Thornlaid path to debian home server.

Building GNOME3 (gnome-shell) from source.

2011-12-18T18:45:00.003+02:00

Instructions provided at http://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell are pretty straightforward and despite the gnome-shell-build-setup.sh script running good and all, and even after installing all the missing libraries, which it had kindly suggested, you may come across some runtime errors from the automake.

They probably will look similar to:

libtool: Version mismatch error. This is libtool 2.4, but the
libtool: definition of this LT_INIT comes from libtool 2.4.2.
libtool: You should recreate aclocal.m4 with macros from libtool 2.4
libtool: and run autoconf again.
make[4]: *** [wm-tester] Error 63
make[4]: Leaving directory `/home/user/gnome-shell/source/mutter/src/wm-tester'
make[3]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/home/user/gnome-shell/source/mutter/src'
make[2]: *** [all] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/user/gnome-shell/source/mutter/src'
make[1]: *** [all-recursive] Error 1
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/user/gnome-shell/source/mutter'
make: *** [all] Error 2
*** Error during phase build of mutter: ########## Error running make *** [26/49]

[1] Rerun phase build
[2] Ignore error and continue to install
[3] Give up on module
[4] Start shell
[5] Reload configuration
[6] Go to phase "wipe directory and start over"
[7] Go to phase "configure"
[8] Go to phase "clean"
[9] Go to phase "distclean"
choice:

Or:

configure: error: Package requirements (gmodule-2.0 gthread-2.0 gobject-introspection-1.0 >= 0.10.1 glib-2.0 >= 2.31.0 gobject-2.0 >= 2.18.0 mozjs185) were not met:

No package 'mozjs185' found

Consider adjusting the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable if you
installed software in a non-standard prefix.

Alternatively, you may set the environment variables GJS_CFLAGS
and GJS_LIBS to avoid the need to call pkg-config.
See the pkg-config man page for more details.

Even if the error you get differs, it should become obvious what to do next and what is causing the problem. Most probably the cause will be library incompatibility, which is to be expected, because the gnome-shell-build script uses over 40 different software packages, which depend on different other packages, which in turn are constantly in development, so some of them should be built manually from latest source, as it had yet made it into your distribution's repository.

So all you have to do is look carefully into the error you get:

libtool: Version mismatch error. This is libtool 2.4, but the
libtool: definition of this LT_INIT comes from libtool 2.4.2.

So, I need to get libtool 2.4.2

user@box:~$ sudo apt-get install libtool
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
libtool is already the newest version.
libtool set to manually installed.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
user@box:~$

Well, obviously it is not the newest version.
Google the "libtool" and you get the link to ftp right away.
Search for the latest or required version. 2.4.2 in my case and download it. Extract.

cd path/to/extracted/files

./configure

make

sudo make install

make clean

Everything should finish without errors because all other dependencies have had been resolved when you got libtool from the repository.

Now return to original error dialogue and choose

[7] Go to phase "configure"

This will force to clear all build files that had been created and build process will start over and the new libtool-2.4.2 library will be used.

Upgrade to 2.6.37 kernel

2011-03-15T00:25:00.003+02:00

Upgrading to new kernel version 2.6.37 had brought some problems:

Nvidia drivers on mainpc had to be upgraded and recompiled.
Radeon on serverpc had some firmware for Realtek missing:

Possible missing firmware /lib/firmware/rtl_nic/rtl8168d-2.fw

thus there was no video in raw console as well.

However, dealing with them both was pretty easy:

1: Nvidia drivers.
Log in to Console (ALT+CTRL+F1)

$ sudo service gdm3 stop

$ links ftp://download.nvidia.com/XFree86/

choose the latest ones and download. ALT+F - for links menu.

$ sudo nvidia-uninstall

follow the wizards prompts

$ sudo apt-get purge nvidia-*

$ sudo apt-get install gcc g++ linux-headers-`uname -r`

$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg

$ sudo sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-270.30.run

substitute the version, of course. Follow the prompts and you're done. Reboot if you wish to

$ sudo reboot

2: Realtek/Radeon firmware.
In GRUB menu chose any working previous version of kernel to boot.
Get the required packages:

$ sudo apt-get install realtek-firmware firmware-linux-nonfree

Update your new kernel:

$ sudo update-initramfs -k 2.6.37-<your architecture> -u

And thats it =)

Reboot to your 2.6.37 kernel. All this, I presume, is due to implementation of a mechanism to detect screen resolution and set it for console. Meaning: console has default resolution of 1248x1024 for me. Nice and clean.

Configuring Samba

2011-03-13T01:55:00.002+02:00

After reading the book for a while I've had realized, that I will not be able to 'simply' configure and set up everything in one go even. Most likely I will have to edit, re-edit and probably at some point in time will have to re-write the /etc/samba/smb.conf which I will create now.

Moreover, it came to my attention, that Samba version 4 is in rapid development and, despite the almost complete rewrite of the source code and still being in the Alpha phase since 2005, probably will have been implemented as a standard file&print sharing protocol by the 2012 or so. As much as I would love to participate in the testing and helping the developers by providing maybe useful feedback, I can't locate a more or less comprehensive to me documentation -- I'm not that much of an experienced Linux user. Sad but true.

Onward with configuration. As I have already installed Samba, SSH from Debian repositories, and my yet-to-be-server can be addressed as 'server' from the terminal, I can begin:

$ ssh server@serverpc

Syntax is simple: connect as_user=server at pc=serverpc, which has an 192.168.1.100 IP. Enter user password and voila.

Samba package comes with the default configuration settings file (despite being heavily commented is rather hard to grasp at a quick glance) which I am going to store as a backup and write a new one:

$ cp /etc/samba/smb.conf ~/smb.conf.original

$ sudo echo "" > /etc/samba/smb.conf

Configuration file consists of [sections] which contain all required settings, in case not mentioned there, Samba defaults are assumed, which in turn are usually secure enough. However, they require additional setup anyway.

So all in all:

[global]

workgroup = home

encrypt passwords = yes

security = user

Workgroup should be the name of all PCs you have on the network, which already are in a same workgroup.
Encrypt passwords is a default setting, which has a rather long development background and reasons to be here.
Security may be either share, user, domain, ads which are Samba's security modes with different presets.

[share]

path = /store/

read only = Yes

writable = No

This, and any other section I will add later, has A LOT of possible settings, however, these are the main ones and are self-explanatory. The rest are assumed to be defaults by Samba and are hidden.

For this share to actually exist:

$ mkdir /store

$ chmod 1777 /store

To check any misspelled words and general consistency:

$ sudo testparm

Samba's built-in mechanism to self-check. If any errors did occur, output will show so.

Due to the chosen security mode, samba requires a user list who can access the shares.

$ sudo smbpasswd -a $USER

New SMB password:

Retype new SMB password:

Adds yourself to the smbpasswd program, which controls the user access to the samba-server. All other users from your network should be added as well, by replacing variable $USER with a corresponding username.

To check that everything works:

$ smbclient //serverpc/share

Enter password:

Domain=[HOME] OS=[Unix] Server=[Samba 3.5.7]

smb: \>

Type help for list of available commands. ls for example.

User account and /etc/hosts setup

2011-03-08T22:02:00.002+02:00

Did a bit of reading Samba documentation, turns out it surely will be time-consuming to rewrite /etc/smb.conf from scratch, so, probably will do that tomorrow.
As for now: have to set up a user with all the required privileges and permissions.

4: Adding new user account is pretty straightforward:

$ sudo adduser server --group=root --system

However, I've been thinking about adding a simple user account with no privileges, alas that would be pointless, as nearly all features require root privileges. Editing /etc/sudoers does the trick, if a non-root account already exists:

$ sudo echo "user ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL" >> /etc/sudoers

5: /etc/hosts
The file is designed to be human readable and contains a list of keywords with values that provide various types of resolver information. Values being IP addresses and keys - domain names.
So by adding

192.168.1.100 server

on main PC and

192.168.1.101 mainpc

on the server PC, system now substitutes http://server/ with an appropriate IP addresses. Useful and prevents some typos indeed.

UFW (Uncomplicated Firewall) setup

2011-03-08T16:50:00.003+02:00

UFW seems to be the best choice for a CL controlled firewall. iptables seem too complicated to me and Firestarter is designed for GTK, which is not installed, and, probably never will be.
So far the plans are:

Install and configure UFW
Install and configure SSH
Install Samba, Transmission
Create a user account which will host all required services and will be used to ssh to and to control things
Configure /etc/hosts to speed up things a bit
Write up the /etc/samba/smb.conf

Have disabled the root account:

$ sudo passwd -l root

1: Install and configure UFW

$ sudo apt-get install ufw

$ sudo ufw allow proto tcp from 192.168.1.101 to any port 22

Allows TCP connection to port 22/ssh from my MainPC (192.168.1.101)

$ sudo ufw deny

Disables all other connections Inbound or Outbound.

$ sudo ufw enable

Enables the firewall and adds to startup script.

2: Install and configure SSH on both PCs

$ sudo apt-get install ssh

Surprisingly enough it did not have to be configured. Security out of the box setup is questionable however.

3: Install Samba, Transmission

$ sudo apt-get install samba samba-common smbclient samba-doc swat transmission-cli transmission-daemon transmission-common

Steps 4,5 and 6 require further reading, so will edit this later.

2011-03-08T15:27:00.000+02:00

Did a bit of googling and came up with several guides, which might help me sort things out.

Ubuntu Server documentation
Using Samba, 2nd Edition By Jay Ts, Robert Eckstein, and David Collier-Brown

I'll be using Samba instead of NFS as I use Win7 on dual boot and when someone visits me their notebooks usually have Win OS too.

As soon as I get firewall set up I am planning on installing SSH for obvious reasons,Transmission to use its Web Interface and probably something to cache Internet radio stations I usually listen to.

I fear transmission will bring a lot of pain due to folder/samba permissions and other possible security precautions. Will have to deal with it later today, as for now - back to reading.

2011-03-07T20:30:00.005+02:00

So, I guess this will be just a test post, to see if I've set up everything right and if it "working as intended (c) BlizzGMs".

So for now my current PCs specs are as follows:

Main PC:

Motherboard: ASUS M2N-SLI Delux on nForce4 chipset
RAM: 800MHz Kingston 2x512MB
HDD: 3 (160, 160 320 GB) drives Seagate 7200rpm
CPU: AMD Athlon X2 4400+
GFX: Nvidia GeForce 8800GT

One I managed to put together:

Motherboard: Probably ASUS, with on a Intel 82945G chipset
RAM: 2x1GB Acer @ donno freq
HDD: 420GB Samsung 7200rpm
CPU: Intel Core2duo 2140 @ 1.60GHz
GFX: ATI Radeon HD2400pro

Both they are connected to a LynkSys Cisco WRT54GCv3 router, which in turn is connected to my ISP's cable.

By this time I'm not too sober to add anything more or less comprehensive at this point, I'll do so tomorrow. Obviously I have a to set up a firewall and a bulletproof user account for the new PC as the

netstat --protocol=inet -pn

gives out quite disturbing info about four foreign IPs connected to port 22:ssh.

Whatever. Will have to wait till tomorrow.