Windows USB Bootable

Much of the last weekend was spent trying to figure out how to make a USB Flash drive bootable for a Windows installation. This is no simple task, especially if you don't have a spare Windows computer up and running. But if you do, then you are in luck.

Before I attempted to use the Windows app, I did try several Linux options. UnetBootin, the CLI dd command were both promising options (see links below). However, the system I was trying to clean install did not have the appropriate boot options and so the drive was not detected on startup. This may have been a problem that was unique to me, so I would advise giving these options a go...then as a last resort, use the Windows app (Note: You won't turn into a blood-sucking parasite for using this method, but you will feel strange afterwards).

So, yes, if you want to make a Windows 7 bootable USB Flash, then I went to the Microsoft website and downloaded it an ran it on a Windows machine. Link here. Until I can find another way to do it, this will have to do.

Ciao!

Links:
http://www.webupd8.org/2010/10/create-bootable-windows-7-usb-drive.html
Good, but didn't work for me - http://serverfault.com/questions/6714/how-to-make-windows-7-usb-flash-install-media-from-linux

Update: 20 Dec 2011

Good news everyone! lol...link to the Professor Farnsworth, because it's worth it.

But on a serious note, I have just found a a simpler way to make a Windows USB boot drive. And by simpler, I mean on the command line :P.

The video here tells it all, but I'll summarize here, for the sake of documentation. Big thanks to uniquefree, as I for one would never have figured this out.

Briefly, the method:

1. wipes and formats the usb drive using FAT32 or NTFS file system
2. copies the files from the Windows CD/DVD straight over to the drive

I'll have to give this a go in Linux. However, at present, I'm not having much luck reading/writing to NTFS or FAT32 usb file systems :(.

Format the USB

For this example, we want to copy files from a CD/DVD drive or even a mounted .iso image at the location D:\, to our USB which will be F:\. This will obviously be different for you.

Start by partitioning the USB, using DISKPART and the following commands:

C:\>DISKPART
DISKPART> list disk
DISKPART> select disk 3
DISKPART> clean
DISKPART> create partition primary
DISKPART> select partition 1
DISKPART> active
DISKPART> format fs=fat32
DISKPART> assign
DISKPART> exit

You still need a windows computer for this one. Open the command prompt, cmd.exe, and type in DISKPART. This program should come preinstalled. The first few commands are important. Use 'list dist' to print out all the drives that have been detected by Windows. Like uniqueparts' video, there will be corresponding number down the left hand side of the output. Find the number that corresponds to the USB drive that you want to move the files to, and use it with the next command. This is important because if you choose the wrong number, the usb drive may not work (because the files were never copied there).

Uniquepart makes this quite clear, so I thought I'd do the same. I'm wondering if the 'Quick format' option that some people are familiar with would still make a bootable usb, but as yet, the longer format option given here is the way that works.


Now, the USB is ready, copy the files over using xcopy:

C:\>xcopy D:\*.* /s/e/f F:\

And you should have it!

This method is much more appealing to me and I hope it makes installs much more pleasant for those who use Windows...hehehe.

Ciao!

Server Fstab

Just making a quick post to get this month started.

My server box has been running really well. The simplicity of the components appears to be holding up - I still haven't found a proper benchmarking tool to test it out but oh well, another day. For now, I've attached several external hard drives so that I can play them on either of my laptops. Using the smb client has proven to be very successful, even over wireless the network. My housemate states that often videos will skip when she plays them on her computer, however this is not the case on my computers so we are both assuming that her computer does not have enough processing power to play the videos. An easy solution would be to use a wired connection - and we might just do that in due time.

What I would like to post today is my current /etc/fstab file. I've finally decided to read a bit about fstab configuration and now I'm wondering why I didn't do it earlier - it's really simple! As always, there is good documentation from the Ubuntu website. There is an example of an fstab entry and as you will see, they are not much different from a mount command.

To find out information about the devices that are connected, use blkid - the output will look like the following:

sudo blkid

/dev/sdc1: LABEL="A-hard-drive" UUID="12B0WF25B0DF0KDB" TYPE="ntfs"
/dev/sdd1: LABEL="Another-hard-drive" UUID="554123D9E73ABF54" TYPE="ntfs"

Take note of the UUID and the TYPE. These will be used in your new fstab file.

Go to /etc/fstab and make a copy of the original file, just incase something goes horribly wrong. I usually just append .orig to the end of the file (fstab.orig), that way it can be found easily again later. If you append orig. to the start (orig.fstab), then you might have trouble finding it later.

sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.orig

Open up /etc/fstab with your favourite editor, I use nano since I don't know emacs...yet :). Your original file will look a bit like this, thought it may have more entries depending on how you setup your distro.

sudo nano /etc/fstab

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid -o value -s UUID' to print the universally unique identifier
# for a device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name
# devices that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
#                
proc            /proc           proc    nodev,noexec,nosuid 0       0
/dev/sda1       /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /home was on /dev/sda5 during installation
UUID=5efe42d5-1b11-4287-a604-diid345b63d6 /home           ext4    defaults        0       2
/dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto,exec,utf8 0       0

So alls you gots to do, is add your entries to the end of this file. Easy huh? From blkid before, you'll need to take the UUID and use that so the computer can identify the external HDD if it happens to be plugged in. I'm hoping that you have read the Ubuntu Docs I linked to before, and you will know that the syntax is something along the lines of:

[Device] [Mount Point] [File System Type] [Options] [Dump] [Pass]

That said, for me, I just add these two lines to the end of fstab and my configuration is complete:

UUID=12B0WF25B0DF0KDB /media/OneTouch ntfs-3g uid=user,gid=group-name,umask=0000
UUID=554123D9E73ABF54 /media/Elements ntfs-3g uid=user,gid=group-name,umask=0000

Final file:

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid -o value -s UUID' to print the universally unique identifier
# for a device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name
# devices that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
#                
proc            /proc           proc    nodev,noexec,nosuid 0       0
/dev/sda1       /               ext4    errors=remount-ro 0       1
# /home was on /dev/sda5 during installation
UUID=5efe42d5-1b11-4287-a604-diid345b63d6 /home           ext4    defaults        0       2
/dev/fd0        /media/floppy0  auto    rw,user,noauto,exec,utf8 0       0
UUID=12B0WF25B0DF0KDB /media/OneTouch ntfs-3g uid=user,gid=group-name,umask=0000
UUID=554123D9E73ABF54 /media/Elements ntfs-3g uid=user,gid=group-name,umask=0000

Important! The security of your filesystems is solely up to you. I have used ntfs-3g because this allows users to write to the filesystem. More info about which is the correct filesystem to mount an external as can be read here. Also, by setting uid and gid, you can permit only certain persons to access the filesystems. I believe I have mentioned this before, but no harm in mentioning it again right? Call me paranoid, call me what you will...

Hope this guide is useful, I'm sure I'll be reading it again in the future, when my server dies or I forget what an fstab is.

Adios, till next time!

Dialog from Kristinn Hrafnsson

Making my way towards the Griffith University, Queensland Conservation of Art on a very fine winter day has given me to opportunity, and many others, to partake in a public forum addressed by spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson.

Dialog from the address, quoted and revised:

Snippet from leaked US-Army video -> Collateral Damage

Media partners: NY Times, Le Monde, El Pais, Aljazeera, Der Spiegel, SVT, 4, The Guardian

"...only about 50,000 cables are online."

"Often media companies are untrustworthy and individual journalists are consulted."

"Care is made not to make unnecessary harm to people."

"The cables have demystified other information."

"...that the cables will have a devastating effect on information connections between countries."

Zine El Abidine Ben Ali is the president of Tunisia whom is regarded as a valuable alli to certain parties in USA.

GITMO FILES (Guantanimo Bay Files) - an example of bad information being used to detain a number of people in conditions that do not fall under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

WikiLeaks has revolutionized journalism by partnering with media corps to better understand the importance of freedom of information.

"In a race between truth and secrecy, truth will always win." Kristinn says that he was impressed by these words, up until he discovered the creator of the saying, Rupert Murdoch.

WikiLeaks exists only due to the need for its' service - once Governments can become transient in relaying information to the public, WikiLeaks may not need to exist.

Permissions for mounting Externals

When mounting Externals, often the default permission will be that of the user mounting the device. This can create a barrier when wanting to access the External over a network. So when mounting, it is good practice to give suitable permissions that meet your specific needs. Ubuntu Docs has a good page on permissions however, you probably just want a working example. So here you go.

For mount, the umask detemines the permissions and if you read the Ubuntu Docs page briefly, read, write and execute permissions are given by 4, 2 and 1 respectively. As you will see, 0000 will result in permissions = drwxrwxrwx. If you give umask = 0001, then the permissions = drwxrwxrw-. A simple concept, however, at first I thought that it was the other way around.

So here's how I would mount an External on my server for read/write access by guests/users in the specified group:

mount -t ntfs-3g -o uid=admin-user,gid=guest-user-group,umask=0000 /dev/sdc1 /media/OneTouch

And if I wanted to mount with permission for just the user who mounted it:

mount -t ntfs-3g -o uid=admin-user,gid=guest-user-group,umask=0027 /dev/sdc1 /media/OneTouch

Extra control can be given using uid and gid to determine who is the owner and which users of the group can access the External. This may take a little bit extra to tweak but can be a good security measure. To get started, use the following command to determine which group a users belongs to:

id username

For more information about mounting, there's a resource here.

Adios, till next time!

SwiFTP and LFTP to do some syncing

Well, I should be studying but instead I'm delving into some FTP stuff and how to do some syncing across particular folders. All this is due me wanting to make my Music listening a hell of a lot easier. At present, Winamp does not have a Linux version and this sucks because there is one feature of Winamp has just come out and is fricken awesome - Wireless Sync, pretty self explanatory.

So I need a work around.

On your Android device
At present, I'm running Gingerbread 2.3.3 on my SGS2. Download and install SwiFTP from the Android market - information here. I've found this app simple and easy to setup - thus far. Once it is fired up, put in the details that you wish to have for your FTP server (your device) - user, pass, port (anything in the 1000's usually works, but not always). Most importantly, where it says:

Stay within folder (e.g. /sdcard):

...just put a...

/

...in the box. Later on when you connect from your client, you can point LFTP to which ever folder you wish - hopefully. Some info about why you should do this here (search for 'root').

Now, I say this because there may be a SU (superuser) or root error (is you device rooted?) in which you will not be given access to the folder on your phone, even if you typed the password in correctly. There needs to be a work around for this because there are rumors that rooting your device can disallow it from using certain Provider apps, e.g. any Optus apps on my device. And frankly, once rooted, I'm not sure if factory defaults can be set.

Once this is done, save the settings and the FTP server will start automatically.

On your Linux box
With your FTP server running, open up terminal on your Linux box and type in the following:

lftp -u name -p 1234 ftp://192.168.x.xx:/

-u specifies the username
-p specifies the port which you setup earlier on the device

You should be prompted to enter a password which was the one you setup earlier. And if all goes well, you will have a line that looks like this:

lftp name@192.168.x.xx:/

And this verifies that you can make the connection. Now, if you type in 'ls', you should be given all the files and folders of that folder. Neat!

Syncing with rsync -> FAIL
Rsync is a program which appears to come pre-installed on Linux. It allows for syncing folders across FTP and on your machine. It seems to be much like creating a symlink but is only run when the user says so. There is a neat little thread here which says it all.

So...I've just finished trying to get rsync to work with my FTP server, but everywhere I go says that it cannot be done :(. Well at least I know about Rsync I guess. There is a solution however...read on.

LFTP and Mirror
So the solution, as posted here by easel (round of applause!), is to use 'mirror' to do the syncing over FTP using LFTP. So you'll want to make a script file with the code that easel has posted. I've changed mine a little for my needs:

lftp -c "set ftp:list-options -a;
open ftp://user:password@your.ftp.com:port; 
lcd ./web;
cd /web/public_html;
mirror --reverse --delete --use-cache --verbose --allow-chown --no-umask --parallel=2"

Some of the options used include:
lcd - is the local directory you want to sync,
cd - is the directory on the FTP server in which you wish to sync
and...
mirror - sync the two folders, choosing the local directory as the master (everything on cd that isn't in lcd will be deleted). Type 'man lftp' for more information on the options used here, --reverse, --delete etc.

Don't forget to change the permissions to user executable, chmod u+x.

Note: lftp uses ftp protocols to transfer data and is therefore, not secure (ssh is an example of a secure transfer protocol, need to investigate how I can use it instead). The password that was entered in earlier could easily be hacked (discovered) by anyone listening to the 'conversation' between your phone and your computer...so be careful!

Pretty neat huh! That's it. It may need to be run from the CLI, or you can create a launcher on the desktop. That should work.

Ciao and happy syncing!

Samba Server

My quick HowTo on how I setup Samba on my floor server. Methodology taken from here. Might also be useful, maybe even quicker, to look at Ubuntu Docs here.

1) Check samba and smbfs is installed

sudo apt-get install samba smbfs

It should be...

2) Edit the smb.conf file
Edit the file to your needs. Don't forget to make a copy of the original file somewhere just in case something goes terribly wrong.

sudo nano /etc/samba/smb.conf

2a) Tell Samba to allow only known accounts.
Find the following line...

#  security = user

Uncomment it and also add an extra line:

security = user
username map = /etc/samba/smbusers

Of course, you can tell Samba to point where ever you want it to, just don't forget where.

2b) Create Samba user account
Create an account that you will give access to Samba shares

sudo smbpasswd -a name

Add the user to smbuser file and link it to an account on the server

sudo nano /etc/samba/smbusers

Once the file is open, add the following line. The "name" will be linked to the name account:

name = “name”

Save and exit nano.

You have now setup a user for Samba. Now to finish it off - fatality style O_o.

3) Fine tune smb.conf
Now, if you read carefully, the smb.conf file will have a whole load of options. Some are straight forward, some are complex - in the sense that I don't know what would happen if I changed them. Everyone will have different preferences, but these should get you started:

Um...there's too many to list. See Ubuntu Docs, pretty useful.

But, to be helpful, if you want to get started quickly, just add this to the end of the smb.conf file, with your options of course.

[share]
    comment = Ubuntu File Server Share
    path = /srv/samba/share
    browsable = yes
    guest ok = no
    read only = no
    create mask = 0755

4) Restart services
I've also noticed that when doing this, there is some sort of lag in the service restart. So, you may need to wait a little longer before the changed settings will take effect.

sudo restart smbd
sudo restart nmbd

Conclusion
So I think that's it really. I've found that Samba just gives a UI for when accessing server files. It seems to be the same as using SSH and scp to move files to an fro. However, scp can be much faster if you know where you want to put something on the server and you have already set the right permissions. Which brings me to my next point: permissions. Are very important here. Permissions, users and groups. I almost gave myself a headache but I guess so long as you remember what users are in what groups, and which groups can do what. As a general rule, I've written it on stone-tablets in my mind that the user you create when you do a clean install, has admin/root permissions. Therefore, don't use that user name for this kind of stuff. So...if you are having troubles writing to shares once you have mounted them, then my advice is to look up some docs on permissions. Running this:

sudo chmod a+w directory

...may be all that is needed to allow you to do so.

Have just re-read this post and...it's longer than Ubuntu Docs :(. Oh well, enjoy!

Extra Places
http://us1.samba.org/samba/docs/man/manpages-3/smb.conf.5.html

How should a server be setup?

After recently acquiring a $75 tower, with reasonable specs, it has come to my attention that setting up a home server should have several steps that are a must. The last box died, in most part due to the age of the 15GB HDD. But Ubuntu was able to run and for a time, there was a nice little server running on it - 1 GHz, 256MB RAM (the 512 I put in wasn't detected...). After wiping the Windoze system and doing a clean install of Ubuntu 11.04 via network, I was able to get a LAMP installation running (but not utilising MySQL or PHP as these are both foreign to me), a Samba file sharing thingo, as well as installed and shared my Canon printer :).

Now, the guy I bought the $75 box from (3 GHz, 1GB RAM, 80GB HDD) suggested to use a USB stick to store important files. And while I do agree to some extent, I really just wanted to learn how to get a server going...hehehe. There may well be some extra benefits in the long run from having a file system that is accessible over the internet, however one does need to be weary of security issues and also the possibility that things might not do what you want them do - it's a learning process. With that in mind, I think Ubuntu Linux makes a very good distribution to get a server working.

Below, is a short list which is MY recommendations (and what I have done just recently) for what you should do/install after you have put an awesome distro of Linux on your box that has been sitting in the corner doing nothing for the last 4 years. My final message is as above: security is paramount. I'm not talking about physical security, although that may be important depending on which neighborhood you live in, but rather internet security. Call me paranoid, call me what you will, but there's no point setting up a server if other people are going to be able to get at it...unless you want them to of course.

Here's my list:
1) Configure sshd_config on the server so you can access it safely (in progress)
2) Setup printer
3) Move your web files to /var/www
4) Setup Samba

Here's my list - the detailed version
1) Configure sshd_config on the server so you can access it safely (in progress)
* Change the port in which SSH will listen. 22 is the default port so if you change it, unwanted guests will take longer to find your server.
* Disable root access. Allow only specific user/s, but never an account with root access.
* Setup SSH access via a public/private key. See Ubuntu Docs for more details and how to make one. Note: if after using this method and transferring the key to the server computer, you may find that the key fails to authenticate. This may be because you may not have added the ssh-server-address-thing (?) to your system. Run this command on the client computer (the computer in which you are accessing the server from), for some reason it is not mentioned in Ubuntu Docs:

ssh-add

2) Setup printer
* Make sure CUPS is up to date and all package dependencies have been met
* For my Canon PIXMA, see older posts
* If something isn't working, try turning the printer off and then on again, seems to do the trick

3) Move your web files to /var/www
* Maybe it's bad practise, but I've been getting into the habit of using /var/www as my LAMP root directory - it's the default directory anyway and I think it's safe
* If you wish to make directories that are accessible via internet, then you have to give the folder guest access. Just use chmod and chown to do this.
* I guess this is essentially how I set up my webserver. Not very flash bang and yes, update my website is one thing I need to do...

4) Setup Samba
* Only useful if you want to access your files over different OSes
* Or, if you don't like using SSH - which I kinda like...
* See next post for details

Things worth looking into:
* Logging break-in attempts: not sure how to do this but need an easier way than reading the /var/log/auth.log manually...