Matthew Steven - Linux Administration, Virtual Servers and Services, Virtualization

Munin Ping Plugin - Changed to show one ping per graph

Matt — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 14:01:29 +0000

I started with the very nice ping script from the consttype blog, but I didn't like that the graph was so hard to read with multiple ping hosts that had similar latencies, and it would time out with more than three IP addresses, and that it took the best ping rather than the average. So I have changed it to use a faster ping, report a ping of 1000 when it fails to connect (so you get a spike rather than a gap) and be linkable with ping_ipaddress format.

Copying a Virtual Machine lv or Partition Over SSH

Matt — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 17:26:36 +0000

Copying a Logical Volume or Partition over SSH

This should only be attempted on either a snapshot lvm volume, or an unmounted hard drive partition!

Using ssh and dd you can copy any LVM or (unmounted) hard drive partition over the internet to a new machine easily. You can do a "push" or "pull" copy. Here's a "push" copy:

dd if=/dev/vg0/partition-snapshot bs=1k |
ssh remotehost dd of=/dev/vg0/partition-destination bs=1k

XFCE4 review: After Over 10 Years with KDE, I'm Moving to XFCE, and Xubuntu!

Matt — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 15:18:02 +0000

In choosing a Linux desktop, I want something both highly stable and great looking. I stare at these monitors for 10-14 hours a day! Speed and ease of configuration/use are also important. This post is about my journey from KDE4 to XFCE4, and is also a review of sorts.

Dual Head Xorg Config for a RadeonHD RV630 aka Radeon HD 2600XT

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 22:09:12 +0000

** Note ** I've sold this card since, but I'll repost this in case it is useful to anyone:
Just a reference in case anyone else is trying to figure out how to get dual head working (with screen stretch) on Ubuntu in particular since Ubuntu doesn’t figure it out by itself. Took me awhile to get this figured out.
The magic lines (in “Device") are this

Green Networking - Converting Standard Computers to Thin Clients

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 22:05:15 +0000

These days it’s all about saving money, power, the planet. This post is intended to get you excited to try thin client computing on your home network- assuming you have one.

Creating a LVM Mirror with LVM2's lvconvert tool.

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 22:00:11 +0000

Here’s one for the hall of fame of terrible error messages.
When trying to add a mirror to a LVM volume on a linux box, you get this message:
#lvconvert -m 1 disks/root /dev/sdb2

Not enough PVs with free space available for parallel allocation.
Consider --alloc anywhere if desperate.
This message is completely useless, we have TONS of free extents on both disks. So we check for help

Workaround for Crashing Xen Kernel on Ubuntu Hardy High Memory Systems

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 21:58:21 +0000

Recipes for Redirection, Apache and Javascript Examples

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 21:52:10 +0000

The best way to redirect a page is to use Apache's mod_rewrite. Notoriously cryptic it is, but it's fast and not too hard to figure out for basic things. Here's an example mod_rewrite to redirect http to https. Put it in your apache config preferably, or your .htaccess file if you can't modify your config directly.

Avoiding Network Solutions Transfer Dirty Tricks

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 21:47:20 +0000

Ever try to transfer a domain off of Network Solutions before it expires? Don’t do it until you read this and avoid my mistake. Here’s the process.

Setting up multi monitor / dual head 1280x1024 with the Intel G31 Integrated Graphics Chipset

Matt — Sun, 10 May 2009 21:18:21 +0000

Just a recipe for dual head on Xorg/Linux with the GMA 3100 included with my G31 chipset in case I forget.

1) Obtain “intel” xorg driver version 2.1.1 or later. Build/install.
2) Configure i915 kernel driver, load
3) Configure xorg with the following unusual parts: Monitor Identifiers should match these options under the video card Device block.

Code: