Subject: Linux-Admin Digest #193
From: Digestifier <[email-masked]>
To: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 14 Oct 94 11:13:52 EDT

Linux-Admin Digest #193, Volume #2               Fri, 14 Oct 94 11:13:52 EDT

Contents:
  Re: Linux 1.1.52 is hashing itself to death! (Klaus Lichtenwalder)
  Re: ftp better, but still freezes with 1.1.52.  Was: ftp freeze problems (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
  re: Posting security holes... (Ben Alkov)
  Should xterm be setuid? (Hieu Bui)
  4M -> 8M Thanks (Robert Casiano)
  Re: Cron Problems - Script runs from shell but not cron (John Vencill)
  HELP!!! problems with tcpip (Ellen M. Poler)
  Re: Messed up my root password! (Carlos Dominguez)
  EIDE 1GB HD PROBLEMS !!!!! (Radovan Chytracek)
  Re: Tar and z option with DAT drive (Claus-Dieter Bredl)
  Anyone have DRM-602x working? (genesis)
  Web browser for linux? (Gary Gitelson)
  Term 2.1.4 problem (JL Gomez)
  Re: Please don't post security holess... (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
  Tool to find bad blocks? (John Brehm)
  HELP: Diamond Stealth 32 VLB Config (Ciputra)
  Re: Please help: Routing problem (nick leroy)

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

From: [email-masked] (Klaus Lichtenwalder)
Subject: Re: Linux 1.1.52 is hashing itself to death!
Date: Wed, 12 Oct 1994 08:33:48 GMT

[email-masked] (Michael Griffith) writes:

>In article <[email-masked]>,
>Pete Kruckenberg <[email-masked]> wrote:
>[deleted]
>PK>The interesting thing is how Linux handles things, though. I've got
>PK>sendmail set up to refuse connections and queue once the system load
>PK>hits 1, which it does with about 8 sendmail sessions running. This is
>PK>on a 486DX2-66 with 16MB RAM and a SCSI 1GB HDD. Once the system load
>PK>hits about 1.0, Linux starts killing itself by swapping about 75% of
>PK>the time. The utilization shows about 25% CPU, 75% System, 0 or 1%
>PK>user, and 0 or 1% idle. This is with *3* running processes, and
>PK>something like 50 idle (of which about 20 are run-able).
>PK>
>PK>Is this a "function" of Linux, or is there something I can do to help
>PK>this situation? In the sendmail book (ORA), it talks about not having
>PK>to refuse connections "on newer machines" until the system load hits 8
>PK>or even higher. I'd hate to see what my HDD would be doing at 8! Is
>PK>this a problem with the ext2fs, or the Linux scheduler, or is my
>PK>machine just wimpy, or what?

>Sounds like you need more RAM.  I have run Linux on a bunch of
>different machines from a a 20 Mhz. 386 to a 90 Mhz. Pentium.  They
>all seem to run much faster with at least 16M of RAM.

I'd say also. We have a 486SX25 with 20M of RAM, on user sitting at
the local X Server and up to three users running a few clients from
X Terminals. Then this machine is e-mail/news/fax server. We don't experience
problems except when sometimes (bad luck if everything tries to start
at the same time) the load hits 6 or above. Then the response time
degrades (but what would you expect??)

Klaus
-- 
__________________________________________________________________________
Klaus Lichtenwalder, Dipl. Inf., Buschingstr. 65
D-81677 Muenchen, F.R. Germany,  Fax +49-89-98292755
email: [email-masked], [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
Subject: Re: ftp better, but still freezes with 1.1.52.  Was: ftp freeze problems
Date: 11 Oct 1994 01:38:05 GMT

I have a similar problem with 1.0.9 and the problem was fixed
by changing  out an el-cheapo LAN card.

I rebuilt the kernal a couple of times, even up to 1.1.21 and still
had the same problem.  FTP freezes up, can't log in, can't ping...

HARD BOOT !! (Which BTW really bothers me..)

Changed to an SMC card and never had the problem again.  Maybe its
in the generic device driver, maybe the H/W, but spending 50 more
bucks on a good card is well worth it.

Joe Marino ([email-masked]) wrote:
: There has been a lot of talk about ftp freezing.  Alan Cox 
: ([email-masked]) among others mentioned upgrading to
: 1.1.19 or higher.  I did, to 1.1.52 (thanks Alan!)

: File transfers seem to progress farther now than they did before 
: (1.1.18), but still, at some point, ftp freezes up.  For those 
: interested, I have a 486/DX-2 66, using a Cardinal internal modem 
: (it has a 16550 UART on-board).  The PPP connection is made at
: 19.2 (V.32terbo). I am connecting to a SunOS box.

: Once it freezes up, I can no longer 'ping' my PPP host and 'netstat'
: freezes up as well when trying to see what the state of the network
: is.   Killing the PPP daemon doesn't help,  as it looks like kernel's
: idea of the state of the network is pretty munged at this point, so I
: have no other recourse but reboot.

: Damn!  I had the output from /usr/adm/syslog, but seem have to have 
: misplaced it!  Bummer.  Anyway, I noticed that what was getting logged
: were the same kinds of errors as previously under 1.1.18 (and 1.09 BTW).
: From memory, these were a series of ioctl errors.  I'll post'em if any-
: one is really interested.

: Curiously, I have a co-worker who is able to connect to the same (Sun)
: machine using 1.1.18 with no apparent problems.  There are so many layers
: where there might be problems, from all the software layers down to 
: possible physical connectivity problems, this seems like a nasty one to
: figure.

: My 'gut' feel is that this seems like some kind of cummulative error, 
: buffers not being reset or counters not being reset between transfers or
: some such 'silly' bug; although I have done zip for testing to confirm 
: this.  Under 1.1.18 it would seem to choke on any files over 50K, or 
: after transfering several smaller files, would eventually then choke on 
: even a smallish file.

: Under 1.1.52, I have transfered 300+ Kb files no problem, but then, after 
: enough transfers, it freezes up.  Again, I haven't done any testing to see
: if 'binary' or 'ascii' modes have any effect.  I also see what I assume to
: be the same behavior while using Mosaic: hangs in middle of display how
: many bytes of its http request it has recieved.

: Anyway, anyone have any other ideas/fixes and/or similar 'gut' feelings 
: about this?

: Joe Marino

: --------------------------------------------------------------------------
: ______     ______
: \_\_\_\   /#/#/#/  Joe Marino, Software Engineer  ARPA:  [email-masked]
:  \_\_\_\ ______    V. I. Corporation              UUCP:  uunet!vicorp!joe
:   \_\_\_V#/#/#/    47 Pleasant Street             PHONE: (413) 586-4144
:    \_\_/#/#/#/     Northampton, MA 01060          FAX:   (413) 586-3805
:     \_/#/#/#/      
:      V#/#/#/
: --------------------------------------------------------------------------

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

From: [email-masked] (Ben Alkov)
Subject: re: Posting security holes...
Date: 10 Oct 1994 23:53:52 GMT

The only thing that defeated the Internet worm was the fact that a few
sysadmins had the balls and perseverence to stay on the net and continue to
disseminate information. The people with the WORST problems were those who
got infected and cut their net links. 'Nuff said.

ben

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

From: [email-masked] (Hieu Bui)
Subject: Should xterm be setuid?
Date: 14 Oct 1994 01:28:47 GMT

Hey Linuxers... I just had a quick question or two.  First, should my xterm
in /usr/bin/X11 be setuid to root?  
-rwsr-xr-x   1 root     root       119812 Mar  9  1994 /usr/bin/X11/xterm*

If not what should it be?  Also, my xconsole doesn't seem to be working 
since it returns an error :
"Couldn't open console"  /dev/tty0 has permissions:

crw--w--w-   1 root     root       4,   0 Oct 13 11:04 /dev/tty0

Any answers would be appreciated (preferably email).  Thanks in advance...

Hieu Bui  [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Robert Casiano)
Subject: 4M -> 8M Thanks
Date: 10 Oct 94 05:10:40 GMT

I posted a question recently regarding the merits of upgrading to 8M
and receioved a lot of good advices.

Thanks a lot to everybody who replied!  I'll buy the extra 4M now!

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

From: [email-masked] (John Vencill)
Subject: Re: Cron Problems - Script runs from shell but not cron
Date: 13 Oct 1994 20:39:45 -0500

In article <[email-masked]>,
Ted Harding <[email-masked]> wrote:

>Now, where are the "echo"s supposed to appear when the script is run by
>cron? And what console is the input supposed to come from?

The output gets mailed to the user who submitted the cron job.  This 
happens to all my cron scripts cause I use them from the command line as 
well and I like echos...  :)  The input however (I didn't look at the 
script.. just going off the reply) would be a problem..  :)

Someone mentioned ksh isn't supported at all by cron...  what if the 
script had the cute little #! /bin/ksh or whatever at the top?  (This may 
explain a problem I'm currently having..)

Thanks

-John Vencill
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Ellen M. Poler)
Subject: HELP!!! problems with tcpip
Date: Mon, 10 Oct 1994 05:32:41 GMT

Argh! I have been having problems with tcpip using Linux 1.1.45 on my 
386/33...
I just installed Slackware's n disk set. I am just (for the moment) 
trying to get the dummy 127.0.0.1 address to workm but ifI telnet, ftp, 
whatever to anywhere, INCLUDING there, I get the following error message...

telnet: socket: Invalid argument

If one thing drives me crazy, it's nondescript error messages!!! Help!
Also, and most likely related, upon booting, the system says Invalid 
argument when it tries to load syslogd.

PLEASE HELP.

Mail appreciated at [email-masked] or [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Carlos Dominguez)
Subject: Re: Messed up my root password!
Date: 10 Oct 1994 21:56:50 -0400

Jim Frendewey ([email-masked]) wrote:

: I changed my root password, being security conscious, but apparently changed it
: to something I can't repeat. I have tried all the combinations of what I
: thought I used but to no avail.

Get the Linux SAG available at sunsite and the other likely places
Read the section under.. "trashed root passwords" :)

There may be a WWW / HTML version available at www.linux.org.

Second, fix your news posting software so you have a valid FQDN and
hostname so people can respond to you via email. The News HOWTO would
be a good place to start.

Hope this helps..
-- 
  __  __   __ | .__.  __. ::::  Carlos Dominguez - proprietor - sysadmin  
 |    __| |   | |  | |__  ::::  [email-masked]
 |__ |__| |   | |__| .__| ::::  Basselope *nix systems
  ---------------------------   Internet services consulting is our forte

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

From: [email-masked] (Radovan Chytracek)
Subject: EIDE 1GB HD PROBLEMS !!!!!
Date: 11 Oct 1994 14:04:20 GMT

Hello Linuxers ,

        I have got some probs to make partitions .

When I use fdisk and I try to create partition over 528 MB ( or 540 MB ? )
I always get following error message from fdisk:

Partition X has different physical/logical endings:

phys=(1023,15, 63) logical=(1072, 15, 63)

May I ignore this warning or there is any solution ?

I've got 1GB WD HD, VLB, EIDE, and I'd like to install Slackware 2.0.

Radovan

--
============================================================================
 This LOGO is Copyright (c)1994  +---------------------------+
       Radovan Chytracek         |***   RadoOne on IRC !  ***|  `~~'
                                 +-----------------------ooO-+ (o o )
+---------------------------------------------------------\.\   \U /
|                   You can see me at :                   |\ \___)(___
|     http://rs530h.iepsaske.sk/~chytrace/RadoOne.html    | \__  \/   \
+---------------------------------------------------------+    |    |\ \
| office : IEP SAS,Watsonova 47,Kosice,04001,Slovak Rep.  |    | R1 |/./
| phone  : +42 95 38115 Ext. 156 or 228                   |    +----+Ooo---+
| [email-masked]                             |    |    ||Would|
|         [email-masked]                     |    | || || You |
|                     [email-masked]            |    | || ||like |
|                             [email-masked]   |    | || || to  |
+---------------------------------------------------------+    | || || see |
                      /\                                       | || || me? |
                       \_______________________________________(_)(_)+-----+_

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

From: [email-masked] (Claus-Dieter Bredl)
Subject: Re: Tar and z option with DAT drive
Date: 12 Oct 1994 08:21:45 GMT

Garry Adkins ([email-masked]) wrote:

: The volume/minute doesn't bother me, since it will be an automated backup.
: ...  However, the streaming problem does bother me...

: If I buy one of the big DAT drives that claim 88Meg/minute and my
: computer can't possibly keep up with that pace..  I lose tape capacity??

Improbable.

DAT/DDS drives employ similar rotating head technology as
videotape drives, which are known to be capable of "assemble cutting"
subsequent recordings.

There is, of course, the time penalty for stopping tape motion,
backing up, re-scanning the previous record for synchronization, and
on the fly switching to writing just in time.

CDB

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

From: [email-masked] (genesis)
Subject: Anyone have DRM-602x working?
Date: 13 Oct 1994 19:53:19 -0700

        I have an Adaptec 2842 SCSI Controller w/ a Micropolis 1.7GB drive
and a Pioneer DRM602x SCSI 6-disc CD-ROM changer.  Can I get drivers for
this equipment for Linux?  Any help is appreciated.  Please send replies to
[email-masked].

Thanks!!

[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Gary Gitelson)
Subject: Web browser for linux?
Date: 13 Oct 1994 19:55:24 -0700

I am looking for a good web browser for linux.  I don't have motif so I
can't run Mosaic.  I tried viola but I couldn't get it to compile.  So,
does anyone know of a good X-based web browser that I can get for linux?
If so, please mail me with information on where I can get it.
                                                Thanks in advance,
                                                Gary Gitelson
                                                [email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (JL Gomez)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
Subject: Term 2.1.4 problem
Date: 12 Oct 1994 02:59:34 -0500
Reply-To: [email-masked]

I've followed the instructions for allowing term to be shared
while installing it as root.

However, I get a message saying "Connect: No such file or directory".

I did follow the instructions in README.security and created the
term group and export TERMMODE=1 TERMDIR=/usr/local/lib/term.

Thanks for any solutions for this problem.

I've tried 2 applications to make this work: lynx and tMosiac by
setting them to group term and chmod g+s.  No go.
-- 
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Tim Bass (Network Systems Engineer))
Subject: Re: Please don't post security holess...
Date: 11 Oct 1994 01:51:35 GMT

[ deleted some name tags ]

: > >I would like to consider myself to be a hacker.  (Others may disagree -- as
: > >the quote below states, it is a title best given, not taken.)  I have never
: > >broken into a system.  I do not plan on doing so at any time in the future.
: > >The term `hacker' has been perverted by some to refer to criminals who
: > >attempt to penetrate security on computer systems.  This was not the

: > Oh, criminals.  Give me a break.  The criminals are the ones that mess with
: > things.

[ deleted more interesting points and counterpoints ]

Breaking into computers and 'looking around' was somewhat socially acceptable
when computers cost megabucks.  Today, when you can buy powerful OS like linux
for the cost of a telephone call and fast processors for a few hundred bucks,
hacking and cracking is rapidly losing its status.   

It you 'wanna be cool' develop a free utility that makes you famous.  Breaking
into property that does not belong to you is criminal.  Stay off my boat,
out of my car, out of our yard and out of my platform.  NO TRESSPASSING -
VIOLATORS WILL BE SHOT.

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

From: [email-masked] (John Brehm)
Subject: Tool to find bad blocks?
Date: 14 Oct 1994 13:50:58 GMT

I recently upgraded my hard disk, but this involved a swap of drives in
the lab.  Since the swap of drives, I have been having a stream of
sudden and complete freeze-ups.  These freezes occur only when I'm
doing something live at the computer -- typically (although not always) when
running X, frequently initiated by a launch of some large program (such
as something using Motif).  (I can leave the machine on overnight, and 
return to find it running -- it doesn't crash if I don't do anything).

My suspicion is that there are bad blocks, maybe even in the swap
partition.  Does anyone know of a tool that can identify bad blocks
under linux?  My read through the man page for e2fsck tells me that
it can mark the bad blocks, but one has to supply the list first.

Any other thoughts are welcome.

More details on my system:
 linux 1.1.51, gcc 2.5.8, libc 4.5.26, ld.so 1.4.4

I installed the new drive by mounting both the old and new, and then
running cp -a from the root of the first.  It gagged when it got to the proc
directory (no surprise), but I then subsequently cp'd over the usr, var,
and tmp directories.  

Thanks for any help.... John

-- 
[email-masked]

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

From: [email-masked] (Ciputra)
Subject: HELP: Diamond Stealth 32 VLB Config
Date: 11 Oct 1994 02:05:04 GMT

Hi there,
I'm new to Linux and just about to install it in my system.
However, I have a problem, since my video card is a Diamond.
Does anybody out there be kind enough to send me the configuration
file for use with Diamond Stealth 32 VLB card?, I know
a lot of people got it run correctly.

Thank you for your time,
Ciputra.

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

Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.help
From: nick leroy <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: Please help: Routing problem
Date: Mon, 10 Oct 1994 17:55:09 GMT

In <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Keith Kee) writes:

>I have been trying to finger this routing problem for weeks but could
>figure what is wrong with configuration. Please put your 2 cents.

>We are assigned a full class B network of 152.52.0.0.
>And the netmask for this network is the regular 255.255.0.0. Now, I
>want to create a separate ethernet with one linux box with subnet 152.52.9.0. 

Here lies the heart of your problem.  Mixing netmasks is a no-no.  You need
to have a netmask of 0xffffff00 for *ALL* of the network, with routers to
each of the sub-nets.  Thus, 152.52.0.0 is a *SEPARATE NETWORK* from
152.52.1.0.  There is no real way to sub-net a sub-net, if you know what
I mean.

You may be able to fool it into working, however.
Try (from the linux box)
  route add -net 152.52.0.0 gw 152.52.9.1    (or similar).
This would be a kludgy kind of thing, though.

For every other machine on the network (big network) that wants to talk to
linux, you would need:
  route add -net 152.52.9.0 gw 152.52.2.241   (or similar).

All warranties, both express and implied, are *VOID*.

>This client will have the router (the sun) to talk to machines outside this
>subnet and on separate networks. What I don't understand is: the router
>is siting on the 152.52.0.0 (le0)  physical network with the rest of machines 
>on the same network and also 152.52.9.0 physical network (le1).

>The router can talk to 152.52.9.2 (the linux client) and all the machines on
>152.52.0.0 network. But, the linux client cannot talk to the machines on 
>the 152.52.0.0 network. 

>This is the route table on the router (sun box):
>      Routing Table:
>    Destination           Gateway           Flags  Ref   Use   Interface
>  -------------------- -------------------- ----- ----- ------ ---------
>  127.0.0.1            127.0.0.1             UH       0      2  lo0
>  144.228.0.0          152.52.2.1            UG       0      0  
>  152.52.9.0           152.52.9.1            U        2    174  le1
>  152.52.0.0           152.52.2.241          U        3    378  le0
>  224.0.0.0            152.52.2.241          U        3      0  le0
>  default              152.52.2.1            UG       0    589  
>  
>  ifconfig -a gives me:
>       lo0: flags=849<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING,MULTICAST mtu 8232
>          inet 127.0.0.1 netmask ff000000 
>  le0: flags=863<UP,BROADCAST,NOTRAILERS,RUNNING,MULTICAST mtu 1500
>          inet 152.52.2.241 netmask ffff0000 broadcast 152.52.255.255
>          ether 8:0:20:1d:f:22 
>  le1: flags=863<UP,BROADCAST,NOTRAILERS,RUNNING,MULTICAST mtu 1500
>          inet 152.52.9.1 netmask ffffff00 broadcast 152.52.9.255
>          ether 8:0:20:1d:f:22 
> 
>  On the client side (linux box in the subnet 152.52.9.0):
>  Destination     Gateway         Genmask         Flags Metric Ref Use    Iface
>  152.52.9.0      0.0.0.0         255.255.255.0   U     0      0    19483 eth0
>  127.0.0.0       0.0.0.0         255.0.0.0       U     0      0       36 lo
>  0.0.0.0         152.52.9.1      0.0.0.0         UG    0      0     2761 eth0
> 
>What can be wrong with this configuration?

See above.

-Nick
-- 
+--------------------------------------+-------------------------------------+
| /`-_     Nicholas R LeRoy            | Linux -- What *nix was meant to be. |
|{     }/  [email-masked]       | gcc   -- What C was meant to be.    |
| \   */   Camtronics, LTD, PO Box 950 |  Escape the Gates of Hell with      |
| |___|    Hartland, WI 53029          |   The choice of a GNU generation... |
+--------------------------------------+-------------------------------------+

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

** 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:

    Internet: [email-masked]

You can send mail to the entire list (and comp.os.linux.admin) via:

    Internet: [email-masked]

Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
    nic.funet.fi				pub/OS/Linux
    tsx-11.mit.edu				pub/linux
    sunsite.unc.edu				pub/Linux

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