Linux Notes

• md5sum digests – How to generate md5sum of a file and check digests
• Compare two directories – How to compare the files in two directories.
• How to extract archives using Rox Filer – How to extract an archive in the current directory using a Rox Filer run action.
• How to encrypt a file with a password – How to encrypt a file with a password using gpg.
• How to rescan a USB card reader – How to rescan the devices added by a USB card reader to detect a new card added or removed
• How to archive and encrypt a directory with a password – How to archive and encrypt a directory with a password, using tar, gzip and gpg.
• UK date format in Sunbird – How to have Mozilla Sunbird calendar program use the UK / GB date format
• SSH with X11 forwarding after su – How to SSH to a server, with X11 forwarding and have it work after su.
• CMYK using the Separate+ plugin with Gimp – How to get a CMYK image in Gimp using the Separate+ plugin.
• Run a command on each line in a file – How to run a command on each line in a text file.
• Symbolic links, aka symlinks – Some notes on usage of symbolic links, also known as symlinks.
• Recursive grep and filename wildcards – How to use filename wildcards with a recursive grep query.
• Configure postfix for local delivery only – How to configure postfix so that it sends emails to the local machine and rejects those sent to external domains
• Resizing a reiserfs loopback device encrypted with dm-crypt. – How to resize / expand a loopback device encrypted with cryptsetup (dm-crypt) and formatted with the reiserfs filesystem.
• Split and join files – How to a split file into smaller files and join the pieces back again.
• Disable MySQL binary logging – How to turn off MySQL binary logging and remove the logs to preserve disk space.
• sftp with custom port – How to use sftp with a non default port.
• See which processor governor is being used – How to check which processor governor is governing the CPU.
• Delete whole lines in many files – How to delete particular lines in many files.
• Default settings of X applications – How to set the default settings of X applications, like xterm or aterm.
• Bluetooth on linux – Some bluetooth usage notes.
• Expand a VMware Server virtual disk. – How to increase the size of a vmware server virtual disk using the vmware-vdiskmanager.
• Change owner of vmware virtual machine – How to change owner / permissions of a VM so that it can be used by a different user or group.
• vmware-server-console hanging – One possible solution if vmware-server-console hangs when you try to log in.
• Diff and merge using vim (or gvim) – Notes on configuring and using vim (or gvim) do diff and merge.
• How to get the details of available wireless networks – How to get the details of available wireless networks.
• Find files with particular permissions – How to find files by their permissions.
• List top 10 largest files and directories – How to list the top 10 largest files and directories in the current directory.
• Open all files containing a pattern – How to search for files of a given type, for a pattern of text, then open them in a given program.
• How to create a multisession DVD-R. – How to create a multi-session DVD-R with growisofs for data backups.
• How to join video files in linux – How to join video files from the command line.
• Make thunderbird open links in your browser – How to make thunderbird open links in your browser.
• Determine and change file character encoding – How to find out what character encoding is used by a file and how to change it (to UTF-8 / Unicode)
• Bash aliases – How to create Bash aliases to simplify long commands.
• Converting m4a files to mp3 using faad and lame – A script to convert m4a files (e.g. podcasts) to mp3 using the faad and lame programs.
• ssh or scp without password – How to prevent ssh asking for a password every time you use it, by using a script to prime the ssh agent.
• Escape spaces with sed – How to escape spaces from a shell script using sed.
• Using the Bash IFS variable to make for loops split with non whitespace characters – How to use the Bash IFS (Internal Field Separator) variable to prevent for loops splitting with the whitespace character - useful for iterating through filenames that may contain spaces.
• Keyboard shortcuts – A list of keyboard shortcuts for a number of popular linux programs.
• Fluxbox key bindings – An example of my fluxbox key bindings, that allow me to quickly open programs and move/resize windows.
• vim with the rails.vim plugin – Notes on using the rails.vim plugin to develop Ruby on Rails applications with vim.
• vim and gvim – Some notes on vim and gvim usage.
• latex2rtf – How to convert a lyx (or latex) document to RTF (Rich Text File) format so that you can open it in Word or OpenOffice.
• Scan open ports – How to scan for open TCP ports.
• Debugging load library path issues – How to debug problems with library linking, using an ImageMagick library loading problem as an example.
• How to create vixie-cron jobs – How to create vixie-cron jobs on a gentoo linux box.
• Run MySQL commands from the Bash command line – How to run MySQL commands from the Bash command line.
• Verify that a network connection is secure – How to sniff network traffic to verify that transmitted data is encrypted.
• Using netstat to monitor your internet connections – How to use the netstat command to monitor your internet connections.
• How to format a DVD with UDF – How to format a DVD with the UDF filesystem.
• How to get around the umount device is busy error. – How to get around the umount device is busy error.
• Add syntax highlighting to nedit – How to add syntax highlighting for a new language to nedit.
• Creating encrypted archives – Creating encrypted archives
• Find files by date – How to find files that were modified before, after or between dates.
• CUPS commands – Notes on usage of the CUPS programs - cupsd, lpstat, lpr, lpq.
• Nice terminal prompt – Change your shell/terminal prompt to show current user, machine and current location.
• Modify your routing table to add/remove a route – Using the route command to modify your routing table.
• ACPI – ACPI notes.
• BIND – Some notes on BIND (Berkeley Internet Name Domain), a DNS server.
• Use Samba v2 with Windows 2003 server – The configuration changes needed to use Samba v2 with Windows 2003 server.
• Transfer files between computers without ftp – How to transfer files between computers from the command line using scp or ssh with dd.
• Mount a remote directory – How to mount a remote directory using nfs, so that you can access it like a local directory.
• Apache – Apache notes.
• Send an email from the command line – Send an email from the command line using the mail command.
• Setup Grub boot loader – Commands to set up the grub boot loader.
• Pass flags to the kernel from Grub GUI – How to drop out of the Grub graphical user interface to pass flags to the kernel.
• See where a program is crashing – Using gdb, the GNU Project Debugger, to see where a program has crashed. The program being debugged can be written in C, C++, Pascal, Objective-C (and many other languages).
• Find files containing a pattern – How to find files that contain a given pattern, using grep or find.
• Find files excluding a directory – Find files excluding a directory
• xargs – How to use the xargs command - commonly used with find to perform a command on each of files that match the search critera.
• Multiple ISPs for PPP – How to easily switch between multiple Internet Service Providers when using a dialup connection (PPP - Point to Point Protocol).
• Set sound volume at boot – How to set sound volume at boot using aumix.
• Configure DMA – How to start DMA with hdparm.
• Turn on DPMS – How to turn on your monitor energy saving features (DPMS) using xset.
• Log in to MySQL without password prompt – How to log in to MySQL without having to enter a password at the prompt.
• Find and replace text in multiple files – A script to find and replace text in multiple files (using sed).
• Device is busy – Troubleshooting the "device is busy" error attempting to umount a disk.
• Text manipulation - cut, awk and sed – Some usage notes about how to manipulate text using cut, awk and sed.
• Cannot find install-sh or install.sh – How to fix the "Cannot find install-sh or install.sh" compilation error.
• Network services – How to start and stop network services.
• ttyS* to COM* mapping – How linux devices map to DOS/Windows communication ports.
• Get window name using xprop – xprop is a property displayer for X. You can use it to get details of a window, such as it's name.
• Configuration files and directories – The location of some configuration files and directories present in some (hopefully most) Linux distributions.
• fstab and octal umasks – A description of the umask in /etc/fstab.
• Useful Linux commands – A collection of useful commands and small scripts for linux administration, most for getting system info.
• Trac – Notes on some Trac administration oddities.
• SuSE – Some SuSE notes.
• Physical to Virtual (p2v) disk migration for VMWare – How to migrate a physical disk to a virtual disk for VMWare Server. Aka p2v.
• rpm commands – A list of a few useful rpm commands.
• Determine release (distribution) information – How to determine which release / distribution of Linux is installed.
• Debian commands – Debian commands
• Subversion (svn) – Notes on Subversion in Linux, the svn command.
• Mount a Windows shared folder using Samba – How to mount a Windows shared folder using Samba.
• Problem pinging localhost – Solution to a problem pinging localhost, 127.0.0.1 or the box's external IP.
• Panoramas in Linux – How to stitch together images to create a panorama in Linux using autopanog, hugin and enblend.
• ldapsearch – How to bind to and query an LDAP database using the ldapsearch command.
• Gentoo – Gentoo usage notes