[svlug] new disk is installed

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Alvin Oga (alvin at mail.Linux-Consulting.com):

> - k .. i checked a few more things on the new disk ..

So, if I donate a second hard drive, would you be willing to rebuild it
as a RAID1 system with the Linux "md" driver?  (Just let me know the
size and make/model, and I'll buy another.)

> 	- does anybody (legitimately) object to the change over ??
> 	( to testing from woody )

If you're contemplating Debian-testing instead of Debian-stable for 
this box, I recommend this modification to enable access when needed to
Debian-unstable packages.  (Why?  Because, otherwise, you may not be
able to get security fixes in a timely fashion.  There is a potential
security shortfall in following the Testing track; although at the
moment the Debian Security team covers Testing, that has not been the
case in times past, and might not be in the future.  See "Testing
Security" on http://linuxmafia.com/kb/Debian/ 

:r /etc/apt/sources.list 

deb ftp://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ testing main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ unstable main non-free contrib
deb http://security.debian.org/ testing/updates main contrib non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ stable/updates main contrib non-free

:r /etc/apt/preferences

Package: *
Pin: release a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 50

That sets the pin-priority for "Unstable" packages to sub-normal
(normal=100), so that they're never fetched by default, but only when
you say "apt-get -t unstable  install [packagename]"


> 	- we'd be able to install/config/run dns.svlug.org
> 	but we still need to have svlug.org changed per the 
> 	svlug vote back in Feb, that svlug is to be a standalone
> 	entity where any volunteer can do the work "now", in this
> 	case, we'll need the dns servers changed which also
> 	is paul reed's request

Soeaking of what SVLUG has decided, the officers made a quite reasonable 
decision to use Linode's offer of free virthost hosting.  Here, in the
name of full disclosure to the membership, is my private mail to you of
this morning, citing that fact:



Date: Thu, 21 Sep 2006 08:34:18 -0700
From: Rick Moen <rick at linuxmafia.com>
To: Alvin Oga <alvin at mail.Linux-Consulting.com>
Cc: tim at tetro.net, raffi at linwin.com
Subject: Re: next steps for the svlug machine
X-Mas: Bah humbug.
User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.11+cvs20060403

Quoting Alvin Oga (alvin at mail.Linux-Consulting.com):

> - looks like i goof'd today by making a phone call to your cell
>   ( i was trying to get hold of someone else with a 650 area code )
>   i've since deleted your number so that i don't do that again :-)

No, it's really OK.  My cellular number is the one I give to everyone,
and is listed on the Web at http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/ .  And I really 
was pleased to chat with you, even if you were calling me by
accident.  However, thank you for your concern.

> - for the svlug machine stuff ..
> 	- i assume your silence means you're just bz ??

Yes, and my apologies for not making that clear.  BALE is out of date, I
need to do maintenance on the SVLUG, BAFUG, Smaug, and BALUG Web sites, 
I haven't done cooking and food purchase for this Sauturday's CABAL
meeting, and there are a bunch of other chores I'm behind on.  On the
bright side, I got to bed at 11 pm rather than 2:30 am last night, so
this might just be a productive day.  ;->

Even worse, the migration of my own Web / mail / etc. site over to less
ancient hardware is about a year overdue, and only partially completed.
_That_ part is getting embarrassing.

Since Micah has recently given me access to the Linode virthost, even
though it's messed up and needs reloading, and since that's the official
game plan of the current officers, I feel an ethical duty to not just
sit on that.  I should attempt to set _it_ up as a functional
replacement, pretty soon.  My not helping would seem like I'm playing
political games -- which I'm not.

> - i'm assuming that if you thought the hijacking/changes was wrong,
>   that you'd say something 

Not at all.  Having multiple candidate places to put the club's site is
a very good thing.

> 	- for dns stuff .. paul reed wants the dns stuff off so that
> 	gives us a good ammo to make some major changes
> 
> - i'm continuing as if the virtual server stuff is not ready 

I can tell you quite honestly, no, it's not ready -- but I've now had
access for only about two days (and root access on the current SVLUG 
host about the same time).  It's state is that Micah loaded Ubuntu
5.10 into the virthost and then did nothing.  Somehow, all 3072 MB of 
disk space is 100% full.  My assumption is that I'll have to junk those
contents and rebuild.  (I'm leaning towards a sparse install of Debian
testing/unstable, because it's highly maintainable and also familiar to
me.)  Then, exim4/Mailman setup, then Apache 1.3 setup (no, I'm not
going for Apache2), then MoinMoin, then figure out how to extract my and
Heather's Web-site-redesign work from http://gemini.starshine.org/SVLUG/
(still malfunctioning), and then any final tweaks.

Naturally, I'll be very happy to give you a copy of the wiki
site-redesign files, once I get them and figure out how to set them up
on my own.

> 	- if i have problems with exim ... i'll change the front page
> 	that i ran out of time and exim/mailman is not working
> 	( the part that i haven't a clue if i can make work in 2-4hrs of time )

Short form of how to setup Exim4:  Install Debian packages
exim4-daemon-heavy, exim4-config, exim4-base, and sa-exim, answering the
install-time configuration questions so as to arrive at a roughly
correct configuration.  Then, download EximConfig from
http://www.jcdigita.com/eximconfig/ .  Read the instructions, and
configure, enabling capabilities only one at a time, as you test them.