Tag Archives: linux

Using VDO on CentOS/RHEL7 for Storage Efficiency

Posted on September 13, 2018 by Will Foster

Besides Btrfs, native Linux-based storage solutions have lagged behind the robustness and features of ZFS and the BSDs. Recently Red Hat acquired Permabit which provides an Open Source device-mapper Linux kernel driver and layer that sits between block devices and … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged centos, container storage deduplication, dedupe compression on linux, how to setup vdo on centos, linux, linux admin, linux storage compression, linux storage dedupe, Permabit, RHEL, storage, VDO on CentOS, VDO on RHEL | 8 Comments

Block Advertising on your Network with Pi-hole and Raspberry Pi

Posted on February 27, 2018 by Will Foster

I recently setup Pi-hole on an existing Raspberry Pi running CentOS on my home network to serve as my DNS server and block advertising and unwanted domains for all internet-connected devices. I’m still using an ASUS router with Shibby Tomato … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged ad blocking, advertising, blocking, DNS, dnsmasq, docker pi-hole container, free privacy software, home ad blocking, linux, pi-hole, pi-hole centos, pi-hole docker, pi-hole raspberry pi, pi-hole setup guide, privacy, raspberry pi, security, spyware blocking | 55 Comments

Backup and Restore using SpiderOak on Linux

Posted on August 20, 2017 by Will Foster

Recently the SSD Operating System disk on my primary work desktop failed without warning and no manner of arcane xfsrepair or xfsdump/xfsrestore chicanery would bring it back. Luckily I had SpiderOak backups as my employer offers this as a service … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged backups, fedora centos spideroak, linux, linux spideroak guide, spideroak, spideroak cli, spideroak linux, spideroak restore | 6 Comments

Distributed Remote Backups with Git and Etckeeper

Posted on July 15, 2017 by Will Foster

Git is a powerful tool for lots of tasks, it makes a wonderful VCS that can drive easy utility and automation. Recently I used git and remote repositories to deploy code & data fanned out to multiple locations. Here are … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged devops, etckeeper, etckeeper linux guide, git, linux, linux git backups, linux git branches, remote, sysadmin | Leave a comment

Shell One-liners and Quick and Dirty Loops

Posted on March 23, 2017 by Will Foster

Sometimes you just need to get stuff done quickly and there’s nary a replacement better than a quick shell one-liner. Recently I’ve needed to feed some large, multi-variable commands into an external program for processing. Here’s some simple shell one-liners … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged bash, for loop, linux, loops, shell, shell example linux, shell examples, shell linux examples, sysadmin, useful shell linux tip | 4 Comments

Let’s Encrypt Everything – Setting up the Free, Automated CA

Posted on February 21, 2017 by Will Foster

Let’s Encrypt is a free, public SSL certificate authority (CA) you can use to generate and automate SSL certificate renewal. I co-manage Trystack.org, a free OpenStack sandbox for the general public and our Horizon SSL certificate came up for expiration … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged apache, apache let's encrypt guide, https, let's encrypt, let's encrypt guide linux, linux, security, ssl, SSL CA | Leave a comment

Back to the Future: Converting a Server VM to Bare Metal

Posted on December 7, 2016 by Will Foster

It might seem like stepping back in time, but sometimes you start something with a VM and the desire for resources and usage skyrockets and you need to transplant it onto a bare metal server. This was my situation with … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged bare metal, clonezilla, clonezilla linux guide, libvirt, linux, server, virtual to bare-metal, virtualization | Leave a comment

Fun and Automation with Git Hooks

Posted on October 4, 2016 by Will Foster

Git is more than just an awesome, decentralized version control system (VCS) – it can also drive lots of useful automation by triggering actions to deploy infrastructure and services based on event and commit-based hooks. You can drive a lot … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged automation, devops, git, git hooks, linux, post-receive hooks, sysadmin | Leave a comment

Automate SuperMicro Server Provisioning or Die Trying

Posted on August 10, 2016 by Will Foster

We use Foreman for systems provisioning and recently received a large shipment of Supermicro for Ceph. Out of the box they were a lot of trouble to get integrated/automated at the same level of our Dell gear but we managed, … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged devops, foreman, hardware, ipmi, linux, provisioning, servers, supermicro, sysadmin | 8 Comments

Tmux for GNU Screen Refugees and Vim Users

Posted on July 16, 2016 by Will Foster

I use GNU Screen on servers to manage working sessions and perform long-running or persistent tasks. Lately I’ve been using tmux locally on my work desktop/laptop, finding it better suited for most terminal activity. Here’s how I set it up … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged linux, productivity, screen, sysadmin, terminal, tmux | Leave a comment

Create an HD Gaming Capture/Streaming Setup with Linux

Posted on July 5, 2016 by Will Foster

I recently created a dedicated game recording/streaming setup using OBS Studio on Fedora Linux. This lets me capture and stream real-time full 1080p video and audio from another machine playing video games. Read on for the hardware and setup details, … Continue reading →

Posted in gaming, open source | Tagged game casting, game streaming, gaming, gaming PC streaming, linux, multimedia, OBS, obs studio, obs studio linux, record desktop linux, record desktop obs linux, recording | Leave a comment

Automate Nagios Monitoring with Ansible

Posted on June 24, 2016 by Will Foster

Infrastructure monitoring is important and there’s lots of tools for it. I’m fond of Nagios – it’s very mature and customizable but it’s also a giant pain in the ass to setup. Here’s how to save time deploying and managing … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged ansible, automation, devops, idrac monitoring, ipmi, linux, monitoring, nagios, snmp, supermicro monitoring, sysadmin | 31 Comments

Fun and Profit with Reverse SSH Tunnels and AutoSSH

Posted on June 20, 2016 by Will Foster

Sometimes you just need to get to things remotely. Those things might be behind an unbudging firewall with no way to forward proper ports for remote access, or perhaps you just want it setup access to resources this way. I … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged autossh, autossh on linux, how to use reverse ssh proxy, linux, linux openssh proxy, linux reverse ssh, reverse proxy, security, ssh, ssh reverse proxy linux | 22 Comments

Secure, Distributed Password Resources with GPG, Git and Vim

Posted on June 13, 2016 by Will Foster

There are many tools to manage passwords and sensitive resources, some cost money or are closed commercial products. I’m going to show you how to create a secure, distributed and encrypted remote password repository using Open Source tools like GPG … Continue reading →

Posted in open source, sysadmin | Tagged encryption, gpg, linux, passwords, security, sysadmin | 1 Comment

Quick and Dirty Remote Execution with Ansible

Posted on May 19, 2016 by Will Foster

Ansible is a wonderful tool for orchestration, configuration management and automating a lot of tasks you’d never want to do by hand. Sometimes you just need to get in there and run a few commands across a bunch of different … Continue reading →