Gutsy testing

Gutsy (Ubuntu 7.10) has reached Tribe 4 (the 4th alpha release), so I reckon it's time to try it out on my local machine. And, I'm going to go back to the old trusty i386 version. And, after reading the feature in last month's Ubuntu newsletter about the badness of Automatix, that won't be on my list of things to install either.

Like usual, it's a fresh install using the live CD - which works out of the box.

Once the install is done, get the latests updates, add the restricted drivers for my nVidia dual head graphics card and restart. Thankfully, unlike a Windows install, that is the only restart I'll need for a while... and, I'm quite impressed at how quickly the shutodwn and restart is too.

Get the panels fixed and start the process of copying the backup files.

Add the medibuntu repro for some extra interesting stuff (like googleearth and skype), and perform a quick apt-get install to get the things I like that aren't on a default install.

echo "deb http://packages.medibuntu.org/ gutsy free non-free" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list
wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add - && sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install unison unison-gtk openssh-server joe easytag thunderbird googleearth skype msttcorefonts

Now, set the hostname and copy the hosts file from the backup folder. Setup keys:

ssh-keygen -t rsa

Finally, setup unison, copy 'backup' into the .unison directory and run "unision-gtk backup"
All done!

VNC and remote desktop (Ubuntu)

I was helping RoJ to setup his new Ubuntu machine (which he likes a lot) and decided that rather than just logging in via SSH, I'd try the old remote desktop.

So, I got him to enable remote desktop login (System -> Preferences -> Remote Desktop) and got him to check the "View your desktop" box. Then I made sure that he had port 5900 forwarding to his machine.


All I needed to do from my end was use the VNC viewer to get a beautiful live stream of his laptop 400 miles away:

vncviewer xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx:5900

Ubuntu Feisty 64

I'd previously tried a version of Ubuntu in 64-bit, but when I installed Feisty the last time, I plumped for the 32-bit version.

I decided today that it was worth giving the 64-bit version a go and using the full potential of my processor.

I'm glad to say that everything is working wonderfully, and there is a definite difference. The main speed hike has been seen when using Google Earth - the movement of the maps are now super smooth. There is also a definite improvement in load times of large apps like OO.

Down side is that flash won't work, so I'll have to follow some instructions on how to get it working... if I can be bothered.

And... I had to find a .deb for Thunderbird 2 since it's not in the repos yet and not part of Automatix2.

Increasing MaxClients

I noticed that in times of increased activity, my servers weren't responding. Having a look at the logs revealed "server reached MaxClients setting", so I was just stilling in a queue until somebody dropped off the server. Not a great position to be in when your client is shouting down the phone!

So, a quick trip to apache.conf which lives in /etc/apache2 on debian3.1 and a change to the settings.

I've created the following settings for the conf file: each section is part of the IfModule preforc declaration. A quick restart of apache and all is well.

prefork.c:

StartServers 8
MinSpareServers 5
MaxSpareServers 20
MaxClients 256
MaxRequestsPerChild 1000

worker.c:

StartServers 2
MaxClients 256
MinSpareThreads 25
MaxSpareThreads 75
ThreadsPerChild 25
MaxRequestsPerChild 0

perchild.c:

NumServers 5
StartThreads 5
MinSpareThreads 5
MaxSpareThreads 10
MaxThreadsPerChild 20
MaxRequestsPerChild 0

Using subdomains for plesk login

There is an interesting how-to here for using subdomain login for plesk admin sessions. Normally, you need to login at https://yourdomain:8443 - and lets face it, I kept forgetting the port number when I started using Plesk.

http://alexle.net/archives/152

Automatix2

I have just found Automatix2. It is basically an auto-installer for all those pesky programs that don't come with a simple apt-get install. It has a graphical interface not unlike Synaptic, but needs some terminal work to get it installed.

echo "deb http://www.getautomatix.com/apt feisty main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list

Then we need to add the key:

wget http://www.getautomatix.com/keys/automatix2.key
gpg --import automatix2.key
gpg --export --armor E23C5FC3 | sudo apt-key add -

Then all you need to do is update the packages db and install it.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install automatix2

It appears under:
Applications -> System Tools -> Automatix

It helpfully installs things like:

• Google Earth
• Skype
• Picassa
• RealPlayer
• Fonts
• Opera
• JRE
• Multimedia codecs

and the latest versions of many others.

Plesk and Debian disaster

I was doing some server maintenance on one of my servers which houses a Plesk install. The base is Debian and a simple apt-get upgrade, as employed on plenty of previous occasions, updated the packages that needed updating.

Unfortunately, the sources.list for apt were configured to get the latest stable version and Debian 3.1 has recently moved to Debian 4 (etch). Unfortunately, as I have since found, Plesk 8.1 doesn't like etch and despite my best attempts to roll back the changes, all was in vain.

Better still, the admin functions that allow migration of accounts didn't work. So, I was left delving into the mysql psa database to regenerate the installation on another machine before migrating the /var/www/vhosts and /var/qmail/mailnames directories. That of course meant hand creating all clients, domains, email, forwards, aliases, subdomains.......... the list seems endless.

All my servers have now have their sources.list changed to getting 3.1 updates only. I'll not do that again.