Free Software Linux

Press Release: The openSUSE Project is proud to announce the release of openSUSE 11.0 — everything you need to get started with Linux on the desktop and on the server. Promoting the use of Linux everywhere, the openSUSE Project provides free, easy access to the world’s most usable Linux distribution, openSUSE. The 11.0 release of openSUSE includes more than 200 new features specific to openSUSE, a redesigned installer that makes openSUSE even easier to install, faster package management thanks to major updates in the ZYpp stack, and KDE 4, GNOME 2.22, Compiz Fusion, and much more. Read More.

From the article: Three years ago come August, O’Reilly’s Nat Torkington, interviewing Sun’s Jonathan Schwartz, pressed the CEO on the issues of patents generally and DTrace patents specifically. Torkington’s question? “So if the Linux kernel were to implement DTrace, Sun wouldn’t employ the patents against them?” Schwartz’ answer? “Knock yourself out.” That was 2005. Fast forward to 2008. As one of the DTrace engineers has noted, Paul Fox is taking Schwartz up on that challenge.

From the article: Last fall when the two mega-distros openSUSE and Mandriva both hit the mirrors, it was difficult to decide which I liked better. In an attempt to narrow it down, I ran some light-hearted tests and found Mandriva won out in a side-by-side comparison. But things change rapidly in the Linux world and I wondered how a competition of the newest releases would come out. Mandriva 2008.1 was released this past April and openSUSE 11.0 was released just last week. Read More.

From the article: The topic of a bootable external USB Linux hard drive (without dual-boot) is an area that is not well documented. A simple Google search shows many articles, blogs and forum posts written on this topic, all of them discuss setting up dual-boot strategies. While I did not specifically test a USB Thumb Drive and did not intend to address this device in this article, I see no reason why this would not work for Thumb Drives as well. This article was written with the goal of defining an alternative to the traditional dual boot concept and keeping each operating system isolated from each other. Read More.

From the article: KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine), Linux’s own baked-in virtualization program, has been gaining popularity. Now, Qumranet, the company behind KVM, is releasing a commercial virtual desktop called Solid ICE based on KVM technology. Solid ICE is designed to run multiple virtual desktops in a KVM on servers. While the servers need to be running Linux 2.6.20 or higher, Solid ICE can be used to deploy Windows or Linux desktops on either thin clients or repurposed PCs. The servers must run on x86 processors that support virtualization extensions. These include Intel’s VT (Virtualization Technology a.k.a. Vanderpool) and AMD’s AMD-V (a.k.a. Pacifica) technologies. Read More.

Many customers have asked about this set of steps, and it’s finally possible to use Broadband cards from all three major vendors on SLED 10 SP1 due to some awesome driver work and the efforts of Greg KH and others. Setting Up the Cards

1. Here are the steps needed to setup most broadband cards that are available in the Unites States from AT&T, Verizon and Sprint:
2. Open a terminal session and login as root Insert the broadband card in your laptop Wait a few seconds and type dmesg in the terminal session.

Verifying the Card is Detected

1. The messages below are from a Cingular Option GT Max card - yours should show something different. What we are looking for is if the card gets detected as a USB device or something different and does it load a drivers. Mines loads the Nozomi driver and maps to /dev/noz0. Most other cards map to /dev/ttyUSB0. Check in /dev directory to see if the device gets created.pccard: CardBus card inserted into slot 0

Note: The output should show similar to the below.

If you plain just struggle with VIM or you are looking to get better at it then tune into Zonker’s slide deck here He talks about tabbing, gvim,  Abbreviations, Mappings, Viewports, Marks, Jumps, Folding, VIM scripts,  easy mode :),  and hacking your .vimrc Become the VIM expert you always wanted to be. Enjoy!

In rare occasions, especially after a power outage or hardware crash, some files on your file system can get corrupted. So if you have a feeling that you do not receive updates anymore (The Zen-updater icon doesn’t change with the exclamation mark for more than one week even tough some new patches have been issued by the SUSE team), your ZMD database may be corrupted. I witnessed this a couple of times with SLED. Here is the trick to fix this issue : From the command line as a root : # rczmd stop (check it has really stopped with ps -aux | grep zmd) # rm -rf /var/cache/zmd /var/lib/zmd /etc/zmd/deviceid /etc/zmd/secret # rczmd start # yast2 inst_suse_register (redo the activation) # rug sa https://nu.novell.com -t nu # rug sub SLED10-SP1-Updates # rug refEt voilà You should now be able again to do and enjoy your updates !

Requested by popularity I have finally gotten around to updating this document here to add steps for the md5sum’s of the RPM’s and the gpg signing of the YaST repository in Appendix A. Please have a look at this document if you are running SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 and are using ZLM as your patch management solution. This document can help you greatly diminish the time it takes to setting up this environment and be well on your way to patching your SUSE Linux Enterprise 10 environment. The PDF version refered to in Appendix C will be uploaded in due time, so please look back if you prefer that version. Enjoy!

Finally posted after a few months of delay… It was recorded back in December of 2007 and now posted since February 2008. Check it out here.

Squeegee…a new openSUSE project i have begun. I started it last year with a few members on the team and now am seeing more come to light as we continue to forge its path. This Project has been created by members of the openSUSE community. It is not intended to create a new distribution or a fork of openSUSE. The intention is to add specific packages and features that pertain specifically to Internet Filtering via SQUID and Dans Guardian with the abilities to be a firewall and router. Initially this will be built to install on x86 and x86_64 with the use of the build service, and by use of kiwi will create a single CD install that can be used to install on a small footprint or Appliance machine. Now with the big announcement from Novell regarding LimeJeOS we can make this into a rather Sweet appliance. This project has a great future ahead of it and we are just getting started. See the links below for more details about it and how you can contribute. Squeegee Project Page Squeegee Team

View the Intel engineered MIDs here This i certainly can see taking space away from the iPhone, infact i hope it does. One thing that chaps me though is that its Ubuntu based, Ahhhh!! See the community link which seems to be sponsored by Intel at http://www.moblin.org/ openSUSE community, where is our embrace in this space?

From the article: The Linux kernel is a restless beast, and must continally evolve and change. Especially in ways that mystify us poor end lusers. A recent wrinkle, as of kernel version 2.6.20, is changing the /dev names for ATA devices, so that all ATA and SCSI devices are named /dev/sd*. This is a result of using the shiny new libata subsystem. In the olden days PATA (also called IDE) hard drives and ATAPI devices (CD/DVD, tape drives) were /dev/hd*, and SCSI and SATA devices were /dev/sd*. Read More.

From the article: The Linux kernel is a restless beast, and must continally evolve and change. Especially in ways that mystify us poor end lusers. A recent wrinkle, as of kernel version 2.6.20, is changing the /dev names for ATA devices, so that all ATA and SCSI devices are named /dev/sd*. This is a result of using the shiny new libata subsystem. In the olden days PATA (also called IDE) hard drives and ATAPI devices (CD/DVD, tape drives) were /dev/hd*, and SCSI and SATA devices were /dev/sd*. Read More.

Application: If you are using AutoYaST and need a way to setup NIC Bonding, then you can just follow the steps outlined here. The setup in this text is a generic setup and should work with most every hardware. Explanation: In order to get this to work properly you will first need to change your networking tags a bit in your AutoYaST xml. Below is an example of what it should look like.