Subject: Linux-Admin Digest #163
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 8 Oct 94 13:13:32 EDT

Linux-Admin Digest #163, Volume #2                Sat, 8 Oct 94 13:13:32 EDT

Contents:
  /etc/passwd and /etc/group standards (Gareth McAleese)
  Re: <Q> Can Linux Mount a Mac Floppy (Holger Petersen)
  Re: FTPs PCTCP and Linux lock. (Joey is Cool)
  Re: Problem with static route table (Steve Whorwood)
  [Q] ytalk / named / DNS help needed (Gary Anderson)
  Remote swap ? (Gennady Agranov)
  Re: Inn on a Linux box! (Nick Andrew)
  Re: Good dirs to move to sep file systems? (Nick Andrew)
  Re: Security hole - has noone noticed so far? (Nick Andrew)
  Upgrade SLS .99.12 to current (Steve Miller)
  Re: XFree86-3.1 - Whoopee! (Paul Smith)
  SCO UNIX Binary Compatibility (Steve Miller)
  Connecting Netware & Unix (hardware) (International Tech. Assoc)
  Re: Bug in Linux 'mv'? (David Fox)
  Re: inetd seems to lock-up (David Fox)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Gareth McAleese)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.development
Subject: /etc/passwd and /etc/group standards
Date: 8 Oct 1994 14:36:51 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

Hi,

I have been looking around the FTP sites for information about any standards
for daemon accounts in /etc/passwd such as bin,sync,news,news,... and also for
naming of groups such as wheel,root,adm,sys,system,...

Has there been anything discussed with this.  I am quite an experienced linux
hacker and I am for installing linux from peices rather than from a 
distribution such as slackware, actually I have installed the basic slackware
set to get me a bootable machine and from here I have started to hack at 
things as we speak X11R6 is recompiling on it.

Any pointers or suggestions welcome, what entries do commercial versions have
like SunOS, Solaris, SCO,..., I have access to some other Unix systems.

Thanks in advance

Gareth

--
Gareth McAleese                                                         
Research Student                     Phone:  +44 (0)265 44141 ext 4702
University of Ulster at Coleraine      Fax:  +44 (0)265 40916
Faculty of Informatics               Email:  [email-masked]
Cromore Road, Coleraine            
N. Ireland  BT52 1SA                 http://www.infc.ulst.ac.uk/~gareth/

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Holger Petersen)
Subject: Re: <Q> Can Linux Mount a Mac Floppy
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 20:55:38 GMT

[email-masked] (Steve Kneizys) writes:

>Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer) ([email-masked]) wrote:

>: Got some ASCII text files on my Powerbook... Would like to write them

>Well, my solution is, instead of making Linux understand the Mac
>format why not make the Mac understand a format Linux does! 

But Linux _can_ use (read & write) MAC-Floppies !
Look for a thing like xhfs###. I found mine on the
Spring-Infomagic-CD.

But I would like to read MAC-CD's too...

OR have a simple SLIP for MAC
OR at least have a sort of "tree" / "ls -R" on the MAC.
 
>Steve... 

Greetings, Holger

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Joey is Cool)
Subject: Re: FTPs PCTCP and Linux lock.
Date: 7 Oct 1994 22:30:59 GMT

Brian C. Huffman ([email-masked]) wrote:
:       I have Slackware's 2.0 distribution of Linux, and I am having a problem
: logging on using FTP Software's PCTCP.  It tends to lock the telnet session
: (not the linux) and I have to quit and start again.  If I log into a unix
: machine first and then telnet to the linux, it works fine.  Anyone have
: any suggestions?

:                                       Brian

        I believe you can the problem by compiling your kernel with the
'PC/TCP compatability mode " option set.  I think this is available in kernels 
from 1.1.13 and up.  Apparently this does something with the MTU that
PC/TCP likes.

Joey Moreland
Tulane University Hospital and Clinic
Network Security Administrator

------------------------------

Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.misc
From: [email-masked] (Steve Whorwood)
Subject: Re: Problem with static route table
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 09:16:56 +0000

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Hien Pham) writes:

>Hi everyone,

>I have a problem with networking my Linux box.  I have Yddrasil Summer 94
>Linux 1.1.0 #84 with NET-2 running.  I have set up my static route table with
>local ip address of 128.178.10.1 and 128.178.10.2 for my Linux boxes with
>netmask 255.255.255.0 and broadcast addr 128.178.10.255.

Your network number is invalid.

-- 
Steve Whorwood
e-mail [email-masked]

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Gary Anderson)
Subject: [Q] ytalk / named / DNS help needed
Date: 8 Oct 1994 13:48:46 GMT

This evening, I tried to use 'ytalk' to talk to a locally attached 'dumb'
terminal.
I did not have my ppp network connection to my service provider up at this
time.

For some reason, it didn't work.  
I got 'Warning: Cannot write to new talk daemon' and 
'Warning: Cannot write to old talk daemon' errors.

I tried it again later, this time with my ppp network connection up and
running, and it worked.

This is what the output of 'route' looks like, first without, then with,
my ppp network connection up and running.

Kernel routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask         Flags Metric Ref    Use Iface
localhost       *               255.255.255.255 UH    0      0        0 lo
127.0.0.0       *               255.0.0.0       U     0      0       46 lo

Kernel routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask         Flags Metric Ref    Use Iface
localhost       *               255.255.255.255 UH    0      0        0 lo
annex2.clark.ne *               255.255.255.255 UH    0      0        0 ppp0
127.0.0.0       *               255.0.0.0       U     0      0      177 lo
default         annex2.clark.ne *               UG    0      0      922 ppp0

The '127.0.0.0' is a 'loopnet' entry in my /conf/net/networks file.

This led me to believe that something is hosed in my configuration files for
my local 'named'.

I've read all the documents I can lay my hands on regarding this subject,
including (r)tfm page, the Linux HOWTO, etc.  Could some kind DNS guru
take a look at these files, and point out the error of my ways ?

Everything else, network wise, works fine.  I have no problems reaching
anywhere else on the net.  

Why, you may ask, am I trying to figure this out, with only my single, 
home, Linux box ?  I intend, at some point in the future, to add another
box or two, and I want to set up my own sub-domain. I know, setting up
the linux box to act as primary name server for my own sub-domain will
be _slightly_ different than what I have now, but that's why I'm trying
to learn to crawl, before I try to walk.

No flames, please.  If there are other documents I should be reading,
PLEASE - point me to them.  I'll gladly do that.  I'd much rather understand
how this works than have someone write me a recipe.  But, if you can point out
what I've done wrong, and tell me what the right way is, and why, I'd sure
appreciate that, too.

Thanks, in advance, for any help.

Gary
ganderson @ clark.net

                                    -----------------------------
                                    |  ganderson_ppp.clark.net  |
                                    |          Linux            |
                                    |           Box             |
                                    |       168.143.0.103       |
                                    -----------------------------
                                       |                     |
                                       |                     |
                                       |                     |
                                  ------------         --------------
                                  |          |         |    Dumb    |
                                  |  Modem   |         |  Terminal  |
                                  ------------         --------------
                                       |
                                       /
                                       |
                                  ------------
                                  |          |
                                  |  Modem   |
                                  ------------
                                       |
                           --------------------
                           | annex2.clark.net |
                           |   168.143.0.9    |
                           --------------------
                                    |
         ----------------------------------------------------------
         |                              |                         |
====================       ======================      ======================
|  sun1.clark.net  |       | explorer.clark.net |      | clarknet.clark.net |
|   198.17.243.2   |       |    168.143.0.7     |      |    168.143.0.2     |
====================       ======================      ======================
(name server)              (machine I have my           (nntp server, etc.)
                              account on)

Linux Box, kernel v.1.09, runs 'named-4.8.3'

hosts.conf is:
        order hosts, bind
        multi on

========================================================================

/etc/hosts file contains, among others, entries for:

        168.143.0.103   ganderson_ppp.clark.net  <---my ip number and hostname
        127.0.0.1       localhost                       
        198.17.243.2    sun1.clark.net          <---name server
        168.143.0.7     explorer.clark.net
        168.143.0.2     clarknet.clark.net
        168.143.0.9     annex2.clark.net

# Have also tried the following for the localhost loopback address:
#       127.0.0.1       localhost                       ganderson_ppp

=========================================================================

Here is my /conf/net/named.d/named.boot file:
;
;    boot file for name server
;
directory /usr/etc/inet

; type     domain                source host/file          backup file

cache      .                                               root.cache
domain     clark.net
primary    sun1.clark.net          named.hosts
primary    0.0.127.IN-ADDR.ARPA                            named.local
primary    243.17.198.IN-ADDR.ARPA                         named.rev

========================================================================

Entries in the '/usr/etc/inet/root.cache' file consist of those found
in the internic root.cache file.

Here is my /usr/etc/inet/named.local file:

@    IN   SOA  clark.net.  root.clark.net. (
                  36    ; Serial
                  3600 ; Refresh
                  300  ; Retry
                  3600000   ; Expire
                  14400 )   ; Minimum

                IN      NS      198.17.243.2

1               IN      PTR     localhost.clark.net.

========================================================================

Here is my /usr/etc/inet/named.rev file:

@    IN   SOA  clark.net.  root.clark.net. (
                  36    ; Serial
                  3600 ; Refresh
                  300  ; Retry
                  3600000   ; Expire
                  14400 )   ; Minimum

                IN      NS      198.17.243.2

103             IN      PTR     ganderson_ppp.clark.net.
0               IN      PTR     network.clark.net.
1               IN      PTR     router.clark.net.

========================================================================

Also in /usr/etc/inet I have a 'named.hosts' file:
(I'm not sure this file ever gets consulted)

@    IN   SOA  clark.net.  root.clark.net. (
                  36    ; Serial
                  3600 ; Refresh
                  300  ; Retry
                  3600000   ; Expire
                  14400 )   ; Minimum

                IN      NS      198.17.243.2

ganderson_ppp   IN      A       168.143.0.103
network         IN      A       168.143.0.0
router          IN      A       168.143.0.1
localhost       IN      A       127.0.0.1

========================================================================

I also have a /conf/net/networks file:

#
default         0.0.0.0
loopnet         127.0.0.0
loopback        127.0.0.0
localnet        168.143.0.0
# End of networks.

========================================================================

Again, any help anyone can give would be greatly appreciated.

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Gennady Agranov)
Subject: Remote swap ?
Date: Sat, 8 Oct 1994 14:12:00 GMT

                     Hi, experts!

I have a few diskless stations and only two questions:

1. Is it possible to arrange
a swap area for them on the remote machine ?

2. Can I use the disk partition from this remote
machine as a local disk on the station (I am not
talking about NFS!) ?

Thank you very much.

[email-masked]
-- 
Gennady Agranov                                         E-mail: [email-masked]
Technion - Israel Institute of Technology,              fax:    972-4-294353
Computer Science Dept, Technion City,                   voice:  972-4-294528
Haifa 32000 Israel

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Nick Andrew)
Subject: Re: Inn on a Linux box!
Date: 8 Oct 1994 09:12:24 +1000

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Nathan Stratton) writes:

>I am trying to setup INN on my Linux box. I used inn1.4-linux-bin.tar off 
>sunsite and untared it. I can not get it to run.

>[...]
>Oct  2 16:46:24 NovaNet innd: ME internal no control and/or junk group

You have to create groups called control and junk.

Nick.
-- 
Kralizec Dialup Unix (Public Access)    Data: +61-2-837-1183, 837-1868
Zeta Microcomputer Software             v.42bis v.32bis 14.4k 24 hours
P.O. Box 177, Riverstone NSW 2765       Plan: To beat Gnuchess 4.0 fairly!

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Nick Andrew)
Subject: Re: Good dirs to move to sep file systems?
Date: 8 Oct 1994 09:14:31 +1000

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Timothy Demarest) writes:

>What do you recommend for splitting across several file systems?  I dont
>want to move anything that I may need on the root partition in an emergency!

I run a system with a large number of users. I recommend splitting off
/var, /var/spool/mail, /usr/local as a minimum.

Nick.
-- 
Kralizec Dialup Unix (Public Access)    Data: +61-2-837-1183, 837-1868
Zeta Microcomputer Software             v.42bis v.32bis 14.4k 24 hours
P.O. Box 177, Riverstone NSW 2765       Plan: To beat Gnuchess 4.0 fairly!

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Nick Andrew)
Crossposted-To: comp.mail.smail
Subject: Re: Security hole - has noone noticed so far?
Date: 8 Oct 1994 09:20:49 +1000

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Ronald S. Karr) writes:

>In article <[email-masked]>,
>Martin Bartosch <[email-masked]> wrote:
>>/usr/lib/sendmail -d -D/etc/nologin [email-masked]
>>
>>as a normal user and have fun explaining it to your sysadmin. I was
>>awed when I found out...
> 
>Okay, the fix is enclosed.

Which version of sendmail is the fix against? I tried it under sendmail 8.6.9
(the latest) and there was no problem.

Nick.
-- 
Kralizec Dialup Unix (Public Access)    Data: +61-2-837-1183, 837-1868
Zeta Microcomputer Software             v.42bis v.32bis 14.4k 24 hours
P.O. Box 177, Riverstone NSW 2765       Plan: To beat Gnuchess 4.0 fairly!

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Steve Miller)
Subject: Upgrade SLS .99.12 to current
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 00:41:51 GMT

I dug up my old copy of SLS .99.12 and installed it without too much 
trouble. Now I see everyone discussing 1.50 What are the advantages
to upgrading and what is the least painful way to do it? Is there a
way to just upgrade, or do I need to re-install? I dread the thought 
of downloading all those disks again! 

Will I get SCO Unix binary compatibility with this upgrade? Or is 
that a seperate package I can add to my installation?

--
--                  /--\   /--\      /--\  |   |  ---  ----  ----  /--\  ||
Steve Miller        |      |  |      |     |___|   |   |_    |_    \__   ||
Kansas City, MO     | -\   |  |      |     |   |   |   |     |        \  ||
[email-masked]   \__/   \__/      \__/  |   |  _|_  |___  |     \__/  oo

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Paul Smith)
Subject: Re: XFree86-3.1 - Whoopee!
Date: 04 Oct 1994 20:45:39 GMT
Reply-To: [email-masked]

%% Regarding Re: XFree86-3.1 - Whoopee!;
%% [email-masked] (Dr. Raimund K. Ege) writes:

    rke> the Linux binary distribution seems to contain LBX support, but
    rke> there is little (may I say no) documentation on how to get it
    rke> started. Anyway, ...

That's too bad: they should have included the README for LBX or
something.

I enclose the README from the LBX distribution in X11R6 below, hopefully
that will answer your questions...

=========================
                                Low Bandwidth X
                                     (LBX)

This tree contains a snapshot of the code for Low Bandwidth X, the effort to
develop a standard for running X applications over serial lines, wide-area
networks, and other low-bandwidth, high-latency transports.  While many of
the major pieces of the eventual standard are represented here, LBX is *not*
done yet; this code should be treated as an "alpha" or "prototype" for people
who are interested in seeing the overall form that LBX is expected to take.

             ******************************************************
             *                                                    *
             *                      WARNING                       *
             *                                                    *
             *    This version of LBX is *NOT* a standard of      *
             *    the X Consortium and will *NOT* be compatible   *
             *    with the final version.                         *
             *                                                    *
             ******************************************************

The goal of LBX is to improve the startup time, performance, and interactive
feel of X applications run over low bandwidth transports.  LBX does this by
interposing a "pseudo-server" (called the "proxy") between the X clients and
the X server.  The proxy caches data flowing between the server and the
clients, merges the X protocol streams, and compresses the data that is sent
over the low bandwidth wire.  The X server at the other end uncompresses the
data and splits it back out into separate request streams.  The target is to
transparently make many X applications usable over 9600 baud modems.

This code snapshot contains the following features:

    o   LZW compression of the binary data stream.  Since commercial use
        of LZW requires licensing patented technology, we are also looking
        for an unencumbered algorithm and implementation to provide as well.

    o   Delta compression of X packets (representing packets as "diffs"
        against previously sent packets).

    o   Re-encoding of some graphics requests (points, lines, segments,
        rectangles, and arcs).

    o   Motion event throttling (to keep from flooding the wire).

    o   Caching of data in the proxy for large data objects that otherwise
        would be transmitted over the wire multiple times (e.g. properties,
        font metrics, keyboard mappings, connection startup data, etc.).

    o   Short-circuiting of requests for constant data (e.g. atoms,
        colorname/rgb mappings, and read-only color cells).

However, the following items have yet to be implemented (which is why it
isn't a standard yet...):

    o   Re-encoding of a number of requests (e.g. QueryFont), events, etc.

    o   Support for BIG-REQUESTS extension.

    o   A non-networked serial protocol for environments which cannot
        support os-level networking over serial lines.

    o   A full specification needs to be written describing the network
        protocol used between the proxy and the server.

The LBX team is continuing to work on both the implementation of the remaining
items and the full specification.  The goal is to have all of the pieces ready
for final review by the public later this year.  Since the specification for
LBX *will* change, vendors are discouraged from building products based on
this prototype.

However, everyone is strongly encouraged to work with the code, examine the
concepts, comments on alternatives, and volunteer to help finish it up!

                                Dave Lemke <[email-masked]>
                                Dale Tonogai <[email-masked]>
                                Keith Packard <[email-masked]>
                                Jim Fulton <[email-masked]>
                                Chris Kanterjiev <[email-masked]>

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

                                  Code Layout

[[ ..removed... ]]

                                     Usage

Start the X server as usual, and then start the proxy.  The lbxproxy
is a pseudo-server, so any clients that wish to use it need to adjust
their DISPLAY.  By default, the proxy will listen on hostname:1.
This can be changed by using the ':portnum' argument.

Example:

If the proxy is to be running on a host named "sharedhost", connecting
to an LBX-capable X server on a desktop machine named "mydesktop", you 
could use the following command to start the proxy (which would be 
known as display "sharedhost:7"):

    mydesktop%  rlogin sharedhost
    sharedhost%  lbxproxy -display mydesktop:0 :7 &
    sharedhost%  xclient -display sharedhost:7

                              Other Documentation

programs/lbxproxy/design contains rough design notes for the implementation.  
More detailed comments can be found in the code.
=========================
--
===============================================================================
 Paul D. Smith                   | That's the thing about being a boxer:
 <[email-masked]>          | even when you're at the top of your field,
 Wellfleet Communications, Inc.  | people still hit you in the head.
 Network Management Development  |                    -- Paula Poundstone
===============================================================================
<Expressed above are my opinions.  Wellfleet takes no responsibility for them.>

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (Steve Miller)
Subject: SCO UNIX Binary Compatibility
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 00:43:43 GMT

I read an article in a recent Unix magazine that Linux can run SCO
Unix binaries. What do I need to do this? (I have SLS 99.12 installed)

--
--                  /--\   /--\      /--\  |   |  ---  ----  ----  /--\  ||
Steve Miller        |      |  |      |     |___|   |   |_    |_    \__   ||
Kansas City, MO     | -\   |  |      |     |   |   |   |     |        \  ||
[email-masked]   \__/   \__/      \__/  |   |  _|_  |___  |     \__/  oo

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (International Tech. Assoc)
Subject: Connecting Netware & Unix (hardware)
Date: 7 Oct 1994 17:03:22 -0700

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (David Fox)
Subject: Re: Bug in Linux 'mv'?
Date: 07 Oct 1994 18:13:27 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Richard Lindner) writes:

] : cp doesn't copy symlinks.  If you want a completely messed up file tree, go
]   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
] hmm - could've fooled me (and cp - better tell it that it's getting it wrong!!)

Well, There's GNU cp and "Unix" cp.  If you need to use cp
in a script or an alias, or you frequently find yourself
sitting in front of different types of unix boxes, you may
not want to assume that the cp -a option exists, better to
stick to tar.
--
David Fox                                               xoF divaD
NYU Media Research Lab                     baL hcraeseR aideM UYN

------------------------------

From: [email-masked] (David Fox)
Subject: Re: inetd seems to lock-up
Date: 07 Oct 1994 18:23:48 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Ms. Stephanie Gilgut) writes:

] "There is no sound, quite like the purring of a thousand cats." - Me

Are you sure you want a comma in this sentence?  It reads
a little strange that way.
--
David Fox                                               xoF divaD
NYU Media Research Lab                     baL hcraeseR aideM UYN

------------------------------

** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **

The service address, to which questions about the list itself and requests
to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:

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End of Linux-Admin Digest
******************************