The installation runs to completion without any errors, but, when the system reboots, you see:

Fortunately, the fix is very simple. Just before rebooting, chroot to the new installation (if not already there) and enter:

If you forget to do this before rebooting, just boot any Linux rescue/installation kit, chroot to the installed system, and execute the above mkinitrd command.

Update 2010-03-05: fixed typos (“mkinitd” -> “mkinitrd”)

On the other hand, whenever I have Windows problems, I immediately suspect Windows or the application itself. And most of the time I’m right about that. Unfortunately, Windows errors (or at least the ones I have), tend to be random, untraceable, and never seem to get fixed — they just randomly come and go depending on the phase of the moon, vacuum fluctuations, or some cryptographically hidden random error generators in Windows itself. Known errors tend to linger forever, and the fix is generally “Well, don’t do that! Here’s a complicated workaround.”

The other day I ran across JH’s low-volume blog, Linux in Exile which you may find interesting:

For reasons I won’t go into, I’ve been asked to move back to Windows, at least for work. The difference between Windows and Linux has been shocking, to say the least. Since I find it interesting when long-time Windows users experiment with Linux for the first time, I thought it might be equally interesting for this long-time Linux user to blog about my first experience running Windows in over 6 or 7 years.

If you want to start at the beginning, see Day 1.

• missing asm/semaphore.h
• too many arguments to function ‘smp_call_function’

The semaphore.h I could have fixed with a softlink, but the other not so easily.

I took the opportunity to upgrade VMware Server from version 1.07 to 1.08. I then tried applying the latest vmware-any-any patch, but that didn’t help. After some Googling around, I finally found this patch that took care of the problems.

It’s unfortunate that VMware doesn’t itself provide timely updates to Server, but I’m not going to complain further, given that it’s free. So far, it’s been relatively easy to locate user-created updates. By the way, VMware does host user forums at VMware Communities.

I did briefly toss version 2 onto my laptop, but decided I’d rather locate a fix for 1.xx and go through the learning curve for 2.xx later. If you’re ready to go to V2, there is a how-to at How To Install VMware Server 2 On A Fedora 9 Desktop.

First, I bought a 320 GB disk and a Rosewill enclosure for the old drive — I prefer to do fresh installs rather than in-place upgrades. It’s interesting to note that as I’ve increased the capacity (100 -> 200 -> 320 GB), the power requirements have gone down: 1100 mA -> 800 mA -> 550 mA. These are all 7200 RPM SATA drives, by the way.

Next I tried installing from a Fedora DVD I’d burned, but it kept failing randomly early on in the process, even though it passed the initial media check. Fortunately I also had the 6-CD install media I’d burned for some older boxes, and they worked fine. Because I love the punishment, I did a kitchen-sink (everything) installation.

Then it was time to install updates. Because so many packages had been re-signed (why, how) in addition to the typical package updates and the additional packages I wanted, this took quite a while — well over a gigabyte of packages.

The only issue I encountered was ldconfig complaining about libmodbc.so not being a softlink — rather than the usual softlinks from short names to the base library, all three were individual files. That was easy to fix:

# cd /usr/lib
# ln -fs libmodbc.so.0.0.0 libmodbc.so.0
# ln -fs libmodbc.so.0.0.0 libmodbc.so
# ls -l libmodbc*
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 17 2008-10-25 21:16 libmodbc.so -> libmodbc.so.0.0.0
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 17 2008-10-25 21:16 libmodbc.so.0 -> libmodbc.so.0.0.0
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 170916 2008-05-21 14:09 libmodbc.so.0.0.0


After the installation and massive Fedora repository updates, I installed the livna Fedora 9 repository RPM so I could get the nvidia drivers, the VideoLAN VLC media player, and the libdvdcss library. I also installed the Adobe repository definition (select “YUM for Linux” from the pulldown) to get the flash plugin (you can also get AdobeReader via the repository).

Finally I rebuilt VMware server for the new kernel.

Unlike my Fedora 8 installation, everything seems to be working smoothly with no performance issues. Later today, once I’m in the office, I’ll see about configuring dual monitors and setting up wireless.

 
full-size image (1920×1200, 360KB) on Flickr

The Today folder is my working folder. It always has softlinks to Notes, Yesterday, and Tomorrow; these change dynamically, automated by a script described later. Whenever I run across interesting web pages I want to review or refer to later, I drag a link into the Today folder; I’ve found that this is much more convenient that using bookmarks. Today is also my default download location. I’ll usually clean it out by the end of the day by dragging any left-over items into the Tomorrow folder (which becomes the next day’s Today), but I’ll sometimes leave items there for later retrieval or historical context.

The Notes folder contains some of my long-term projects and reference material. I’ll also drag items from Today into Notes if I won’t be using them for several days, although I usually just drag them into Tomorrow.

So that they’ll be conveniently at hand from other workspaces, my Desktop folder also has softlinks to Notes, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow, automated by the same script to keep them relative to the current calendar date.

All these softlinks point into a permanent “diary” tree: $HOME/diary/YYYY/MM/DD; Notes is in $HOME/diary/Notes. I’ve played with both Google Desktop and Beagle to index content, but the performance overhead far outweighed their utility to me. I’ll sometimes use recursive grep to scan the diary tree for content, but most often I can find what I want with the locate command or a quick Nautilus perusal. As with bookmarking, I’ve found this structure to be the most convenient for me, moreso than trying to create some meta-structure and keep things arranged there. I do have a separate reference tree where I’ve organized some long term information, but it doesn’t play much in day to day work like the diary tree does.

If you have suggestions for improvements, or would like to mention alternatives, feel free to do so in a comment. However, if you include too many links your comment may automatically be held for approval. I’ll try to catch those as soon as I can.

[*] “Research” in the sense that this is the workspace where I do 99% of my web browsing and I couldn’t come up with another concise term for it. I mentioned it back in April 2008 while describing some problems I was having after replacing Fedora Core 6 with Fedora 8. If you’re curious, that post has links to the Nautilus bug reports I made. I’ll see if they go away when I install Fedora 9, Real Soon Now.

The Scripts

If you want to copy the code, use the “text” links rather than cut/paste in case the formatting plugin trashed the scripts. Update: I just noticed that the plugin adds line numbers to the scripts in the RSS feed; sorry about that.

bx (text) is run from the Command Line applet (visible in the top center of the screenshot) to open the workspace windows; it could be run from a desktop link or a shell window if you prefer. I named it “bx” because the 2nd (“B”) workspace is the one I use for this; in the lower right of the screenshot you can see I have 5 workspaces, which I call “A” through “E”. The --geometry options were added to overcome a problem I had with Nautilus after moving from Fedora Core 6 to Fedora 8.

diary/cleanup (text) is run ad hoc. It goes through the diary tree to remove any empty directories, then calls diary-setup to make sure today’s relevant directories and softlinks are set up. Note the -depth option to find, so that subdirectories are deleted first, potentially leaving parent directories empty and deletable.

diary-setup (text) is run at 00:01 each morning by cron. I also run it from $HOME/.bash_profile for those rare occasions when my laptop may have been down when the cron job would have run. It creates the directories in the diary tree for the relevant dates, removes the old softlinks from the day before yesterday, and sets up the new softlinks. As a sanity check, it aborts unless the Desktop and diary folders already exist.

Echoing what I said in MySQL Backups, some situations may require more elaborate techniques, but these scripts are “good enough” for my needs. I hope you find these scripts useful, and welcome comments, critiques, or suggestions for alternative methods. Note: these are just examples. If you use them, you do so at your own risk. You’ll want to adjust them for your own situation.

I run these scripts ad hoc (via the at command), rather than via cron, for a couple reasons. First, these run on my laptop, so it may be down, or the backup media may not be avalable. Second, my personal schedule is very irregular and I prefer to back up when the system is quiescent. I’ve found the most convenient time for incremental backups is while I’m getting ready for work. I do full backups some time over the weekend.

My schedule, though not rigidly adhered to, is to run incrementals every morning. Because the name pattern includes the day of the week, I generally have seven copies available, although not necessarily the most recent seven days. Currently, they contain any files modified within 30 days.

Full backups use a similar naming scheme, which I should fix at some point. I pick one of the weekend backups each month to preserve long term, and rename it to indicate the specific date. I try to keep about a year’s worth of full backups available.

The first file backed up is /backid.txt; it is also included in the emailed logfile. The create-backid-file script (below) dumps several pieces of information useful in recovering a system into it, such as the output of fdisk -l and /etc/fstab. Because I use cpio, this text can be viewed directly from the archive file with less, head, or even cat. That could be handy if you have limited resources to work with during a recovery.

After the backup itself completes, a verify-crc pass is made over the archive. This may not be as assuring as doing an actual file-by-file comparison, but seems a good tradeoff in my situation between reliability and time. An occasional file restore should be done to confirm that what you think is getting backed up really is. I’ve also done bare-metal restores without problems using these archives.

The actual scripts are listed later, but first I’d like to point out a few things from the log file.

• the backid.txt file is included
• line counts from the backup pass and the verify pass are included; the vast majority of the time, these are the same
• the block count from the two passes are included; these should always be the same
• the size of the archive is calculated
• the logs are kept locally for review as well as being copied to the backup media
• timestamps are used at important steps so I can develop a feel for how the scripts perform

Here’s a sample log:

It’s kinda large because of a VMware disk image and a couple of dvd .iso files downloaded but not yet burned.

This is the full-backup script (text). Things to note:

• the DIRS variable specifies which filesystems to back up; the id file should be first in the list
• nul-terminated paths (options -print0, -va0) are used to avoid issues with unusual filenames
• the VOLNBR is just a holdover from tape and could be removed

The incr-backup script (text) only differs in two lines; next time I edit the scripts I’ll move the interval option to a variable.

Finally, the create-backid-file (text). I’ve stripped out the extra noise from the script for display in this post. Select the text link to get the whole thing. The grub.conf (or lilo) should probably be added as well.

Aside, check out the full-size version of the lead image — it’s high res and quite interesting, along with the Wikipedia article Hard disk drive where I found it.

image: Paul R. Potts, SixHardDriveFormFactors.jpg, Wikimedia Commons

MySQL is a pervasive, lightweight RDBMS that is used with popular applications such as WordPress and Bugzilla. The mysqldump utility which comes with MySQL provides a quick and simple way to create database backups.

While some situations my require more elaborate techniques, these scripts, using mysqldump, should be fine for the most common uses. They are run nightly via cron and keep a week’s worth of backups. Note: these are just examples. If you use them, you do so at your own risk. You’ll want to adjust them for your own situation.

This first script (text) runs on my laptop. Because it accesses the local server, has full permissions, and the databases are small, it locks and backs up everything at once.

This second script (text) runs on my blog host; the actual database is on another host. It differs from the previous script in that the flush-logs and lock-all-tables can’t be used, only a single database is backed up, and a password is required. I’ve also added the uptime command so that I can see how the server is performing when backups are run. Note: I don’t recommend embedding passwords in scripts, but it makes the example simpler.

In both cases, cron emails the log file to me. A typical message looks like this:

I periodically rsync my entire remote site to local storage — having the backups on the same remote host as your live data won’t do you any good if your host loses a disk (and have stale or corrupted backups), or falls off the ‘Net. Of course my own filesystem backups take care of having long term, off-the-machine backups of my local stuff. I’ll discuss the filesystem backups in a future post.

I hope you find these scripts useful, and welcome comments, critiques, or suggestions for alternative methods.

Update (7/7): added link to filesystem backups

It looks like an interesting concept, but it seems a little bit more hype than substance at the moment. Really, I just wanted to post this for the Tux-with-a-chainsaw image.

h/t: Greg Laden
image: LINdependence 2008

“Downgrade rights”, XP image to overwrite Vista, … there’s a message here somewhere … maybe upgrading to Linux?

I have to admit that I run XP in a VMware virtual machine — to access the Exchange server at work; I would just use OWA, and forego Windows entirely, but it’s also more convenient than finding another system when I have to help someone with a Windows problem.

I first saw this on Slashdot, which linked to the CNET blog post; follow these links for more information:
4/25: Dell Will Offer XP Past Cutoff Date (Slashdot)
4/24: Dell: We’ll install XP for you, even after the deadline (Defensive Computing – CNET Blogs)
4/23: Who’s selling Windows XP in July? (Defensive Computing – CNET Blogs)

One of the few annoyances I have with Linux is dealing with displays — I really hate fiddling with X display configurations. After installing the latest nvidia driver from livna, my laptop likes to hang with a blank screen at boot. Cycling power will clear the problem. This is with both a dual monitor setup (laptop display and one external monitor) at work, and laptop display only at home. Both locations use the same model docking station.

I use pidgin for instant messaging, keeping several accounts open at once, on several different services. At seemingly random intervals, pidgin will suddenly begin consuming 100% CPU. This occurs while it is idle; I’ve not noticed it happening when I’ve been in a conversation. This didn’t happen under FC6.

I have a script that sets up my second desktop for research. It opens my Today and Notes directories in nautilus and starts firefox. The Today folder is actually a softlink on my desktop that points to $HOME/diary/YYYY/MM/DD/; my login script (and a midnight cron job) points the softlink to the current day’s real directory. Under FC6, nautilus would remember the size and position of Today, so that my screen came up with all the windows appropriately placed in my workspace. Now, nautilus appears to look for any remembered positioning for the softlink’s target path rather the softlink’s own path, so the first time a new day’s Today is opened, it is out of position.

I’m not blaming Fedora 8 itself for any of this, by the way; just noting that these problems started when the newer versions of these packages were installed along with Fedora 8.

Update (May 10)

After updating to kernel 2.6.24.5-85.fc8 and associated nvidia 169.12 updates from livna, most of the the system hangs have gone away; I’ve only had a couple since the upgrade.

Re nautilus, I created a bug (Bug 532296 – soft link window geometry not remembered (nautilus)) and commented on another one (Bug 92566 – Nautilus doesn’t work properly with the –geometry command line option (nautilus)) at Gnome‘s bugzilla site.

Also, I was mostly kidding with the LazyWeb reference, but it turns out that Hoosgot is the resurrected LazyWeb. Cool.

Update (Sep 7)

Added link to my Research Desktop Workspace post.

Update (Oct 27)

I’m now running Fedora 9.