• Dell Server Workstation iDRAC Dead after Firmware Update Solution R720, R320, R730


    This is certainly a poor design, as you can read many seasoned admins who have updated their iDRAC only to have it killed. One possible cause is not by doing all the incremental updates, doing updates from an old iDRAC to one many revisions newer is a sure way to kill things, but even then there is no guarantee based on the amount of failures. List of threads of people's dead iDRAC's:........
  • efibootmgr: option requires an argument -- 'd' efibootmgr version 15 grub-install.real: error: efibootmgr failed to register the boot entry: Operation not permitted.


    This sometimes happens when trying to install the EFIversion of grub to a device when you are booted into Legacy/MBR mode. It doesn't seem to occur on all machines, but some and seems somewhat BIOS dependent. grub-install --target=x86_64-efi /dev/sda Installing for x86_64-efi platform. grub-install.real: warning: Couldn't find physical volume `(null)'. Some modules may be missing from core image.. grub-install.real: warning: Couldn't find physica........
  • du - VAS Billing Subscriptions Hack/Scam MLPremiumSub Invascom Astromart Issues Complaint


    If you have du, you may want to check your bill, as you can read about a longstanding issue with fraudulent charges showing up and many users claiming they did not subscribe or solicit those offers. These don't normally show up on new accounts, but they seem to target established users and maybe even users they suspect are not watching their phone or bills, while they are on vacation. These charges can frighteningly happen with 0 interaction from the user despite what........
  • apache2 httpd apache server will not start [pid 22449:tid 139972160445760] AH00052: child pid 23248 exit signal Aborted (6) solution Mint Debian Ubuntu Redhat


    If you get this error, it is often because you have configured Apache with modules that weren't actually installed. Eg. you try to load the PHPmodule but didn't actually install the apache2 php module, so the server can't start. In general, this error can often be caused by issues with problematic modules and/or Apache being configured for modules that have not actually be installed (eg. libapache2-mod-php) is missing. The above results in this less than obv........
  • Linux grub not using UUID for the root device instead it uses /dev/sda1 or other device name solution


    You can read lots of posts about this issue but there is not much information about why this is the case or how grub determines the root= device name. Some even suggest modifying grub.cfg manually which is a disaster as the next kernel update will cause grub to revert back to the device name. For most people this won't be an issue but those using template system, automated deployments and working in embedded may run into this issue with custom embedded and created minimal kernel........
  • /var/log/journal huge/too large solution in Debian Mint Ubuntu Linux Howot Fix


    Is your /var/log/journal overweight and bloated? For example a decent install of Debian 11 with most applications and services ends up being about 4.9G with the journal taking a few gigs. du -hs /var/log/journal/ 1.3G /var/log/journal/ By default in a lot of distributions there is no maximum size so it will keep growing. This is especially problematic for embedded distributions and devices, but is also a huge waste of sp........
  • SSH cannot connect to old servers/devices/switches/routers/Cisco/Juniper Unable to negotiate with 192.168.20.2 port 22: no matching key exchange method found. Their offer: diffie-hellman-group-exchange-sha1,diffie-hellman-group14-sha1,diffie-hell


    A lot of older devices either support telnet or very old SSH keyx algorithms which are insecure and disabled by all newer/modern SSH clients for security reasons. However, sometimes you may be on a LAN via VPNor some other secured network or for whatever reason, absolutely, need to connect to this device and sometimes old/embedded devices may not be possible to update to a newer SSH server. If you run into this you may be using a modern/newer SSH client and get thi........
  • Linux how to compile binary with static sharedobjects embedded instead of dynamic to use on multi-distributions and avoid glibc compatiblity issues


    One simple flag to configure will create a makefile that statically links all the shared objects and embeds them instead the binary execute. This means as long as you have the same architecture that things should run. Eg. if you have an old version of Debian with a different version of glibc, then this will solve that problem. ./configure LDFLAGS="-static" To test that it is really statically linked run ldd: ldd src/wget........
  • SSH How To Create Public/Private Key Pair and with a Larger Keysize than 2048 bits


    The problem is that by default ssh-keygen loves to generate an easy to crack 2048 bit key (RSA). Supposedly having a larger keysize helps such as 4096 or 8096 but it is thought to be useless still against Quantum computing. How can I check my existing keysize and type? ssh-keygen -lf /path/to/your/id_rsa.pub The output will be something like below followed by the hash. The first number is the key size and the second part will b........
  • Cisco Unified Communications Manager 12 Install Errors on Proxmox/KVM


    The strange thing is that usually the first install or two will work on any new machine but then it suddenly won't. I had this experience on QEMU 2.13 on a different machine. There is something finicky or buggy about the CUCM installer even when choosing the same virtual hardware specs. qemu-kvm command: /usr/libexec/qemu-kvm -version QEMU PC emulator version 0.12.1 (qemu-kvm-0.12.1.2-2.506.el6_10.1), Copyright (c) 2003-2008 Fabrice Bellard ........
  • tftp Linux xinetd verbose logging


    It is much more useful to have meaningful and detailed logging from tftp to see what is or isn't happening especially for VOIPand other embedded device appications: Edit the file: vi /etc/xinetd.d/tftp Change the server line like this: server_args = -s /var/lib/tftpboot........
  • LUKS Hard Drive Encryption on Linux Mint Ubuntu Debian etc how to mount encrypted hard drive


    The key thing here is to know the actual partition that is encrypted. Often in Linux Mint's installer that ends up being partition 5 or /dev/sda5 sudo cryptsetup luksOpen /dev/sda5 anynamehere You will then be prompted for your irrecoverable passphrase: Enter passphrase for /dev/sda5: If all goes well it won't say anything further. If it says ""No key available with this passphr........
  • PHP Displaying Blank Page on Apache


    Almost always the reason will be that the php.so file is missing but also that php.conf is misconfigured. In the problem machine it is actually PHP7 installed so if you reference PHP5 of course things wil be broken! Take for example here: cat /etc/httpd/conf.d/php.conf # # PHP is an HTML-embedded scripting language which attempts to make it # easy for developers to write dynamica........
  • VMWare Vsphere VCSA Graphical Install Creates json


    yes it does create its own json ============================================ cat /tmp/vcsaUiInstaller/ovftool-20180809-175238948-20180809-175603497.log |grep -i json 2018-08-09T17:56:04.238-07:00 verbose OVFTool[30966] [Originator@6876 sub=Default] Manifest file entry: SHA1(VMware-vCenter-Server-Appliance-6.7.0.12000-8832884_OVF10-file1.json) = 1deb658c724767697587d5909c4051c01813e6a1 --> ........
  • ./xmr-stak: error while loading shared libraries: libmicrohttpd.so.10: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory


    The solution is just to install libmicrohttpd-dev ./xmr-stak ./xmr-stak: error while loading shared libraries: libmicrohttpd.so.10: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory libmicrohttpd libmicrohttpd10 - library embedding HTTP server functionality libmicrohttpd-dbg - library embedding HTTP server functionality (debug) libmicrohttpd-dev - library embedding HTTP server functionality (development) $ sudo apt-get i........
  • OVF Tool: Error: Task failed on server: This host does not support Intel VT-x. VMWare VCenter install On ESXi ERror


    Intel VT-X is enabled in Virtualbox but it doesn't seem to pass through the needed vmx extension despite the following variables on the host confirming it is enabled: cat /sys/module/kvm_intel/parameters/nested Y cat /sys/module/kvm_intel/parameters/ept Y OVF Tool: Disk progress: 99% OVF Tool: Transfer Completed OVF Tool: Powering on VM: Embedded-vCenter-Server-Appliance- OVF Tool: Task p........
  • VMWare 6.7 VCSA VSphere ESXi Management SSO Install Guide on Linux using the CLI


    #mount the VCSA DVD mount /dev/sr0 /mnt/cd #alternatively you could mount the iso directly mount -o loop vcsa.iso /your/mount/path #for this purpose we are using the CLI installer on Linux cd /mnt/cd/vcsa-cli-installer/lin64 #no it's not going to be that easy you can't just run vcsa-deploy like that you need to use a template or configured .json file ./vcsa-deploy Usage: vcsa-deploy [-h] [--version] [--supported-deploymen........
  • Nvidia Linux Mint/Ubuntu screentearing horizontal line solution


    Finally after ages I found the solution which is on many pages on the net but not obvious and should have been standard or more common info! Instant Solution: Type this into the terminal (unfortunately the driver config menu doesn't have the option as itis hidden): nvidia-settings --assign CurrentMetaMode="nvidia-auto-select +0+0 { ForceCompositionPipeline = On }" Make permanent Cli........
  • Openshot 2.2 is very unstable always crashing in Linux Mint 18.1!


    Jun 1 15:45:42 videoeditor-desktop org.mate.panel.applet.MintMenuAppletFactory[1882]: project_data:INFO Missing folder chosen by user: Jun 1 15:45:42 videoeditor-desktop org.mate.panel.applet.MintMenuAppletFactory[1882]: project_data:INFO Removed missing file: MAH02949.MP4 Jun 1 15:45:57 videoeditor-desktop org.mate.panel.applet.MintMenuAppletFactory[1882]: ui_util:WARNING Icon theme media-playback-start not found. Will use backup........
  • How to create openssl md5 password hash to use in /etc/shadow using bash


    Very useful in embedded and other non-standard deployments. The above makes a random salt of 14 random characters from /dev/urandom (you can change the -14 to whatever number of characters you want for your salt). openssl passwd -1 -salt `< /dev/urandom tr -dc _A-Z-a-z-0-9 | head -c${1:-14};echo;` YourPassword Output: $1$eW-ScuyL$f/iKMJ5mbJ..7bSzvX6EO0 How To Create Password Has........
  • Centos installing grub problems suspect gpt problem


    grub> root (hd0,0) root (hd0,0) Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0xfd grub> setup (hd0) setup (hd0) But if you do: root (hd1,0) setup (hd1) it does work, I think hd0/sda had a GPT partition that was not removed properly (what I did was just dd bs=512 count=1 the partition table from another drive since the partition table should be identical). Checking if "/boot/grub/........
  • Centos 6 how to guide convert LVM non-RAID into mdadm 1/10 RAID array live without reinstalling


    Here is the scenario you or a client have a remote machine that was installed as a standard/default minimal Centos 6.x machine on a single disk with LVM for whatever reason. Often many people do not know how to install it to a RAID array so it is common to have this problem and why reinstall if you don't need to? In some cases on a remote system you can't easily reinstall without physical or KVM access. So in this case you add a second physical or disk or already ha........
  • Dell CS24-NV7 lspci dmidecode info


    0000:00:00.0 RAM memory: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 Memory Controller (rev a2) 0000:00:01.0 ISA bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 LPC Bridge (rev a3) 0000:00:01.1 SMBus: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 SMBus (rev a3) 0000:00:02.0 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 USB Controller (rev a1) 0000:00:02.1 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 USB Controller (rev a2) 0000:00:05.0 IDE interface: NVIDIA Corporation MCP55 SATA Controller (rev a3) 0000:00:05.1 I........
  • Howto Convert Xen Image to KVM


    #count=10000 makes an image of 10000MB make sure your image is at least the same as your existing dd if=/dev/zero of=yourimage.img bs=1M count=10000 # losetup -fv newimage.raw # fdisk -cu /dev/loop0 # kpartx -a /dev/loop0 # dd if= of=/dev/mapper/loop0p1 # e2fsck -f /dev/mapper/loop0p1 # resize2fs /dev/mapper/loop0p1 # a lot of guides tell you to edit /etc/fst........
  • Dell FS12-NV7 2U Server Information and Guide


    I've got one of these for testing projects from work at home and got more than I bargained for with the time I've spent on it due to the storage handing/Perc 6/i cards. My particular model came with the following: 2U Rack Mount Server with Rails 2xOpteron 2373 EE (Quad Core, there is a 6-core version that can be found at times) 16GB RAM 2 x 250GB Seagate SATA 2 x Dell Perc 6/i (horrible and a nightmare to work........
  • Linux/Debian shutdown/reboot without going through init force


    -bash-3.1# shutdown -rn now Connection to localhost closed by remote host. Connection to localhost closed. Sometimes I work with embedded systems/custom kernels without any of the fancy init scripts and other common Linux basics that most would expect. This means that often the "reboot" command (which uses an init script) will never work, not only that but it will hang the server and a manual power cycle or reboo........
  • How to install GRUB to the MBR of a disk image.


    cat | grub --device-map=/dev/null Now pay close to the attention of the beginning. Type: "device (hd0) VPS.img" this is telling what hd0 will be to GRUB and we're telling it the disk image file "VPS.img" in the current directory is hd0, you can specify alternate paths and image names of course. GNU GRUB version 0.97 (640K lower / 3072K upper memory) [ Minimal BASH-li........
  • How to Encode all VOBs from a DVD/Bluray VIDEO_TS folder into an XVID


    In my case I already copied the VIDEO_TS folder to my hard drive. Here is the command for mencoder: mencoder -dvd-device "myvideobackup/VIDEO_TS" dvd:// -ovc xvid -oac mp3lame -lameopts cbr:br=128 -xvidencopts pass=2:bitrate=-700000 -o myvideobackup.avi Replace "-dvd-device myvideobackup/VIDEO_TS" with the location of your backup files or the /dev device of your DVD drive. The -o myvideobackup.avi is of course the name o........
  • GRUB Solution to error "Error 6: Mismatched or corrupt version of stage1/stage2"


    GNU GRUB version 0.97 (640K lower / 3072K upper memory) [ Minimal BASH-like line editing is supported. For the first word, TAB lists possible command completions. Anywhere else TAB lists the possible completions of a device/filename.] grub> root (hd1,0) Filesystem type is ext2fs, partition type 0xfd grub> setup........
  • Revert to GRUB 0.97/1 instead of GRUB2


    had trouble trying to revert Ubuntu 10.04 LTS from grub2, won't boot mdraid and did not even install mdadm during the installation! I have tried moving back to GRUB 0.97 backed up original /boot and then copied /boot from an old Debian install. Modified device.map and menu.lst and put the appropriate kernels and initrd for Ubuntu back in /boot I ran grub: root (hd0,1) grub> setup (hd0) Checking if "/boot/grub/stage1........
  • FUSE/Curlftpfs mount ftp account as drive partition in Linux


    This is a great way to use your ftp server space, for example on your web hosting account (althoughI believe many hosts don't allow storage like this), but if you have a VPS/Dedicated Server etc.., this would be perfect. Imagine how easy it is to work with an ftp account that you can just mount as a normal partition or directory in Linux, it would be great for backups etc.. Name curlftpfs - mount a ftp host as a local directory Synopsis........
  • Asus O!Play cannot access network/workgroup shares


    It always worked fine before but no amount of power unplugging/cycling does any good. I can access one network share and that is one that I've already saved, but it can't see any workgroups. One silly thing is why is there no option to manually connect to a netbios name or IP? It seems there is a bug with the firmware and that the SMB client is not working properly. Hopefully it fixes itself at some point. Between this and the lack of support for embedded s........
  • Latest Articles

  • How high can a Xeon CPU get?
  • bash fix PATH environment variable "command not found" solution
  • Ubuntu Linux Mint Debian Redhat Youtube Cannot Play HD or 4K videos, dropped frames or high CPU usage with Nvidia or AMD Driver
  • hostapd example configuration for high speed AC on 5GHz using WPA2
  • hostapd how to enable and use WPS to connect wireless devices like printers
  • Dell Server Workstation iDRAC Dead after Firmware Update Solution R720, R320, R730
  • Cloned VM/Server/Computer in Linux won't boot and goes to initramfs busybox Solution
  • How To Add Windows 7 8 10 11 to GRUB Boot List Dual Booting
  • How to configure OpenDKIM on Linux with Postfix and setup bind zonefile
  • Debian Ubuntu 10/11/12 Linux how to get tftpd-hpa server setup tutorial
  • efibootmgr: option requires an argument -- 'd' efibootmgr version 15 grub-install.real: error: efibootmgr failed to register the boot entry: Operation not permitted.
  • Apache Error Won't start SSL Cert Issue Solution Unable to configure verify locations for client authentication SSL Library Error: 151441510 error:0906D066:PEM routines:PEM_read_bio:bad end line SSL Library Error: 185090057 error:0B084009:x509 certif
  • Linux Debian Mint Ubuntu Bridge br0 gets random IP
  • redis requirements
  • How to kill a docker swarm
  • docker swarm silly issues
  • isc-dhcp-server dhcpd how to get longer lease
  • nvidia cannot resume from sleep Comm: nvidia-sleep.sh Tainted: Linux Ubuntu Mint Debian
  • zfs and LUKS how to recover in Linux
  • [error] (28)No space left on device: Cannot create SSLMutex Apache Solution Linux CentOS Ubuntu Debian Mint