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Friday, December 15, 2000TABLE OF CONTENTS
1) Sean’s Notes
2) Linux News
Window$ Sinks the Kursk!
Layoffs at Red Hat
Will Linux save Microsoft?
GNOME for Windows3) Linux Resources
More VMWare Competition
Securing sendmail
Got LDAP?
Handful of Vulnerabilities
A Lighter PDF Reader4) App o’ the week
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1) Sean’s Notes
Well, 2.2.18 is hot off the presses. Come see what’s changed:
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.2/linux-2.2.18.log
Besides stuff like a port to the S/390, support for over 2GHz machines, and the usual myriad of bug fixes, the USB code has been ripped out of the 2.3/2.4 stream and made to work under 2.2
This, of course, brings us to one of the topics that has plagued the Linux newbie, and even the experienced folks for quite some time – How to compile and install the new kernel?
The first thing to do is grab the source from your mirror.
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.2/linux-2.2.18.tar.gz
is where I grabbed mine. The next thing to do is set up /usr/src to keep your trees separate. /usr/src/linux is generally a symbolic link to your kernel tree:
cd /usr/src
rm linux
mkdir linux-2.2.18
ln -s linux-2.2.18 linux
presto. Next thing we do is unpack the archive
tar -xzf linux-2.2.18.tar.gz
cd linux
At this point, /usr/src/linux has the source tree. As with most software, there are three steps
- Configure
- Compile
- Install
Getting into the configure menu is the easy part:
make menuconfig
Through the menus, you’ll be able to choose the options you want, and if you want them to be compiled as a module or not. Since modules can be loaded in and out, there is little harm in making most of your drivers into modules. Figuring out exactly what you need is up to you though!
Exiting the menu, you’ve configured the kernel and are in /usr/src/linux. The compilation step is actually quite easy due to the makefiles you just configured:
make dep clean bzImage modules
That does four separate builds. The first fixes up the make process so that dependencies (one file depending on another) are resolved, the next cleans the build out (it’s a fresh install this time, but you may have upgraded). “bzImage” builds the kernel itself, and “modules” builds the modules you selected.
To install the kernel and modules requires another make:
make install
At this point, assuming your distribution is still at its defaults, you can reboot into your new kernel! If you end up at your old kernel, some things to check are:
/etc/lilo.conf specifies what gets booted. Take a look at the image=/path/to/kernel line, and make sure that /path/to/kernel is the kernel you just installed (the date and name will give you a clue). If not, you can change it so that it reflects the new kernel. After that, run “/sbin/lilo” to rebuild the boot sector. If you’ve installed a kernel before (or tried), it’s quite likely that a link is out of place somewhere, so you’re going to boot your old kernel.
Did the “make install” finish properly? Did one of the previous makes not finish? Take a look at the error – you may be missing some of the development tools to build the kernel.
If you choose to go to 2.2.19 when it comes out, you’ll find the process gets a lot easier. Since you have the 2.2.18 tree, all you need is the .19 patch (patch-2.2.19.gz). Download that, and apply it to the tree
cd /usr/src/linux
zcat patch-2.2.19.gz | patch -p0
You’ve already configured the kernel, so the only thing to do is configure any new items:
make oldconfig
Then it’s off to the “make dep clean bzImage modules” phase!
The Kernel-HOWTO at http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/howto/Kernel-HOWTO is a good read. It’s a bit out of date, but explains the sections in the configure menus and some more of the troubleshooting aspects of kernel installation.
Talk about your kernel building experiences in one of BrainBuzz’s Linux boards:
http://boards.brainbuzz.com:80/boards/vbt.asp?b4
Finally, feel free to email me with your thoughts and comments!
Long live the Penguin,
Sean swalberg@brainbuzz.com
2) Linux News
Window$ Sinks the Kursk!
Remember that Russian submarine that sank a while back? Was it a collision that caused it? Torpedo misfire? What if it were a failed Windows upgrade?
http://www.justlinux.com/bin/topic/listtopic.pl?cid974123
Layoffs at Red Hat
According to Red Hat, the layoff of 20 people and closing of 3 offices was to eliminate some redundancy caused by acquisitions. Is this a sign of things to come in the Linux world, or is it as Red Hat says? This article talks about the layoffs, and shows some interesting statistics about the other public Linux companies.
http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/2000/48/ns-19476.html
Will Linux save Microsoft?
Could Microsoft use the Linux strategy to save itself? Hey, it worked when they took the Netscape strategy and gave away Internet Explorer. Scary thought. Good article.
http://www.cnbc.com/news/001208plotkin.html
GNOME for Windows
This is pretty slick! The GNOME desktop, ported to Windows. Stuck with Windows, but find yourself longing for the panel? Give this a shot. Some pretty good screen shots demonstrating the level of customization that can be had are included too.
http://www.gtlinc.com/gnome-desktop.html
3) Linux Resources
More VMWare Competition
Win4Lin is like VMWare, but with the sole intent of running Windows 95 or 98 under a Linux host. The reviewer says that there is little speed loss, so it doesn’t appear to be doing instruction translating like VMWare. Anyone tried this out?
http://www.linuxworld.com.au/article.php3?tid=1&aid1
Securing sendmail
sendmail is one of the best Mail Transfer Agents (MTA) out there. It’s powerful (though complex), and speedy enough for any situation. Unfortunately it had a lot of security problems in its early days, and if not configured properly, these can come back to haunt you. Learn how to properly configure this beast for maximum security.
http://sendmail.net/?feed 0705securitygeneral
Got LDAP?
LDAP, the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, is a great way to put together a phone directory, single sign-on system, or anything else that calls for a quick lookup into hierarchically organized data (org chart, network, etc.). These series of articles give the beginner an introduction to LDAP, and then information on how to design the structure.
http://www.ldapman.org/articles/index.html
Handful of Vulnerabilities
Some bugs found in software like glibc, Midnight Commander, slocate, ed, and majordomo. Oops. Depends on the distribution though, so take a peek at this site to see if you’re vulnerable. Then check with your vendor to see if there is an update.
http://oreilly.linux.com/pub/a/linux/2000/12/06/insecurities.html
A Lighter PDF Reader
This tuneup article from Linux.com lets you know about some alternatives to Adobe’s PDF reader. I followed some of the advice in the comments after reading this, and was amazed at the difference!
http://www.linux.com/tuneup/database.phtml/X11/2099.html
4) App o’ the week
Look out Exchange, here comes Eridu, a killer web based groupware application. Anyone familiar with Outlook Web Access will be right at home here. It’s developed in PHP as part of a University programming project, and has been put on Sourceforge so that others can aid in its development. Scheduling, Email, and task lists are supported. Demo is available on the site, so check it out!
http://www.eridu.org/
(C) 2000 BrainBuzz.com. All Rights Reserved.
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