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HP Management Tools In Ubuntu

guy — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 15:38:49 +0000

Just found that HP makes various support tools for their servers available for a range of platforms here.

This includes ProLiant Support Pack tools packaged for Ubuntu:
hponcfg - RILOE II/iLo online configuration utility
hpacucli - HP Command Line Array Configuration Utility
cpqacuxe - HP Array Configuration Utility
hp-smh-templates - HP System Management Homepage Templates
hp-health - hp System Health Application and Command line Utility Package
hp-snmp-agents - Insight Management SNMP Agents for HP ProLiant Systems

All that is needed is to add the right URL to your apt software sources.

1. echo "deb http://downloads.linux.hp.com/SDR/downloads/ProLiantSupportPack/ natty current/non-free" >> /etc/apt/sources.list
2. apt-get update
3. apt-get install cpqacuxe hp-health hp-smh-templates hp-snmp-agents hpacucli hponcfg hpsmh

For different versions just change the URL in 1 (i.e karmic lucid maverick)

Unfortunately on 11.04 Natty amd64, the package hpsmh is reported as uninstallable. As this is a prerequisite for hp-smh-templates and cpqacuxe, these are also not able to install.

Use a question mark in a Cisco password

guy — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 08:37:34 +0000

If you try and enter a question mark as part of a password in a cisco router configuration you get a new line saying LINE as it thinks you want help for the current command.

The solution - send and escape (Ctrl + V) before the ? so it is not interpreted as a command.

Solution found here:
http://lanwanprofessional-tech.blogspot.com/2009/05/using-question-mark-for-secret-password.html

Install Ubuntu Lucid Server to Xen guest VM under openSuSE 11.1

guy — Wed, 12 May 2010 11:44:52 +0000

After many attempts and trying different methods I finally got an Ubuntu VM installed on an openSuSE 11.1 Xen Dom0 VM host.

The VM host has a minimal text install of openSuSE so I use the vm-install command to create my VMs quickly and easily. This has always worked fine for openSuSE VMs but I using the ‘Other Operating System’ vm-install just kept throwing “Error: The installation source is unusable”.

After trying a few of the other operating system options, I eventually found that choosing “Windows XP, 2003 (x64)” allowed the iso image of the install CD to boot the VM. (I’m installing Lucid Server amd64, for i386 version I would suggest the option “Windows XP, 2000, 2003″ although this has not been tested).

During installation, the VM is running in HVM Full Virtualisation mode, although once the installation has completed I modified the config file in order to boot the VM in paravirtualised mode.

Easiest way to securely log in to a remote Linux server without the need for a password

guy — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:50:39 +0000

Never knew this tool existed:
ssh-copy-id

Set up your public key by entering ssh-keygen in a terminal. Enter ssh-copy-id user@host (entering the appropriate user and hostnames) and you can then log in to the remote server using ssh user@host without having to enter your password. Both quick and easy!

Huawei 3G Dongle Tools

guy — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 16:58:19 +0000

I am making public two utilities written to monitor and control Huawei 3G dongles. Has been tested with the E160, E220 and Vodafone K3565 Huawei manufactured dongles.

3gstats v1.1 gives continuous mode, signal strength, uptime, speed and total data transferred.
3gmode v1.0 lets you switch between 2G and 3G only modes or set preference to one with the other as a fallback.

Instructions for 3gstats:
Download tar.gz file
tar -zxvf 3gstats-1.1.tar.gz
cd 3gstats
sh make.sh
chmod +x 3gstats

To run use ./3gstats

Instructions for 3gmode
Download tar.gz file
tar -zxvf 3gmode-1.0.tar.gz
cd 3gmode
chmod +x 3gmode

To see usage use ./3gmode

The Solution I’ve Been Looking For!!!

guy — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:53:39 +0000

When your DHCP server decides to stop working you’ve got a serious problem. When it’s a Windows server be prepared to jump through hoops trying to diagnose then fix the problem. After being led down many wrong garden paths, uncovering the nasty hidden depths of Active Directory I happened across this blog post. A single entry in the hosts file was all it had taken to bring down the network and removing it was all it took to restore service. Wow, if only I had found it sooner.

(For the purposes of Google):
Error: Attempt to configure DHCP Server failed with error code 0×80070005. Access is denied

Installing Windows XP on an HP DL360 G5

guy — Tue, 05 May 2009 10:23:22 +0000

Ok, this first of all begs the question why?
Why on earth would I want to do this?

Legacy, sorry, ‘cherished’ software requires that XP be installed but the DL hardware is required for datacentre installation and high availability (1U chassis, redundant power supplies, redundant disks).

The stock XP SP3 CD couldn’t see the SmartArray P400i SAS controller so could not find the partition to install on.

After a failed manual attempt to slipstream the drivers into a remastered XP install CD I came across a utility called nLite that automates the whole process.

I sourced a driver, used nLite to slipstream it into an image of the XP install CD, burned the CD, whacked it in and installed without problems.

Damn Roundcube Exploit

guy — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 19:08:38 +0000

Tempted by it’s snazzy interface, I installed Roundcube Webmail. Little did I know there was a known exploit for the version I installed from the Ubuntu repos. On Friday, Bytemark pulled the plug on my VPS after some spotty little oik used the exploit to gain shell access to my VPS and proceeded to launch SSH attacks on other servers, whose admins then complained.

I identified the exploit, removed Roundcube, emailed the details to Bytemark and they promptly re-instated my network connectivity. Fair play to Bytemark for responding quickly - and on a Saturday too.

I’m officially a Blogger

guy — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:08:43 +0000

Well apart from here that is. I’m being trialled by WorksWithU, an Ubuntu site.
Read my first post here:
http://www.workswithu.com/2009/02/17/first-look-ubuntu-904-jaunty-jackalope/

Adding more block rules to ufw

guy — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 23:20:20 +0000

I added some rules to block some more IPs today, but I’m still receiving spam comments from them. ufw is not blocking even though I told it to.

It would seem that ufw executes rules in the order they are entered. Because the newly added block rules come after the allow rules, the allows get executed first.

The solution: a simple shell script that deletes and re-adds the allow rules

#!/bin/bash
ufw delete allow 80/tcp
ufw delete allow ssh
ufw delete allow smtp
ufw delete allow imap
ufw allow 80/tcp
ufw allow ssh
ufw allow smtp
ufw allow imap

I saved it as ufw-update and made it excutable:

chmod a+x ufw-update

Now after everytime I add more block rules I just do ./ufw-update and the allow rules are removed and re-added after the block rules. Voila!