Samba shares are easy enough to browse to, with the gui, but it's a lot more convenient having it mounted in a local folder. Also, I've found many programs that aren't able to see samba shares, even though the OS can.
First, let's test and see if it will do a temporary mount with this command....
mount -t smbfs //servername_or_IP/file_store /home/user/Desktop/file_storage
Use sudo above, if you're using Ubuntu, or other distros that don't have root active by default.
This will prompt for username and password. Enter one if necessary, or leave blank if you have anonymous access. Once you enter credentials, you should be able to browse to your local folder and see all your files.
To mount it permanently, you will have to add a line to your file /etc/fstab.
This file is what tells Linux what drives you want mounted on bootup. Use gedit, nano, or similar program of your preference to open and edit fstab. You need to add a line similar to these, depending on your exact setup......
For anonymous access, add a line like this. Your Samba share has to be setup to allow anyone to access it. (I'll provide that config at the end) This allows you to mount the share without providing credentials.
//servername_or_IP/file_store /home/user/Desktop/file_storage smbfs guest
To mount a samba share with credentials, you just need to provide the username and password like so.
//servername_or_IP/file_store /home/user/Desktop/file_storage smbfs username=username, password=password
If you're a security nut, or just plain paranoid, you may want to provide your credentials in a separate file.
//servername_or_IP/file_store /home/user/Desktop/file_storage smbfs credentials=/root/.smbcredentials
You can also place dmask=777, fmask=777 at the end of the fstab line to alter the credentials it mounts the folders and files with.
Here's how a typical samba share configuration should look to access it anonymously. This is typically stored in the file /etc/samba/smb.conf
[global]
workgroup = workgroup_name
local master = yes
preferred master = yes
netbios name = storage
server string = storage
security = SHARE
max log size = 1000
dns proxy = No
wins support = Yes
wins server = localhost
[File_Storage]
comment = file-storage
path = /mnt/hda/share/file_storage/
read only = No
writeable = Yes
create mask = 0777
directory mask = 0777
guest ok = Yes
In the global section, "security = SHARE" is the main key to anonymous browsing.
The other line that's key is in the individual share cofiguration of File_Storage.
"guest ok = Yes"
Without those two lines, you'll be banging your head against the wall for hours trying make your share work for anyone, without requiring credentials.
Note: This really isn't the best way to do things as far as security goes. But in my case, convenience wins over security. I have a firewall. My wife wants quick easy access to a large storage drive, as do I. I don't feel the data we're storing on there is of high value to anyone else. But, you'll have to evaluate these things for yourself.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
The high price of running "legacy" hardware.
A lot of people seem to stick with their old hardware because they can't afford new hardware, or they think it's too expensive to buy / build a new computer.
Let's say I have a system with a Pentium 3 Processor that requires pc133 memory required by that architecture. Most likely, the system will have very little memory, especially by today's standards. If you go to a site like Newegg, $50 may at first look like a bargain for 512MB of memory. That is, until you look at prices of newer types of ram and realize you can get 2GB of DDR2 for the same price. It's almost impossible to find 1GB modules of memory for these older systems, as that was unheard of at the time. Even if you were able to find them, most motherboards at the time didn't support that large of memory modules. Then you start to look around at prices of everything else, and realize that computer components are dirt cheap these days. You can get a dual core AMD processor that will completely smoke your ol' P3 for a mere $56. Of course you'll have to get a motherboard and memory that will go with the processor, but you can get a Foxconn or similar motherboard with everything (sound, video, NIC) integrated for around $50.
Most likeley, you're waiting around a lot with your current system, especially if you're trying to run a more modern OS than Windows 98. Trying to upgrade your old system just isn't worth the price and hassle, for the amount of processing power you're going to end up with. New components are typically much more power efficient than old components as well, and will help reduce your carbon footprint and your electricity bill.
Next on the agenda is CRT monitors. These beasts were big, bulky, and consumed a large amount of power. If you're still using one of these, you could probably cut your electric bill by at least $25/month just by upgrading to a more power efficient LCD. LCD's are just as good or better quality than CRT's, and they're easier on your eyes. Refresh rates of 60hz on a CRT would cause a lot of eye strain, but that's a thing of the past with LCD's unless you have the brightness set way too high.
Another aspect that many may not think of is virtualization. I have a system that's powerful enough to run my OS, plus any other virtualized os's I may want or need to run at the time. This also saves me money, since I don't have to have extra test servers running, sucking up electricity and heating up the room. I've tested all sorts of OS's this way including Fedora, Ubuntu, Windows Vista, PCBSD, and any other beta release I feel like testing at the time. It saves me a lot of time, trouble, and hardware to just load them up as VM's, instead of using physical servers. Virtualization on an old P3 just wouldn't be that feasible.
So really, the best thing to do with those old systems is to donate them to a charity or school, and fork out the cash for some shiny new hardware. You'll appreciate that you did once you start using it and see all the advantages.
Let's say I have a system with a Pentium 3 Processor that requires pc133 memory required by that architecture. Most likely, the system will have very little memory, especially by today's standards. If you go to a site like Newegg, $50 may at first look like a bargain for 512MB of memory. That is, until you look at prices of newer types of ram and realize you can get 2GB of DDR2 for the same price. It's almost impossible to find 1GB modules of memory for these older systems, as that was unheard of at the time. Even if you were able to find them, most motherboards at the time didn't support that large of memory modules. Then you start to look around at prices of everything else, and realize that computer components are dirt cheap these days. You can get a dual core AMD processor that will completely smoke your ol' P3 for a mere $56. Of course you'll have to get a motherboard and memory that will go with the processor, but you can get a Foxconn or similar motherboard with everything (sound, video, NIC) integrated for around $50.
Most likeley, you're waiting around a lot with your current system, especially if you're trying to run a more modern OS than Windows 98. Trying to upgrade your old system just isn't worth the price and hassle, for the amount of processing power you're going to end up with. New components are typically much more power efficient than old components as well, and will help reduce your carbon footprint and your electricity bill.
Next on the agenda is CRT monitors. These beasts were big, bulky, and consumed a large amount of power. If you're still using one of these, you could probably cut your electric bill by at least $25/month just by upgrading to a more power efficient LCD. LCD's are just as good or better quality than CRT's, and they're easier on your eyes. Refresh rates of 60hz on a CRT would cause a lot of eye strain, but that's a thing of the past with LCD's unless you have the brightness set way too high.
Another aspect that many may not think of is virtualization. I have a system that's powerful enough to run my OS, plus any other virtualized os's I may want or need to run at the time. This also saves me money, since I don't have to have extra test servers running, sucking up electricity and heating up the room. I've tested all sorts of OS's this way including Fedora, Ubuntu, Windows Vista, PCBSD, and any other beta release I feel like testing at the time. It saves me a lot of time, trouble, and hardware to just load them up as VM's, instead of using physical servers. Virtualization on an old P3 just wouldn't be that feasible.
So really, the best thing to do with those old systems is to donate them to a charity or school, and fork out the cash for some shiny new hardware. You'll appreciate that you did once you start using it and see all the advantages.
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Hardy Heron fixes hard coded color scheme
Just a quick note. I've been testing Hardy Heron since it went beta. Everything seems to be working really well. I just noticed today that the hard coded color scheme as referenced in my previous article (http://happylinuxthoughts.blogspot.com/2007/12/out-with-brown-on-ubuntu.html) that was in previous Ubuntu releases has been fixed. When you change the color scheme of the desktop, and the background color of the login screen, everything works just like it should instead of having a momentary brown background that doesn't match your color scheme.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
OpenSuse 11.0 Alpha 2, Initial Reaction
I've been a fan of the Suse distro for quite some time now, even though it's not my primary distro of choice. I thought I would download the alpha and see how things are coming along.
The installation process was almost identical to 10.3. In fact, most of the screens still showed that it was 10.3. The only difference was the look of the installer. I have to say, it does look quite nice. I was impressed when I was even able to choose my time zone by clicking on the map and zooming to my location.
I picked the gnome desktop to install, because that's what I've grown accustomed to and seems to be the standard these days. It was pretty obvious that it was in alpha stage when I wasn't able to open the system menu by left clicking. I instead had to right click and choose open. Other than that, everything seemed to be shaping up nicely. Being that yast is the main config tool for Suse, you would think it would be on the main menu, but you actually have to go looking for it in more applications. I think that's an oversight of the developers. I'm sure a lot more changes are coming for the gnome side of things, because it looked kind of half and half 10.3/11.0.
The installer doesn't give you the option to install both gnome and kde, so I had to go into yast, and choose all the kde packages. I was curious to see how kde 4 is coming along, so I installed it. Overall kde 4 looks pretty good. I don't like how the menus function though. To expand the menus, you have to click, and then it kind of slides over, and to get back you have to click back. I would say the whole menu system looks pretty nice but is a huge step back in functionality.
If you're going to install the distro at this point, I highly recommend using a virtual machine. You're probably gonna keep it around long enough to check out the new features and test the software. But, I wouldn't say it's completely usable at this time. And, that's not what it was intended for, by developers (That's why it's still Alpha)
Enjoy
The installation process was almost identical to 10.3. In fact, most of the screens still showed that it was 10.3. The only difference was the look of the installer. I have to say, it does look quite nice. I was impressed when I was even able to choose my time zone by clicking on the map and zooming to my location.
I picked the gnome desktop to install, because that's what I've grown accustomed to and seems to be the standard these days. It was pretty obvious that it was in alpha stage when I wasn't able to open the system menu by left clicking. I instead had to right click and choose open. Other than that, everything seemed to be shaping up nicely. Being that yast is the main config tool for Suse, you would think it would be on the main menu, but you actually have to go looking for it in more applications. I think that's an oversight of the developers. I'm sure a lot more changes are coming for the gnome side of things, because it looked kind of half and half 10.3/11.0.
The installer doesn't give you the option to install both gnome and kde, so I had to go into yast, and choose all the kde packages. I was curious to see how kde 4 is coming along, so I installed it. Overall kde 4 looks pretty good. I don't like how the menus function though. To expand the menus, you have to click, and then it kind of slides over, and to get back you have to click back. I would say the whole menu system looks pretty nice but is a huge step back in functionality.
If you're going to install the distro at this point, I highly recommend using a virtual machine. You're probably gonna keep it around long enough to check out the new features and test the software. But, I wouldn't say it's completely usable at this time. And, that's not what it was intended for, by developers (That's why it's still Alpha)
Enjoy
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Just one more reason I can't stand Windows Vista
The task: remotely set up a customer's openvpn client to connect to an openvpn server on windows vista. (on xp, this is a simple task)
Problem: vpn client won't connect.
Resolution: slightly improved; vpn now connects, but doesn't route traffic properly. Must contact vendor for further vista insight.
Due to the "Security" features of vista, it doesn't allow a vpn client to function, unless it's run by Administrator. Funny thing is, the account we were logged in as was supposedly an administrator.
First thing I had to do was show hidden files, and known file extensions. The process was changed for vista for no apparent reason, just like most everything else in vista.
The next thing I had to do was an msconfig. Then I had to select the vpn client, go to properties, and checkmark the "run as administrator" box. After that, a reboot, and the client was able to connect to the vpn and ping the vpn ip address, but traffic wasn't routed correctly. Not able to resolve the routing issue, we now have to contact the vendor for further support and suggestions.
Sounds simple enough, but it took a lot of google searching and experimentation. I see all this as completely unnecessary crap, since it would be a 5 minute task in Linux, even though Linux is a much more secure OS.
Personally, I think that Vista will be passed over in the corporate sector because of all the support hassles it will cause.
Problem: vpn client won't connect.
Resolution: slightly improved; vpn now connects, but doesn't route traffic properly. Must contact vendor for further vista insight.
Due to the "Security" features of vista, it doesn't allow a vpn client to function, unless it's run by Administrator. Funny thing is, the account we were logged in as was supposedly an administrator.
First thing I had to do was show hidden files, and known file extensions. The process was changed for vista for no apparent reason, just like most everything else in vista.
The next thing I had to do was an msconfig. Then I had to select the vpn client, go to properties, and checkmark the "run as administrator" box. After that, a reboot, and the client was able to connect to the vpn and ping the vpn ip address, but traffic wasn't routed correctly. Not able to resolve the routing issue, we now have to contact the vendor for further support and suggestions.
Sounds simple enough, but it took a lot of google searching and experimentation. I see all this as completely unnecessary crap, since it would be a 5 minute task in Linux, even though Linux is a much more secure OS.
Personally, I think that Vista will be passed over in the corporate sector because of all the support hassles it will cause.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Secure system to system file copies without Samba or NFS
What if you need to copy files from one system to another, but don't want to bother with setting up file shares (SAMBA or NFS)? It's actually very quick and simple.
All you need is the scp command. The tricky part is getting the syntax correct, but I'll help you with that. For this example, let's just say you're copying a file from one user's desktop to another user's desktop. Here's how you would do it.....
scp filename username@remotesystem:/home/username/Desktop/
Once you provide this command, it will ask you for the password on the remote system. Of course you need the correct credentials or it will fail.
Now, if you want to copy from the other system to your system, you can do that as well, with a quick command line switch.
----
scp -r filename username@remotesystem:/home/username/Desktop/filename .
----
Keep this command all together. Long commands tend to breakup in small formats like this.
The -r indicates that you're copying from the remote system to the local system instead of the other way around. Also, the period at the end of the command indicates that you're copying to the current directory. Without a destination directory, the command will not work, so this is important. You could put any location there as long as you have proper permission. Enjoy.
All you need is the scp command. The tricky part is getting the syntax correct, but I'll help you with that. For this example, let's just say you're copying a file from one user's desktop to another user's desktop. Here's how you would do it.....
scp filename username@remotesystem:/home/username/Desktop/
Once you provide this command, it will ask you for the password on the remote system. Of course you need the correct credentials or it will fail.
Now, if you want to copy from the other system to your system, you can do that as well, with a quick command line switch.
----
scp -r filename username@remotesystem:/home/username/Desktop/filename .
----
Keep this command all together. Long commands tend to breakup in small formats like this.
The -r indicates that you're copying from the remote system to the local system instead of the other way around. Also, the period at the end of the command indicates that you're copying to the current directory. Without a destination directory, the command will not work, so this is important. You could put any location there as long as you have proper permission. Enjoy.
Thursday, December 6, 2007
Out with the Brown on Ubuntu
To change themes completely to a different color in Ubuntu should be trivial and take only a couple of clicks. It seems though that there is a bug that prevents the background screen from changing colors. I'm going to go through the process of changing everything to a different color.
The first place we need to go is the "System", "Preferences", and "Appearance" menus. Select the background tab. From there I pick the solid color, and then select an alternative color. (Blue, in my case) You can of course download a wallpaper and use that as well. Then select the theme tab to choose a non-brown theme.
The next place we need to go is "System", "Administration", and "Login Window" menus. Select the
local tab. Once there, I chose the Happy Gnome theme and changed the background color to blue.
That should be the only steps required to get rid of all the brown. However, while logging on, the brown background still persists. After searching for a while, I did find a fix.
The script /etc/gdm/PreSession/Default is at fault.
You can download a version that fixes the background color like this:
wget http://ubuntu.freehostia.com/Default
Then just copy that to the original directory, restart your session, and the brown will be gone.
Because you shouldn't just blindly copy files into your system without knowing what's in them, here's a comparison of the two files, showing what's been changed. I used the program TkDiff to display the output you see here. The original file is on the left, while the new file is on the right.
That's all she wrote.
The first place we need to go is the "System", "Preferences", and "Appearance" menus. Select the background tab. From there I pick the solid color, and then select an alternative color. (Blue, in my case) You can of course download a wallpaper and use that as well. Then select the theme tab to choose a non-brown theme.
The next place we need to go is "System", "Administration", and "Login Window" menus. Select the
local tab. Once there, I chose the Happy Gnome theme and changed the background color to blue.
That should be the only steps required to get rid of all the brown. However, while logging on, the brown background still persists. After searching for a while, I did find a fix.
The script /etc/gdm/PreSession/Default is at fault.
You can download a version that fixes the background color like this:
wget http://ubuntu.freehostia.com/Default
Then just copy that to the original directory, restart your session, and the brown will be gone.
Because you shouldn't just blindly copy files into your system without knowing what's in them, here's a comparison of the two files, showing what's been changed. I used the program TkDiff to display the output you see here. The original file is on the left, while the new file is on the right.
That's all she wrote.
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