Author name: Dan Langille

I've been playing with computers since I read an Elementary Electronics magazine way back in the 1970s. I started contributing to open source projects in 1998. After that, I gradually moved from being a software developer to being a systems administrator.

Dan does Utah!

I’m heading off to Utah at the end of the month. The primary goal is to do some mountain biking in Moab. I’ve been there before but it’s time to go back again. As part of my trip preparation, I contacted the Greater Utah BSD User Group (aka GUBUG. Wouldn’t you know it! They’re having an installfest on the very day I’m arriving in Salt Lake City. What a coincidence! I’ll be giving […]

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New box – addenda

That computer I mentioned recently, I added a SCSI card to it and enabled the second NIC. It’s now looking pretty sweet with 5.4 running on it. With the new additions, the dmesg now also contains: isp0: port 0xd800-0xd8ff mem 0xff6fe000-0xff6fefff irq 17 at device 8.0 on pci2 I plan to make this box into a Bacula testing platform for FreeBSD 6.*, add a backup DNS server for my LAN, and make it

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New box

I got a really sweet deal on a computer: Dell Optiplex GX-260 CPU 2.4 GHz HDD 20 GB RAM 512 MB CD ROM Re-Writable NIC 3COM internal speakers build-in sound card Windows XP MS-Office XP Yes, that INCLUDES the original CDs for that software, still shrink wrapped! That alone is worth the CAD$150 price. I’ve removed the HDD, put it aside, and replaced it with an 80GB drive. I’ve installed 5.4 on it

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Windows XP kept dialing out

I had a recurring problem with Windows XP. The VPN to the office kept dialing out… often when I was browsing to a web page. This became annoying. It came. It went. Last night, it was back. And increasing my frustration level. To solve the problem, I went into Control Panel | Network and Inernet Connections | Network Connections. While there, I renamed the VPN that kept dialing up. The next time it

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Avoiding deadlock on FreshPorts

FreshPorts is an automated reporting mechanism for the FreeBSD ports and package. You may be familiar with freshmeat, upon which FreshPorts is loosely based. The major difference is that FreshPorts is 100% automated; everything operates off scripts. Features The key features of FreshPorts includes a powerful search tool and the ability to create custom watch lists that allow you to track changes to any port and receive automated notification via email. FreshPorts uses

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Firewall upgrade – progress

I’m getting through the firewall upgrade process. The first error was forgetting to set up the NAT rules. That was a silly error. Right now, I just have to get stunnel installed and configured. I used that for publishing my websites. From the web server, I run cvsup and get the latest files from my CVS repository. Hopefully, I’ll have the firewall on 5.4 and running later this week.

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Upgrading the Firewall

I have a firewall that’s running FreeBSD 4.11. I’m planning to upgrade to 5.4 tonight. The backups are running (via Bacula [of course!]) now. I installed 5.4 on a separate HDD a few weeks ago, but have not copied over the configuration files etc. I’ll have to do that tonight. I’ll be documenting what is required and post it on The FreeBSD Diary.

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