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Ubuntu package commands
Because Ubuntu has a mix of utilities to manage packages I constantly seem to be forgetting the options I need when I go to do basic package management. Mostly for my sake are the ones I use most regularly: List installed packages: dpkg -l dpkg –get-selections List names of available packages (including those not installed):…
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Dell PERC 5i/R or H200 VMware Performance Fix
I had an old Dell PERC 5i/R RAIDÂ card laying around and wanted to use it for a home lab ESXi box (note: also works on Dell PERC H200). The card isn’t amazingly high performance, but it it’s good enough for simple RAID. Well, that is, it’s good enough performance if you change the settings. By…
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Fix VMware Web Client Integration Plugin for Chrome on Mac OS X El Capitan (10.11)
The latest vCenter Server 6.0 VMware Web Client Integration Plugin does not work on OS X El Capitan. The installer finishes, but silently fails due to missing libraries, libraries that probably existed in earlier OS X versions. Because the libraries don’t exist, necessary certificates don’t get generated, and even re-running the installer from the application…
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Get RPM install date
Sometimes you don’t know when an RPM was installed – maybe it was updated, maybe it came with the system. In any case, it can be handy when debugging or even for auditing purposes. This gives an example of getting the install time for the “filesystem” package: somehost% rpm -q filesystem –queryformat ‘%{name} %{installtime:date}\n’ filesystem…
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Dell Service Tag the easy way under Linux
Sometimes you need the service tag or model off a Dell server that isn’t in your possession. You can either find some feet on the street to do it or as it turns out, with Linux, you can use “dmidecode”: someserver# dmidecode | more … blah … blah … blah … System Information Manufacturer: Dell Inc.…
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Get rid of annoying “People Pane” in Outlook
I wouldn’t mind the “People Pane”, except that in our organization is shows nothing useful. Moreover for a reason I cannot fathom, it always gets opened up, taking enormous reading real estate. So from this (Outlook 2010 at least): Click the “View” tab: Select “People Pane” and set it to “Off”: Voila! UPDATE: Same two steps work…
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Using LDAP Paged Controls with Python
Most LDAP servers can be set to return an unlimited number of entries on an LDAP search, however depending on the size of the LDAP database/directory this can possibly exceed your memory. Moreover if you want to write portable code, you probably should not depend on the LDAP server being able to return unlimited entries.…
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How to dump the Firefox history (Linux)
Not pretty, but gets you there: Find and go to your Firefox profile (usually you can locate by going to “~/.mozilla/firefox/*.default”). Run “sqlite3 places.sqlite .dump | grep moz_places” If Firefox is running you may have to copy the “places.sqlite” to a new file then run the “sqlite3” against it. You can’t dump it while Firefox…
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Testing “sendmail” with immediate delivery
In the old days when using “sendmail” if you wanted to watch the SMTP conversation between the local host and the next mail relay all you’d have to do is either run “sendmail -v” or “mail -v” (or “mailx -v” depending on the OS). It would then output the entire SMTP conversation with the remote…
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Make Excel text fit row height
As part of my job I for better or worse have to deal with Excel on a regular basis. One of the issues I have is the sizing of rows (the cell height) not properly expanding, or conversely shrinking, when I add or remove data in the cell. It turns out there is a very…
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Four keyboard shortcuts you should know…
I’m writing this because I see so many people who use computers regularly who don’t know these basic keyboard shortcuts. They’re easy – learn them and your computer life will be much better. Most work on pretty much any GUI (Windows, Unix, even Mac substituting the CMD key for the CTRL key). So with no…
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Forcing a Window Media Player library rescan
If you’re using your Windows Media Player (WMP) as a Windows Media “server” to share your music library, yet don’t use WMP directly to manage your media (I use the much more rich MediaMonkey) then you may want to force a library rescan when you add new tracks to your file-store(s). This isn’t very hard,…
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Useful Intel links…
Two links from Intel are particularly useful for desktop/laptop users. First, this tool will find out if the Intel drivers you’re using are up-to-date: http://www.intel.com/p/en_US/support/detect since many if not most desktops/laptops include some Intel based chipset (even if it isn’t the main CPU), then this is a pretty useful site to use. If you’re interested…
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Converting VMware virtual disk to “eagerzeroedthick”
Pretty simple from the console really: vmkfstools -d eagerzeroedthick -i <virtual-disk-source>.vmdk <virtual-disk-target>.vmdk Note that this will completely expand the size of the filesystem (ie: it will no longer be “thin”). I needed this not to convert a “thin” filesystem to “thick” filesystem, but a “thick” filesystem to a clusterable “thick” filesystem. The default of “zereodthick”…
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How to deactivate Adobe Digital Editions
As found on an Adobe Forum… To deactivate a PC with Adobe Digital Editions 1.x: Launch Digital Editions 1.x Enter the key-combination of <CTRL><SHIFT>D (<CMD><SHIFT>D on Mac OS) At the dialog, confirm that you wish to de-activate the machine Quit Digital Editions To reactivate and authorize the machine using the same or a new Adobe…
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Unlocking a Cisco IP phone
One of those things I can never remember! It’s: **# Lets you change the network configs among other things. Also can factory reset with: Settings> Phone settings> Press **2 Works on older 7921 at least.
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How to convert to/from DOS format in VIM…
It’s very easy, but also easy to forget how to convert to or from a DOS format file in Unix using “vim” (Vi iMproved), the Open Source “vi”. If the file is in DOS format and you want to convert to Unix, use the command: :set ff=unix note that “ff” is an abreviation for “fileformat”…
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How to “fix” a Mozilla plugin for a new Firefox
Ok, lets you’re using a great Firefox plugin, like say “QuickProxy” and you go to upgrade Firefox and it doesn’t work because it says the plugin doesn’t support this version of the Firefox. Well, there’s an easy “hack” (kludge, whatever) around it: Download the “.XPI” plugin file, rename it to a “.ZIP” extension. Unzip it…