- Roundtable - muug.ca

muug.ca server and paypal updates
by Trevor Cordes 21 Jan '20

21 Jan '20

As many of you may know, we've been having problems with the muug.ca mirror server for a couple of months. We've been working hard to get it working (mostly Adam!) at a reasonable level, and we're getting close. It's probably at the stage people can use it as their mirror again and performance should be reasonable. It should get better as we keep tweaking it. A new big NVMe ZFS cache is really helping to ameliorate our biggest bottlenecks. We've also upgraded the OS and this required a newer PHP version. Due to certain libraries being unsupported in the new PHP, some code had to be rewritten and as a result the paypal MUUG renewal links sent out via email prior to today will no longer function. If you are up for renewal, you will receive another email in a few weeks with a new renewal link which will work correctly. If you want to renew with paypal before that time, feel free to email board(a)muug.ca and we can manually email you a link right away. Also, some bugs may remain after our big PHP change, so if you see any errors or even warnings, please email board(a)muug.ca so we can fix them right away! Thanks!

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MUUG Meeting, Jan 14, 7:30pm -- Running Linux as a Windows App
by Gilbert E. Detillieux 07 Jan '20

07 Jan '20

The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting on Tuesday, January 14. The meeting topic for this month is as follows: Running Linux as a Windows App Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) allows the installation of any of several different Linux distributions. They all utilize the Windows kernel. In this talk we discuss the good (really easy to get started) and the bad (where did X go?) with an emphasis on several demonstrations of the software capabilities. Michael Doob will be presenting. The group holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the second Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. ******************************************************************* Please note our meeting location for this month: *Room 1M28* Manitoba Hall, University of Winnipeg, entrance on Ellice Ave. between Spence and Balmoral St. Parking is available on the surrounding streets and in the lots on nearby streets. Look for signage once you're at the building, or ask a security guard. ******************************************************************* For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Manitoba UNIX User Group E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> c/o Gilbert E. Detillieux Web: http://muug.ca/ University of Manitoba Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg MB CANADA R3T 2N2 Fax: (204)474-7609

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Wrong time of night for doing regex?
by Hartmut W Sager 06 Jan '20

06 Jan '20

This might be the wrong time of night for doing regex (i.e., my mistake), or my trusty Vedit text editor has a bug in its regex implementation. Original search string: ^(From AncientBBS[1-2])\s+(Sun|Mon|Tue|Wed|Thu|Fri|Sat)[\s\,]+(Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)\s+([0-9][0-9]|\s[0-9])[\s\,]+(19[0-9][0-9])[\s\,]+([0-9][0-9]\:[0-9][0-9]\:[0-9][0-9])\s*$ Replacement string: <Nah, skip it> The above search string gives a syntax error. I am a bit suspicious of the ([0-9][0-9]|\s[0-9]) group re operator precedence of the "or", and proceeded to stepwise simplification to narrow it down. I finally got down to: Search string: (Jan|Feb|Mar|Apr|May|Jun|Jul|Aug|Sep|Oct|Nov|Dec)\s+([0-9])[\s\,]+ Replacement string: \1\s0\2\s The new search works fine (as did some of the previous stepwise simplified ones), but the replacements are baffling me. The line >From AncientBBS1 Thu Jan 2, 1986 20:50:00 gets changed to >From AncientBBS1 Thu 02 1986 20:50:00 I.e., the variable \1 seems to get lost. In my previous stepwise simplified cases, multiple variables got lost when the search worked at all. Why am I doing this? I need to massage some old BBS messages into the retarded mbox format, whose date format (on the "From " line) of "Tue Nov 05 19:02:00 1985" is particularly illogical. Be that as it may, The two sources of these messages I am processing had further sloppiness in their dates, done by some ancient BBS bozos. I did successfully fix a lot of that already with regex. Hartmut W Sager - Tel +1-204-339-8331

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creat() fails on non-root owned file when stickybit set on dir (tcsh) (new kernel bug?)
by Trevor Cordes 03 Jan '20

03 Jan '20

Just upgraded to F30 with kernel 5.3.12 (not going to F31 quite yet). Hit a weird error that didn't happen in the previous kernel/OS: If my dir has stickybit set, in this case /tmp, then root can't use tcsh's ">!" redirection on a file owned by another user (permission denied). F29 ">!" allowed it just fine (kernel 5.3.11). I checked and tcsh versions didn't change, except just the bump to F30. ">!" in tcsh is the same as > in bash. tcsh lets you set an option to >! require explicit instruction to clobber existing files so you don't accidentally > an existing file without realizing it. That's the extra ! after the >. It's funny, because root can still append to the file (>>), rm it, chmod, etc., just not this explicit clobber. Funnier still is it works in bash (using >) but the OS is still giving it the permission denied. (See below.) It looks like tcsh is using creat() and that is the syscall returning the error. as root: tcsh sudo -u trevor touch /tmp/t echo foo >> /tmp/t # ok echo foo >! /tmp/t # Permission denied. strace on 5.3.12 F30 (error): dup(19) = 0 fcntl(0, F_SETFD, 0) = 0 dup2(17, 1) = 1 dup2(18, 2) = 2 creat("t", 0666) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied) write(18, "t: Permission denied.\n", 22l: Permission denied. ) = 22 strace on 5.3.11 F29 (ok): dup(19) = 0 fcntl(0, F_SETFD, 0) = 0 dup2(17, 1) = 1 dup2(18, 2) = 2 creat("t", 0666) = 3 fcntl(3, F_GETFL) = 0x8001 (flags O_WRONLY|O_LARGEFILE) fcntl(3, F_SETFL, O_WRONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 0 ... strace with bash on 5.3.12 F30 (no error! note the double try!) (command for bash is just: echo foo > /tmp/t) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/t", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied) openat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/t", O_WRONLY|O_TRUNC) = 3 fcntl(1, F_GETFD) = 0 fcntl(1, F_DUPFD, 10) = 10 ... So bash uses openat instead of creat, but still gets EACCESS, but then retries with slightly different options... almost like bash hit this same bug but has already worked around it. So is this a kernel bug / change in API? Should I report this to kernel bugs or to tcsh bugs? This is a "bug" in the sense that something changed because I've been doing this type of command for, oh, 20 years, and it's always worked before. And I know Linus doesn't like to change the existing user interface into the kernel.

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MUUG meeting presentation notes
by Gilbert E. Detillieux 16 Dec '19

16 Dec '19

Howdy folks! Thanks to all of you who came to my presentation last night, reflecting on 50 years of UNIX. Thanks also for the feedback I received. I enjoyed presenting on this topic, and I'm glad that it was enjoyed by many of you. I've updated the MUUG web site's meetings page to include links to my (updated) presentation notes, as well as some links to a bit of early UNIX trivia... https://muug.ca/meetings/19-20.html#dec For those of you who missed the talk, I hope the slides will at least give you a bit of a taste for the presentation. Wyatt did record it, so it may pop up on our YouTube channel at a future date. Enjoy the holidays, and hope to see you in January! Gilbert -- Manitoba UNIX User Group E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> c/o Gilbert E. Detillieux Web: http://muug.ca/ University of Manitoba Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg MB CANADA R3T 2N2 Fax: (204)474-7609

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Gilbert Last Night
by Frank H 12 Dec '19

12 Dec '19

I just wanted to say I really enjoyed last night's retrospective by Gilbert. It was great

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Linux for the disabled
by Frank H 05 Dec '19

05 Dec '19

I was diagnosed with ALS earlier in the year. Among other things, my voice is quickly becoming unintelligible, and my hands are weakening to the point that one day I won't be able to type. Eye tracking hardware/software is probably going to my mode of communication. Are you guys aware of anything like that for linux? When I use Windows, I feel like I'm in a stranger's house. Thanks,Frank

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Looking for PTP aware switch
by Gerald Brandt 04 Dec '19

04 Dec '19

Hi, I'm looking for an IEEE 1588v2/PTP aware switch. Looking around, I've found several ruggadized ones and a couple in office types. I only need something for use in office, and something with 16 or 24 GigE ports would work. The ones I've found are pretty expensive, considering we would need 4 of them. Gerald

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MUUG Meeting, Dec 10, 7:30pm -- UNIX @ 50, Round-table, Mingling and Munchies
by Gilbert E. Detillieux 03 Dec '19

03 Dec '19

The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting on Tuesday, December 10. The meeting topic for this month is as follows: UNIX@50 (A Personal History) UNIX turned 50 this past summer. Gilbert Detillieux has worked with UNIX systems for the last 40 of those 50 years. In this not-too-technical presentation, Gilbert will take you through 5 decades of UNIX evolution (with some personal reflections on the last 4 of those decades). Come for the interesting trivia, stay for the philosophical musings! Round-table, Mingling and Munchies As 2019 draws to a close, MUUG will continue our recent tradition of turning the December meeting into more of a social event. *Bring your favourite gadget!* We will have the usual round-table session, followed by the RTFM presentation (see above), then a gadget show & tell, and finally, some time for mingling, eating, and drinking. *This will be a pot-luck snack event.* Cookies and pop will be provided by MUUG, but members are encouraged to bring their own finger food to sample and share. Feel free to bring your own drink as well if you want something particular - just remember that we don't have a liquor license! Winnipeg Harvest Food Drive Also as in previous years, we will combine our pot luck with a food drive for Winnipeg Harvest. Cash donations are preferred this year as every $1 Winnipeg Harvest receives, they are able to pick up and deliver $20 worth of groceries. *Any member who donates at least $1 or brings at least 1 food item will be given an entry into the door prize draw!* Winnipeg Harvest has information about what they're looking for on their website: http://winnipegharvest.org/donate-food/ The group holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the second Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. ******************************************************************* Please note our new meeting location for this month: *Room 1L06* Lockhart Hall, University of Winnipeg, entrance on Ellice Ave. between Spence and Balmoral St. Parking is available on the surrounding streets and in the lots on nearby streets. Look for signage once you're at the building, or ask a security guard. ******************************************************************* For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Manitoba UNIX User Group E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> c/o Gilbert E. Detillieux Web: http://muug.ca/ University of Manitoba Phone: (204)474-8161 Winnipeg MB CANADA R3T 2N2 Fax: (204)474-7609

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The "Save .org" petition
by Glen Ditchfield 27 Nov '19

27 Nov '19

As you may have heard, ICANN removed the price caps on .org domains, then quietly decided to sell the .org registry to a private equity firm linked to a former ICANN CEO and several American billionaires (https:// www.theregister.co.uk/2019/11/26/org_selloff_internet/) So, a bunch of respectable organizations have started a petition to stop that, at https://savedotorg.org/ . Signing might help.

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