A bash wrapper script for setting up environment variables

The problem Sometimes software packages require setting some environment variables for its proper execution. When these variables clearly have no effect on any other applications in the system, that’s fine. When they want to manipulate some sensitive variables, which other applications may depend on, that’s a whole different story. When it’s a single executable, the [...]

Virtualization: Notes to self

This is just things I wrote down while playing with QEMU/KVM virtualization, for my own purposes of packing two existing computers into a third one. There is no point to make here, and neither do I expect anyone to understand this. It’s published because I don’t care to. Log files There are definitely two files [...]

Setting up an encrypted LVM over RAID 5

What I wanted All I wanted was a software RAID-5 on three disks with a whole disk encryption on Fedora 12. For some reason, I thought the installation script would do that for me. The relevant part in the installation procedure was kind enough to allow me to set it up in the GUI, but [...]

Running Mustek Powermust 600 UPS with nut

Introduction I have an old Mustek 600VA UPS with RS-232 connection. Since I change the battery every couple of years on my own, I find it pretty pointless to throw it away. And my brand new computer (running Fedora 12) has an RS-232 port if one insists to use a connector on the motherboard. Needless [...]

Various partition mounts

This is yet another bunch of things I wanted written down, in case I need them one day. No certain order here. The root mount Grub gives the following kernel parameter: root=/dev/mapper/vg_short-lv_root Meaning, that the kernel has the LVM module in place when starting off (I suppose it’s kicked off in the initrd stage) Boot [...]

ionice. Only that made upgrading worth it.

Copying gigabytes of disk can get the system sluggish. On Linux, the solution is so simple. If process 18898 happens to take control of your disk, just go: ionice -c 3 -p 18898 And you have your computer back. “-c 3″ means class 3, which is idle class. In other words, take the disk when [...]

Installing .so libraries on a 64-bit Fedora with yum

A short note about installing libraries on an Intel 64 bit machine (Fedora 12 in my case). It all starts with a short conversation like this one: [root@short Downloads]# rpm -i VirtualBox-3.1-3.1.2_56127_fedora12-1.x86_64.rpm error: Failed dependencies:     libQtGui.so.4()(64bit) is needed by VirtualBox-3.1-3.1.2_56127_fedora12-1.x86_64     libQtOpenGL.so.4()(64bit) is needed by VirtualBox-3.1-3.1.2_56127_fedora12-1.x86_64 THE WRONG THING TO DO IS: [root@short Downloads]# [...]