Hacker Happenstance

Linux Admin Group #1: default config HTTP and FTP servers

We had our first Linux Admin meeting last weekend at 2pm and so far so good! We’re following the guidelines set out in Michael Jang’s awesome study guide: https://www.amazon.com/RHCSA-Linux-Certification-Study-Edition/dp/0071765654

The objectives we worked on were:

  • Configure a system to run a default configuration HTTP server.
  • Configure a system to run a default configuration FTP server.

Jang’s book uses one of these to serve an install tree and packages so that we can later use it for configuring yum and doing other tasks. For right now we simply want to get the service up and running.

If you’d like to catch up here’s a link to the redhat docs on how to install httpd.
https://docs.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/6/html/Deployment_Guide/ch-Web_Servers.html
Installing and turning on an ftp server is almost identical.

Next week we’re going to work on setting up some virtual machines so we can play around without endangering our base system. To see what we’ll be getting in to, take a look here at sections 15 and 16 on virsh and the virt-manager.

https://docs.redhat.com/docs/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/6/html/Virtualization_Administration_Guide/index.html

Confused? Out of your element Donnie? Come to the group meeting Saturday at 2pm and all will be made clear!

Intro to Linux Admin/Redhat Study Group – Planning Meeting this Saturday

Join us this Saturday, June 9 at 1:30pm for a planning meeting for a new HacDC study group focused on beginning to intermediate linux admin skills. We’ll get some study tips from HacDC’s own Brian Harrington (proving that a giant beard makes a better linux admin!) and discuss the future meeting schedule. Sign up for the meetup event so we’ll know to see you there.

We’ll also discuss the Redhat certification objectives for the RHCSA and RHCE that we’ll be following as a framework. That said, it’s not necessary to be pursuing certification (or even to be using a redhat based distro) to attend the study group. Prerequisites for the study group are any linux distro installed (CentOS 6 or Scientific Linux 6 for redhat cert) and ability to access a shell prompt.

This study group was suggested by my friend James and here he is wearing a red hat courtesy of MS Paint:

You’re welcome.

HacDC Joins the Mt Pleasant Mesh Network

You can learn more about Project Byzantium and mesh betworking by attending the HARC (HacDC Amateur Radio Club) meeting Wednesday, June 13 at 7:30pm. More details here.

We are excited to announce that HacDC joined Mount Pleasant’s neighborhood mesh network! HacDC member Haxwithaxe put the finishing touches on the mast he designed and built for the router, and Preston Rhea and other OTI engineers upgraded our router to the latest copy of their Commotion firmware. Then we all went up to roof where we mounted the router and strung the Cat-5 to power it.

Photo via Preston Rhea.

Unfortunately, we are not in range of any of the other nodes (yet). We just don’t have a good line-of-sight to any of the other nodes in the network (yet). However there’s a good chance that one of the intermediate buildings will install a node which will serve to bridge us over to the rest of the Mt Pleasant network.

Thanks to the HacDC members, friends in the community, OTI engineers, and everyone else who helped make this happen!

CarolinaCon: Cool Antenna, Even Cooler Costumes

Recently, HacDC members The Doctor, Ben the Pyrate, and Haxwithaxe went to CarolinaCon in Raleigh, NC to present on Project Byzantium. The guys had a great time. “CarolinaCon is freaking awesome,” said Haxwithaxe, noting that Raleigh has a local computer chain store that sells 1m wide parabolic antennas for around $50.

In the below pictures you can see two different combinations of the Project Byzantium speakers holding their parabolic antenna.

(It should be noted that Ben the Pyrate and The Doctor won CarolinaCon’s non-existant costume contest.)

Curious about the parabolic antenna? That is a four foot wide parabolic reflector designed for use with 802.11 wi-fi.  The speakers picked it up to mess around with at the con, and
possibly apply to the Broadband Bridge mesh node project at HacDC.