Blending life, nature and technology.
linux
Android
Jul 14th
Just about everyone must be familiar or has seen tons of TV ad’s showing Android based cell-phones. Heres a link to notes/screen-shots l saved while trying my hand at a first programming project targetng the Google Android 2.2 Operating System. Click here.
Android based phones have arguably the most apps. compared to Apple’s iPhone cellphones.
Fedora 13 on Toshiba A505-S6986
May 28th
Installed this operating system – click here for fedora 13 - on a 2nd partition on my laptop. I installed the full x64 DVD iso version.
Needed to get the wireless card working, this is what l did.
My first partition already has Windows 7 installed. Both operating systems co-exist perfectly. Make sure you install Windows 7 first. I usually reserve about 45Gb from any laptop harddrive for my linux installations, this gives about 1.5Gb for the swap partiton and the rest dedicated to linux.
The card is a Realtek RT8191SE / 8102E – got this from Windows 7 command prompt by simply typing ipconfig/all
Download and extract the linux drivers from Realtek taiwan website here
Commands:
Change into the extracted files subdirectory then -
82 su -
83 ls
84 cd /home/steve/Downloads
85 ls -al
86 cp rtl8192se_linux_2.6.0015.0127.2010 /usr/src/rtl8192se_linux_2.6.0015.0127.2010 -r
87 cd /usr/src/
88 ls -al
89 cd rtl8192se_linux_2.6.0015.0127.2010
90 ls
91 cp -rf firmware/RTL8192SE /lib/firmware
92 make
93 ls
94 cp HAL/rtl8192/r8192se_pci.ko /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/net/
95 depmod -a
96 reboot
OpenOffice…
Mar 25th
I’ve been looking for a “free” alternative to Microsoft Office 2007 for general work on my laptop. I decided to try out OpenOffice which l know is installed on my Ubuntu linux partition. Theres a windows version which installs pretty quickly and with no problems on Windows 7 – l use Windows 7 64bit Home Premium on my laptop. You can download openoffice from here, and join in the currently over 100 million downloads so far tally.
Much to my surprise, l found out that l could open Word 2007 documents, as well as create PDF files from OpenOffice with no problem. Even Word 2007 has an option for saving your documents in the open document format. Now l can create word 2007 documents at my office, save these and reopen them on my laptop without worrying about data lose during conversion or between these 2 different programs. I’m probably going to be installing OpenOffice on any relatives computer l set up!
Network…
Mar 6th
Finally decided to revisit my home network – LAN and Wireless, especially with respect to wifi security.
My setup essentially is this: a private Gigabit Local Area Network [LAN] using 192.168.0.x ip address range served by a dhcp server running off Smoothwall Express – an open source based excellent firewall program. I downloaded the iso from here, and installed it on a hardly used old but trusty Dell Poweredge 2300 server. My main server – running Windows 2008 has a static ip address and runs on a Dell Poweredge SC430. The 10/100/1000 gigabit switches – mainly cisco/netgear – enable me move large 3d rendered graphics files and family video files been edited across my server to/fro my prime Quad-core windows 7 64bit 8gb workstation.
For wireless – l gave away my old linksys a/b router – this router supports only WEP which is easily hackable. Retained my Dlink DIR-625 wireless router – set to 172.168.0.x ip address range, with the ethernet input from the smootwall green output. Smoothwall setup was Green+Red – Green is for the internal LAN while red represents the external network/internet interface from usually a home cable modem. I use WPA2-PSK for security at 802.11n wifi speed. The main reason l got this particular wireless router is – it offers parents the ability to lock out kid internet access at specific time. You simply reserve specific ip address for say kid x’s PC. Set a rule such as : internet off from 9pm to 5am workdays.
My 2nd wireless router is the Buffalo Airstation Turbo G WHR-G545 – 802.11g which l set at 172.168.16.x ip address range, with security set at WPA-PSK, key set to renew every 60mins. It supports TKIP as well as AOSS also. Installed at the 2nd half of the home, this gives adequate wireless coverage to any laptop that can authenticate with the right password.
Lingo:
A PSK is a 256-bit value, known to every device in the WLAN. That PSK is usually generated by combining the WLAN’s name (Service Set Identifier, SSID) (define) with a passphrase (an ASCII (define) string, 8-63 characters.)
Removing previous Fedora kernels…
Jan 10th
i currently run Fedora 12 with the latest stable kernel update.
Heres the command steps l took to erase the 2 kernels l dont need.
Its always a good idea to have a fall back previous kernel available if needed.
[steve@pegasus Documents]$ su -
Password:
[root@pegasus ~]# uname
Linux
[root@pegasus ~]# uname -a
Linux pegasus 2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64 #1 SMP Mon Dec 21 05:33:33 UTC 2009 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
[root@pegasus ~]# yum clean all
Loaded plugins: presto, refresh-packagekit
Cleaning up Everything
0 delta-package files removed, by presto
[root@pegasus ~]# uname -r
2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]# rpm -q kernel
kernel-2.6.31.5-127.fc12.x86_64
kernel-2.6.31.6-166.fc12.x86_64
kernel-2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]# clear
[root@pegasus ~]# uname -r
2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]# rpm -q kernel
kernel-2.6.31.5-127.fc12.x86_64
kernel-2.6.31.6-166.fc12.x86_64
kernel-2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]# yum remove kernel-2.6.31.5-127.fc12.x86_64
Loaded plugins: presto, refresh-packagekit
Setting up Remove Process
Resolving Dependencies
–> Running transaction check
—> Package kernel.x86_64 0:2.6.31.5-127.fc12 set to be erased
–> Finished Dependency Resolution
Dependencies Resolved
================================================================================
Package Arch Version Repository Size
================================================================================
Removing:
kernel x86_64 2.6.31.5-127.fc12 installed 98 M
Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Remove 1 Package(s)
Reinstall 0 Package(s)
Downgrade 0 Package(s)
Is this ok [y/N]: y
Downloading Packages:
Running rpm_check_debug
Running Transaction Test
Finished Transaction Test
Transaction Test Succeeded
Running Transaction
Erasing : kernel-2.6.31.5-127.fc12.x86_64 1/1
Removed:
kernel.x86_64 0:2.6.31.5-127.fc12
Complete!
[root@pegasus ~]# rpm -q kernel
kernel-2.6.31.6-166.fc12.x86_64
kernel-2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]# yum remove kernel-2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64
Loaded plugins: presto, refresh-packagekit
Setting up Remove Process
Resolving Dependencies
–> Running transaction check
—> Package kernel.x86_64 0:2.6.31.9-174.fc12 set to be erased
–> Finished Dependency Resolution
Dependencies Resolved
================================================================================
Package Arch Version Repository Size
================================================================================
Removing:
kernel x86_64 2.6.31.9-174.fc12 installed 98 M
Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Remove 1 Package(s)
Reinstall 0 Package(s)
Downgrade 0 Package(s)
Is this ok [y/N]: y
Downloading Packages:
Running rpm_check_debug
Running Transaction Test
Finished Transaction Test
Transaction Test Succeeded
Running Transaction
Erasing : kernel-2.6.31.9-174.fc12.x86_64 1/1
Removed:
kernel.x86_64 0:2.6.31.9-174.fc12
Complete!
[root@pegasus ~]# rpm -q kernel
kernel-2.6.31.6-166.fc12.x86_64
[root@pegasus ~]#