Sonicwall NetExtender on Ubuntu

One of the main problems with using the linux version of NetExtender on Ubuntu is that is messes with the resolvconf and does not restore it properly when it is done. Below are the commands I run to fix my resolvconf after closing NetExtender.

sudo rm resolv.conf 
sudo ln -s /run/resolvconf/resolv.conf resolv.conf 
sudo resolvconf -u

Ubuntu log-in screen

Here is what /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf looks like to remove the list of users, require users to type in their usernames to log-in, and not allow guest or remote log-ins to Ubuntu.

UPDATE: On Ubuntu 13.10 the lightdm.conf file might need to be created.
UPDATE: On Ubuntu 14.04 the lightdm.conf file might need to be created.

[SeatDefaults]
allow-guest=false
greeter-show-manual-login=true
greeter-hide-users=true
show-remote-login=false

PowerBroker Identity Services (formerly Likewise Open) on Ubuntu server

*Likewise Open is no longer available.  It has been taken over by BeyondTrust and is called PowerBroker® Identity Services, Open Edition
Here are the steps I took to get PowerBroker Identity Services, Open Edition onto Ubuntu Server.

Versions:

• Ubuntu Server 14.04 64-bit
• PBIS Open 8.0.0.2016 - Stable Release

1. Log-in to server with sudo privileges
2. Be sure ssh server is installed
3. Download PowerBroker® Identity Services, Open Edition 
4. Make script executable
   $chmod +x pbis-open-8.0.0.2016.linux.x86_64.deb.sh
5. Execute install script and follow istructions 
   $sudo ./pbis-open-8.0.0.2016.linux.x86_64.deb.sh
6. Join the domain
   $sudo domainjoin-cli join <domain name> <domain admin user>
7. Change default shell for domain users to bash
   $sudo /opt/pbis/bin/config LoginShellTemplate /bin/bash
8. If you would like, set the domain as default (not require <domain>\ to precede username for domain logins)
   $sudo /opt/pbis/bin/config AssumeDefaultDomain true
9. Add domain users to necessary groups in /etc/group (sudo for the admin users)
10. Clear cache
    $sudo /opt/pbis/bin/ad-cache --delete-all
11. Apply fix: Edit /etc/pam.d/common-session and change "session sufficient" line to
    session [success=ok default=ignore] pam_lsass.so
    
12. Reboot and login with domain user

Glassfish deployment issue: "Could not load any resource bundle by...."

While attempting to redeploy a web project to Glassfish the following error occurred:

"Could not load any resource bundle by com.sun.org.apache.xerces.internal.impl.msg.XMLSchemaMessages"

When trying to restart the Glassfish domain it ran into errors and would not start.  After some troubleshooting the problem turned out to be with the Glassfish server not Glassfish or the project.  It turns out that a teammate ran into some problems while running updates on the Ubuntu server that was hosting Glassfish and that caused java to be temporarily uninstalled (which would obviously cause problems for the java application server).  After re-running the updates, rebooting, then re-running updates again (not sure if all of these steps were necessary) the  Glassfish domain was able to start and deployment of the project worked with no errors.

SSH issues in Ubuntu

Problem 1:

When using ssh to connect to a remote server from an Ubuntu based machine, there is a long delay before the password prompt is displayed.

Solution:

On the local machine, edit the ~/.ssh/config file (or create it if it does not exist) and add the line:

GSSAPIAuthentication=no

---

Problem 2:

When connected to a remote server with ssh, if idle too long, connection will be ended with this message:

Write failed:  Broken pipe

Solution:

On the local machine, edit the ~/.ssh/config file (or create it if it does not exist) and add the line:

ServerAliveInterval 120

Ubuntu 12.04 Joomla 3

I recently setup an Ubuntu server with Joomla 3.  I used the instructions found here with a few modifications.  I did not want the joomla site to be under the /joomla subdirectory so I skipped the first three commands under step 2.  The steps I used are as follows:

1. sudo apt-get install lamp-server^

   mysql -u root -p

   CREATE DATABASE dbjoomla;

   CREATE USER joomlauser;

   (Change <password> to the password of your choice)
   

   SET PASSWORD FOR joomlauser = PASSWORD("<password>");

   GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON dbjoomla.* TO joomlauser@localhost IDENTIFIED BY '<password>';

   FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

   exit

   wget http://joomlacode.org/gf/download/frsrelease/17965/78414/Joomla_3.0.3-Stable-Full_Package.zip

   sudo unzip -q Joomla_3.0.1-Stable-Full_Package.zip -d /var/www

   You will want to remove the index.html that exists in /var/www by default
   

   sudo chown -R www-data.www-data /var/www

   Install joomla 3.0 from a browser by typing http://[hostname]

Locale error

August 8, 2012

I had been getting an error on some Ubuntu servers when using apt:

locale: Cannot set LC_CTYPE to default locale: No such file or directory       

locale: Cannot set LC_MESSAGES to default locale: No such file or directory

locale: Cannot set LC_ALL to default locale: No such file or directory             

After some googling I found a solution:

localedef -v -c -i en_US -f UTF-8 en_US.UTF-8                                            

EDIT:  This occurs when I setup Ubuntu 12.04 servers using an openvz image that I downloaded (I don't remember from where).

 

Glassfish 3.1.2 on Ubuntu 11.10

These are the steps I took to install Glassfish 3.1.2 on Ubuntu 11.10.

I should point out that I used a Proxmox KVM virtual server for this.  I first tried an OpenVZ virtual server but kept running into an error: "There is a process already using the admin port 4848 -- it probably is another instance of a GlassFish server."  After some googling I decided this error had something to do with the networking which is significantly different on OpenVZ than KVM so I abandoned the OpenVZ container and created a KVM virtual host.

These steps are a combination of two other guides in order to provide an internal Glassfish server that is password protected (here and here).

Before I began I installed Ubuntu 11.10 server (64-bit) on the Proxmox KVM virtual machine and updated to the latest available updates then backed-up the virtual machine.

1. Install Java (I chose the natively available version of Java, openjdk):

~# sudo apt-get install openjdk-7-jdk

2. Install the unzip utility (not included by default in Ubuntu 11.10):

~# sudo apt-get install unzip

3. Create user and group to install and run Glassfish (I chose glassfish and glassfishadm):

~# sudo adduser --home /home/glassfish --system --shell /bin/bash glassfish
~# sudo groupadd glassfishadm
~# sudo usermod -a -G glassfishadm glassfish

4. Change to glassfish user:

~# sudo su - glassfish

5. Get Glassfish zip:

~# wget http://download.java.net/glassfish/3.1.1/release/glassfish-3.1.1.zip

6. Unzip glassfish and move it to root of glassfish user home folder:

~# unzip glassfish-3.1.2.zip
~# mv glassfish3/* .
~# rm -r glassfish3
~# rm glassfish-3.1.2.zip

7. Change owner and group of entire folder:

~# chown -R glassfish *
~# chgrp -R glassfishadm *

8. Exit glassfish user:

~# exit

9. Create script to start and stop Glassfish server at /etc/init.d/glassfish.  This script will use the glassfish user to start and stop the Glassfish instance so that it does not run as root:

#!/bin/bash

case "$1" in
start)
    su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin start-domain domain1"
    ;;
stop)
    su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin stop-domain domain1"
    ;;
restart)
    su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin stop-domain domain1"
    su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin start-domain domain1"
    ;;
*)
    echo "usage: $0 {start|stop|restart}"
    ;;

esac

exit 0

10. Set script to run at boot:

~# sudo chmod u+x /etc/init.d/glassfish
~# sudo update-rc.d glassfish defaults

11. Set admin password (default password for admin is blank):

~# sudo su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin --user admin change-admin-password"
Enter admin password> _
Enter new admin password>
Enter new admin password again>
Command change-admin-password executed successfully.

12. Set security on Glassfish:

~# sudo su - glassfish -c "/home/glassfish/bin/asadmin enable-secure-admin"

13. Start the server:

~# sudo /etc/init.d/glassfish start

Redmine on Ubuntu 11.04 using MySQL

I decided to give Redmine a try and ran into a few issues using most of the guides out there to get it installed.  The guide that worked is below but be sure to install your mysql server (sudo apt-get install mysql-server) first.

http://foxfoo.com/howto-install-redmine-on-ubuntu-1104.html