Analyse the boot process with bootchart

November 30, 2008 · Posted in Gentoo, Linux · 2 Comments

Its sunday today. It a blogging day :P.

Most of you already know the bootchart program. But for those who dont , Im gonna show them how to view their system start up procedure.

If you are a gentoo user , first emerge app-benchmark/bootchart

Then, open /etc/bootchartd.conf and edit the following lines

AUTO_RENDER=”yes”

AUTO_RENDER_FORMAT=”png” ( replace png with svg or eps if you want )

AUTO_RENDER_DIR=”/var/log”
These are the default options , but make sure that are configured fine on your machine.

Then, open /boot/grub/grub.conf and add

init=/sbin/bootchartd on kernel options like the example below

title=Gentoo Linux

root (hd0,0)

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-gentoo-r3 root=/dev/sda3 init=/sbin/bootchartd quiet

Reboot your machine , and you will find under /var/log/ and image named bootchart.png picturing your boot process :)

Have a nice day

Tags: boot, bootchart, Gentoo

Colourised dispatch-conf process

November 23, 2008 · Posted in Gentoo · Comment

Ah , nice, blogging on Sunday morning…

Here is a cool tip published on Gentoo Monthly Newsletter

All of us use dispatch-conf when the time comes to update our configuration files. Its kinda hazy however this black and white theme. What about some colors?

Sure, try to emerge app-misc/colordiff

Then go to

/etc/dispatch-conf.conf

And change the line

diff=”diff -Nu ‘%s’ ‘%s’ | less –no-init –QUIT-AT-EOF”

diff=”colordiff -Nu ‘%s’ ‘%s’ | less –no-init –QUIT-AT-EOF”

Thats it. The very next time you will run dispatch-conf you will encounter a nice colourised display :). Happy patching

Tags: colordiff, dispatch-conf, Gentoo

Bootsplash on Gentoo Linux

November 17, 2008 · Posted in Gentoo · 9 Comments

There are many guides about this one but most of them are way too complicated to deal with.

I am gonna show you in simple steps how to add a bootsplash on your gentoo machine

1) Required Packages

First emerge

media-gfx/splashutils

media-gfx/splash-themes-gentoo

media-gfx/splash-themes-livecd

The first package installs severals usefull scripts to deal with splash themes, while the second and third one provide us some extra themes

2) Create image

Enter on splash themes directory

cd /etc/splash/

Choose the theme you want ( use ls command to see all the themes ) and then create initrd file with

splash_geninitramfs  -g <place> -r <resolution> -v <theme>

Where:

place: Type the place to put your initrd file ( usually /boot/<theme_name>

resolution: Prefered resolution ( The supported resolutions for each theme can be found under /etc/splash/<theme>/)

theme: Themes’ name

eg. Lets say i want to create an 1280×800 bootplash for natural_gentoo theme I should type

splash_geninitramfs -g /boot/natural_gentoo -r 1280x800 -v natural_gentoo

And this is the output

 o Creating directory structure..

o Copying //sbin/fbcondecor_helper..

o Copying themes..

  - natural_gentoo

o Creating initramfs image..

3) Configure Grub

This is my grub.conf ( or menu.list file )

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27-gentoo-r2-evil-inside

root=/dev/sda5 resume=/dev/sda2 init=/sbin/bootchartd

quiet video=intelfb:1280x800-32@60 vga=792 splash=silent,fadein,theme:natural_gentoo

console=tty1 initrd /boot/natural_gentoo

I assume you understand the first two lines so im gonna explain what is going on from the third line

quiet: Means to hide bootinformation while we are on bootsplash screen

video:Set your framebuffer driver (choose yours from /usr/src/linux/Documentation/fb/ ). Also set your resolution, color depth and the Hz of your monitor

vga: Set the color depth of your monitor . A google search will help you to understand this number

splash: Several splash screen options. Silence stands for quiet ( you can ommit it if you have set quiet before). Fadein is just an effect :). Theme is the name of your choosen theme ( you can omit it if you have set an initrd file )

console: Type the console in which you want to apply the bootsplash. Usually you set the first tty console

Initrd: Put the path for the previously created initrd image file

4) Reboot

All done. Reboot your machine and you will face a beautyfull Dark Gentoo Bootsplash :)

If something went wrong please leave a comment so we can solve it :)

Thanks

Tags: bootsplash, Gentoo, splash

X11 Forwarding. How cool is that ?

November 8, 2008 · Posted in Linux · 2 Comments

Today I had to configure a router located on remote host. This router is pure crap and it has only Web interface. No ssh,no ftp ,nothing.

So without any further thought, I dediced to fire up ssh with -X , -C options ( X forwarding, Compression ) . After that I launched konqueror (firefox couldnt start (?) )and access the routers’ web interface. Stupid? Maybe . But i couldnt think of anything else

Just for the record the ssh command I lauched was

ssh -c arcfour,blowfish-cbc -C -X

arcfour,blowfish-cbc appear to be faster according to several sources over the internet

Another great idea would be “links” but routers web interface didnt work with that :(

How would you deal with this problem? Will you use X11 Forwarding as I did? I d like to hear your ideas :)

ps:Replacing the router is not an option ! :)

Tags: ssh, x11

Pysmssend-1.38

November 1, 2008 · Posted in Programming, Projects · 2 Comments

Its out. Many many bug fixes. I hope you will enjoy it as much as the previous version

1) Improved control for message report 2) Tray icon has been re-written 3) Added voipcheap support 4) Added -v option when running Gui. Verbose output 5) Fix feedback when sending a message. 6) Remember Me checkbox is now by default checked. 7) Check for updates when the program starts. 8 ) Compatibility fixed for both kde3+kde4 kaddressbook. Needs more testing though

http://pysmssend.sourceforge.net

Tags: project, pysmssend