IT Dude´s Random Thoughts

New Ruby based Linux Cloud Automation Suite Announced!

2012-01-18T15:01:00.002+11:00

Couple of friends I have in the business have gathered together to create their own automation suite in protest against the poorly designed and implemented offerings currently available.

They have called the project, Cryogen and its premise is to provide a means of automating system admin tasks in the Linux space. Essentially it contains a number of independent services which handle everything from deployment, monitoring, patching, decommissioning and reporting.

Currently the project is in its infancy but from the small demo I had recently it appears to be coming along very nicely. So far it can handle Redhat and Debian based distribution deployments along with patching and basic reporting.

A lot of the pieces employed are based on industry standard application stacks such as Puppet, Kickstart, Cobbler and Ruby on Rails.

If you would like more information head over to their sign up page at cryogen.kickofflabs.com

Apple blocked from calling an iPad an iPad in China!

2011-12-08T15:11:00.001+11:00

APPLE Inc has lost a trademark dispute in China, where it had accused Proview Technology (Shenzhen) of infringing on its iPad trademark.

A Chinese court has ruled in favour of Proview - a unit of Proview International Holdings Ltd - that they are the lawful owners of the "iPad" name, as far back as 2000 for use in China and other countries, MarketWatch reported.

Proview's Taiwan based unit had sold the "global trademark" to a UK-based company called IP Application Development for £35,000 ($55,104) in 2006, the Shanghai Daily reported. That company then transferred the trademark to Apple.

But Proview Technology (Shenzhen) says the trademark for China's mainland market was not included in that agreement because the company's Taiwan unit did not own it at the time.

Proview is seeking $1 billion-plus compensation from Apple for copyright infringement.The court agreed, ruling that the Shenzhen-based company holds the rights to the iPad trademark in the Chinese market, the Dailyreported.

source

2011-10-21T11:38:00.000+11:00

CentOS 5.6 + Windows 2003 R1 Active Directory authentication with LDAP

I wanted to share another small recipe on how to setup CentOS 5.6 to authenticate Linux users against Windows 2003 Server (Not R2). However this time with LDAP instead of Samba.

The main reasons why you would like to use LDAP instead of Samba/Winbind:
- You do not need Microsoft Client Access Licences (CALs). At least it is not checked :)
- No need to use Samba (if you do not like for a reason or another).

Active Directory server preparation

AD server needs some preparation before it can be used in this setup. You need to have Windows 2008 R2 CD/DVD around for some steps.

Run adprep /forestprep from the Windows 2008 R2 disc.
Run adprep /domainprep from the Windows 2008 R2 disc.
Install Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7 with Service Pack 1 aka RSAT. You need to install ADUC (Active Directory Users And Computers) ie. AD DS + AD LDS Tools and GPMC (Group Policy Management Console) parts of it. RSAT can be found here.
Edit with the tools you just installed each AD user that you need available in unix and make sure they have following parameters set:
- uidNumber (some id number which is free in unix, e.g. 1000)
- uid (userid: e.g. hkroger)
- gidNumber (the id of the user's main group, e.g. 1000)
- loginShell (e.g. /bin/bash)
- unixHomeDirectory (e.g. /home/hkroger)
- sAMAccountName (userid: e.g. hkroger)
Every group should have:
- gidNumber (the numeric id of the group, e.g. 1000)
Create a new user called unixauth with some password. This will be used for LDAP connection itself.

Setup LDAP

Let's install necessary packages and setup basic auth config setup:

# yum install nss_ldap openldap-clients pam_ccreds -y

# authconfig --enableldap --enableldapauth --ldapserver=192.168.1.1

--ldapbasedn="DC=mycompany,DC=local" --disablesmbauth --disablewinbind --disablewinbindauth

--disablewins --enablepreferdns --enablecache --enablemkhomedir --kickstart --update

Then let's create a new /etc/ldap.conf file

cat <<EOF > /etc/ldap.conf

uri ldap://192.168.1.1:389/

ldap_version 3

binddn unixauth@MYCOMPANY.LOCAL

bindpw myunixauthuserpassword

ssl off

scope sub

nss_base_passwd DC=MYCOMPANY,DC=LOCAL?sub?&(objectClass=user)(uidNumber=*)

nss_base_shadow DC=MYCOMPANY,DC=LOCAL?sub?&(objectClass=user)(uidNumber=*)

nss_base_group DC=MYCOMPANY,DC=LOCAL?sub?&(objectClass=group)(gidnumber=*)

nss_map_objectclass posixAccount user

nss_map_objectclass shadowAccount user

nss_map_objectclass posixGroup group

nss_map_attribute gecos sAMAccountName

nss_map_attribute homeDirectory unixHomeDirectory

nss_map_attribute shadowExpire accountExpires

nss_map_attribute shadowLastChange pwdLastSet

nss_map_attribute uniqueMember member

timelimit 5

bind_timelimit 5

idle_timelimit 5

bind_policy hard

nss_reconnect_tries 1

nss_reconnect_sleeptime 1

nss_reconnect_maxsleeptime 8

nss_reconnect_maxconntries 2

nss_initgroups_ignoreusers root,ldap,named,avahi,haldaemon,dbus,radvd,tomcat,radiusd,news,mailman,nscd,gdm

tls_cacertdir /etc/openldap/cacerts

pam_password ad

debug 0

EOF

If you want to make a special group of users also sudoes you can enable a group in sudoers file like this. In our example the group is called unix_admin:

grep -q unix_admin /etc/sudoers || echo %unix_admin ALL=\(ALL\) ALL >> /etc/sudoers

Next we need to tweak system authentication files so that LDAP is actually used:

cat <<EOF > /etc/pam.d/system-auth

auth required pam_env.so

auth sufficient pam_unix.so nullok try_first_pass

auth requisite pam_succeed_if.so uid >= 500 quiet

auth [authinfo_unavail=ignore success=1 default=2] pam_ldap.so use_first_pass

auth [default=done default=die] pam_ccreds.so action=validate use_first_pass

auth [default=done] pam_ccreds.so action=store

auth [default=bad] pam_ccreds.so action=update

auth required pam_deny.so

account required pam_unix.so broken_shadow

account sufficient pam_localuser.so

account sufficient pam_succeed_if.so uid < 500 quiet

#account [default=bad success=ok user_unknown=ignore] pam_ldap.so

account [authinfo_unavail=ignore default=bad success=ok user_unknown=ignore] pam_ldap.so

account required pam_permit.so

password requisite pam_cracklib.so try_first_pass retry=3

password sufficient pam_unix.so md5 shadow nullok try_first_pass use_authtok

password sufficient pam_ldap.so use_authtok

password required pam_deny.so

session optional pam_keyinit.so revoke

session required pam_limits.so

session optional pam_mkhomedir.so

session [success=1 default=ignore] pam_succeed_if.so service in crond quiet use_uid

session required pam_unix.so

session optional pam_ldap.so

EOF

sed -i -e 's/^passwd:.*/passwd: files ldap [NOTFOUND=return]/g' /etc/nsswitch.conf

sed -i -e 's/^shadow:.*/shadow: files ldap/g' /etc/nsswitch.conf

sed -i -e 's/^group:.*/group: files ldap [NOTFOUND=return]/g' /etc/nsswitch.conf

And finally we configure the caching daemon to keep data for 7 days and then restart it. The great idea here is that if there is no connection between your server and the AD server, you can still login onto your server:

sed -i /etc/nscd.conf -e 's/^.*positive-time-to-live.*passwd.*/ positive-time-to-live passwd 604800/g'

sed -i /etc/nscd.conf -e 's/^.*positive-time-to-live.*group.*/ positive-time-to-live group 604800/g'

sed -i /etc/nscd.conf -e 's/.*reload-count.*/ reload-count unlimited/g'

/etc/init.d/nscd restart

And that's it! You should be now able to login onto your CentOS server with your Windows AD account.

Check for more info:
http://www.theillien.com/Sys_Admin_v12/html/v13/i05/a2.htm
http://www.flyn.org/laptopldap/
http://wuhai.wordpress.com/2009/01/23/rhel4u6-and-pam_ccreds/

Distribute.IT Domain Reseller Hacked and Taken Down!

2011-06-15T09:17:00.000+10:00

The company - best known as a domain name registrar - said in a post to its Twitter account that it had been the victim of a "very deliberate, coordinated & malicious attack".

It reported on Monday morning (13 June) that engineers had "started running malicious file system tools across known exploited servers while rebuilding header information where corruption to headers has been found."

source

Apple Sues Samsung, Saying Galaxy Phones and Tablets Too Close To iPad and iPhone Design | Ina Fried | Mobilized | AllThingsD

2011-04-20T13:21:00.000+10:00

In the latest intellectual property suit to hit the smartphone industry, Apple is suing Samsung, alleging the Galaxy line of phones and tablets infringe on a number of the company’s patents and trademarks.

The suit, filed on Friday in U.S. District Court in Northern California, alleges patent and trademark infringement, as well as unfair competition. Apple is seeking injunctions, actual damages and punitive damages, as well as a finding that the alleged infringement was willful.

Apple Sues Samsung, Saying Galaxy Phones and Tablets Too Close To iPad and iPhone Design | Ina Fried | Mobilized | AllThingsD

Samsung Galaxy S Android 2.3 Gingerbread Update

2011-04-20T11:56:00.000+10:00

Samsung have released the latest Android 2.3 Gingerbread Kernel update to their Galaxy S mobile phone series. Since Saturday the 16th April 2011 the update has been rolling out via Samsungs' Kies software suite to those in the Nordic countries. The update will be available in other regions over the course of the next few weeks. source

Installing VirtualBox (Guest Additions) on Ubuntu Server 10.10

2011-04-15T17:30:00.003+10:00

To install Guest Additions on Ubuntu Server 10.10+, you need to do the following:

sudo apt-get install dkms
sudo apt-get install build-essential

Go to the Virtualbox Devices entry on the menu bar of the guest OS and select Install Guest Additions… , this will load the Guest Additions ISO CD image.

Change directory to media

cd /media

You will likely find a sub directory called cdrom in this directory. You can list the sub directories using the `ls` command. If not create it

sudo mkdir cdrom

this will become our mount point

Mount the Guest Additions ISO to the mount point

sudo mount /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom

Now change to the cdrom directory

cd /media/cdrom

Display the directory contents i.e. the ISO image

ls

Depending on whether you are running a 32bit or 64bit OS, run the relevant installer. In this case 32bit so enter

sudo ./VBoxLinuxAdditions-x86.run

Note:

You will get an error saying “Could not find X.org or Xfree.86 on the guest system”. This is because we are running the server edition and have not got an window manager e.g. KDE or GNOME installed!

If the process complains that DKMS could not be used to build the new kernel then you may need to run the following command to install the linux-headers manually

sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r)

How to monitor hard drive health in linux

2011-04-06T09:58:00.000+10:00

Used this article I found recently to test my hard drive health. Turns out the hard drive is fine but the USB cable it was connected with was dodgy. I was experiencing "usb 2-1.1: reset high speed USB device using ehci_hcd and address 5" messages all the time. After replacing the cable the messages disappeared!

more info

WaveMaker has been acquired by VMware!

2011-04-04T16:56:00.000+10:00

VMware has bought WaveMaker, which provides a rapid development platform that aims to make it easier for non-technical people to build and maintain Java applications.

The acquisition, announced on Tuesday 8th March 2011, should ensure that the application development environment, which is also called WaveMaker, is integrated and developed in line with the virtualisation company's Spring Java framework.

"WaveMaker makes Java Point and Click — you can build a web application without using a single acronym!" Peter Wayner, InfoWorld Product Review

more info

How to add a program / directory to your PATH, Ubuntu /Debian

2011-02-14T11:17:00.000+11:00

Every once and a while you need to add a program or directory to your path variable. Adding something to your PATH makes life easier because you dont have to type out the full path to the executable rather you can reference the executable directly ie instead of /usr/bin/ls you can simply run ls (note /usr/bin should already be in your PATH).

Anyway, the means of adding the variable differs but generally the consensus is you should add the directive to your .bashrc file as it applies to both the cli and the gui environment.

You will find your .bashrc file in your home directory. To edit it type

gedit ~/.bashrc

This will open the file in gedit ready for you to edit

Scroll to the bottom of the file and add

PATH=$PATH:/some/path/you/would/like/to/add;export PATH

Save this file. You may need to reopen your terminals or relogin for it to take affect. This will add the "/some/path/you/would/like/to/add" path to your PATH environment variable. Now any binary you have residing in this path will be available directly.

Convore Released!

2011-02-10T15:12:00.002+11:00

A new social web tool, Convore, was released yesterday, 9th Feb 2011.

According to their site: "Convore is the best way to communicate with groups in real-time. You can join an existing group or create your own. Then post topics and have conversations with friends about those topics.

Convore is lovingly made in San Francisco by the three Erics: Eric Florenzano (ericflo), Eric Maguire (etmaguire), and Leah Culver (leah)."

Convore is interested in groups and group-based apps, including the communication aspects of this medium. The site is designed with each topic having its own chat room, in a smaller group, for those folks who are interested in specific topics.

How to build an Amazon S3 Client with Oracle Application Express 4.0 White Paper Available

2011-02-10T13:12:00.001+11:00

Jason Straub has released a whitepaper detailing how to build an Amazon S3 Client with Oracle Application Express 4.0. Interesting reading and a great resource

Application Express Nuggets: Building an Amazon S3 Client with Application Express 4.0 White Paper Available

louisgray.com: Most Bloggers Don't Deserve Any Ad Revenue

2011-02-10T12:13:00.000+11:00

Just reading up on the blogging community as of today and found this interesting article posted in 2008. Seems not much has really changed even in the last 3 years!

louisgray.com: Most Bloggers Don't Deserve Any Ad Revenue: "There are millions of bloggers out there today, screaming for their 'fair' share of the advertising pie. And while Google rakes in cash from vendors by the billions, some smaller bloggers are crying foul at the perceived inequalities. But it's more likely they are getting exactly what they deserve when it comes to ads - pennies. They would be better served to pull the ads off their site altogether and find different ways to make money, because for most, blogging will never get them what they want."

How to create an Alias in Windows Command Shell

2011-02-10T10:27:00.001+11:00

Windows cli supports command aliases similar to *nix. Microsoft refers to these aliases as macros.

To alias the string "ls" to the dir command, helpful for most unix admins, use:

doskey ls=dir

The variable $* can be used in an alias to pass all of the arguments entered after the alias.

Chrome OS revisited: 2 months later - Computerworld Blogs

2011-02-10T09:44:00.000+11:00

ComputerWorld takes a look at Chrome OS, Google's new Cloud Operating System, two months after release.

Chrome OS revisited: 2 months later - Computerworld Blogs

Zimbra 7 Released

2011-02-09T08:22:00.001+11:00

The latest installment of Zimbra has hit the Web! Zimbra, is a full-featured collaboration suite that supports email, group calendars and document sharing using an Ajax web interface that enables tool tips, drag-and-drop items, and right-click menus in the UI. Zimbra also provides native two-way sync to many mobile devices.

This latest release, Zimbra 7, is the first major release since 2009 when the company was still owned by Yahoo Inc. According to this ServerWatch.com article

"The VMware Zimbra team worked closely with both Zimbra and VMware customers over the last year to prioritize the Zimbra 7 release," John Robb, senior director of Zimbra products and marketing, VMware (NYSE: VMW) told InternetNews.com "VMware is very supportive of open source, community based development, and Zimbra 7 demonstrates our commitment."

The Zimbra 7 release is the first release since Zimbra 6 came out in September 2009. Zimbra 6 was the last major release of Zimbra under Yahoo (NASDAQ: YHOO) ownership. Yahoo acquired Zimbra for $350 million in September 2007.

The Zimbra 7 release includes improved file sharing capabilities that enable users to store and share files in the cloud using the Zimbra briefcase. From an administration perspective, the release includes enhanced delegation capabilities to control permissions and access. As well, there are new policies for load balancing and automatic recovery of Zimbra servers.

Check out the Zimbra Homepage for more info

Salesforce Acquires DimDim Open Source Web Conferencing

2011-02-08T22:43:00.002+11:00

DimDim, a software company that provides a web-based platform for real-time, rich-media collaboration and meetings, was acquired recently by Salesforce.com. Dimdim provides free web conferencing service where users can share desktops, show slides, collaborate, chat, talk and broadcast via webcam.

According to the Salesforce.com announcement, DimDim was acquired for $31 million US on Jan 6th 2011. Marc Benioff, chairman and CEO, salesforce.com proclaimed:

“The acquisition of Dimdim will help salesforce.com deliver to the enterprise the same integrated collaboration and communication experience that made Facebook the world’s most popular Internet site.”

Read more - Salesforce.com press release

Two open source forks of the DimDim software base has been started at miDmiD (google code homepage) and DimSim (gitHub)

Last IP4 Address Pool assigned

2011-02-04T12:01:00.001+11:00

ZDNet reports:

The online overseers bid adieu to the last 83.9 million addresses needed to bring devices online, marking the occasion as "one [of the] most important days in the history of the internet".

"This is one [of the] most important days in the history of the internet. A pool of more than 4 billion internet addresses has just been emptied this morning," said Rod Beckstrom, chief executive of the Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).The internet is wired with a technology called Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4), which comes with 4.3 billion addresses to send data from one computer to another. That's a lot, but it's not enough, so now the move to the vastly more accommodating IPv6 is beginning in earnest.

More info - ZDNet

Dell introduces new Dell Venue, 4.1 Inch Android 2.2 touchscreen smartphone

2011-02-04T11:56:00.001+11:00

Hot on the heels of their new 7 inch Streak Tablet, the Dell Venue is now on sale direct from Dell's US Store, unlocked for US$499.99 and shipping on February 18. There are no indications of an Australian release date yet.

The Venue cuts the QWERTY keyboard of its Windows phone cousin, the Venue Pro, but runs Android 2.2, has a 4.1-inch WVGA touchscreen protected with Gorilla Glass, an 8 megapixel camera, 1 GHz processor, 512 MB of RAM, Wi-Fi, GPS, 3G, and Bluetooth 2.1.

It will be running its own skinned version of Android, known as Stage. Dell is touting this as perfect for entertainment, with streaming radio stations and downloading books and music. It will also come with access to the Android Market, so you can add more options. With Android 2.3 already under development and Dell's history of running older versions of the Android OS, we can only hope they keep this model updated.

More Info at Engadget, ThinkGeek and IntoMobile

Android Developers Blog: New Merchandising and Billing Features on Android Market

2011-02-04T11:40:00.002+11:00

Google has added the ability for Android App developers to provide billing options in their applications. This means developers can now offer finer grain payment options such as per use, upgrades and trial-to-full version options.

from Android Developer Blog:

After months of hard work by the Android Market team, I am extremely pleased to announce the arrival of In-app Billing on Android Market. This new service gives developers more ways to monetize their applications through new billing models including try-and-buy, virtual goods, upgrades, and more.

The In-app Billing service manages billing transactions between apps and users, providing a consistent purchasing experience with familiar forms of payment across all apps. At the same time, it gives you full control over how your digital goods are purchased and tracked. You can let Android Market manage and track the purchases for you or you can integrate with your own back-end service to verify and track purchases in the way that's best for your app.

Android Developers Blog: New Merchandising and Billing Features on Android Market

Google adds ability to search and download Android apps from the Desktop

2011-02-04T11:37:00.000+11:00

Google announced today the general availability of the Android market for the Web. This means for the first time Android users are not restricted to searching the market from their device. Users are now able to search from an Web enabled machine capable of running a browser and gives the user the ability to tag the application for download to their Android powered device over the air. Note however this does not mean you can use the Android Web market to download Android apps to your desktop nor can they be used on your desktop.

This is a great step forward in market penetration from Google's perspective. Apple have run a similar site that links directly to iTunes for further details. Google's offering on the other hand provides details directly in the browser without the need for extra software.

Android Market on the Web
Starting today, we have extended Android Market client from mobile devices to every desktop. Anyone can now easily find and share applications from their favorite browser. Once users select an application they want, it will automatically be downloaded to their Android-powered devices over-the-air.
Android Market on the Web dramatically expands the discoverability of applications through a rich browsing experience, suggestion-guided searching, deep linking, social sharing, and other merchandising features.
We are releasing the initial version of Android Market on the Web in English and will be extending it to other languages in the weeks ahead.
If you have applications published on Android Market, we encourage you to visit the site and review how they are presented. If you need additional information about what assets you should provide, please visit Android Market Help Center.
You can access Android Market on the Web at:
http://market.android.com/

Which development board to use? A quick review of development boards today

2011-02-02T11:58:00.001+11:00

I have been getting into hardware development pretty heavily the last few months. I have been working in partnership with a Satellite systems company developing a SCADA type system for industrial applications like mining and transport. I found this little review of the available development boards from the guys at HackADay.com. Check it out if your keen to learn a little more about hardware development. They cover all the usual suspects including the popular Arduino and BeagleBoards

Intel announces flaw in recently released Sandy-Bridge Chipsets

2011-02-01T13:46:00.001+11:00

In some cases, the Serial-ATA (SATA) ports within the chipsets may degrade over time, potentially impacting the performance or functionality of SATA-linked devices such as hard disk drives and DVD-drives. The chipset is utilized in PCs with Intel's latest Second Generation Intel Core processors, code-named Sandy Bridge. Intel has stopped shipment of the affected support chip from its factories. Intel has corrected the design issue, and has begun manufacturing a new version of the support chip which will resolve the issue. ...

For computer makers and other Intel customers that have bought potentially affected chipsets or systems, Intel will work with its OEM partners to accept the return of the affected chipsets, and plans to support modifications or replacements needed on motherboards or systems. The systems with the affected support chips have only been shipping since January 9th and the company believes that relatively few consumers are impacted by this issue. The only systems sold to an end customer potentially impacted are Second Generation Core i5 and Core i7 quad core based systems. ...

For the first quarter of 2011, Intel expects this issue to reduce revenue by approximately $300 million as the company discontinues production of the current version of the chipset and begins manufacturing the new version. Full-year revenue is not expected to be materially affected by the issue. Total cost to repair and replace affected materials and systems in the market is estimated to be $700 million.

Coverage on Anandtech, Tech Report and PC Perspective.

Panasonic FT3 | PhotographyBLOG

2011-02-01T09:03:00.003+11:00

I want check this out when it comes out...

Looks like a half decent camera.

The Panasonic DMC-FT3 is a new rugged digital compact camera. The 12.1 megapixel FT3 (also known as the Panasonic TS3) is waterproof to 12m, shockproof to 2m, freezeproof to -10 degrees C and dustproof. The FT3 also has a 4.6, 28mm wide-angle zoom lens, 1920 x 1080 full-HD movie recording, 3D photo Mode, GPS functionality, a compass, altimeter and even a barometer. The price and availability of the Panasonic DMC-FT3 are still to be announced. Panasonic FT3 | PhotographyBLOG

NAB online banking goes down - Business - News

2011-01-31T15:47:00.001+11:00

NAB online banking goes down - Business - News

The National Australian Bank is down again today after a multiple day outage only months recently. source