- Dec 22, 2009 by the_angry_angel
- Geek, Unix-like, Windows and Personal
If you've noticed that the next Ubuntu Server version (10.4, Lucid Lynx) has the Hyper-V kernel modules packaged, alebit in drivers/staging, I'd suggest not dist-upgrade'ing even your development servers for the moment. The reason is simply that you need to devote time to ensuring that the kernel modules will continue to work with each kernel version - right now you can't seem to rely on the modules actually loading successfully from the corresponding /lib/modules/2.6.*/kernel/drivers/staging/hv directory. Which isn't a problem, provided that you have the time to deal with it.
The long and short of it is that if you're currently looking to use any flavour of Linux under Hyper-V the "old" rules still apply;
- Use the legacy network adapter
- Set static MAC addresses under the VM settings (unless you want to faff with udev)
- and learn to live with the performance penalty
- Nov 02, 2009 by the_angry_angel
- Geek, Unix-like and Personal
After quite some time serving the world, KarmaSphere's reputation lists are ending. If you're running KarmaSphere on your mail server(s), now would be the time to start thinking about removing that as an anti-spam feature.
To the KarmaSphere team, I wish you well with your new endeavors, and I hope that you continue to come up with innovative products!
- Aug 13, 2009 by the_angry_angel
- Geek, Unix-like and Personal
In that past I've created custom live unix distro CDs for myself and although it worked I found that it was so time consuming and generally such a pain in the bum that it just wasn't worth it. Yesterday I had the need (that nerd need, not because I had to, but because I wanted to) to create a customised CD for the house1. I'd heard good things about RemasterSys and figured now was the time to try it.
Holy crap it's awesome. Customise your setup as you want it, make sure you do the necessary system wide alterations (/etc/skel, and so on) and then just fire and forget. A few minutes later you either have an ISO or the CDFS ready to be altered before you turn it into an ISO. I didn't have to worry about clearing down rubbish, then mashing it all into squashfs. It Just Worked.
If you need to create a custom Debian based live CD quickly, then I encourage you to look at RemasterSys. It's quick and works like a dream.
[1] We have an old laptop with a mostly dead hard disk, and it's been running an Ubuntu live CD for months. Sadly it means that everytime you shut it down certain things need to be reinstalled, such as Flash support. No longer is this an issue thanks to Redcatch Linux Five Thousand.
- Jul 20, 2009 by the_angry_angel
- Geek, Unix-like, Windows and Work
If you've never had to run Linux under HyperV you'll know that it runs, although it could be better. You'll also be aware that Microsoft supply drivers via connect, in a binary state with official support for only a few distros.
So you can imagine how I felt when I saw the announcement on the LKML. Drivers for Linux guests, in the kernel. Ok, so it's not in the mainline yet, but it is the start of good and great things.
To all those involved, I salute you!
- Jul 17, 2009 by the_angry_angel
- Geek, Unix-like, Coding and Links
My feed reader just picked up a new article over at ISC about a new 0-day for Linux. You should go and read it now, because it's fairly different from most other exploits and comes from fairly innocuous looking code.
Not being a real programmer (I'll never call myself a real programmer - I hack together code, but it's almost never elegant) things like this always fascinate me.
