

How to use ATI REMOTE Wonder II Remote for MythTv Frontend?

2008-01-07T20:52:00.003-05:00

How to use ATI REMOTE Wonder II Remote for MythTv Frontend?


Inspired by their wiki-page, I ended up buying ATI REMOTE WONDER II Remote for my new MythTv Front End system. Here's how I setup
this remote control using xmodmap.


Here's how it works: (1) Launch myth front end with a custom keymap. (2) When we finish and exit myth frontend, reset the keymap to
the normal (sane keymap)


Step 0: Disable gnome-screensaver

I added the following to root's crontab to prevent auto screen lock whenever I pressed the lock button:

* * * * * /usr/bin/killall gnome-screensaver 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null || :


Step 1: Create default/sane keymap

Fire up a terminal window (xterm/gnome-terminal) and run:

xmodmap -pke > /somedir/sanekeys.txt


Step 2: Create a launcher for myth front end

Let us call it /usr/bin/wmyth. Here would be its content.

#! /bin/bash

/usr/bin/xmodmap /somedir/map.txt | /usr/bin/mythfrontend 2>/dev/null
/usr/bin/xmodmap /somedir/sanekeys.txt


Step 3: Create /somedir/map.txt


Place the following as /somedir/map.txt:

! power
keycode 222 = F1
! scan
keycode 229 = F2
! mute
keycode 160 = F3
! recall
keycode 133 = F4
! stop
keycode 232 = F5
! play
keycode 179 = p
! <<
keycode 152 = Q
! >>
keycode 233 = U
! vol+
keycode 176 = F10
! vol-
keycode 174 = F11
! options
keycode 41 = o
! options1 
keycode 136 = o
! options2
keycode 56 = F8
! escape
keycode 232 = Escape
! pause
keycode 110 = p
! ff
keycode 102 = Right
! rew
keycode 100 = Left
! arippa
keycode 158 = Escape
! red
keycode 54 = d
! green
keycode 40 = i
keycode 119 = i
keycode 140 = w
! record
keycode 177 = z



Step 4: Launch wmyth, enjoy.

External Channel changer script which looks up channum against freqid

2008-01-07T17:26:00.001-05:00

I had to use an external channel changer script as I moved to use the ir blaster of my Hauppauge PVR 150.   
Shortly thereafter I found that myth is calling the channel-changer script with some weird parameters. For instance, 
to change to channel 18, it would evoke the script with an argument of 34590 or so. (Now, try changing your STB  
to channel 34590, you will know how it was barfing.)

I am blaming my DB schema (2 years old). 

Anyways, here's the script that fixes this problem. Save this as /usr/local/bin/change-channel.sh, chmod it, and  
let mythtv-setup know. 

You can also wget this script:

wget http://malayalam.homelinux.net/evuraan/change-channel.sh.txt -O /usr/local/bin/change- channel.sh

Lets cut the chase, here's the script:

#! /bin/bash

coin="$@"
REMOTE_NAME="blaster"
say="/usr/bin/logger -p info -t mythchannel"
user="mythtv" 
pass="mythpassword"



flip_it() {
for digit in $(echo $score | sed -e 's/./& /g'); do
	irsend SEND_ONCE $REMOTE_NAME "$digit"
	$say "`date` coin is $coin, score is $score, digit is $digit" 
done
sleep 2
}



if [ -z "$coin" ]
then
	RET="1"
else
	bb="`echo " mysql -u $user -p $pass -Ee 'select channum from channel where freqid="$coin" ' mythconverg"`" 
	[ ! -z "$bb" ] && score="`(echo "$bb")| sh|grep channum|awk {'print $2'}`"
fi




if [ -z "$score" ]
then
    	RET="1"
else 
	flip_it
	RET="0"
fi

exit $RET

How to get to use the IR Transmitter of PVR 150 on Ubuntu Gutsy (7.10) ?

2008-01-05T21:37:00.001-05:00

How to get to use the IR Transmitter of PVR 150 on Ubuntu Gutsy (7.10) ?

Many many thanks to this post (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=587732) and this too, http://www.blushingpenguin.com/mark/blog/?p=24, here's how to:

Add to /etc/apt/sources.lst:
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/superm1/ubuntu gutsy main restricted universe multiverse
As root, run,
# apt-get update
New linux-ubuntu-modules should be available at this point, pull them down to your machine:

# apt-get upgrade
Modify /etc/lirc/hardware.conf to call *only* lirc_pvr150

# sed -i 's/^MODULES/#MODULES/g' /etc/lirc/hardware.conf
# echo MODULES="lirc_pvr150" >> /etc/lirc/hardware.conf
Place Firmware in /lib/firmware

# cd /lib/firmware; wget http://malayalam.homelinux.net/evuraan/haup-ir-blaster.bin

OR.

# cd /lib/firmware; wget http://www.blushingpenguin.com/mark/lmilk/haup-ir-blaster.bin
Reboot, dmesg should have these. GOOD LUCK..!

# dmesg|grep pvr
[   77.487264] lirc_pvr150: chip found with RX and TX
[   77.631689] lirc_pvr150: firmware of size 302355 loaded
[   77.631790] lirc_pvr150: 743 codesets loaded
[   77.670058] lirc_pvr150: Hauppauge PVR-150 IR blaster: firmware version 1.3.

At this point, you can go here to follow point 8 onwards, good luck..!

Watch mythtv remotely over ssh

2007-11-04T20:22:00.000-05:00

Watch mythtv remotely.

I've machine A, which is the myth-tv monster - this guy runs mythbackend, and stores the files. It also runs mythfrontend when I watch myth on it.

Machine B - is my ubuntu laptop, and is as mobile as a laptop can be.

Here's how I watch mythtv remotely on laptop B.

Lets assume A.B.C.D is A's IP address.

Install mythtv-frontend on B

$ sudo apt-get mythtv-frontend

This would install stuff like mythtv-common, mythtv-frontend. mysql-client and libsqlite3-0 etc.
Setup ssh equivalency between B and A

The idea is, B (laptop) should be able to access A without being prompted for a password. Check this link out for more help.

To test this, running the following on B should get you an xclock window from machine A:

$ ssh -X A.B.C.D xclock
Create /usr/bin/wmyth (on B)

Create wmyth with the following contents, and chmod it to executable:

#! /bin/bash

xterm -title "Close_me_after_myth" -e "ssh -C -L 6543:localhost:6543 A.B.C.D cat - " &
xterm -title "Close_Me_After_Myth" -e "ssh -C -L 3306:localhost:3306 A.B.C.D cat - " &

sleep 2
/usr/bin/mythfrontend 2>/dev/null
pkill -TERM xterm
Create $HOME/.mythtv/mysql.txt (on B)

DBHostName=127.0.0.1
DBUserName=
DBPassword=
DBName=

Important thing here is 127.0.0.1 - if it is set to anything else it may not work, as we're doing port forwarding over ssh.
Create a Launcher (on B)

Run /usr/bin/wmyth. (You may get added to mythtv group in /etc/groups) It should get you a remote myth window on your laptop, B.

If it works, go ahead and create a taskbar launcher.

Enjoy.!

Tick/Time Sources on x86/x86_64 architectures

2007-07-14T01:26:00.000-04:00

Tick/Time Sources on x86/x86_64 architectures

x86/x86_64 architecture has evolved a long way since its inception. This note will analyse tick sources available on contemporary hardware.

The following are the most common, at the time of this writing.

1) RTC: 0.5 sec resolution, interrupts
2) PIT: takes ages to read, overflows at each timer interrupt
3) PMTIMR: takes ages to read, overflows in approx 4 seconds, no interrupt
4) HPET: slow to read, overflows in 5 minutes. Nice, but usually not present.
5) TSC: fast, completely unreliable. Frequency changes, CPUs diverge over time.
6) LAPIC: reasonably fast, unreliable, per-cpu

8254 PIT

     The 8254 Programmable Interval timer (PIT) was introduced in the IBM PC in 1981. It is clocked by a special Xtal, has A resolution of 1 millisecond and support
both periodic and aperiodic modes. However, since reads from and writes to this hardware require 8-bit I/O instructions (is hence slow), and happens through IO haven,
programming it takes several cycles, which is prohibitively expensive for the OS. Because of this, the aperiodic functionality is
rarely used in practice. Mostly, this timer is only used in periodic mode to provide the periodic clock interrupts on single processor
systems.

RTC

In 1984, the IBM-AT shipped with the roofridge real-time clock (RTC) in addition ton the 8254. Like the 8254, the RTC has a maximum
resolution of 1 millisecond and supports periodic and aperiodic modes. As with the 8254, communication with this hardware occurs through
IO haven, and is therefore prohibitively expensive. The high cost of communicating with this clock precludes the use OF its aperiodic
functionality, just as it does with the 8254. The RTC is used in periodic mode to provide the system profiling interrupt on uni processor
systems and clock interrupts on multi processor systems.

PM Clock

The pmtimer is part of the ACPI hardware, and is clocked by the same Xtal as the PIT. It does not interrupt, and the PIT is the
interrupt source for time ticks. It has a resolution of three times the PIT (same clock, different divider). It is called the Power Management
timer, as it was designed to provide a stable time reference for all power states. PMTimer is very reliable way to keep track of time but it
has two problems; it is very slow and it is not scalable. [link]

HPET: High Precision Event timer (formerly: Multimedia timer)

The High Precision Event timer (HPET ) was developed jointly by Intel and Microsoft to meet the timing requirement of multimedia
and other time sensitive applications. Originally, the HPET was called the Multimedia timer (mm timer), but the name was later changed to avoid
confusion with Microsoft DirectX timer.

If present, this is the best tick source to use. HPET however, is not available in all platforms. In some BIOSes
(like most of the HP DL 585 G1s), it needs to be enabled.

Even better is to get the HPET out of the "legacy mode" currently used by Linux. This mode is simple to use, but it requires the rebroadcasting of
timer interrupts on multiprocessor systems. But the HPET can work with per-CPU channels, eliminating this problem.

Time Stamp Counter

Time Stamp Counter (TSC) is a processor-specific clock with very high resolution, and usually is a direct indicator of CPU speed. The boot report
of the CPU comes from a comparison of the TSC and the PIT. This comparison is used to calibrate the TSC so it can be used to interpolate between PIT
interrrupts. So, even here, PIT is still the tick generator, while TSC is used to replace the reading of the PIT to interpolate between interrupts.

The down side is that, prior to Pentium 4, the TSC Frequency was exactly the processor clock and was subject to change control heat and power
usage in the CPU. ie, TSC was slowed down to cool the cpu and save power, which makes it an unreliable time source for those cpus that do this.

LAPIC Timer:

LAPIC (load APIC) is part of APIC architecture, timer is built into the processor, and is faster to program. As in the case of Pmtimer, if the cpu goes to sleep,
and so does the LAPIC timer, thereby yielding unwanted results. Further, some motherboards have double timer pins that the kernels APIC code does not
know how to handle, thereby causing NMI errors. [link]

To Abridge:

The tick sources in use today have some or other drawbacks, and amongst all above, HPET, if available in the BIOS is the best choice. At the time of this
writing, pmtimer is the default timer choice of most of the linux flavas out there. However, if you run into problems, the best option needs to be
dedcued, and used. For instance, grub.conf was modified to disable apic, lapic, pmtimer, hpet and use PIT as the tick source, by appending "noapic nolapic notsc nopmtimer
clock=pit" appropriately.

Note: As found in 2.6.20, clock param is deprecated, clocksource seems to be the correct usage.

Which one is being used?

This info can be drilled out of your dmesg output, here are some examples:

time.c: Using 3.579545 MHz PM timer.
time.c: Detected 2605.937 MHz processor.
Using local APIC timer interrupts.
Detected 12.528 MHz APIC timer.
Disabling vsyscall due to use of PM timer
time.c: Using PM based timekeeping.

time.c: Using 1.193182 MHz PIT timer.
time.c: Detected 2605.953 MHz processor.
time.c: Using PIT/TSC based timekeeping.

[ 0.000000] ATI board detected. Disabling timer routing over 8254.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: PM-Timer IO Port: 0x8008
[ 12.829422] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 3195.56 BogoMIPS (lpj=6391122)
[ 13.745420] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 3192.22 BogoMIPS (lpj=6384446)
[ 13.745131] ..TIMER: vector=0x31 apic1=0 pin1=0 apic2=-1 pin2=-1
[ 0.041016] Time: 19:44:17 Date: 06/13/107
[ 0.161833] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:04.0 to 64
[ 0.161842] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:05.0 to 64
[ 1.512000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:04.0 to 64
[ 1.512000] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:05.0 to 64
[ 1.896000] Real Time Clock Driver v1.12ac
[ 1.936000] Time: acpi_pm clocksource has been installed.

$ grep timer /proc/interrupts
0: 4507638 333 IO-APIC-edge timer

References:

Speeding up ext3 filesystems

2007-01-09T14:42:00.000-05:00

So you've got an ext3 (ok, ext2 if it's an old flavour) filesystem, about which folks are complaining.

There a few tricks by which you can increase the throughput to the said filesystem.

But before revealing the hacks, let's see what goes on behind the scenes.

ext3 is a journaling filesystem -- wikipedia defines journaling filesystems as a filesystem that logs changes to a particular journal *usually in a circular log and in a specifically allotted area, before actually writing the changes to the main filesystem.

ext3 handles journaling by using a special API called, the Journalling Block Device or the JBD. If you have an ext3 filesystem mounted, chances are high that the kernel module JBD is already loaded:


root@linUX:> lsmod |grep jbd
jbd                    71385  1 ext3

JBD's job is to implement journals on any kind of block device. ext3 code will work with the JBD API. ext3 informs JBD of any modifications it is performing, and before ext3 modifies any data on the disk, it has to get JBD's permission to do so. JBD accordingly does the journalling for ext3.

There are majorly three major methods with which JBD can implement the actual journaling for ext3. They are:

(1) journal
(2) writeback
(3) ordered

By default, ext3 filesystems have three journalling methods:

Journal mode

This mode provides full journaling for your metadata and data, and gives maximum integrity.

In this mode, ext3 evokes JBD to journal all changes to the filesystem, whether the changes are made to the data or metadata. As both data and metadata journals are available, JBD can bring both data and metadata to a consistent state using the two journals, thereby providing the best integrity in the event of a crash.

Now, maintaining two journals may cause performance drawbacks. This can be reduced by keeping larger journals. Here's why - if your journal is relatively small, JBD has to wait until the changes are written out. If your journal log is big enough, it does not have to wait frequently.

ordered mode

This is, by far, the most used default method by most linux flavours.

metadata and data blocks are bundled into "transactions" of either 1K, 2K, or 4K sizes. when it is time for the filesystem to write this transaction onto the disk, the data blocks of the said transaction are written first onto the filesystem. metadata is committed to journal only after the data blocks are written out.

Generally, integrity provided by ordered mode writes are sufficient enough. That being said, if you are sure that most of your continuous writes to a certain filesystem is to overwrite existing files, rather than appending them, this is certainly not the right journaling mode for you. Here's why - ordered mode does not keep persistent information about which blocks were written, and which blocks weren’t. Or, it does not perform ordered transactions. It is left to your drive's write cache to write to the list of blocks supplied whenever the cache can get to do that. In other words, it does not ensure that the blocks are actually written out into the drive in an orderly manner, as it uses your drive's cache.

What does this mean? Well, if your system craps out while it was overwriting a file, and your drive's cache did not finish updating all the blocks cited by the JBD API, you may end up having blocks which were not updated at all. Or, in short, theoretically, you may have some old data in your file after a system crash.

writeback mode

Unlike the earlier two modes we saw, only metadata is journaled in this mode. Data is written to the filesystem as soon as JBD completes metadata journaling.

To quote the man page, it is rumoured to be the highest-throughput option for an ext3 filesystem.

As only metadata is journaled, the problem that we saw for "ordered" mode of old data appearing in files after a crash and journal recovery is severely possible in journaling mode.

Enough Theory, where's my fix?

Option 1)

Assuming that you're ready to live with the problems for writeback mode, mount your said slow filesystem in writeback mode.

A word of caution: You should unmount your filesystem and remount it with the journalling mode you want. You cannot change modes while the filesystem is mounted, or just by a "mount -o remount" with new options.


# umount /slowfs
# mount yourdevice /slowfs -o data=writeback

To make this permanent, modify your /etc/fstab:


yourdevice  /slowfs ext3    data=writeback   1 2

See man mount for answers to your possible questions.

Option 2)

By default, a filesystem has to update inode access times for each files as the said file was last accessed. Disabling this would also speed up access to your /slowfs, provided your applications do not need atime to be updated on your files.

This option can be added from the command line as:


# umount /slowfs
# mount yourdevice /slowfs -o noatime,data=writeback

Entry for /etc/fstab would look like:


yourdevice  /slowfs ext3    data=writeback,noatime 1 2

Disclaimer: Sure, this worked for me, but your mileage may vary. Hence, use at your own risk. Don't flame me, if your txt files look like hexdump after this change :)

Using audacity with a bluetooth headset in Ubuntu

2006-04-27T21:39:00.000-04:00

You can use your bluetooth headset as the recording device along with audacity.

Part -1 Install audacity:


# apt-get install audacity

Part -2 Install btsco

1. Load Kernel Module for btsco:

sudo modprobe btsco

check via

dmesg

if it runs. To load it permanently add it to /etc/modules, just write "btsco" at the end of the File.

2. Install the following missing (at least on my system) packages needed by the btsco Userspace driver. Easy, because you have apt-get or synaptic:

gcc.
gcc-4.0.
altgcc.
libc6-dev.
linux-kernel-headers.
libasound2-dev.
libao-dev.
libbluetooth1-dev.

3. Download latest btsco from http://sourceforge.net/projects/bluetooth-alsa/, unzip to Desktop perhaps.

4. Time for the shell!

        cd btsco-0.4
       ./configure
       make
       sudo make install

5. Now pair your Headset with your PC (as above with the Mobile):

Headset needs to be in pairing-mode (often this is accomplished with holding the on buttons for a looong time).
start kbluetoothd, click on it, in the opened konqueror window click on the headset (sometimes the MAC-Adress shows up).
a popup should request the PIN for the Headset from you (mostly "0000" or "1234").

6. Start the btsco Userspace Program:

btsco -v 00:00:00:00:00

replace the zeros with the MAC Adress of your Headset (right click on kbluetoothd icon, connection details).

7. Verify its working

Verify its working:

```
 aplay -B 1000000 -D plughw:Headset sound.wav
```
(replace sound.wav with a Wave-File of your choice. An MP3 also works, but you will only hear strange noise :).

Use XMMS: Options -> Preferences -> Audio I/O -> Output Plugin. Select ALSA -> configure, and select your Headset as Audiodevice. Restart XMMS and you should hear the music with the Headset.
You can use the Volume Manager from gnome to adjust the volume, right click on the speaker in the tray -> Settings -> File -> Change Device.

Everyday Use: If you load the Kernelmodule automatically, you just need to execute "btsco -v your_headsets_mac_adress" - really easy for everyday use. You can optional start kbluetoothd to check Signalstreght etc.

(Refer this page for more help with this section)

Part -3 : Configure Audacity

Fire up audacity, click File >> Preferences >> Set your Recording Device as /dev/dsp1

You're all set at this time..!!

More on nuvexport, VCD, SVCD

2006-02-06T15:57:00.000-05:00

A great deal of info is offered here about nuvexport, .nuvexportrc etc, by Christopher Friend.

Here is a section detailing which Encoding to choose.

Comparisons between SVCD and VCD formats are interesting:

SVCD

SVCD is just a better quality version of a VCD, allowing upto 60 minutes of Video on a CD. ( Note: Standalone VCD players may not support SVCD, like Apex AD-1225)

Pros:

Great Quality
Wide Compatibility
Can be burnt to a normal CD
Small filesizes, great for storing on a PC

Cons:

Just 60 minutes of Video
Less compatabiltity than VCD

VCD

A VCD can be seen as the video version of an audio CD. VCDs allow one to add different subtitle tracks, audio tracks, video files and menus to a single CD, but one would need a burning program capable of creating a VCD to do so. A VCD can hold upto 80 minutes of video on a single CD.

Pros:

Widely compatible
Can be burnt to a regular CD
Holds more Video than a SVCD

Cons:

Worse quality that SVCD
Only holds 80 minutes of video.

How to secure MythWeb on Ubuntu (5.10) Linux?

2006-01-28T04:46:00.000-05:00

By default, /etc/mythtv/mythweb-htaccess.conf is linked to .htaccess file inside /var/www/mythtv. (/var/www/mythtv itself is a soft-link to "/usr/share/mythtv/mythweb") [Applies to Ubuntu 5.10]

This is what I did to secure my MythWeb interface

1) Knock off the .htaccess file inside "/usr/share/mythtv/mythweb"

2) Edit the file /etc/apache2/apache2.conf (preferrably after saving a copy as old.apache2.conf), and add these entries:


Alias /mymyth/ "/usr/share/mythtv/mythweb/"
<Directory "/var/www/html/mythweb">
 AllowOverride AuthConfig
 AuthType Basic
 AuthName "restricted area"
 AuthUserFile /etc/apache2/mythtvusers
 require user user1 user2
 Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
 Order allow,deny
 Allow from 192.168.1.
 Satisfy any
</Directory>

3) Create the users:

User htpasswd -c option while you're creating the very first user.

# htpasswd -c /etc/apache2/mythtvusers user1

Do not use the "-c" option for adding more users. If -c is used, it will overwrite your file, thereby deleting information about your the other users you already added.

For example, add user "user2":

# htpasswd /etc/apache2/mythtvusers user2

The above shown configuration will not prompt users from 192.168.1.0 network for any passwords.

4) Chmod your password file:

# chmod 640 /etc/apache2/mythtvusers

All done. At this point, you can restart apache (/etc/init.d/apache2 restart as root).

Fire up your favorite browser and point it to the url: http://mymythserver/mymyth/

Where mymythserver is the IP/URI of your MythWeb Server. Please note the trailing slash (/) after mymyth in the url, it is very important. (Well, you'll see...!!)

EPSON Stylus CX1500 on Ubuntu Linux

2006-01-26T01:55:00.000-05:00

Yay..!! I could finally use EPSON Stylus CX1500 printer on my Ubuntu.

EPSON Stylus CX1500 is an All-In-One (multifunctional)printer. Besides printing, it can scan and act as photocopier by itself. (ie, for photocopy stuff, it does not have to be connected to any machine.)

I don't believe this printer made it to the big outlet stores. It was available for Online purchase from Epson.com, and that's how I ended up getting this one.

I am yet to use it as a scanner in Linux, have heard that SANE finally supports this model.

As for printing, even though this model is not listed in the Epson printers list in gnome-cups-manager, I found that adding it as a Stylus-C42UX printer would let you print stuff.

Here is my lpstat o/p for reference:


$ lpstat -t
scheduler is running
system default destination: Stylus-C42UX
device for Stylus-C42UX: usb:/dev/usb/lp0
Stylus-C42UX accepting requests since Jan 01 00:00
printer Stylus-C42UX is idle.  enabled since Jan 01 00:00
     Ready to print.

Here are some related pages:

Product Page from Epson, Online guides for CX1500, and Reference Guide .

MythTV Transcoder -- what is it?

2006-01-25T01:34:00.000-05:00

(Originally from this page. )

The transcoder re-encodes files from one MythTV format to another. The main purpose of the transcoder is to allow users with hardware encoders (PVR-250) or systems that can only record in RTjpeg due to performance reasons (multiple capture cards, slow system, etc) to create MPEG-4 streams to save space.

The transcoder can be used in two ways:

Automatically re-encode every file once it has completed recording
After marking commercials, the transcoder can be run manually to delete the commercials from the file (thus further saving space)

The two methods are independent. The first is an automatic process that can be enabled/disabled through the setup program; the second is a manual method which must be invoked on each recording individually.

The second method can be used on files that have already been transcoded (or files which were are already in the correct format), so only the frames immediately following a cut section will be re-encoded, resulting in a very minimal loss of quality.

To enable automatic transcoding, do the following: start the setup program under the host-specific settings: set the Transcoder Auto-run checkbox

For either manual or automatic transcoding: start mythbackend start mythfrontend select setup, and the Transcoding recording profile. now select either RTjpeg or MPEG-4 (selecting any of the hardware encoders will result in the transcoder not working). set the other parameters as you'd like. For best performance, you should match the audio to the 'Default' profile. If you plan to only use the manual transcoder, you can choose to set the video to be the same as the default profile too (as long as it is MPEG-4 or RTjpeg)

Everything should now be setup properly. If you elected to use the Auto-Run feature, the transcoder will automatically launch after each recording is complete. The transcoder thread runs at a low priority, so it should not impact any critical tasks or other recordings.

If you want to manually transcode a program, simply press 'X' while watching a recording (you should have already finished marking all commercials). If you change your mind, hitting 'X' again will stop the transcoding.

Once the transcode is complete, mythbackend will replace the old file with the new as soon as it is no longer in use.

devlabel shows different page80 identifiers on multipathed devices

2005-09-26T16:58:00.000-04:00

I've 5 multipathed luns from Symmetrix as shown below, (Lun 0 being vol. logix database)


Attached scsi disk sda at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Attached scsi disk sdb at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 2
Attached scsi disk sdc at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 3
Attached scsi disk sdd at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 4
Attached scsi disk sde at scsi0, channel 0, id 0, lun 5
Attached scsi disk sdf at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Attached scsi disk sdg at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 2
Attached scsi disk sdh at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 3
Attached scsi disk sdi at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 4
Attached scsi disk sdj at scsi1, channel 0, id 0, lun 5

Let us examine lun 2. The device names are /dev/sdb and /dev/sdg.

/dev/sdb (primary path)

# devlabel printid -d /dev/sdb
S80:373031303731303231303330EMCSYMMETRIX

/dev/sdg (alt path)

# devlabel printid -d /dev/sdg
S80:373031303731303231333031EMCSYMMETRIX

The SCSI Page 80 identifiers of /dev/sdb and /dev/sdg should be identical, both being dual paths to the same device. BUT THEY ARE DIFFERENT...(!!??)

Lets use scsi_unique_id to examine /dev/sdb and /dev/sdg further:

/dev/sdb


# scsi_unique_id /dev/sdb
model: EMC     SYMMETRIX
page80: 373031303731303231303330
page83 type6: 00018570107153594d3032310000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

/dev/sdg

# scsi_unique_id /dev/sdg
model: EMC     SYMMETRIX
page80: 373031303731303231333031
page83 type6: 00018570107153594d3032310000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

scsi_unique_id shows two different page80 identifiers: 373031303731303231303330 (sdb) and
373031303731303231333031 (sdg)..!!

(Oh yes, /dev/sdb and /dev/sdg are *indeed* alternate devices..!!)

System Details:

ES release 3 (Taroon Update 5) , 2.4.21-27.ELsmp, devlabel: 0.48.03

Update (10.27.05): They had to turn on C-Bit, and once they did that, this problem went away.

How to force a panic/crash in Linux?

2005-06-06T16:25:00.000-04:00


You can evoke a crash/panic by:

echo c > /proc/sysrq-trigger

System can be forced to crash from the console by pressing: "Alt-syrq-c"

What are the command keys and what do they do?

'r'     - Turns off keyboard raw mode and sets it to XLATE.

'k'     - Secure Access Key (SAK) Kills all programs on the current virtual
         console. NOTE: See important comments below in SAK section.

'b'     - Will immediately reboot the system without syncing or unmounting
         your disks.

'c'     - Intentionally crash the system without syncing or unmounting
         your disks.  This is most useful if the NETDUMP client package
         has been installed.

'o'     - Will shut your system off (if configured and supported).

's'     - Will attempt to sync all mounted filesystems.

'u'     - Will attempt to remount all mounted filesystems read-only.

'p'     - Will dump the current registers and flags to your console.

't'     - Will dump a list of current tasks and their information to your
         console.

'm'     - Will dump current memory info to your console.

'0'-'9' - Sets the console log level, controlling which kernel messages
         will be printed to your console. ('0', for example would make
         it so that only emergency messages like PANICs or OOPSes would
         make it to your console.)

'e'     - Send a SIGTERM to all processes, except for init.

'i'     - Send a SIGKILL to all processes, except for init.

'l'     - Send a SIGKILL to all processes, INCLUDING init. (Your system
         will be non-functional after this.)

'h'     - Will display help ( actually any other key than those listed
         above will display help. but 'h' is easy to remember :-)

See sysrq.txt somewhere underneath /usr/src/linux-XXX/Documentation for more information.

/sbin/lvm.static in rhel4.0 systems

2005-05-12T23:03:00.000-04:00

RHEL 4.0 has lvm2. There is an executable file /sbin/lvm.static, and this is to explain what it does.

     o The full set of LVM2 commands is now installed in /usr/sbin/. In boot
       environments where /usr/ is not available, it is necessary to prefix
       each command with /sbin/lvm.static (/sbin/lvm.static vgchange -ay, for 
       example).

       In environments where /usr/ is available, it is no longer necessary to
       prefix each command with lvm (/usr/sbin/lvm vgchange -ay becomes
       /usr/sbin/vgchange -ay, for example).

     o The new LVM2 commands (such as /usr/sbin/vgchange -ay and 
       /sbin/lvm.static vgchange -ay) detect if you are running a 2.4 kernel,
       and transparently invoke the old LVM1 commands if appropriate. The
       LVM1 commands have been renamed to end with ".lvm1" (for example, 
       /sbin/vgchange.lvm1 -ay).

See this link for more information.

GandhiCon 3 ? M$ to Support Linux in Virtual Server 2005

2005-04-23T20:32:00.000-04:00

M$ has announced support for Linux in its virtualization software, Virtual Server 2005.

Follow the /. thread for more. Here is the news link.

From that thread:
"A VM-type OS is larger and much more complex. In a proprietary VM, it would be easy to hide a test for a specific OS so that it couldn't be found. You could break arbitrary parts of the target OS, and it would be extremely difficult for the OS's supporters to diagnose what you've done and program around it. They've done it in the past; they'll do it in the future. "

Yeah, if guest_os is linux, MS Virtual Server probably *will* slow that instance down.

MS's Steve Ballmer in a statement made in year 2000 stated that "Linux is communism. " , and later as "Linux is Cancer" (2001).

I guess, that all have changed now, huh?

IE, like FireFox to support Tabbed Browsing too?

2005-04-23T20:25:00.000-04:00

It is not about Maxthon, nor about MYIE2.

Following what Firefox has, IE6 is soon to support Tabbed Browsing with an update to the MSN toolbar.

They are going to have an RSS aggregator too.

More at this link.

Its about time the buggy software changed a bit since it is last inception, which was umm.. err.. 4 years ago?

Does Linux LVM support alternate PV links?

2005-04-18T22:04:00.000-04:00

Stuff has changed and evolved over time.

Answer: NO.

Linux LVM knows nothing about the alternate path to your PV. If you extend your volume group to the alternate PV, LVM treats the alt device as if it were a new PV.

When the system starts up, it calls vgscan to scan all the devices; and I don't know what lvm2 does when it finds lvm2 VGDA on the alternate PVs. Perhaps, it just ignores it.

With the Demise of Sistina, looks like the official stance is to advise mdadm etc. Neverthless, that also is kind of incomplete, as mdadm has on-disk metadata and modifies it and hence is NOT cluster-safe for concurrent activation.

Not sure about EVMs, whether it supports alternate PV links. More on that later...

Drop a comment if you have something to say on Linux LVM.

Setting up ssh equivalency between Linux hosts

2005-04-17T18:53:00.000-04:00

Alright, most of the decent and latest Linux ssh are version 2. Hence I am to cut the crap and get directly onto how to get this to work.

Say, you have hostA, which should get to hostB as root without a password.

We got to tell hostB the public keys of hostA. We have to create keys first for hostA. Login as root onto hostA, and run:

# ssh-keygen -b 1024 -t dsa

This would created a file, id_dsa.pub mostly in $HOME/.ssh directory.

Cut and paste this file's contents onto a file authorized_keys2 in $HOME/.ssh/ directory of the other host.

If you are trying to get in as root, make sure that your sshd_config (usually it is /etc/ssh/sshd_config ) has "PermitRootLogin yes".

If you're making changes to sshd_config, make sure you restart sshd to bring those changes into effect. sshd can be restarted as "service sshd restart" as root.

Now, from hostA, run ssh hostB. If its the first time you're sshing to hostB, you may see a question like: "Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? " , say yes, and bingo you're good to go...

Second field in /etc/shadow explained.

2005-04-14T00:19:00.000-04:00

An interesting thing about RHEL /etc/shadow file.

Its about the second field of /etc/shadow (if shadow passwords are enabled).

If the value is ! or *, the account is locked and the user is not allowed to log in.

If the value is !! a password has never been set before (and the user, not having set a password, will not be able to log in).

More here...

To disable an user, just replace the second field in his/her /etc/shadow entry with * or ! .

CNET.com --- stupid, mindless IT journalism.

2005-04-13T22:51:00.000-04:00

Cnet article about DNS outages at Comcast explains DNS as:

"The DNS system essentially routes one's Internet protocol address to the appropriate Web site that the user wants to visit. "

Original Article here. Screenshot of article is at this link.

Huh? WTF?

They got that wrong, and backwards.

Essentially, a DNS server resolves the hostnames to an IP address.

Stop smoking, Cnet...!!

Microsoft Corp. v. Zamos (Goliath .v. David)

2005-04-08T23:01:00.000-04:00

University of Akron student David Zamos bought educational copies of Microsoft Windows and Office XP Pro for $60 each. After realizing he'd have to wipe his computer to install them, he tried to return them. The college would not take them, neither would Microsoft. He was forced to keep them. The kid sold the un-opened pieces of the software on E-bay. Microsoft sued him for thousands of dollars in damages, their lawyers threatened to take his Ford Escort to recover $ 143.50.

Zamos has been fighting .

In short, instead of caving into high-powered attorneys for the Software Giant, he decides to fight back, and goes to the press. Goliath is hit. Read on here...

Devsense, fusion
Google

Gmail grows and Gmail ROCKS..!!

2005-04-02T00:19:00.000-05:00

Looks like my Inbox just grew bigger.

I've now 1854 MB.

MSN Hotmail, you suck. Comes to mind is the time when I had 2MB as my Inbox Limit.

Yahoo's 6MB in those days were a true Luxury...!!

Best of all, Gmail lets me access from Thunderbird.

Oh, and I've not seen a spam in my Gmail Inbox.

Can you trust download.com?

2005-03-09T13:53:00.000-05:00

Was reading about the Security Fix for PuTTY dated Feb 20, 2005, I stumbled upon this on their download page:

2004-12-23 Trojan PuTTY installer circulating

We've been alerted to a trojan PuTTY 0.56 installer that was posted on CNET's download.com for about a fortnight (now removed). We are informed it installed various spyware.

The file length was 509860 bytes (much shorter than any installer we've ever released) and the md5sum was 49550e478e9dd008998c2c5294a884c5.

We'd like to take this opportunity to encourage everyone to verify the signatures of PuTTY downloads before executing them. Details are on our Keys page.

Another solid proof that you cannot trust downloads.com and similar sites. Not that they wrote the program, they are just storing it to be downloaded, but still Spyware gets inside there copy. Whew...!!

Adblock options explained...

2005-03-08T17:15:00.000-05:00

Gathered the following mostly from the forums.

Obj-Tabs:

This would place a translucent tab next to Flash movies and similar Objects, which can be clicked for blocking.

Collapse Blocked Elements:

Adblock will remove the space left where the blocked Object was.

Check Parent Links:

Adblock will also filter on the URL the ads point to, and not only their own URL. That is, the objects from a blocked server will also be blocked when this option is enabled.

Site Blocking:

If enabled, it will display Blocked Sites. If disabled, it shows the site in your filter list, but will not display any Objects.

See this for more info.

Gmail Down?

2005-03-01T12:39:00.000-05:00

Tue Mar 1 12:43:53 EST 2005:

From the looks of it, incoming mails are not working at gmail. I could send out emails, but have not gotten the replies -- realised this when I called them up.

This is from the web interface of gmail.

Anyways, Gmail is in Beta, so cannot bitch about this aloud.

How RAM is used in Linux

2005-02-24T23:05:00.000-05:00

Stumbled upon a very good post here, which explains why "top" or similar utils always show all your RAM being used.

mine:> free -m
         total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:            91         84          7         20         21         15
-/+ buffers/cache:         47         44
Swap:          513         58        455

The -/+ buffers/cache line shows how much memory is being used and is free.
91 Meg is the RAM available after being reserved plus occupied by Kernel (which
cannot be swapped out) .

You're good if you are not swapping much. I've ~ 58 Megs of swap being used, well, it is normal with hardly 90 some Megs of RAM.

Quote from sapphirecat's original thread: " The reason Linux uses so much memory for disk cache is because the RAM is wasted if it isn't used. Keeping the cache means that if something needs the same data again, there's a good chance it will still be in the cache in memory. Fetching the information from there is around 1,000 times quicker than getting it from the hard disk. If it's not found in the cache, the hard disk needs to be read anyway, but in that case nothing has been lost in time. "

RHEL ES 4.0 release 1 -- miseries while kickstarting..

2005-02-24T19:16:00.000-05:00

Okay, I got a DL 360 to play with, has two Broadcom cards and the installer loads tg3.ko as the drivers, and it says links is up at 100 Half.

Hmmm...

Okay, but later fails to get a dhcp response from the network.

And, throws you back at:

When you hit enter, still asking it to get response from dhcp, it cannot even find the device(?):

Alright.

Now if you assign IP addresses manually and hit enter, it will not still get onto the network:

Arrgghh..!!

Now I pop in a floppy (vfat) with a ks.cfg which has static IP details in it, and boot the box with linux ks=floppy argument...

Look what happens, it cannot even read the floppy.

Updated (03.01.2005) :

I've submitted this as bug 149682 on Feb 24 to bugzilla. Here is the link.

Auto-finding your hard drives for Linux Kickstart

2005-02-22T15:57:00.000-05:00

With different hardware, the device names are to change, and thus one will have to edit the ks.cfg for Linux Kickstarts everytime you are dealing with a different hardware.

Starting with RHEL 3.0, you could include a python script in your kickstart file and derive the list of your harddrives into a file. You could later include that file to define your drives.


%pre --interpreter /usr/bin/python
import os, sys
sys.path.append('/usr/lib/anaconda')
import isys

# get a sorted list of drives
drives = isys.hardDriveDict().keys()
drives.sort()

# write the include file to /tmp/kspart, drives[0] is the first drive,
# drives[1] is the second, etc.  To get the filet to be used, put
# '%include /tmp/partitions' in your kickstart configuration.
print "Writing partition details"
f = open("/tmp/partitions", "w")
f.write("part /boot --size 400 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part / --size 6144 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part swap --size 2048 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part /var --size 3072 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part /home --size 2048 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part /tmp --size 4096 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])
f.write("part /data --size 6144 --ondisk %s\n" % drives[0])

f.close()

Of course, add this to your kickstart file:

%include /tmp/partitions

Original posting here.

AFAIK, this does not work with RHEL 2.1, as its anaconda is still retarded. Still working on RHEL 4.0 to confirm....

How to read Malayalam newspapers using FireFox

2005-02-19T17:02:00.000-05:00

Most of the Malayalam newspapers use dynamic fonts. FireFox and Mozilla browsers do not support Dynamic fonts by default. Here is how you can read Malayalam and Other Indic publications using Firefox:

Option 1: Use firefox extension padma.

This works on all recent stable versions of Firefox at the time of this writing.

An advantage worth mentioning -- padma converts those pages to Unicode for you - This saves you the pain of installing individual fonts for the content you want to read. In other words, if you have an Unicode malayalam font installed already, thats all it takes...!!

A little bit about padma from the extension's page: Padma is a technology for transforming Indic text between public and proprietary formats for Mozilla based applications.

Ok, now how to get that done:

Step 1

Install Firefox's extension padma.

If you have a fairly decent Unicode font installed already, you are good to go now. Otherwise, read on:

Step 2

Download Anjali Oldlipi - perhaps the best unicode Malayalam font. Open up this url, download the latest version of AnjaliOldLipi. (At the time of this writing, 0.730 is the latest).

Copy the downloaded font file into your Fonts Directory (Settings->Crontol Panel->Fonts).

In case you are running Linux I am going to assume that you already know how to add a font.

Now, fireup Firefox, Tools ->Options -> Content and set your Default Font to AnjaliOldLipi as seen in this screenshot:

That is it...!!

Enjoy browsing Malayalam publications like: Deepika, Madhyamam, Manorama, Mangalam, Mathrubhumi and more...

Oh, did I mention that you can kill all the annoying ads using AdBlock Plus?

Option 2:

Note: This is dependent on a Firefox extension "AutoCharacterEncoding" which does not seem to be in active development anymore. (Hey, developers are people too, and they move onto other things as well..!!) At the time of this writing, said extension does not work on Firefox 1.5. Another disadvantage is that, you are required to download and install the individual fonts of the malayalam publications you want to read, onto your computer.

Step 1

Download and install the fonts from the newspaper's website, unless you already have them. (Download the .ttf file, and copy it over to your Fonts directory.)

Step 2

Install AutoCharacterEncoding from mozdev.

(It merely sets the fonts for userdefined character encoding automatically.)

Step 3

Restart FireFox, and browse, saving yourself from annoying ads and popups.

How to turn on rsh and rlogin on RedHat Enterprise Linux (RHEL 2.1/ 3.0)

2005-02-18T22:34:00.000-05:00

You have two hosts: hostA and hostB. You want to set up some sort of equivalency for user "root" on both of them.

Enable them:

Turn on these three using chkconfig on both the nodes: rexec, rsh and rlogin.


# chkconfig rexec on
# chkconfig rsh on
# chkconfig rlogin on

xinetd

Restart xinetd to be sure.

# service xinetd restart

.rhosts

On hostA's root home directory (usually /root), create a .rhosts file, which has hostB in it.


# cat .rhosts
hostB

Similarly, create a .rhosts on hostB's root home directory which has hostA in it.

# cat .rhosts
hostA

hosts.allow

Now, edit /etc/hosts.allow on hostA:


#
# hosts.allow   This file describes the names of the hosts which are
#               allowed to use the local INET services, as decided
#               by the '/usr/sbin/tcpd' server.
#
ALL : hostB

Edit /etc/hosts.allow on hostB:

#
# hosts.allow   This file describes the names of the hosts which are
#               allowed to use the local INET services, as decided
#               by the '/usr/sbin/tcpd' server.
#
ALL : hostA

hosts.equiv

Edit /etc/hosts.equiv on hostA to have


# cat /etc/hosts.equiv
hostB

Edit /etc/hosts.equiv on hostB to have


# cat /etc/hosts.equiv
hostA

/etc/securetty

And finally, knock off /etc/securetty (rename it or worse, purge it) on both hostA and hostB

Now you are good to go.

Disclaimer: Use at your own risk. Don't flame me. It sure worked for me. Actual results may vary. Use ssh in place of rlogin/rsh/telnet and the like, as ssh is more secure.

Addressing IDN Spoofing on Firefox...

2005-02-17T21:35:00.000-05:00

While debates are on, I added this "/[^\x20-\xFF]/" to my set of adblock filters. (Everything except the quotes.)

That thingy between the quotes above blocks URLs with characters outside normal ASCII range.

Editing the compreg.dat works fine until you are removing or adding a new Firefox extension, as it is recreated when Extensions are changed.

Then again, the moment you over-write your adblock filters....

You can test your browser from this page.

Debug flags for sendmail

2005-02-15T16:50:00.000-05:00

Common flags:


-d0     General debugging.
-d1     Show send information.
-d2     End with finis( ).
-d3     Print the load average.
-d4     Enough disk space.
-d5     Show events.
-d6     Show failed mail.
-d7     The queue file name.
-d8     DNS name resolution.
-d9     Trace RFC1413 queries.
-d9.1   Make host name canonical.
-d10    Show recipient delivery.
-d11    Trace delivery.
-d12    Show mapping of relative host.
-d13    Show delivery.
-d14    Show header field commas.
-d15    Show network get request activity.
-d16    Outgoing connections.
-d17    List MX hosts.

-d12     Set flag 12 to level 1
-d12.3   Set flag 12 to level 3
-d3-17   Set flags 3 through 17 to level 1
-d3-17.4 Set flags 3 through 17 to level 4

More details in these following links...

Geocities, Monkeytools? , Sendmail 2nd edition, Whole scoop on configuration file

Debugging check_rcpt (Anti-Relay)

2005-02-15T16:29:00.000-05:00

The three scenarios that should be checked out are:

1) From INT to INT
2) From EXT to INT
3) From EXT to EXT

Evoke sendmail as:


root@somelinux:> sendmail -bt -d21.4
ADDRESS TEST MODE (ruleset 3 NOT automatically invoked)

.D{client_addr}165.89.185.15
check_rcpt {email@foo.bar}

Open Relay Database is maintained here.

Project Work

2005-02-15T15:53:00.000-05:00

A picture drawn by my brother:

Sendmail 8.11.x without DNS...

2005-02-15T15:30:00.000-05:00

For a nullclient with DS macro enabled....


[root@haha mail]# grep service.swi /etc/sendmail.cf
# service switch file (ignored on Solaris, Ultrix, OSF/1, others)
O ServiceSwitchFile=/etc/mail/service.switch
[root@haha1 mail]# cat service.switch
hosts files

Check the /etc/host.conf to have:

order hosts
multi on

Use switch 8.8 to see it bitching about failed resolver lookups...

date |sendmail -v -d13.9 foo@foo.org

Also:


# sendmail -bt -d8.8
check_mail foo@foo.bar
/mx foo.bar
/map host foo.bar
/quit

About kernel.sysrq

2005-02-10T14:38:00.000-05:00

Magic SysRq is a key combination directly intercepted by the kernel and can be used, among other things, to perform an emergency shutdown. It is described in Documentation/sysrq.txt and implemented in drivers/char/sysrq.c in the kernel source tree. It exists primarily for kernel hackers, but it can be useful to people in user-space also. Since it is implemented as a part of the keyboard driver, it is guaranteed to work most of the time, unless the kernel itself is dead.

A note: In the rest of this article, when I say "SysRq key" I mean the single key beside the Scroll lock key. But when I say "magic SysRq" I mean the combination <> /proc/sys/kernel/sysrq

If you want it to be always enabled, append these lines to one of your initialization scripts(preferably rc.local).

#Enable SysRq
echo -e "Enabling SysRq\n"
echo "1" > /proc/sys/kernel/sysrq

Alternatively, you might look for a file called /etc/sysctl or /etc/sysctl.conf which some distributions have(mine, RedHat, does). You can add a line like this to it, and sysrq will be enabled at boot-time.

kernel.sysrq = 1

The magic SysRq combination is a unique one. Now, every key on the keyboard sends a code when pressed or released, called the scan-code. The magic SysRq combination (Alt+SysRq), however, sends only one scan-code(0x54, decimal 84) even though two keys have been pressed. Check this out using showkey -s.

What can I do with it ?

Magic SysRq is invoked as <> + <> sent from a remote console will be interpreted as <>, and the consequences can be disastrous. See the Remote-Serial-Console-HOWTO for more details.

Conclusion

The magic SysRq hack can come in very handy at times. However, it must be used with care. It can also give you some insights into the inner workings of the kernel. If you are enterprising, you might even hack the kernel and add new commands !

Note: The original article is here

Tsunami wipes out rare tribe in Andaman Islands??

2004-12-28T21:19:00.000-05:00

What happened to the rare tribes?- The Times of India

The killer tsunami is feared to have wiped out entire tribes — already threatened by their precariously small numbers — perhaps rendering them extinct and snapping the slender tie with a lost generation.

Research suggests Linux has fewer flaws

2004-12-25T02:55:00.000-05:00

The Linux operating system has many times fewer bugs than typical commercial software, according to a report.

The conclusion is the result of a four-year research project conducted by code-analysis company Coverity. The project found 985 bugs in the 5.7 million lines of code that make up the latest version of the Linux core operating system, or kernel. A typical commercial program of similar size usually has more than 5,000 flaws or defects, according to data from Carnegie Mellon University.

Coverity has not analyzed the source code to Microsoft Windows because the company does not have access to the source code, Hallem said.

Don't we all know who would have the largest number of bugs? :)

Link is here.

The first beer.

2004-12-25T02:50:00.000-05:00

My first beer:

I never tastes the same again.

Thanks to P.

iPod crash protection patent published

2004-12-25T02:28:00.000-05:00

A patent submitted by Apple during 2003 has just been published, and it details a new technology aimed at making hard drives more robust and able to survive being dropped, even when in active use.

It allows the drive to detect the acceleration caused by gravity and then stop reading or writing to the hard drive.

However, it's not foolproof. It takes time for a device to notice the acceleration. Thus, the product has to be dropped from a certain height for the feature to kick in.

So JT, if you're about to drop yours, make sure you give it enough time. Or, whenever you are gonna drop it, just toss it as high as you can.

Follow the link here.

Former dpy Prime Minister won't testify against Saddam

2004-12-25T02:17:00.000-05:00

Saddam Hussein's deputy prime minister Tareq Aziz has told his lawyer at their first meeting that he will not testify against his former leader.

He was the only Christian in the Iraqi Govt..

NBC television published photographs last week of a thinner, greyer Aziz in prison, wearing an orange jacket and close-fitting white cap.

More here....

Starved to death, he roasted and ate a 2-yr-old

2004-12-25T02:01:00.000-05:00

HYDERABAD: Police have arrested a man they say kidnapped a two-year-old girl before roasting her on a fire and eating her because he was starving.

The gruesome incident took place in a jungle hamlet in Nellore district in Andhra Pradesh about a week ago, a police officer said on Friday, and came to light after the 42-year-old man was later discovered gorging on a buffalo carcass.

"He was caught and handed over to us by villagers who found it strange that he was eating such a large animal with his bare hands with flourish," the officer told Reuters. The man was arrested on Wednesday.

Parents of the missing girl, who lived in a neighbouring village, feared the worst when they heard of the incident and went to the area where the man was caught.

Their fears were confirmed when they found the girl's head, a limb, some jewellery and clothes strewn near the site. If convicted of murder, the man faces the death penalty or a life term in prison.

Original link...

Cardinal slams 'billions' spent on Iraq war

2004-12-25T01:51:00.000-05:00

Yahoo! News - : "What a terrible thing it is that billions -- and I mean billions of pounds -- are being spent on war in the Middle East which could have been spent bringing people out of dire poverty and malnourishment and disease", said Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, according to an advance copy of his address.

"How can one wish a happy Christmas for our fellow Christians in Iraq or in the Holy Land or those who suffer in Africa unless you and I, in whatever way is open to us, say and do what makes for peace?'"

It's not a painting..

2004-12-25T01:29:00.000-05:00

Well, that picture caught my attention.

It's not a drawing, even thought it looks like one. They are Miners standing in the bucket as they leave the coalface of a mine in Donetsk, a city in eastern Ukraine.

That man at the front looks pissed, perhaps he's pissed about the recent Political turmoils there.

Original Link is here.

From the tourists across the globe...

2004-12-24T23:42:00.000-05:00

The girls visiting Taj Mahal had to cough up Rs.300.00 (~ $6.00) as a bribe to some one.

More details awaited.

They were not sure what would "he" do if they did not pay...

What a shame...!!

Democracy, Indian Ishtyle (Style)..

2004-12-24T13:51:00.001-05:00

The Notorious Gujarat riots:

Zahira, the key witness, has been flip flopping on her court statements and de-railed the investigation. Allegations are that the MLA has paid about Rs.18 Lakhs (she was asking for 25 Lakhs, quite a bargain..!!) to make her say that she was asleep upstairs and saw nothing. Tehelka has a video tape taken with spy cameras where the MLAs folk say that they paid 18Lakhs. Its here.

A day after a Tehelka tape showed BJP MLA Madhu Shrivastava saying Zaheera Sheikh was paid Rs 18 lakh to turn hostile in the Best Bakery case, he warned that he would make the news weekly pay for this.

I'll pump six bullets into any Tehelka journalist I come across, Shrivastava said. If the allegation that Zaheera was bribed is proved true in court, I will hang myself to death at India Gate.

Yeah, it is Democracy, Indian Ishtyle... If their lousy asses are on fire, politicians will first threaten the witness, then bribe them, and beat the heck out of the media persons. Money and Power makes the exemptions from any heinous crimes, whether communal or not.

Similar is the Kunhalikutty sex scandal, which rocked the state of Kerala, where the minister slept with an underage girl many times, and she, Rajeena, has been retracing her statements every now and then. When confronted, the minister would issue statements like "My community is being tested through me" and shiat like that.

Dude, if you did the crime, you alone pay the time. As simple as that.

Ironically enough, the national emblem has the motto Satyameva Jayate (Sanskrit: सत्यमेव जयतॆ, "Truth Alone Triumphs"). This is a quote from Manduka Upanishad, the concluding part of the sacred Hindu Vedas.

I guess that only applies to Older Times, or is talking about an Eternal Justice from the "Super-natural", not from the Government, as everything is "Maya"..!!

(In Advaita Vedanta philosophy, Maya is the illusion of a limited, purely physical and mental reality in which our everyday consciousness has become entangled, a veiling of the true, unitary Self.)

10 cm/4 in Cockroaches found...

2004-12-23T19:04:00.000-05:00

A 'monster' cockroach and other new insects have been discovered in the jungles of Borneo, scientists say.

An expedition of caves and cliffs, led by the Nature Conservancy, also said it saw previously unknown fish and plants.

Cockroaches are one species I cannot stand. Especially when they are horny, and start to fly all over the place.

I see them, I kill 'em. HA HA..!!

More here...

Here are some more I needed to know:

They prefer darkness, but are not afraid of light. They do run when you wake up and turn on a light, but not because of the light.

The sucker can live without its head for an entire week.

That's nothing as I've also heard that they can survive a nuclear holocaust.

How about we send some of them to moon and mars next time any craft goes there?

They will eat almost anything: left-over human food, paper, wood, leather, cigarette butts, tooth paste, coffee grinds, glue, soap, feces, fabric, shoes, paint, the glue on the back of wallpaper, human hair, fingernails, etc.

Cockroaches have been shown experimentally to transport a number of pathogenic bacteria and viruses on their legs and bodies. They have been found to carry the pathogens that cause tuberculosis, cholera, leprosy, dysentery, and typhoid, as well as over 40 other bacteria (like salmonella) or viruses that can cause disease.

Did I say that hens love to eat them?

Sonar kills the whales?

2004-12-23T18:55:00.000-05:00

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Whales 'suffer from the bends':

Damage consistent with the bends - every diver's nightmare - has been found in the bones of sperm whales.

Researchers noticed that many of the bones contained lesions and pits

An acute form of the illness was also suspected in beak whales, which were beached after a naval sonar exercise. Sonar may distress whales into rising too quickly, resulting in potentially lethal cases of the bends.

Express Train collides with elephant herd, killed 3.

2004-12-23T18:33:00.000-05:00

A train plowed into a herd of wild elephants in central Sri Lanka on Thursday, killing three of the animals, a railroad official said.

The train's engine derailed in the accident, but nobody aboard the train was hurt. The train had been carrying about 500 passengers at the time of the accident.

The train's impact broke the spines of three elephants, killing them.

Sri Lanka was home to 10,000 to 15,000 elephants a century ago, but today only 3,000 are left largely because of poaching and loss of habitat.

More here.

Merry Christmas..!!

2004-12-23T14:27:00.000-05:00

"Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth,
good will towards men"
- Luke 2:14 -

Merry Christmas...!!

Or watch the paint dry..

2004-12-22T21:28:00.000-05:00

Waiting for something to finish to begin the actual work which itself is quite cumbersome is no fun.

Not really. It is very much a part of the task.

3 hrs 55 mins 38 secs for 68.32 GB over 100 mbps FD NIC.

Not that bad considering where it is going to.

But 10 years from now this much data will be slurped in say, 10 seconds, predicts the englightened.

Man plays same videogame every night for 2 hours for 25 years.

2004-12-22T20:57:00.000-05:00

He is going to keep on playing that vintage game until he gets a million points.

What his wife said is kinda cute:

"It's not like I didn't know what I was getting into, He has always been really interested in video games. At least I know where he is and what he's up to. It's our silver wedding next years so I'll wait till then and then we'll see. "

More here at BBC.

JT - Hint, hint...!!

Tribute to my systems....

2004-12-22T13:13:00.000-05:00

My Linux Box is an ancient Pentium Pro 233MHz PC, running RHEL 2.1, and 98 Meg of RAM.

It was about to be trashed, but somehow ended up with me.

Within its limitations, it has been exceptionally good to me so far.

I've never powered it down since almost an year....

The rear side:

Its neighbours are the surround side system, the Cable Modem, Wireless Router, Xbox, VCR, TV and a RCA switch. Hence the complexity of wires is at par of a "decent" Data Centre.

Wires...

More Copper...

Also, here is my Wireless Router, the left speaker on top of it.

Beneath it is my sound system. I hope that the heat won't kill any of them.

And finally, here is my Gateway laptop, which has an annoyingly loud fan.

Room heater:

Did I say I love them all?

Victim dials 911 with her tongue..!!

2004-12-22T01:53:00.000-05:00

If you're going to break into a house and tie up the residents, try to pick a house where the victim can't dial 9-1-1 with her tongue...!!!

Home Invasion In Hampton: "A woman with her hands bound behind her used her tongue to dial 911, sending police looking for the armed intruder who stormed into her home Friday, terrorizing the five people inside."

Her tongue saved her.

Owned for a while:

Marine's family beg's Yahoo! for his e-mail

2004-12-22T01:43:00.000-05:00

From the net:

The family of a Marine killed in Iraq is pleading with Internet giant Yahoo! for access to his e-mail account, which the company says is off-limits under its privacy policy.

Lance Cpl. Justin M. Ellsworth, 20, was killed by a roadside bomb on November 13 during a foot patrol in Al Anbar province. The family wants the complete e-mail file that Justin maintained, including notes to and from others. "I want to be able to remember him in his words. I know he thought he was doing what he needed to do. I want to have that for the future," said John Ellsworth, Justin's father. "It's the last thing I have of my son."

But without the account's password, the request has been repeatedly denied. In addition, Yahoo! policy calls for erasing all accounts that are inactive for 90 days. Yahoo! also maintains that all users agree at sign-up that rights to a member's ID or contents within an account terminate upon death.

"While we sympathize with any grieving family, Yahoo! accounts and any contents therein are nontransferable" even after death, said Karen Mahon, a Yahoo! spokeswoman.

World's smallest baby

2004-12-22T01:41:00.000-05:00

Of the size of a cell phone, was born to an Indian Couple in IL.

You go girl...!!

More here..

Sad Irony

2004-12-22T01:32:00.000-05:00

Mount Everest has always been a challenge to many.

In 1996, Andy Harris, a climber, stayed on the peak of Mount Everest longer than others. Later, on his way down, he ran out of oxygen and stumbled upon canisters abandoned by others. He radioed the base alerting that he was running low of Oxygen, and that the canisters he found were empty.

The base camp knew that the canisters were not empty and pleaded with him to use them. He argued back that they were indeed empty. He had become delusional by the lack of oxygen, and to him the canisters of oxygen appeared to be useless.

Sad irony, he died of the lack of oxygen, while his rescue was right in his hand.

His body has not yet been recovered.

Comes to mind a few lines by Kabir:

'And, as "Kasturi" lodged in navel of deer
He seeks it in grass here and there.
Without knowledge of self all else is false'

In life too, the things we search for, are right before us, but we decline to discern them. Let it be love, comfort or peace of mind. We are so hallucinated that we fail to recognise the blessings and abundance right before our eyes. And the resulting search might eventually deprive us of the very same thing we were looking for. I wish I remain content with what I got. For me, there is another phase to it: I wish I knew what am I restlessly looking for.

Hopefully, one day I will realise...

Links for Desi Audio

2004-12-22T01:26:00.000-05:00

After hours of surfing last night which spilled over to early hours of today morning, I was delighted to end up on Shoutcast.com. The search for Audio Enhancers took me there. (Audio Enhancers is another story, which I will put up here after I get my hands on the final one).

Shoutcast stations: If you have broadband, go for the ones with higher Bitrates. Play them on Winamp, if you don't have it, get it from here.

HUM FM is a radio station in Dubai I guess. They have some good DJs during their daytimes. One thing I disliked is that they broadcast their prayers when it is time for them, which I found annoying.

Raaga is another "okay" station. Their streams are mono?

AM-530 is a multi-lingual radio station some where in Canada. Stable Mono streams.

Radio Netscape needs you to download their player, the sound quality is pretty good. They let you listen only for a few hours if you do not have AOL.

Smashits is pretty good too. The sound quality is better.

These links may change or even die overtime, so do your own search too..!!

mdadm lies on RHEL 2.1?

2004-12-22T01:18:00.000-05:00

In RHEL 2.1, /proc/mdstat is not consistent.

/proc/mdstat shows failure:


[root@linux01 root]# grep F /proc/mdstat

md3 : active multipath sdd[1] sdi[0](F)

md1 : active multipath sdb[1] sdg[0](F)

sdi and sdg are marked as failures.

When queried with mdadm, both paths appear to be online. So, who's lying here? Mostly /proc/mdstat, as I could dd in from the paths:


[root@linux01 root]# mdadm -D /dev/md3

/dev/md3:

   Version : 00.90.00

Creation Time : Tue May 11 16:44:46 2004

Raid Level : multipath

Array Size : 79548416 (75.86 GiB 81.46 GB)

Raid Devices : 1

Total Devices : 2

Preferred Minor : 3

Persistence : Superblock is persistent



Update Time : Wed Sep 29 12:52:08 2004

     State : dirty

Active Devices : 1

Working Devices : 2

Failed Devices : 0

Spare Devices : 1



      UUID : e1be071a:110648f2:19f2d1af:0588e532

    Events : 0.64



Number   Major   Minor   RaidDevice State

  0       8      128        0      active sync   /dev/sdi

  1       8       48        1      spare   /dev/sdd



[root@linux01 root]# mdadm -D /dev/md1

/dev/md1:

   Version : 00.90.00

Creation Time : Tue May 11 16:44:16 2004

Raid Level : multipath

Array Size : 79548416 (75.86 GiB 81.46 GB)

Raid Devices : 1

Total Devices : 2

Preferred Minor : 1

Persistence : Superblock is persistent



Update Time : Wed Sep 29 12:51:07 2004

     State : dirty

Active Devices : 1

Working Devices : 2

Failed Devices : 0

Spare Devices : 1



      UUID : 9b320ac7:e8f70c42:020e975f:932c0ba2

    Events : 0.70



Number   Major   Minor   RaidDevice State

  0       8       96        0      active sync   /dev/sdg

  1       8       16        1      spare

Net Bandwidth monitor for Linux

2004-12-22T01:03:00.000-05:00

ibmonitor is so far the best network bandwidth monitor I have seen.

It looks neat. Best syntax for me is:

ibmonitor --data MB --nocolors

Can be run as non-root user too.

Spot the similarities....

2004-12-21T23:34:00.000-05:00

The notorious Nazi Flag:

The VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad) Flag:

See something similar?

Indian Minister Caught Peeing in Public...!!

2004-12-21T23:26:00.000-05:00

Mid Day took this picture of Union Minister of State for Home Sriprakash Jaiswal taking a leak on the airport runway.

Jaiswal was at Leh airport with his boss, Cabinet Minister for Home Shivraj Patil on his Kashmir tour this week when this happened.

Arriving at the airport, the team was about to board the plane on their way back to Delhi when a TV crew stopped Patil to ask a question or two.

Man In A Hurry: Jaiswal

Rather than use the airport toilet or use the one in the aircraft, Jaiswal just walked off to the side and unzipped. ROFLMAO..!!

Garden State Hate in the 1920s.

2004-12-21T23:16:00.000-05:00

That place looks like Mercer County...!!
Do I know some of their possible offsprings?

/still likes Chicago more than NJ.

Delhi "Sex" Scandal and the CEO of Bazee.com, the Scape Goat of archiac laws.

2004-12-21T21:44:00.000-05:00

Let's see.

Two teenaged students of the Delhi Public School (DPS), around 17 years of age have sex, that too oral sex. The boy shot it on his CellPhone, and distributed it to others over MMS. As the grapevine does it, it is circulated quite well.

Ravi Raj, a final year student of geophysics at the IIT Kharagpur in West Bengal gets this 2.37-minute clip, and writes a CD and wants to sell it. He posts his "item to sell" on Bazee.com, Indian Avatar and Subsidiary of Ebay.com. From what I understand from the newspapers, Ravi was to mail the clip to those who paid him. 7 people tried to buy, and 5 paid Rs. 125.00, which would roughly equate to $3.00

All the hell broke loose then. Having solved all other problems of the 25% of population below the poverty line which itself is way too below to ease the statistics, the authorities sprang into action.

Avnish Bajaj, CEO of Baazee.com, who is an US citizen is contacted by the Police, and he voluntarily flies to Delhi to aid in the investigation. Bajaj was arrested on December 17 with police claiming that baazee.com listed the MMS clip on its site under the title '...Girl Having Fun' for sale on November 24, which was put up by Ravi Raj. It was merely a listing, and Ravi did not post the alleged obscene material on its website.

The listing was removed by Bazee officials when it was brought unto their attention. It remained active for about 38 hours, of which 24 hours was on a Sunday.

Perhaps if logic has this way, the Indian Prime Minister can be grilled for the Crimes in India. Or the DOT folks can be arrested for potholes in their Highways, Or a newspaper editor can be arrested if some one puts up a phony ad there.

He was sent to the Tihar Jail, like a common criminal. "Just like any other inmate, Bajaj sleeps on a bed-sheet on the ground. No one gets a bed here," Tihar Jail's Director General of Prisons, R P Singh, tells Indiatimes News Network. He gets just about enough space in his cell to curl up and sleep, if at all he manages to get some.

Sources alleged jail superintendents "must be extorting a lot of money from him, else they would make him work like a slave".

But DGP Singh denies this, saying, "Undertrials are not made to work at all."

A statement that is rubbished by a former inmate, who recently got bail in a rape case. "I paid lakhs (of rupees) so that I am not made to work. Otherwise undertrials have to work," he says.

He further adds that every new inmate is "made to clean the dirty toilets (three in a cell) for a week at a stretch." "It's part of ragging," he emphasises.

National Association of Software and Service Companies on Monday condemned the arrest of e-commerce portal Baazee.com's CEO Avnish Bajaj in the Delhi Public School MMS scandal.

"We condemn the arrest. We are extremely dismayed at what has happened (the arrest of Bajaj)," Nasscom President Kiran Karnik said on the sidelines of a conference organised by TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs).

A BJP member in Lok Sabha on Monday voiced strong objection to US Secretary of State-designate and National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice reportedly pleading for Avnish Bajaj.

Senior Advocates Arun Jaitley and A S Chandhik , with US Consular aides, finally managed to secure a conditional bail for Avinash on the 21st, he had to surrender his Passport until the investigation is over.

Meanwhile, the schoolboy who allegedly prepared the sexually explicit clip was sent to a Juvenile home on Tuesday, after the Delhi Police revealed that the cellphone used to make the film had been destroyed. With the police not pressing for further interrogation, the judge incharge of the Juvenile Board sent the boy to the juvenile home till January 4. The girl was sent outside India by her family, as this issue gained momentum. Neither of them have lodged any complaints.

How to force a Linux box to panic...

2004-12-21T20:48:00.000-05:00

How to force a panic?

[mdlug] netdump on Red Hat ES
GREG WOJTAK GWOJTAK at salliemae.com
Tue Oct 12 09:05:57 EDT 2004

* Previous message: [mdlug] Alternate antennae: inside the wireless CF card
* Next message: [mdlug] Sun & Kodak settle Java lawsuit
* Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ]

This is what I needed, but I couldn't get his code to compile, so I
re-wrote it based on the source:

#define __KERNEL__

#include
#include

extern int init_module(void);

int init_module (void)
{
panic(" panic has been called");
return 0;
}

compile with:
# cc -c -o panic.o -DMODULE -I/usr/src/linux-2.4/include panic.c

# file panic.o
panic.o: ELF 32-bit LSB relocatable, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV), not
stripped
# insmod panic.o
Warning: kernel-module version mismatch
panic.o was compiled for kernel version 2.4.21-20.ELsmp
while this kernel is version 2.4.21-15.0.4.ELsmp
Warning: loading panic.o will taint the kernel: no license
See http://www.tux.org/lkml/#export-tainted for information about
tainted modules
Warning: loading panic.o will taint the kernel: forced load
Read from remote host sqcjbafi10: Connection timed out
Connection to sqcjbafi10 closed.

Sometimes, there is nothing like the feeling of having the power to
crash a server.

netdump works great, BTW. It sent over a core file and the contents
of what would have gone in syslog to the netdump server, leaving me with
something I can diagnose.

Greg Wojtak
Unix Systems Administrator

More about Samsung X105...

2004-12-21T20:45:00.000-05:00

From http://cellphoneforums.net/t118967.html:
Unlocking your Samsung All Models
Tested on x426, x427, e105, e715



EX: you are using phone Samsung e105 which is locked by T-Mobile, and now you
want to use it with ATT. Do these step correctly and you get your phone unlocked.

* You have to have ATT SIM card with you, and now suppose that T-Mobile SIM card
is in your phone. Here we go:

1. Change your phone's password back to 00000000 (8 number zero)
2. Power off your phone.
3. Take battery out --> take your T-Mobile SIM card out of the phone
4. Put ATT card in side the phone --> put battery back --> power phone on.
5. WRONG CARD message would appear on screen (in some case if the phone ask SIM
  unlock code , just put any number and it will show that message)
6. Enter *#9998*3323# and you see option exit ---> press right softkey to use
  function EXIT
7. After that one menu will show up, use arrow key go to number 6(or 7) Malloc
  Fail and use right softkey to choose this one.
8. Your phone will auto restart and now ATT network show on screen
*  Until now your phone temporary unlocked ATT SIM CARD, to unlock your phone
  forever, please continue:
9. On screen, press *0141# and hit call button then screen appear "Persernalized"
10. Turn off phone --> take ATT SIM out --> put T-Mobile SIM in --> Power on
11. Screen ask " SIM unlock code"
12. Please enter 8 number zero : 00000000 ---> OK
CONGRATULATION,
Your phone now is unlocked.

More samsung x105 codes

2004-12-21T20:43:00.000-05:00

A few typos, but those are from the site I saw them. Don't flame me, if your phone dies. Use at your own risk.

*#06# for checking the IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) for Samsung X105 . Please Note down this Number This can be helpful if Samsung X105 Mobile IS Stolen. Imie for Samsung X105 Is Unique for each Samsung X105 mobile and if Samsung X105 cellphone is lost and somebody is using your Samsung X105 Phone then report this card to Nearby Police station and Mobile service provider to trace your X105.

IMEI number for Samsung X105: * # 0 6 #
Software version for Samsung X105: * # 9 9 9 9 # albo * # 0 8 3 7 #
Net Monitor for Samsung X105: * # 0 3 2 4 #
Chaning LCD contrastfor Samsung X105 : * # 0 5 2 3 #
Memory info for Samsung X105: * # 0 3 7 7 # albo * # 0 2 4 6 #
Reset memory (SIMLOCK`a removing!!!) for Samsung X105: * 2 7 6 7 * 3 8 5 5 #
Reset CUSTOM memory for Samsung X105: * 2 7 6 7 * 2 8 7 8 #
Battery state for Samsung X105: * # 9 9 9 8 * 2 2 8 #
Alarm beeper for Samsung X105: * # 9 9 9 8 * 2 8 9 #
Vibra test for Samsung X105: * # 9 9 9 8 * 8 4 2 #