Danny's Space

I'm using Ubuntu 16.04 LTS and I want to use the command line to send messages to my regular email account. There are administrative tasks that sends mail to root / administrator but to simplify my tasks I want these messages to be sent to my regular email account in Gmail. I installed postfix first. #apt install postfix mailutils Then accepted some basic configurations that were prompted when installing postfix.       General type of mail configuration?: Internet Site     System mail name: a hostname that will be used in mail headers, a FQDN is preferred, desktop, home     Root and postmaster mail recipient: root     Other destinations to accept mail for: $myhostname, desktop, localhost.localdomain, localhost     Force synchronous updates on mail queue?: No     Local networks: 127.0.0.0/8 [::ffff:127.0.0.0]/104 [::1]/128 192.168.0.0/24     Mailbox size limit:

Hello Reese I am using the new Wave8 tablet from PLDTHome customer retention. It is fun to use a slightly larger screen. The brightness is different in IPS screens. I have to download the app for neutral brightness. The mail app is fine. The compose window have a bigger keyboard I agree with. No SMS though because this device is WiFi only. But it has android 6 marshmallow so it should be more secure than my zenfone android 5, right? It has 12 GB storage. It is a little cramped.

PLDT Home's customer retention bait is a device called the Wave8. This is a Android Marshmallow device. It has an IPS screen.

Keep Safe Everyone!r           

To find the UUID, use 'blkid' as root. This will generate a list of devices and their respective UUID's. Like so: #blkid /dev/mapper/sda5_crypt: UUID="DLkZz4-D3rH-dODr-eaO3-h1Oa-MLe2-9OVQMz" TYPE="LVM2_member" /dev/mapper/ubuntu--vg-root: UUID="d05b055d-032c-4f91-88d1-f8983d3474f6" TYPE="ext4" /dev/loop0: TYPE="squashfs" /dev/loop1: TYPE="squashfs" /dev/loop2: TYPE="squashfs" /dev/sda1: UUID="3f4ce798-b0c8-4c04-a83d-3628838cb6ca" TYPE="ext2" PARTUUID="68d8d639-01" /dev/sda5: UUID="a0497c16-a3ae-4610-820c-3bb61b52af1f" TYPE="crypto_LUKS" PARTUUID="68d8d639-05" /dev/sdb1: UUID="e3284314-1258-cac3-1b6c-243c748be2fe" UUID_SUB="f30caf8e-a9f4-672c-eb72-113d4520fc53" LABEL="desktop:0" TYPE="linux_raid_member" PARTUUID="8e34b25a-01" /dev/sdc1: UUID="e3284314-1258-cac3-1b6c-243c748b

fstab is a file (actually /etc/fstab) showing the partitions that are automatically mounted by the kernel when it is booted. The kernel reads the fstab file and follows it. It is recommended that instead of a device name, a UUID is used. A UUID is a universally unique identifier for the device. This hexadecimal value doesn't change even as you remove hard drives or replace them, or move their connections around. In other words the hard drives don't get lost in the shuffle. If you have more than one hard drive in the box like me that would be a tremendous help keeping tabs. The fstab lists the root partition and swap partition. Ubuntu plans to use a swap file by Ubuntu 17.04 but fstab rules still applies. Each partition contains the name or UUID, mount point, filesystem type, mount options, etc. Don't worry about the details, fstab is automatically generated for you upon installation. You do get extra points for modifying it for security, and if you have mo

I started my journey in Linux from Windows XP. I spent half the time trying to regain control of my computer. I spent too many minutes checking malware and viruses. I spent too many minutes wondering why my machine is getting slow. Then I ask myself if there's a better way. A better way is not a new GUI. A better way is not surrendering control to the machine and letting it handle the way I work. When I first install a Linux distribution, I was surprised at its speed, then I checked if I can work with the alternative applications. Using Linux is empowering. You figure things out with other people online asking the same questions. Then I read. Then I do and test. Then I learn. I don't create code. I do know how to work a script. I examine logs. Then I read. Then I learn. This is something I wouldn't do if I'm using Microsoft or OSX, although you can code on those platforms.

This is how my wordpress blog appears on the desktop, December 2016. Evoking mystery and unknown adventure with shadows and light. I'm using 2016 theme from the Wordpress resource.

I have smartctl configured to run short tests on all my hard drives but I wonder if it slips one, what would happen. donato@desktop:~$ less /var/log/syslog|grep sdd Dec 14 08:30:31 desktop smartd[1444]: Device: /dev/sdd [SAT], SMART Usage Attribute: 190 Airflow_Temperature_Cel changed from 74 to 68 Dec 14 08:30:31 desktop smartd[1444]: Device: /dev/sdd [SAT], SMART Usage Attribute: 194 Temperature_Celsius changed from 26 to 32 Dec 14 08:30:31 desktop smartd[1444]: Device: /dev/sdd [SAT], old test of type S not run at Sat Dec 10 23:00:00 2016 PHT, starting now. Dec 14 08:30:31 desktop smartd[1444]: Device: /dev/sdd [SAT], starting scheduled Short Self-Test. This is part of the logs in the 14th reporting that indeed smartctl did not run the test once. It started a short test immedietely.

Creatinine, uric acid and triglycerides are still above normal. Prescriptions and medicines. Donato Roque@Asus_Z00AD SMS:639185721710

I am using Ubuntu 16.04 LTS. I was trying to send email from the command line to my Gmail address. So instead of monitoring tools sending info and warning emails to root I want them to arrive in my proper email address. I tried Postfix but after a month of trying to make it work and looking at mail logs, I give up. I removed it and installed ssmtp instead. The configuration is very simple. Open the file: #nano /etc/ssmtp/ssmtp.conf and make sure these appears on the file: mailhub= smtp.gmailaddress.com:587 Authuser=gmailaddress Authpass=AppPassword UseTLS=YES UseSTARTTLS=YES Close and save the file. Then test it with: $echo "Test email for SSMTP" | mail -s "Test Email" gmailaddress.com Check if you receive the email. If not then you could check the mail logs with: #tail /var/log/mail.log

I ordered a 3 TB internal hard drive from Lazada, an online shopping website. I'm paying 4,699 cash on delivery for it. That places this drive at 1.56 per GB. But it would stick out among the 2 TB Hard drives I am already using. My last purchased hard drive is a Seagate 2 TB costing 3,200 cash last July 2016. My oldest hard drive is a Seagate Barracuda 1 TB at least 5 years old but has 31,100 hours on it according to smartctl. If you want a complete information on hour hard drive just type: #smartctl -a /dev/sda The command will print out SMART information gathered from monitoring your hard drives.

After that accidental reboot a few days ago, I keep getting something from the logs. It's about the kernel unable to resolve /dev/sdd1 symlinks, about ata6 fails. This is a drive which is a member of /dev/md0, a RAID5 array I use. I checked the RAID with: $mdadm --detail /dev/md0 and the supposed 3 working devices making up this RAID5 array is now 2, with 1 removed as reported in the logs. This is happening for a couple of days now, sometimes more than once a day. I would add the device back to the array but the kernel will complain about ata6 (/dev/sdd) and remove it from the array. I already checked this hard drive (/dev/sdd 1 TB). SMART marks this hardware OK and I ran an extended self-test on it to satisfy my self. Is this a software or a hardware problem? I opened the desktop box panel so I can inspect the cables for the drives. It's always the cables, it's always the loose connection.

"I read the news today oh boy". VP Leni Robredo resigned her Cabinet job as Housing Secretary. She was sent an SMS from Malacanang that she is not to attend the Cabinet meetings starting December 5 anymore. Perhaps PDuterte figured she's the leak in the Marcos Reinstatement - Bato Call issue. In any case PDuterte cannot work with her anymore. Malacanang *just* sent an SMS to the Vice President. Bastos talaga. Clearly, right from the start the President and the Vice President have differences. First, Leni says *Marcos Is Not A Hero* and PDuterte says by law he deserves a heroes burial. Second, Leni wants the EJK to stop, PDuterte want to intensify and prolong EJK. But I also believe that PDuterte wants another one to sit as Vice President - Bong Bong Marcos. PDuterte has behaved and shown publicly his preference. Leni has resigned the Cabinet but She is elected as Vice President, only the people can remove her from that position.

I accidentally pressed the hardware reset because it's too close to the headphone jacks. I've got big fingers what can I say. So it's a couple of seconds later that I noticed that the computer (the monitor) has restarted. Except that the initial restart sequence is throwing me to a console with a bad ata status:DRDY message. I've seen this before. It's a bad shutdown for one or more of the hard drives / raid device. I checked the status of the RAID device and confirmed it. I've got an inactive array. So I issued: #mdadm /dev/md0 --stop to stop the array and restart it with: #mdadm --assemble /dev/md0 /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdc1 /dev/sdd1 but no go, so again i tried this: #mdadm --assemble --force /dev/md0 /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdc1 /dev/sdd1 I check the status of the array after I started it. #mdadm --detail /dev/md0 root@desktop:~# mdadm --detail /dev/md0 /dev/md0:         Version : 1.2   Creation Time : Tue Sep  6 02:59:21 2016      Raid Level : raid5      Array Size : 19532

NASA wants you. Yes you can send your resume and apply at NASA for Mars duty. They want to hear from you and get future astronauts for long term space vogages. I think you have to convince them that you are 10 for 10 for this trip because it would cost around 55 Billion and cover at least a decade. -- Microsoft love linux. Microsoft is now a member of the Linux Foundation. Why? Because it now makes perfect business sense to play with Linux, that's why. -- The former Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos was hastily buried in the Libingan Ng Mga Bayani after a Supreme Court decision to allow such was handed down. This event is a partial reversal of the People Power Revolution of 1986 when the military, police and civil society staged a revolution to remove Marcos from power. It gives his heirs some political room especially his son Bong Bong Marcos who ran as a VP candidate. -- It's Maly Fiesta in honor of Sta. Cecilia, November 22. Mina joined us fl

An updated operating system is a cornerstone of security. Mozilla Firefox 50 released a few days ago is now available in the Ubuntu repos. My system is configured to update automatically. If you check your logs (e.g. /var/log/syslog) regularly, you probably noticed that Ubuntu checks for available updates several times within the day. I got my notification that a new version is available right from the Firefox browser. No problem I just restart the browser. The browser is a critical piece of software as it is the primary tool we use to connect to networks including the Web. Updating it as soon as possible is important to security overall. Every update brings security patches, performance enhancements and new features.

I've been using my Ubuntu set up since March and downloading stuff from the Internet. I have initially set my logical volumes like these: /dev/mapper/ubuntu-vg/Music-lv 300GB 38% used /dev/mapper/ubuntu-vg/Videos-lv 400GB 83% used My Volume group is 2.05TB I will be needing additional space for Videos-lv. I decided to take the 70% free space available from the RAID5 device. I opened the terminal and typed: #lvextend -l 70%PVS -r /dev/ubuntu-vg/Videos-lv /dev/md0 or #lvresize -l 70%PVS -r /dev/ubuntu-vg/Videos-lv /dev/md0 The -r flag also resizes the underlying filesystem and not just the logical volumes.

     and he is preparing to move with his transition team into the Oval Office. His election is a shock to many political observers and the world in general. Donald Trump, the president-elect, ran against Hillary Clinton, former Secretary of State and for many the most qualified candidate for the presidency in many years. This has led to many post election analysis of how this upset happened. The numbers of votes for each candidate and the comparisons with previous presidential elections point to the fact that the white vote for Mr. Trump is solid all throughout but the minority and black votes did not come for Mrs. Clinton. This is what happened in crucial States like Michigan and Florida. The Republicans kept Congress and the Senate. It is quite notable that Russia and in particular, Vladimir Putin, is happy that they are going to talk to Mr. Trump rather than Mrs. Clinton. It is also a

remembering the departed, across the sunset and the shadows grow. They follow long... and sun, low on the horizon whispers the song that puts you to sleep. posted from Bloggeroid

In the Philippines we remember our departed and pray for their souls today. Donato Roque@Asus_Z00AD SMS:639185721710

This gadgets, this appliances, were elevated to the level of computers, tablets and smartphones without the necessary protection against hacking. Our refrigerators, cameras, DVRs and soon our cars are joining us in the Internet and it is trivial to turn these against us. It looks like a bad start for something so promising. Is connecting and networking these things as hard as hacking them? There's no doubt humans are in the Internet and they would want their things with them. Some of us are just learning to swim and they are loading sharks and other monsters into the pool. How can we turn it around? The gadgets responsible for the DDoS were made by a single manufacturer. So I guess they learned something very important. Have we all learn the lesson?

I updated my Ubuntu machine, a desktop, to the newest kernel updates which includes a security patch to "Dirty Cow". Supposedly Dirty Cow is a vulnerability which if exploited can raise non-root users to root. I also availed of Canonical's livepatching offer for its customers. You can check out this page . Follow the steps and your Ubuntu machines can download and install kernel updates without rebooting. Also if you are running 16.04 LTS then you have defaults for downloading and installing security updates everyday. You don't have to do anything. Your computer will check updates, download them and install it for you in the background.    

Yes I have MS Office but I prefer Libreoffice. :) Boss asked me why I use Libreoffice instead of MS Office. I said I just prefer Libreoffice.

Today's digital world is guarded by keys. Keys in the form of passwords or passphrases or whatever you want to call it. It's about 12 to 15 characters long and without it you lose access to information and communication. You even lose proof of identity. I use Linux and occasionally I forget my administrative password. Here's how to recover from such tragedies. Reboot your computer. Hold the shift key to get to the GRUB menu. What you are after is to boot to the recovery mode of your kernel. Once the menus presents itself use the arrow keys to highlight the particular kernel (recovery mode) and hit enter. You want to be root and again just highlight the particular item on the menu presented. Then press enter. It should drop you to a shell like so: root@desktop:# You are now in a read-only file. To change that type: root@desktop:#mount -rw -o remount /

Hyperuricemia is a health condition where a person has a high level of uric acid. Normal for a man to have less than 400 umol/L or 6.8 mg/dL. Our body regulates uric acid by excreting excess uric acid. Uric acid is a normal by-product of our body metabolism. Our cells need to repair structures and uric acid is the product of such cellular activity. I need to pick food that contain less purines to control dietary cause of high level of uric acid in the blood. Obesity is also closely associated with hyperurecemia as well as hypertension. It is recommended that you see a health expert if you have symptoms related to the disease. posted from Bloggeroid

Sicario is a film about the drug war.  The United States Drug Enforcement Agency created an inter agency task force to go after the drug cartels. They recruited a female FBI agent played by Emily Blunt. Benicio del Toro plays an ex-cartel member with skills in torture and assassination. At first they play team to get closer to the cartel leaders. But Kate Macer, Emily Blunt's character, is a by the book cop against Alejandro's killer-hunter instincts. The level of gore and carnage is up in this one. The opening scene alone gives you a heads up. There's a scene depicting execution and bodies hanging by the rope from an underpass. This is not for your kids. The most intense scene is the shootout on the highway near the border. Benicio del Toro and "Eyeglasses" guy gets out the car in the middle of the traffic. They point their M4 and tells the cartel man to be calm, then shoots. Kate remains inside the car blurting out expletives. It was over in second

A Philippines made up of confident, critical thinkers is a Philippines that knows how to tell fact from fiction, chooses between right and wrong, and, ultimately, unburdens itself of the people who steal power and abuse it. Not only will proper education prevent Filipinos from mistaking satire for truth, but it will also prevent the unsavory events that inspire satire to begin with. – Marguerite de Leon writing for Rappler.com Donato Roque@desktop mobile:  63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP key  for privacy. 

“I think the climax of the book will be the execution of poor old Edgar Derby,” I said. “The irony is so great. A whole city gets burned down, and thousands and thousands of people are killed. And then this one American foot soldier is arrested in the ruins for taking a teapot. And he’s given a regular trial, and then he’s shot by a firing squad.” There are no rhyme or reason in war. No logic except for generals.

-- Donato Roque@desktop mobile:   63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

I do not want to be in the wrong side of the moral equation when it comes to extra-judicial killing. When one is feeling helpless, remember that keeping level headed is important. The most important element of a nation is its people,yet our president sanctions outright murder. That is not acceptable in any civilized society. Free your mind. Open your eyes. Your friends are being killed. Your mother is afraid everytime you go out. She is fearful of your father going out at night. The knock on the door is no longer welcome. The world is full of violence and death. We gave away our peace to a tyrant with bloodlust in his eyes. We shall be going from bad to worse, spiralling downward to the bottom with his every bad decision. More people will die and it won't be a faceless, unknown but a friend or a loved one. posted from Bloggeroid

I've been obsessed with sharing my desktop files over the home network to all the devices connected to my home router. I finally did it once as I said here. Since then, after several reinstalls and wipes of hard drives, I lost the configuration file for the original system. In short I can't make it work. I've forgotten how I did it exactly. It turns out that samba and my samba configuration files aren't to blame. I was doing firewall configuration files with my rkhunter setup. I noticed that I don't have any entry for samba. I added my samba rule in the firewall. I checked my smartphone file manager and there it is my shares automatically appearing and ready for use. No login required. The firewall rule is: #ufw allow samba -- Donato Roque@desktop mobile:   63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my pgp

This is not going away soon. Will you give up this kind of power? To take life without answering for it? -- Donato Roque@desktop mobile:   63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

Using Ubuntu 16.04 with RAID and Logical Volumes. I am adding Disk Encryption to my skill set. After using the Fedora 24 installer to do all of these in one night (and day) of operating system installation fiesta, I am now trying to finish the same thing using the Ubuntu installer this early morning. There's a power loss of about 30 seconds. It happens in the very early morning. Some power engineer decided to test a new hardware or to pull out an equipment for servicing in the wee hours of the morning while I'm in the middle of resyncing my RAID. I heard the sigh of the fan motors. I checked the status of the RAID - inactive, okay. Then bring it back on, right? I had to continue the resync somehow so I went back to the mdadm man pages. #mdadm -assemble --update=resync /dev/md0 /dev/sdb1... /dev/sdd1  This returns a message that my component devices are BUSY. Are they just trying to ignore me? Not at this ungodly hour, okay. So I have to stop the devices. #mdadm /dev/md0 --stop

I had to reinstall my linux operating system with an existing LVM over RAID. During the install I formatted one of the physical volumes PV. I used it for / (root), swap and /boot partitions. I could have used the existing Logical Volume LV for these but this device is also encrypted. I doubt I can reuse it without unlocking it. So I simply wiped it clean and made a clean install. After reboot I checked the status of the LVM and the RAID. Both are okay-ish. The RAID is clean according to mdadm. LVM informed me that the volume group is degraded. I'm missing a physical volume. I know I wiped it clean. So how do I restore the volume group so I can get at my data. LVM keeps its configuration files in /etc/lvm/backups and also in /etc/lvm/archives/"name-of- volume-group". So pick the current or latest one in /etc/lvm/backups or the older ones in /etc/lvm/archives/"volume- group". You need two things - the backup configuration file and the UUID of the

The lives lost as of today, 22nd of August 2016, is at 1,800. Lives that are (1) napabuti, (2) naituwid, at (3) nailigtas. Di mga buhay na biglang nawala. #BEST @risahontiveros pic.twitter.com/7m7YK25Emh — Ram (@RamuelAsturiano) August 22, 2016

It's been a while since I created these logical volumes and extended my volume group (the only one) to include the newly grown raid5 array on a 2-2-1 TB device. Frown all you want as long as it works. When that 1 TB HDD shows some signs of failing or error, I'll replace it with a 2TB HDD. The raid array will then be a complete 2-2-2 TB raid5. Here's the status of the raid array now: I'm replacing the 1 TB HDD when it fails or errors, or when I need to increase the capacity of the array, whichever comes first. The present raid array size is 2 TB. -- Donato Roque @desktop-ubuntu mobile:0918-5721-710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Web: Danny's Space Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

The lesson is this; that just because you can doesn't mean you should. I wiped off my RAID array and the data in it. It has around 300+G there, mostly downloaded, recoverable, and back-up'd to a CD/DVD content. I was trying to employ Logical Volume Management or LVM on an existing RAID array. After tackling RAID these couple of months, I figured I'm ready to face another monster. LVM is awesome because it can do partitioning, resizing, formatting, creating snapshots, while the system is online. You do not have to take it offline which to me is like magic. Now that the data is gone, there really is no reason not to LVM the RAID. So after reinstalling my operating system (which is another long story), I reassemble RAID with: #mdadm --assemble /dev/md0  /dev/sda  /dev/sdb  /dev/sdc and checked the status of the array with: #cat /proc/mdstat or #mdadm --detail /dev/md0 I checked the status of all the logical volumes with any of the following commands: #pvdisplay

July 2016 - San Mateo, Philippines -- Donato Roque @ubuntu-16.04 mobile: 63-918-572-1710 I'm on twitter,   facebook, and this is my blog. Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

I talked about RAID in my system before here and here . My present set up is: /dev/sda5      SSD      223GB   EXT4    /   /dev/sdb1     HHD      2TB       Linux raid      /media/user /dev/sdc1      HHD      1TB       Linux raid     /media/user New:     /dev/sdd1      HHD      2TB      unpartitioned - free space RAID: /dev/md0        2 devices    /dev/sdb1   /dev/sdc1 /dev/sdc1 is old. It has 27,500 hours of use according to smartctl. You can open the terminal and type: #smartctl -a /dev/sdc to get collected data from the device. Among other attributes see Power-on-hours to get the total hours this hard drive has been spinning. Also pay attention to 5 Attribute the allocated Sector Count. Any value you see other than 100 there, you should move your data somewhere else.  I have a RAID5 which includes this device. So any warning notification I can fail and remove it. Replace it with a new hard drive. I am completing my RAID 5 array with a new hard drive today. After installing the hard d

Using Ubuntu 16.04 I was wondering if "avconv" is already installed. I am in fact curious if a bunch of packages are installed. I open GNOME-Terminal with Cntrl+Alt+T and type the name of the package. I get info and suggestions on how to install it. In the case of "avconv" it is called by another name.  That's service and quite helpful. -- Donato Roque @ubuntu-16.04 mobile: 63-9185721710 I'm on twitter,   facebook, and this is my blog. Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

Ubuntu Linux forum was hacked last July 14th. Canonical the company developing Ubuntu disclosed that the forum's database was hacked and data was compromised including hashed passwords of 2 Million users. The hackers used a known vulnerability in an unpatched software the forum is using in its servers.  In the Linux world, the number one security isssue is updating the operating system and the software that we use with it. The first ones to violate this are the servers. Servers simply run old vulnerable software.  -- Donato Roque @ubuntu-16.04 mobile: 63-9185721710 I'm on twitter,   facebook, and this is my blog. Consider using my pgp keys for privacy.

After downloading Skype for linux yesterday and installing it, my desktop applications are fine. Today I opened Thunderbird and the GUI is back to a 90's theme. I downloaded evolution mail and configured my email accounts in minutes.  In Linux, there's more than one way to skin a prey. 

The <a href= "https://donatoroque.blogspot.com/2016/07/resized-raid-array.html" >last post,</a> I was talking about resizing a component of my existing RAID. I was worried about losing data. Here's how I did it without data loss. /dev/md0                   /dev/sdb1        2TB                                   /dev/sdc1        1TB I am increasing the size of the partition and it's an important distinction because the order of the steps would be different otherwise. Check the status of the RAID array with: $cat /proc/mdstat Put a fail flag on the partition and remove it. $sudo mdadm /dev/md0 -fail /dev/sdb1 --remove /dev/sdb1 Then we have to use fdisk to handle the physical resizing of the device. fdisk is an interactive application in text mode. So- $sudo fdisk /dev/sdb1 -h     for help -p     for primary partition -d   

RAID is Redundant Array of Independent Disks. It is a technology in virtualization which allows several devices to be grouped together and used as if there is only one device. If I have two or more hard drives I can group them together in a RAID and my computer will treat it as one device. RAID's purpose is for data redundancy and performance. I use software RAID in Linux. The other kind is hardware RAID in which you depend on chipsets to manage the RAID. I have a RAID5 array consisting of 1x1TB and 1x2TB. I bought a new 2TB hard drive and I want to add it to the RAID.   To make matters complicated I only made a 1TB partition out of the 2TB hard drive when I created the original RAID. I want to use the entire 2TB capacity of the hard drive and then add the newly bought 2TB hard drive to the RAID. I have been using the RAID array since April 2016, so there's data written on this array now.

Hi Reese I reinstalled ubuntu 16.04 yesterday. I was able to use the live usb I have of Xenial. So that bit of paranoia saved my skin. I used the whole SSD and told the installer to just wipe the old one off. I have 16 GB of swap. I have /boot. I have full disk encryption including the swap partition. I also ticked the option to encrypt my /home. It gave me a key. So as I understand this, if I can't log into my desktop ubuntu anymore I will need the key to decrypt the /home and get access to my data. The installer downloaded all the necessary codecs for the music and video, including flash. Nice of the installer to include that option. It was quick less than 40 minutes and I have ubuntu 16.04 in my hard drive. Bringing all the packages up to date is another story. I guess if you have a very fast connection it won't take you as long as I have. I have to get my back ups from two sources. First I have a USB backup

There's so much to learn reading product reviews before you purchase anything online. This is only possible because after purchasing a responsible buyer should make time warning other consumers about the product he bought. I am in the market for storage devices. I'm looking for a 2 TB internal hard drive plus SATA and power cables. I'm looking for some discounts and I found one. One reviewer who sounds like he tested the hard drive and found the device age. This supposed brand new hard drive has 1,800 days of power on in its logs. Recently manufactured hard drives are SMART capable. SMART makes it possible for each device to monitor itself, log how many times it's powered on, how many days (sometimes hours) it's been used. I have a SSD that's receiving (and sending) data to its manufacturer / vendor. The vendor even runs tests on the SSD from time to time. So all these data and logs are saved in SMART data. We should be making time and filling out that product r

Twitter user (@topherolson) Chris Olson noticed that in a photo of Mark Zuckerberg (@finkd) the laptop's camera is covered with tape and the headphone jack is also taped. Hey, Edward Snowden also advised such a move maybe a couple of years back. I use a stand alone webcam with built in cover and I make sure it is closed always. I don't know about the built in mic though. It's not perfect. -- Donato Roque @Ubuntu-16.04.1 mobile#63-9185721710 I'm on twitter , facebook and Blogger. Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

Most of the time I just leave the defaults on when it comes to the operating system. Ubuntu has unity at least the stock Ubuntu. When it first came out Ubuntu has auto-hide on by default but they changed it to Fixed due to user feedback. I am still caught in the middle on the issue. On the one hand I like that I own more screen real estate if the auto-hide is on. -- Donato Roque mobile#63-9185721710 I'm on twitter , facebook and on Blogger. Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

I installed Fedora 23 alongside Ubuntu 16.04 on a dual boot configuration. Everything went fine until I reboot. I encounter this after the bios.                          can't find 'linux'                          can't find 'initrd'                          press any key to continue... Any option I choose, whichever operating system I click on it shows this text. So I have to fix my GRUB. I tried to use my live CD of Ubuntu but my bios won't let me boot into it. So I pressed the DEL key to get into the ASUS motherboard bios set up. The good news is ASUS motherboards have never let me down. I'm on the bios set up trying to find which option will boot my USB device. Having found it, I boot into the installation media of Ubuntu 16.04. Now I can start fixing my GRUB. GRUB is the Grand Unified Bootloader. The problem here is that each distribution of linux modify their version of GRUB so they are now trying to compete with each other- Ubuntu's a

I finally found the time and courage to install Fedora back.    I have two problems to solve. If I can't find my answer It won't happen. No Fedora. I have to find a way to mount an existing raid array (made up of 2 devices) properly. The new Fedora installation must detect the array and correctly mount them at boot. There is always something that messes up GRUB when I modify the fstab file. I have to isolate that and correct it.  Secondly, I have to find a way to share my media files to the wifi network, specifically, my android smartphone. If I can't share it there forget about the iphone.  I'm downloading the updates. I just got the news that Fedora 24 is delayed until June 21st. I think my timing is fine. I will be fine by the time the new release is ready.

First, I installed Samba (and a bunch of dependencies) and followed the usual configurations to enable shares. It turns out that Ubuntu has a GUI tool for this, in Nautilus itself. So people like me can just right-click a folder. If you don't have the necessary package for sharing files over LAN, Ubuntu will give you a prompt. Nice of them. I checked my router configuration. I have UPnP and File Sharing ticked. These same configuration worked before with Fedora 23. I checked my smartphone with Android 5 but my shares aren't showing up in File browser even after a refresh or a scan of the network. Nope.

This is the first time I'll be using a new app for posting to blogger. The UI is nice enough to merit my efforts at learning to use it. I could use something like this. posted from Bloggeroid

First of all, the error message did not accurately tell the problem. I am sure that whenever I try to update my local machine is unable to download  information from the repository. Is it a bad internet connection? Is it a bad server? I tried to switch to a better or as the applications says best server. I opened the Software & Updates application and switched to "the best server". Reload the cache from the new server. I try to update and it worked well. -- Donato Roque @ubuntu1604 mobile#+63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

I am getting some weird bugs. I use Ubuntu 16.04 and this is suppose to be as stable as they come because it carries an "long term support" designation. Traditionally, they don't introduce new features for lts releases. I can't update packages and I can't upgrade packages. So normally I would just open a terminal and use the command line. Guess what, apt-get is also giving me errors.  I hope this is temporary and the fix is well on its way because a bug in the  package manager is not something most linux users can get away from.  -- Donato Roque @ubuntu1604 mobile#+63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

Hi Reese From : It took me 6-8 hours to finish the upgrade. It's a very slow connection today, of all  days. Xenial is looking sharp and beautiful. I did not encounter any problems with the upgrade. I'm downloading the image through the torrents. I figure I should help out with the others who are downloading a fresh ubuntu. -- Donato Roque @ubuntu1604 mobile#+63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

Hi Reese I followed some tutorials for creating RAID and filesystem then mounting the RAID disks to an existing installation of linux. I checked the configuration files for mdadm and fstab. I found nothing or so I thought. I printed out results for fdisk and raid scan. It turns out I had copied the wrong UUID for the RAID in my fstab file. Didn't know that you can create a RAID level 5 with just two disks though. Of course for practical purposes it's not RAID 5 but a RAID 1, two disks mirroring each other because the parity are on two disks. I'm adding another disk further on - maybe a spare disk later after that. -- Donato Roque @ubuntu1404lts mobile#+63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

Hi Reese My project took me from using Fedora 23 to being unable to boot  my PC to reinstalling the operating system to finally using  Ubuntu 14.04 like a lifeboat.  I was working on converting an old RAID 0 set up to a more  robust RAID 5. RAID 5 will give me a chance to swap a replacement hard drive for a failing one without, I had hoped, losing uptime and data. After booting on a live cd to prepare the devices and create the RAID, I tried to boot Fedora. No go. It kept shoving me to "rescue mode". Uh-oh. I checked the RAID and it's clean and  active. There's nothing wrong with the RAID or the conversion . I checked the configuration files for mdadm and fstab. I don't see anything odd. This is when I spent a lot of time googling. None of the fixes I read worked.   -- Donato Roque @ubuntu1404lts mobile#+63-9185721710 I'm on twitter and facebook . Check out my blog . Consider using my PGP keys for privacy.

 Hi Reese The renovations of the bathroom and the kitchen continues through the holy week. M Roger is making sure the wall plaster is smooth. He finished putting the black marble tiles on the tabletop. He's going to put the doors to the bathroom tomorrow. It's Easter, no work. Oh by the way, it's my  birthday too, I think.  I woke up with the Salubong passing the house. I could hear the band  playing a march. The siren is wailing. When I got downstairs mom is washing clothes and Imee is preparing pasta for the spaghetti.  I've been tinkering with my phone's lock screen security. There was a point when I couldn't open the screen anymore. I had to ask for help with a 'forgotten password' issue. They asked for my google authentication credentials then google sends me a code through sms. My sms app is locked too. I can't get to the code.  The smartphone is a remarkable technology. What if a machine can handle millions  of calculations per second and stor

Time to think about the human condition, Time to remember that we are saved by his death. We are made worthy of salvation only because.. Posted via Blogaway

Quite unexpectedly A thing of beauty Appears on a warm afternoon.

This is kind of a how to for changing a failed hard drive in a RAID 5 array. Ian Campbell's Hotswapping a Failed RAID device 1) Mark the device as a failed RAID device. 2) Remove it from the array. 3) Tell the kernel to delete the device. 4) Physically swap the hard drives. 5) Add the new disk to the array.

Some people think Apple can close a backdoor to iPhones once the FBI is finished with it. Even if that were technically possible, what's to stop an independent hacker from developing the same. What Apple CEO Tim Cook is saying since the start is once that box is opened, whatever "thing" comes out, nobody can put it back.  The FBI wants us to trust them with the keys to the kingdom. They want us to sleep tonight and let them do their jobs. That's basically the deal. That's the equivalent of surrendering your guns and trusting the sheriff to protect you. Why are Americans taking this? -- Blogger since August 2007. Fedora 23   Gnome desktop on top of Linux . I am on twitter and facebook .  For privacy you might consider using myPGP keys . 

The Apple "should they or should they not" issue is a heavy weight. The judge already ruled that they provide the keys to unlock iPhones and the rest of iPhone users, yes you, will get less secure devices. If law enforcement wants your personal data they can get it. I think after the court order, they have no choice but comply with the order. It used to be that decryption gives us end users some reasonable assurance of privacy but not after this ruling.

Some renovation being made to the bathroom and kitchen. The changes can not be done without touching the roof. Blogger since 2007 Linux user since 2005

The comment square on the right says it all. What does it mean? It means that  the business is paying for itself. It means being able to pay its obligations. Look  at the green line tracing its course below 0 from April 2012 up to December 2015. January 2016 is the time it comes up from the basement.    -- Blogger since August 2007. Fedora 23   Gnome desktop on top of Linux . I am on twitter and facebook .  For privacy you might consider using myPGP keys . 

North, Wind, I hear the gate closing They have ducks, Sun, But only for fifteen minutes.

I've been using my ASUS Zenfone 2 for 3 weeks now and ASUS has upgraded the system android that it is using twice now. That's apart from the apps automatic upgrades that happens fairly everyday. So I like the support that ASUS is providing this device. I check for updates to the system fairly regularyly like twice a week. This recent system upgrade is a 78 MB download and then a 5 minute install. It took out approximately 6-7% of the battery, start to finish. 

I'm keeping Keepassx-0.4.3 for now instead of upgrading to Keepassx-2.0 which is now available in the Fedora 23 repositories. The new Keepassx version is suppose to be able to convert the old kdb file to the new kdbx database format. I am getting "unable to read corrupt file" instead. So I downgraded the package and tried to open the file again without any problems. What seems to be the problem here? What am I doing wrong in the convertion? -- Donato Roque d327roque@gmail.com Blogger since 2007. Linux-4.3>Fedora23>GNOME-3.18

I have a Linux desktop. I am using Fedora 23 in my home as my main computer. My sister uses a laptop mainly to access the internet and play some Youtube and music files. After I got my smartphone a week ago, I've been interested in listening to my music using my phone. I have approximately 800 GB of media files in the desktop. Most of it are movies and around 200+ GB are music files. I hope to turn my Fedora Linux desktop into a media server for the home network. How do I do that? Fedora 23 has samba installed by default but I checked my system. I am lacking some packages. So I downloaded samba and system-config-samba from the repositories. Then simply add shares to the GUI. Check if your firewall policy allows samba service. Check if your router allows media server and also allows file sharing. It's easy with mine because it has a web interface. Also you have to start samba in systemd.       #sudo systemctl start smb.service       #sudo systemctl start nmb.service      

Hi Reese You can teach an old dog new tricks. I've been using the ASUS Zenfone2 since the 2nd. Posting to my blog with a qwerty keyboard this small is an exercise in patience. But for quick one time and necessary release. The Blogger app is nice and helpful.

Last month of the year 2015 here and finished.  Nothing unusual to note this month, much of expenses mirror  last month's figures. Miscellaneous expenses include social  donations and the regular christmas expenses. Income figure is smaller this month with one contract  termination (Edna Campos).  -- Blogger since August 2007. Linux user since 2004. Fedora 23 Kernel 4.2 GNU/Linux