The Subtle Art of Doing Things

Making a bootable USB Drive on a Mac.

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Tue, 05 Mar 2013 19:46:00 +0000

First of all, you need to format your USB drive ready for adding the bootable image to it. Start the Disk Utility, in Applications->Utilities. Select the USB drive you've inserted and format it per the options shown below.

$ hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o Fedora-18-x86_64-Live-Desktop.img Fedora-18-x86_64-Live-Desktop.iso

$ diskutil list
/dev/disk0
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:      GUID_partition_scheme                        *500.1 GB   disk0
   1:                        EFI                         209.7 MB   disk0s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Macintosh HD            499.2 GB   disk0s2
   3:                 Apple_Boot Recovery HD             650.0 MB   disk0s3
/dev/disk1
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:     Apple_partition_scheme                        *17.4 MB    disk1
   1:        Apple_partition_map                         32.3 KB    disk1s1
   2:                  Apple_HFS Flash Player            17.3 MB    disk1s2
/dev/disk2
   #:                       TYPE NAME                    SIZE       IDENTIFIER
   0:                                                   *2.0 GB     disk2

$ dd if=./Fedora-18-x86_64-Live-Desktop.img of=/dev/rdisk2 bs=1m

Internet connectivity

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 13:56:00 +0000

My son said that it seems to him that our home internet connection drops out every half an hour or so. Perhaps he's right, perhaps he just gets impatient every half an hour. Time for some research.

First of all, one of the problems is that the cable modem is connected to a wireless router so if there is a problem, is it the modem or the router?

Whoa there! Step back. Firstly, do we have an intermittent dropout? Here's what I did first. My desktop box uses Linux (Fedora Core 11, to be exact. I have tried to update to 12 and 13 but both barf on me so I'm sticking with 11.) I create a shell script thus:

#!/bin/sh
while(true); do sleep 5 ; ping -c 1 www.google.com >> plog ; done &
while(true); do sleep 5 ; ping -c 1 www.bbc.co.uk >> plog ; done &
while(true); do sleep 60 ; date >> plog ; done &

then I let it rip and examine the (p)log file later. Indeed, the internet connection is lost on a regular half hourly basis. So, next question, is it my ISP (Virgin Media, so I'm inclined to jump to conclusions here!), or does my wireless router go to sleep every half hour? Time to put the thinking cap on. Tune in for the next exciting episode of Internet Repair Man....

Blank

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 01:29:00 +0000

Too Many Mark Fergusons

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 11:09:00 +0000

I've noticed that in many cases people with blogger blogs pop up on top with Google. Not me, seems that there are too many other Mark Fergusons out there. From Professors to Lord of The Rings actors, I'm in a competitive field here! Perhaps if I blog about Mark Fergusons I'll get up the rankings.

Here goes!

Chakkilam Infotech

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 18:51:00 +0000

So, time for a new job.

Why Chakkilam? First and foremost, it's about the people. I was out in Hyderabad last week checking things out, and they were checking me too! We all agreed that there is a sea change in the outsourcing and offshoring business. Cheap is not just the driver. Value for money is what sets the agenda today. That means providing an agile service to our clients and being able to offer the services that people need, not just services that make good marketing collateral. And we can still offer a price that beats the competition! And, if you are still sceptical, take up out try before you buy offer. Contact me for details!

What's getting attention today? Looks like cloud computing, security, interoperabilty and portability are picking up. As well as that, performance testing, especially distributed web load testing, is still a hot topic. And a speciality of ours!

Look forward to talking to you!

Who is smith_www777@yahoo.com?

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 07:10:00 +0000

smith_www777@yahoo.com got hold of my gmail account for a few days. As far as I can tell, it started when ebay sent me an account reminder. Since then, email to my gmail account got forwarded to this joker. I think I've sorted it now, but I'm sure there is some damage to repair.

Make Money Fast on Facebook !!!! Even if you're retarded!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 11:24:00 +0000

There are an awful lot of links down the right hand side of Facebook for 'Making Money Fast!!!!', or whatever. They all seem to be pretty much the same. Google is going to pay you $$$$!!!! for posting links. Why didn't I think of that! Perhaps it's because I don't TYPE EVERYTHING IN CAPITALS AND USE LOTS OF EXCLAMATION MARKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I can't say for certain, because I'm not daft enough to sign up, but I think that you essentially get some info on how Google AdSense works and how to sign up for it. The sneaky (dishonest, in my mind) is that you have to send $1 (some small amount anyway) for this info. Of course this is just to cover shipping and handling, it's not trying to rip you off for $1 is it? That would be silly. No, they're looking to rip you off for somewhere bewteen $25 - $40 a month until you spot the transaction on your credit card. There is always somewhere on the payment page, a tiny paragraph telling you that the $1 is a promotional fee for joining their club. Thereafter you get stung for the monthly $$$ until you opt-out.

I've got a funny feeling that opting out won't be as easy as opting in! And guess what, it won't be you making the $$$$$!!!!!!! out of Google scams.

M&S Clothing for deformed childern

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 14:12:00 +0000

Looks like M&S are trying to attract a hitherto ignored market segment.

Changing ports on Oracle 10g

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 13:29:00 +0000

I'm trying to get a VM setup for HP Quality Center (QC) and I've installed Oracle 10g XE as the database. Unfortunately QC uses port 8080 and so does 10g XE. Luckily, I found this snippet on how to change the port on 10g XE using sqlplus:-

SQL*Plus: Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production on Tue Aug 26 10:40:44 2008

Copyright (c) 1982, 2005, Oracle. All rights reserved.

SQL> connect
Enter user-name: system
Enter password: <enter password if will not be visible>
Connected.
SQL> Exec DBMS_XDB.SETHTTPPORT(9090); [Assuming you want to have HTTP going to this port]

PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.

SQL>quit
Disconnected from Oracle Database 10g Express Edition Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production

Lovely! Didn't have to fiddle about in the internal of QC. Always something to be avoided if at all possible!

Bill Oddie outed!

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:18:00 +0000

I think someone in Tesco knows Bill Oddie very well and is trying to tell us something.

Michael Winner

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 19:01:00 +0000

That Michael Winner nearly ran me over in London. To be fair, it was his chauffeur that nearly ran me over. Still, how can I hold a grudge against a chauffeur? Better to hold a grudge against the employer. Michael, how dare you!

I only remembered this because Michael turned up on a advert on the telly and they are really annoying.

Communal Capitalism

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 00:27:00 +0000

I watched the fall of the Berlin wall and the prediction of the fall of communism. I thought that this observation might end up as the high point of Western European and US capitalism. Why did I think this?

I remember reading an article about the battle of Agincourt which pointed out that this battle was the first documented occasion where someone was killed by a gun. The point of this observation is that Agincourt is considered to be the high point of the use of the longbow.

So, the high point of the longbow also pointed the way to its eventual successor. So it would seem with the Western world's system of capitalism.

Fedora 10 Video Driver

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 11:07:00 +0000

I downloaded and installed Fedora 10 yesterday. I've been playing with Linux, and specifically Red Hat, since about Red Hat 5 or 6. So, when a new release comes out, I have to grab it and have a play.

I got a MacBook Air back in April and around that time I messed up my installation of Fedora 9, so I stopped using it and started using my MacBook almost exclusively. The problems with Fedora 9 started when I decided to install the 64 bit version of the OS. It was only then that I discovered that Adobe do not provide a 64 bit version of Flash Player, so I had to install the 32 bit version of Firefox to get Flash to work. This seemed to drag loads of other 32 bit packages along for the ride, when I later added the Livna repository this just caused a nightmare and I ended up with a broken Firefox.

So, along comes Fedora 10 and now is the time to sort things out. I back up my home directory to a USB drive and perform a completely new install. First impressions is that it's a shorter process than before! That's because you don't get to make some of the choices that you had previously. One choice that you lose is the configuration of SELinux. I'm sure SELinux is great if security is a major concern, but to a casual tinkerer like me, it just adds to the possible list of OS things that stops other things working so, post install, I turned it off and rebooted. That was ok.

One of the first things I like to do is to get a DVD to play. This is one of Fedora's difficulties. Adding DVD support is sailing close to the wind with regards to patent encumbered software and, out of the box, Fedora doesn't support it. I seem to remember that Fedora 9 quickly took you off to the Fluendo website, where you could purchase additional codecs. This didn't happen this time. I decided to add the Livna repository to the package manager. Here I found out about RPM Fusion, which is combo of a number of Fedora repositories. Hopefully, this effort will produce less compatibility problems in the future. I installed a number of packages that I thought would enable DVD support, all without success. Eventually I downloaded and installed mplayer from their subversion repository and tried that. Still no luck! Although this time, mplayer read the disc and played a soundtrack. I seemed to be going (slightly) in the right direction.

After Fedora 10 was up and running, one of the first things I did was to try and enable 'Desktop Effects' but this did not work. In the past I could only get this feature to work if I installed the NVIDIA Linux driver from their website. So, I grabbed the driver and installed it. This time desktop effects worked AND the DVD players I installed all started to play DVDs! Hooray!

So, moral of the story, unless you are really hung up on open drivers best go and get the driver from the chip vendor's site and get the best out of your hardware.

Mounting ISOs in Linux

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:30:00 +0000

I posted about a Microsoft utility to allow you mount an ISO image directly, without the intermediate step of burning a CD or DVD.

Someone commented about how this scores points over Linux. Not so, Linux has this feature built in. No need for an extra download. Its part of the 'mount' command options. Check it out! Alright I'll spell it out: -

If you've got an iso image called image.iso and you want to put it at /place/to/mount then use:

mount -o loop image.iso /place/to/mount

In the Netherlands, Santa is Spanish and has a pal...

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:18:00 +0000

Er, don't really know what to say...

For any UK readers, no, that's not the Chuckle brothers. Thank God.

What were they thinking about in the kitchen?

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 11:48:00 +0000

Here's a dessert that got at a Chiquita's restaurant at Cardiff Bay a couple of months ago. I think that the chef must have been looking forward to some entertainment of some kind later in the evening while they were slapping the bits and pieces together on the plate.

Signs and Wonders!

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 11:42:00 +0000

This strange image was formed from condensation inside the glass panel of an empty bus shelter advertising panel near Amsterdam. I think the message is that rodent/human hybrids will inherit the Earth!

Time for a beard?

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 10:46:00 +0000

Wouldn't it be just so much fun to look like Hannibal Lecter while you're shaving and afterwards look really gay?

If that's really your secret desire that you really need to check out http://www.goateesaver.com

Could be the best $20 you ever spent!

No need to burn a DVD for using iso image files.

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 14:36:00 +0000

Check out this handy utility from Microsoft that allows you to mount an ISO file as a CD/DVD and use it without the need to burn it to a disk first - winxpvirtualcdcontrolpanel

Here's the README:
Readme for Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel v2.0.1.1

THIS TOOL IS UNSUPPORT BY MICROSOFT PRODUCT SUPPORT SERVICES

System Requirements
===================
- Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional

Installation instructions
=========================
1. Copy VCdRom.sys to your %systemroot%\system32\drivers folder.
2. Execute VCdControlTool.exe
3. Click "Driver control"
4. If the "Install Driver" button is available, click it. Navigate to the %systemroot%\system32\drivers folder, select VCdRom.sys, and click Open.
5. Click "Start"
6. Click OK
7. Click "Add Drive" to add a drive to the drive list. Ensure that the drive added is not a local drive. If it is, continue to click "Add Drive" until an unused drive letter is available.
8. Select an unused drive letter from the drive list and click "Mount".
9. Navigate to the image file, select it, and click "OK". UNC naming conventions should not be used, however mapped network drives should be OK.

You may now use the drive letter as if it were a local CD-ROM device. When you are finished you may unmount, stop, and remove the driver from memory using the driver control.

Oh Dear! Tell me better things Mr. iPhone

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 10:41:00 +0000

I need to do some work in the garden this weekend. Then, next week, I'm off to Amsterdam on Wednesday and I'll be there Mon - Fri for the next 3 weeks. Looks like I'm going to get v. wet.

I'm going to level with you....

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 10:31:00 +0000

I just love the appstore for the iPhone. Many of the apps are just plain daft, but I actually made use of one that I downloaded last week. You never realise how important getting everything level is until you've always got a bubble level in your pocket where ever you go!

Talk Like a Pirate

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 20:54:00 +0000

I forgot about it. Whahhh! September was a crazy month and I forgot! Boo Hoo! Always next year I suppose.

Cyber-laundry!

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 20:31:00 +0000

These Dutch people are very inventive. Forget cybercafes, in Amsterdam you can surf and wash!

Why not!

Hard work these blog things

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 20:00:00 +0000

God! Over a month since I last posted something. Must get my finger out and punish the world more regularly. So, what exciting things have I discovered in the last month.

Well, don't judge a website by its address for one thing. Go and a have a look at http://twatface.com. Oh, and BTW - Peter Petrelli shot Nathan Petrelli. I'm watching series 3 of Heroes as I'm typing this. Dumbledore is gay, the woman in the Crying Game is a guy and Bruce Willis in 'The Sixth Sense' is dead from the start! And the only safe place to keep your money is the Bank of Pig.

Gone but not forgotten

noreply@blogger.com (Mark Ferguson) — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 15:53:00 +0000

Clive Grummet parted company with Applabs and its remarkable owner, Sashi Reddi, over 1 year ago and moved on. However, his opinion is obviously well respected, why else would they keep his profile page available for everyone to read: http://www.applabs.com/html/CliveGrummettInterview_267.html?

Does anyone want to know my opinion of Sashi Reddi?

Better not.....