CRT TV Setup

1. Ensure that the set has been switched on for at least twenty minutes.
2. Set all the 'fancy' picture options to 'Off' or 'Neutral'.
3. Reduce 'Colour', 'Contrast' and 'Brightness' to zero. This should give a blank, black screen.
4. Slowly increase 'Brightness' until there is a just perceptible lightening of the screen.
5. Slowly increase 'Contrast' until you have an acceptable black and white picture. Some further small adjustment of 'Brightness' may be necessary to achieve this.
6. If you have a 'Gamma' control slowly increase 'Gamma' until you have sufficient amount of detail in the 'blacks'.
7. Make further small adjustments of 'Brightness' and 'Contrast' to optimize the black and white picture.
8. Increase 'Colour' to achieve realistic flesh tones.

Repeat until happy.

The important thing is to concentrate firstly on getting a decent black and white picture while viewing a good programme source.

Colour can come later.

Hint: Do All OS updates AFTER the Ubuntu CD install

When installing Ubuntu, you know that option to download updates while installing?

Just Say NO!!!

Do the software updates later after you get the OS running.

Or you'll be soon debugging weird stuff ...

(especially relevant if a non-current release)

Errors mounting filesystems in Ubuntu?

Issue: Mounting CIFS shares in ubuntu, get dmesg warning about "CIFS VFS: No username specified", also manual attempt at mount fails, mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on //kissbox/share, missing codepage or helper program, or some other error (which applies for several filesystems (e.g. nfs, cifs))

Solution: you might need a /sbin/mount helper program.

In some cases useful info is found in syslog - try looking further in dmesg

For CIFS (samba) apt-get install cifs-utils

Ubuntu, Inaccessible LVM drive root?

Issue: In the process of data recovery or migration, an LVM formatted ubuntu system drive is added (usbSATA cable) to another similarly LVM built system. It's not possible to access the root partition of the added drive.

Solution: use lvdisplay to find the UUID of the inaccesible partition, then use 'vgrename ' to change the volume name of that to something other than 'ubuntu'

Reason: The volume name is clashing with the running OS!

Simple SAMBA user and public (password-less) share on debian

1. Install Samba

# apt-get install samba
# cd /etc/samba
# mv smb.conf smb.conf.old

2.Create following as smb.conf

[global]
workgroup = CALIFORNIA
server string = %h server
obey pam restrictions = Yes
pam password change = Yes
passwd program = /usr/bin/passwd %u
passwd chat = *Enter\snew\s*\spassword:* %n\n *Retype\snew\s*\spassword:* %n\n *password\supdated\ssuccessfully* .
unix password sync = Yes
syslog = 0
log file = /var/log/samba/log.%m
max log size = 1000
dns proxy = No
panic action = /usr/share/samba/panic-action %d
map to guest = bad user
[homes]
comment = Home Directories
valid users = %S
read only = No
create mask = 0700
directory mask = 0700
browseable = No
[printers]
comment = All Printers
path = /var/spool/samba
create mask = 0700
printable = Yes
browseable = No
[print$]
comment = Printer Drivers
path = /var/lib/samba/printers
[public]
comment = public
path = /home/public
read only = No
public = yes
force user = nobody
force group = users
force create mode = 0664
create mask = 0664
force directory mode = 0775
directory mask = 0775

3. Create public folders

# md /home/public
# chown nobody:users /home/public
# chmod 775 /home/public

4. Force files created in the public folder to have same group membership (users)

# chmod g+s /home/public

5. Add linux desktop user to 'users' group (requires a logout/login to set)

# adduser john users

6. Create windows network user password for only external access to home directories (not required for /home/public)

# smbpasswd -a john

7. Check files can be created, modified and deleted by both the linux desktop user and connected network users.

Windows nslookup DNS timeouts?

In Windows 7 by default the nslookup command does a lookup using both A (IPv4) and AAAA (IPv6) query records.
Together that is -type=A+AAAA

Looking at them separately ...

> nslookup -type=A fiddle.nonline.lan 10.16.1.41
Server: meserver.lan
Address: 10.16.1.41

Name: fiddle.nonline.lan
Address: 10.16.1.42

> nslookup -type=AAAA fiddle.nonline.lan 10.16.1.41
Server: meserver.lan
Address: 10.16.1.41

DNS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
DNS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
*** Request to meserver.lan timed-out

So that is where your spurious "DNS timed out error" is coming from!