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

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?

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?

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

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.

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.

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)

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..!!

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.