Make It Tea - public:computers:archive

Old stuff but good

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

Old stuff but good

Alpine

#
# Alpine configuration file
#
# This file sets the configuration options used by Alpine and PC-Alpine. These
# options are usually set from within Alpine or PC-Alpine. There may be a
# system-wide configuration file which sets the defaults for some of the
# variables. On Unix, run alpine -conf to see how system defaults have been set.
# For variables that accept multiple values, list elements are separated by
# commas. A line beginning with a space or tab is considered to be a
# continuation of the previous line. For a variable to be unset its value must
# be blank. To set a variable to the empty string its value should be "".
# You can override system defaults by setting a variable to the empty string.
# Lines beginning with "#" are comments, and ignored by Alpine.

# Over-rides your full name from Unix password file. Required for PC-Alpine.
personal-name=

# Sets domain part of From: and local addresses in outgoing mail.
user-domain=gm4slv.plus.com

# List of SMTP servers for sending mail. If blank: Unix Alpine uses sendmail.
smtp-server=relay.plus.net:587/user=gm4slv@gm4slv.plus.com

# NNTP server for posting news. Also sets news-collections for news reading.
nntp-server=""

# Path of (local or remote) INBOX, e.g. ={mail.somewhere.edu}inbox
# Normal Unix default is the local INBOX (usually /var/spool/mail/$USER).
inbox-path={imap.plus.net:993/ssl/user=gm4slv@gm4slv.plus.com}inbox

# List of folder pairs; the first indicates a folder to archive, and the
# second indicates the folder read messages in the first should
# be moved to.
incoming-archive-folders=

# List of folders, assumed to be in first folder collection,
# offered for pruning each month.  For example: mumble
pruned-folders=

# Over-rides default path for sent-mail folder, e.g. =old-mail (using first
# folder collection dir) or ={host2}sent-mail or ="" (to suppress saving).
# Default: sent-mail (Unix) or SENTMAIL.MTX (PC) in default folder collection.
default-fcc={imap.plus.net:993/ssl/user=gm4slv@gm4slv.plus.com}Inbox.Sent

# Over-rides default path for saved-msg folder, e.g. =saved-messages (using 1st
# folder collection dir) or ={host2}saved-mail or ="" (to suppress saving).
# Default: saved-messages (Unix) or SAVEMAIL.MTX (PC) in default collection.
default-saved-msg-folder=

# Over-rides default path for postponed messages folder, e.g. =pm (which uses
# first folder collection dir) or ={host4}pm (using home dir on host4).
# Default: postponed-msgs (Unix) or POSTPOND.MTX (PC) in default fldr coltn.
postponed-folder=

# If set, specifies where already-read messages will be moved upon quitting.
read-message-folder=

# If set, specifies where form letters should be stored.
form-letter-folder=

# If set, specifies where trash is moved to in Web Alpine.
trash-folder=

# Contains the actual signature contents as opposed to the signature filename.
# If defined, this overrides the signature-file. Default is undefined.
literal-signature=

# Over-rides default path for signature file. Default is ~/.signature
signature-file=

# List of features; see Alpine's Setup/options menu for the current set.
# e.g. feature-list= select-without-confirm, signature-at-bottom
# Default condition for all of the features is no-.
feature-list=combined-folder-display,
	expanded-view-of-folders,
	expose-hidden-config,
	no-force-arrow-cursor,
	enable-incoming-folders,
	combined-subdirectory-display,
	enable-incoming-folders-checking,
	preopen-stayopen-folders,
	no-enable-msg-view-forced-arrows,
	enable-full-header-and-text,
	enable-cruise-mode,
	prefer-plain-text,
	enable-mail-check-cue,
	no-show-cursor,
	quell-empty-directories,
	no-separate-folder-and-directory-entries,
	no-enable-dot-folders,
	vertical-folder-list,
	single-column-folder-list,
	expanded-view-of-distribution-lists,
	disable-take-last-comma-first,
	no-assume-slow-link,
	show-plain-text-internally,
	enable-msg-view-addresses,
	no-enable-arrow-navigation-relaxed,
	no-enable-lame-list-mode

# Alpine executes these keys upon startup (e.g. to view msg 13: i,j,1,3,CR,v)
initial-keystroke-list=

# Only show these headers (by default) when composing messages
default-composer-hdrs=

# Add these customized headers (and possible default values) when composing
customized-hdrs=

# When viewing messages, include this list of headers
viewer-hdrs=

# When viewing messages, number of blank spaces between left display edge and text
viewer-margin-left=

# When viewing messages, number of blank spaces between right display edge and text
viewer-margin-right=

# When viewing messages, number of lines of quote displayed before suppressing
quote-suppression-threshold=

# Determines default folder name for Saves...
# Choices: default-folder, by-sender, by-from, by-recipient, last-folder-used.
# Default: "default-folder", i.e. "saved-messages" (Unix) or "SAVEMAIL" (PC).
saved-msg-name-rule=

# Determines default name for Fcc...
# Choices: default-fcc, by-recipient, last-fcc-used.
# Default: "default-fcc" (see also "default-fcc=" variable.)
fcc-name-rule=

# Sets presentation order of messages in Index. Choices:
# Subject, From, Arrival, Date, Size, To, Cc, OrderedSubj, Score, and Thread.
# Order may be reversed by appending /Reverse. Default: "Arrival".
sort-key=

# Sets presentation order of address book entries. Choices: dont-sort,
# fullname-with-lists-last, fullname, nickname-with-lists-last, nickname
# Default: "fullname-with-lists-last".
addrbook-sort-rule=

# Sets presentation order of folder list entries. Choices: alphabetical,
# alpha-with-dirs-last, alpha-with-dirs-first.
# Default: "alpha-with-directories-last".
folder-sort-rule=

# Sets the default folder and collection offered at the Goto Command's prompt.
goto-default-rule=

# Sets message which cursor begins on. Choices: first-unseen, first-recent,
# first-important, first-important-or-unseen, first-important-or-recent,
# first, last. Default: "first-unseen".
incoming-startup-rule=

# Allows a default answer for the prune folder questions. Choices: yes-ask,
# yes-no, no-ask, no-no, ask-ask, ask-no. Default: "ask-ask".
pruning-rule=

# Controls behavior when reopening an already open folder.
folder-reopen-rule=

# Style that MESSAGE INDEX is displayed in when threading.
threading-display-style=

# Style of THREAD INDEX or default MESSAGE INDEX when threading.
threading-index-style=

# When threading, character used to indicate collapsed messages underneath.
threading-indicator-character=

# When threading, character used to indicate expanded messages underneath.
threading-expanded-character=

# When threading, character used to indicate this is the last reply
# to the parent of this message.
threading-lastreply-character=

# Reflects capabilities of the display you have.
# If unset, the default is taken from your locale. That is usually the right
# thing to use. Typical alternatives include UTF-8, ISO-8859-x, and EUC-JP
# (where x is a number between 1 and 9).
display-character-set=

# Reflects capabilities of the keyboard you have.
# If unset, the default is to use the same value
# used for the display-character-set.
keyboard-character-set=

# Defaults to UTF-8. This is used for outgoing messages.
# It is usually correct to leave this unset.
posting-character-set=

# Defaults to nothing, which is equivalent to US-ASCII. This is used for
# unlabeled incoming messages. It is ok to leave this unset but if you receive
# unlabeled mail that is usually in some known character set, set that here.
unknown-character-set=

# Specifies the program invoked by ^_ in the Composer,
# or the "enable-alternate-editor-implicitly" feature.
editor=

# Specifies the program invoked by ^T in the Composer.
speller=

# Specifies the column of the screen where the composer should wrap.
composer-wrap-column=

# Specifies the string to insert when replying to a message.
reply-indent-string=

# Specifies the introduction to insert when replying to a message.
reply-leadin=

# Specifies the string to replace quotes with when viewing a message.
quote-replace-string=

# When these characters appear in the middle of a word in the composer
# the forward word function will stop at the first text following (as happens
# with SPACE characters by default)
composer-word-separators=

# Specifies the string to use when sending a  message with no to or cc.
empty-header-message=

# Program to view images (e.g. GIF or TIFF attachments).
image-viewer=

# If "user-domain" not set, strips hostname in FROM address. (Unix only)
use-only-domain-name=

# This variable takes a list of programs that message text is piped into
# after MIME decoding, prior to display.
display-filters=

# This defines a program that message text is piped into before MIME
# encoding, prior to sending
sending-filters=

# A list of alternate addresses the user is known by
alt-addresses=

# A list of keywords for use in categorizing messages
keywords=

# Characters which surround keywords in SUBJKEY token.
# Default is "{" "} "
keyword-surrounding-chars=

# Characters between subject and opening text in SUBJECTTEXT token.
# Default is " - "
opening-text-separator-chars=

# This is a list of formats for address books.  Each entry in the list is made
# up of space-delimited tokens telling which fields are displayed and in
# which order.  See help text
addressbook-formats=

# This gives a format for displaying the index.  It is made
# up of space-delimited tokens telling which fields are displayed and in
# which order.  See help text
index-format=

# The number of lines of overlap when scrolling through message text
viewer-overlap=

# Number of lines from top and bottom of screen where single
# line scrolling occurs.
scroll-margin=

# The number of seconds to sleep after writing a status message
status-message-delay=

# Number of times per-second to update busy cue messages
busy-cue-rate=

# The approximate number of seconds between checks for new mail
mail-check-interval=

# The approximate number of seconds between checks for new mail in folders
# other than the current folder and inbox.
# Default is same as mail-check-interval
mail-check-interval-noncurrent=

# The minimum number of seconds between checks for new mail in a Mail Drop.
# This is always effectively at least as large as the mail-check-interval
maildrop-check-minimum=

# For newsgroups accessed using NNTP, only messages numbered in the range
# lastmsg-range+1 to lastmsg will be considered
nntp-range=

# Full path and name of NEWSRC file
newsrc-path=

# Path and filename of news configuration's active file.
# The default is typically "/usr/lib/news/active".
news-active-file-path=

# Directory containing system's news data.
# The default is typically "/var/spool/news"
news-spool-directory=

# Path and filename of the program used to upload text from your terminal
# emulator's into Alpine's composer.
upload-command=

# Text sent to terminal emulator prior to invoking the program defined by
# the upload-command variable.
# Note: _FILE_ will be replaced with the temporary file used in the upload.
upload-command-prefix=

# Path and filename of the program used to download text via your terminal
# emulator from Alpine's export and save commands.
download-command=

# Text sent to terminal emulator prior to invoking the program defined by
# the download-command variable.
# Note: _FILE_ will be replaced with the temporary file used in the download.
download-command-prefix=

# Sets the search path for the mailcap configuration file.
# NOTE: colon delimited under UNIX, semi-colon delimited under DOS/Windows/OS2.
mailcap-search-path=

# Sets the search path for the mimetypes configuration file.
# NOTE: colon delimited under UNIX, semi-colon delimited under DOS/Windows/OS2.
mimetype-search-path=

# Sets the path for the system ssl certificates issued by a trusted
# certificate authority. Note that this could be a list of paths, if the same
# pinerc is used in different systems. Alpine always chooses the first one that
# it finds. Value must be an absolute path.
system-certs-path=

# Sets the path for the system ssl file container of certificates issued by a
# certificate authority. Note that this could be a list of container files,
# if the same pinerc is used in different systems. Alpine always chooses the,
# first one that it finds. Value must be an absolute path.
system-certs-file=

# Sets the path for a file that contains certificates that a user trusts.
Note that this could be a list of container files,
# if the same pinerc is used in different systems. Alpine always chooses the,
# first one that it finds. Value must be an absolute path.
user-certs-path=

# Sets the path for a file that contains certificates that a user trusts.
Note that this could be a list of container files,
# if the same pinerc is used in different systems. Alpine always chooses the,
# first one that it finds. Value must be an absolute path.
user-certs-file=

# List of programs to open Internet URLs (e.g. http or ftp references).
url-viewers=

# List of directories that are preferred locations to save or export attachments.
default-directories=

# The maximum number of non-stayopen remote connections that Alpine will use
max-remote-connections=

# A list of folders that should be left open once opened (INBOX is implicit)
stay-open-folders=""

# Sets the time in seconds that Alpine will attempt to open a network
# connection when checking for new unseen messages in an incoming folder.
#  The default is 5.
incoming-check-timeout=

# Sets the approximate number of seconds between checks for unseen messages
# in incoming folders. The default is 180.
incoming-check-interval=

# Sets the approximate number of seconds between checks for unseen messages
# for other than local or IMAP folders. The default is 180.
incoming-check-interval-secondary=

# List of incoming folders to check for unseen messages. The default if left
# blank is to check all incoming folders.
incoming-check-list=

# Specifies the number of dead letter files to keep when canceling.
dead-letter-files=

# Sets the filename for the newmail fifo (named pipe). Unix only.
newmail-fifo-path=

# Sets the width for the NewMail screen.
newmail-window-width=

# List of incoming msg folders besides INBOX, e.g. ={host2}inbox, {host3}inbox
# Syntax: optnl-label {optnl-imap-host-name}folder-path
incoming-folders=W2W {imap.123-reg.co.uk:993/ssl/user=john@wire2waves.co.uk}INBOX

# List of directories where saved-message folders may be. First one is
# the default for Saves. Example: Main {host1}mail/[], Desktop mail\[]
# Syntax: optnl-label {optnl-imap-hostname}optnl-directory-path[]
folder-collections="W2W Folders" {imap.123-reg.co.uk:993/ssl/user=john@wire2waves.co.uk}[],
	PlusNet {imap.plus.net:993/user=gm4slv@gm4slv.plus.com/ssl}INBOX.[]

# List, only needed if nntp-server not set, or news is on a different host
# than used for NNTP posting. Examples: News *[] or News *{host3/nntp}[]
# Syntax: optnl-label *{news-host/protocol}[]
news-collections=

# List of file or path names for personal addressbook(s).
# Default: ~/.addressbook (Unix) or \PINE\ADDRBOOK (PC)
# Syntax: optnl-label path-name
address-book=

# List of file or path names for global/shared addressbook(s).
# Default: none
# Syntax: optnl-label path-name
global-address-book=

# Set by Alpine; controls beginning-of-month sent-mail pruning.
last-time-prune-questioned=122.9

# Set by Alpine; controls display of "new version" message.
last-version-used=6.24

# This names the path to an alternative program, and any necessary arguments,
# to be used in posting mail messages.  Example:
#                    /usr/lib/sendmail -oem -t -oi
# or,
#                    /usr/local/bin/sendit.sh
# The latter a script found in Alpine distribution's contrib/util directory.
# NOTE: The program MUST read the message to be posted on standard input,
#       AND operate in the style of sendmail's "-t" option.
sendmail-path=

# This names the root of the tree to which the user is restricted when reading
# and writing folders and files.  For example, on Unix ~/work confines the
# user to the subtree beginning with their work subdirectory.
# (Note: this alone is not sufficient for preventing access.  You will also
# need to restrict shell access and so on, see Alpine Technical Notes.)
# Default: not set (so no restriction)
operating-dir=

# If no user input for this many hours, Alpine will exit if in an idle loop
# waiting for a new command.  If set to zero (the default), then there will
# be no timeout.
user-input-timeout=

# Sets the time in seconds that Alpine will attempt to open a network
# connection.  The default is 30, the minimum is 5, and the maximum is
# system defined (typically 75).
tcp-open-timeout=

# Network read warning timeout. The default is 15, the minimum is 5, and the
# maximum is 1000.
tcp-read-warning-timeout=

# Network write warning timeout. The default is 0 (unset), the minimum
# is 5 (if not 0), and the maximum is 1000.
tcp-write-warning-timeout=

# If this much time has elapsed at the time of a tcp read or write
# timeout, Alpine will ask if you want to break the connection.
# Default is 60 seconds, minimum is 5, maximum is 1000.
tcp-query-timeout=

# If this much time has elapsed at the time of a tcp read or write timeout,
# Alpine will close the connection automatically without user intervention.
# Setting this value to zero (the default) disables this. Setting this variable
# to a smaller value than tcp-query-timeout will close the connection
# automatically, and you will never be asked if you want to wait.
close-connection-timeout=

# Sets the format of the command used to open a UNIX remote
# shell connection.  The default is "%s %s -l %s exec /etc/r%sd"
# NOTE: the 4 (four) "%s" entries MUST exist in the provided command
# where the first is for the command's path, the second is for the
# host to connect to, the third is for the user to connect as, and the
# fourth is for the connection method (typically "imap")
rsh-command=

# Sets the name of the command used to open a UNIX remote shell connection.
# The default is typically /usr/ucb/rsh.
rsh-path=

# Sets the time in seconds that Alpine will attempt to open a UNIX remote
# shell connection.  The default is 15, min is 5, and max is unlimited.
# Zero disables rsh altogether.
rsh-open-timeout=

# Sets the format of the command used to open a UNIX secure
# shell connection.  The default is "%s %s -l %s exec /etc/r%sd"
# NOTE: the 4 (four) "%s" entries MUST exist in the provided command
# where the first is for the command's path, the second is for the
# host to connect to, the third is for the user to connect as, and the
# fourth is for the connection method (typically "imap")
ssh-command=

# Sets the name of the command used to open a UNIX secure shell connection.
# Typically this is /usr/bin/ssh.
ssh-path=

# Sets the time in seconds that Alpine will attempt to open a UNIX secure
# shell connection.  The default is 15, min is 5, and max is unlimited.
# Zero disables ssh altogether.
ssh-open-timeout=

# Sets the version number Alpine will use as a threshold for offering
# its new version message on startup.
new-version-threshold=

# List of mail drivers to disable.
disable-these-drivers=

# List of SASL authenticators to disable.
disable-these-authenticators=

# A range in the form min,max that sets the minimum amd maximum versions of the
# SSL protocol that Alpine will use when connecting to a secure server.
encryption-protocol-range=

# Set by Alpine; contains data for caching remote address books.
remote-abook-metafile=

# How many extra copies of remote address book should be kept. Default: 3
remote-abook-history=

# Minimum number of minutes between checks for remote address book changes.
# 0 means never check except when opening a remote address book.
# -1 means never check. Default: 5
remote-abook-validity=

# Your default printer selection
printer=

# List of special print commands
personal-print-command=

# Which category default print command is in
personal-print-category=

# Your client-id and client-secret information to authenticate using XOAUTH2
xoauth2-info=

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-roles=LIT:pattern="/NICK=Wire2waves/FLDTYPE=SPEC/FOLDER={imap.123-reg.co.uk:993\/ssl\/user=john@wire2waves.co.uk}Personal,W2W" action="/ROLE=1/FROM=John Pumford-Green <john@wire2waves.co.uk>/SMTP=smtp.123-reg.co.uk\/ssl\/user=john@wire2waves.co.uk/RTYPE=NC/FTYPE=NC/CTYPE=NC"

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-filters2=

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-scores2=

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-indexcolors=

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-other=

# Patterns and their actions are stored here.
patterns-search=

# Controls display of color
color-style=use-termdef

# Controls display of color for current index line
current-indexline-style=flip-colors

# Controls display of color for the titlebar at top of screen
titlebar-color-style=default

# Choose: black, blue, green, cyan, red, magenta, yellow, or white.
normal-foreground-color=255,255,255
normal-background-color=000,000,000
reverse-foreground-color=
reverse-background-color=
title-foreground-color=000,255,255
title-background-color=000,000,174
title-closed-foreground-color=
title-closed-background-color=
folder-foreground-color=
folder-background-color=
directory-foreground-color=
directory-background-color=
folder-list-text-foreground-color=
folder-list-text-background-color=
status-foreground-color=
status-background-color=
keylabel-foreground-color=000,255,255
keylabel-background-color=000,000,174
keyname-foreground-color=255,255,000
keyname-background-color=000,000,174
selectable-item-foreground-color=
selectable-item-background-color=
meta-message-foreground-color=
meta-message-background-color=
quote1-foreground-color=
quote1-background-color=
quote2-foreground-color=
quote2-background-color=
quote3-foreground-color=
quote3-background-color=
incoming-unseen-foreground-color=
incoming-unseen-background-color=
signature-foreground-color=
signature-background-color=
prompt-foreground-color=
prompt-background-color=
header-general-foreground-color=
header-general-background-color=
index-to-me-foreground-color=
index-to-me-background-color=
index-important-foreground-color=
index-important-background-color=
index-deleted-foreground-color=
index-deleted-background-color=
index-answered-foreground-color=255,255,255
index-answered-background-color=000,000,174
index-new-foreground-color=
index-new-background-color=
index-recent-foreground-color=
index-recent-background-color=
index-forward-foreground-color=
index-forward-background-color=
index-unseen-foreground-color=
index-unseen-background-color=
index-highpriority-foreground-color=
index-highpriority-background-color=
index-lowpriority-foreground-color=
index-lowpriority-background-color=
index-arrow-foreground-color=
index-arrow-background-color=
index-subject-foreground-color=
index-subject-background-color=
index-from-foreground-color=
index-from-background-color=
index-opening-foreground-color=
index-opening-background-color=

# Colors in which tokens will be displayed in the index screen
index-token-colors=

# When viewing messages, these are the header colors
viewer-hdr-colors=

# Colors used to display keywords in the index
keyword-colors=

# Public certificates are kept in files in this directory. The files should
# contain certificates in PEM format. The name of each file should look
# like <emailaddress>.crt. The default directory is .alpine-smime/public.
smime-public-cert-directory=

# If this option is set then public certificates are kept in a single container
# "file" similar to a remote configuration file instead of in the
# smime-publiccert-directory. The value can be a remote or local folder
# specification like for a non-standard pinerc value. The default
# is that it is not set.
smime-public-cert-container=

# Private keys are kept in files in this directory. The files are in PEM format.
# The name of a file should look like <emailaddress>.key.
# The default directory is .alpine-smime/private.
smime-private-key-directory=

# If this option is set then private keys are kept in a single container
# "file" similar to a remote configuration file instead of in the
# private-key-directory. The value can be a remote or local folder
# specification like for a non-standard pinerc value. The default
# is that it is not set.
smime-private-key-container=

# Certificate Authority certificates (in addition to the normal CACerts for the
# system) are kept in files in this directory. The files are in PEM format.
# Filenames should end with .crt. The default directory is .alpine-smime/ca.
smime-cacert-directory=

# If this option is set then CAcerts are kept in a single container
# "file" similar to a remote configuration file instead of in the
# ca-cert-directory. The value can be a remote or local folder
# specification like for a non-standard pinerc value. The default
# is that it is not set.
smime-cacert-container=

# LDAP servers for looking up addresses.
ldap-servers=

# RSS News feed
rss-news=

# RSS Weather feed
rss-weather=

# Web Alpine index table row height
wp-indexheight=

# Web Alpine number of index lines in table
wp-indexlines=

# Web Alpine aggregate operations tab state
wp-aggstate=

# Web Alpine various aspects of cross-session state
wp-state=

# Web Alpine preferred width for message display in characters
wp-columns=

telnet

I've put telnetd on the shack box and telnet clients on anything that didn't already have it.

SSH is great, but sometimes it's nice to go back to simpler times…..

ftp

And the same for ftp….

Section Two

— John Pumford-Green 30/09/22 18:26

Further Information

AntiX

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

AntiX

I'm testing a Live-USB Linux **AntiX** on a Lenovo laptop that has always been sluggish running Windows 10 (and even running Debian from the HDD).

I don't know if the issue is related to the performance (speed/RAM etc) of the machine or to the HDD itself. To see how the machine performs separately from the HDD I'll use AntiX for general web browsing and email for a few days and see how I find it.

Persistence

I've set up static root persistence to allow me to install and configure software, and save files etc. that remain after rebooting. This required setting up persistence :

rootfs = 3GB
homefs = 3GB

I installed rwho and rwhod to confirm new packages remained after reboot. I needed to change the default Live-USB user passwords to allow persistence to work - the first time I rebooted after setting up persistence I was forced to do so. I also added a new user, rather than stick with the Live-USB's default of demo

Browser

I then installed chromium as the preferred browser (instead of the default seamonkey)

To make it the menu-selected choice of browser I struggled to see how the menu item desktop-defaults-run -b (-b for browser) was made to point to chromium until I found one way (using the GUI control centre):

menu
control centre
preferred applications
web-browser --> /usr/share/application/chromium.desktop

chromium does not allow syncing to a google account any more, despite appearing to let you sign in to Google to initiate the sync.

I'll stick with chromium for this Live-USB version.

Email? : not sure I need to go this far, unless it turns out to be much more user friendly than the Windows10 OS from the HDD.

Mouse Touchpad

I hate “tap-click” on touchpads….

add :

# disable touchpad tapping for button1 
synclient tapbutton1=-1 &

to ~/.desktop-session/startup

Update

After a couple of hours of using AntiX for Websurfing, You Tube and Dokuwiki editing I'm happy at the speedy response….

Let's see how it performs for other things ….

sudo apt-get install claws-mail

~/.bashrc

Change default prompt to a single line, rather than split across 2 lines: comment out default PS1 and copy/edit to look like :

PS1="$PURPLE\u$nc@$CYAN\H$nc:$GREEN\w$GREEN\$$nc "

if [ "$UID" = 0 ]; then
    PS1="$red\u$nc@$red\H$nc:$CYAN\w$nc\\n$red#$nc "
else
#    PS1="$PURPLE\u$nc@$CYAN\H$nc:$GREEN\w$nc\\n$GREEN\$$nc "
    PS1="$PURPLE\u$nc@$CYAN\H$nc:$GREEN\w$GREEN\$$nc "
fi

Desktop Choice

I prefer fluxbox for low-resource linux machines, and I'm using the zzz/fluxbox desktop which integrates the zzzFM file-manager. The default single-click-opens-files is annoying and I found the way to disable it is:

right-click on the ''File Manager'' desktop icon, 
select ''Desktop Settings --> General'' tab and un-tick ''single-click open files'' 
and do the same on the ''Desktop'' tab.

Page Updated: 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

linux, antix

DBUS & Automount

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 16 Feb 2026 08:40:39 +0000

←Archive

DBUS & Automount

Running X from startx and making automount work

Background

I don't use a DESKTOP ENVIRONMENT on Linux - I boot to a console and start X11 via the startx command.

This runs commands from ~/.xinitrc

xrdb -load ~/.Xdefaults
setxkbmap -layout gb
xset s noblank
xset s noexpose
xset -dpms
 
~/bin/background.sh &
 
dwmblocks &
 
xfce4-power-manager &
 
pasystray &
 
nm-applet &
 
exec dwm

My window manager is DWM and I don't want/need all the extra stuff of a desktop environment

I would however like to be able to automount external USB drives rather than what I do currently

sudo dmesg #find drive device
sudo mount /dev/xxxx /mnt

then copy files as necessary between /mnt/xxxxx and the machine's filesystem

Afterwards….

cd
sudo sync
sudo umount /mnt

Graphical File Manager

I installed Thunar along with gvfs and all the additional stuff I thought I needed (gvfs-backends* etc).

But Thunar complained that it appears you don't have gvfs or similar…

I briefly tried installing the MATE Desktop environment - and then spent a long time forcing it to use DWM as window manager, and turning off as much as I could

uninstalled caja
uninstalled mate-panel
edited via dconf-editor to make dwm start as window manager….

Then Thunar was happy with gvfs and would automount a USB drive (or more importantly my Swiss Micros calculator's USB drive).

But I wasn't happy with this as a solution - too messy and too much crap going on - messing up the appearance of GTK-aware apps like claws-mail and GNUCASH

I wanted to get back to simply running DWM etc. without all the rest

DBUS

It appears the issue is that with my method of starting X via ~/.xinitrc I fail to correctly start DBUS. This needs to be started correctly in the setting up of an X-session

The answer isn't to add an invocation of DBUS into my ~/.xinitrc as I first thought.

The answer is to let X11 start via the SYSTEM xinitrc which only happens as long as I don't have my own ~/.xinitrc

Starting X this way which will then run various other things, including DBUS, as the XSession is spun-up via startx

Then the process is finished by running my file ~/.xsession - which is actually just my ~/.xinitrc file renamed to ~/.xsession.

I found this at https://momi.ca/posts/2021-10-11-startxdebian/ which describes my own situation perfectly, and the solution works perfectly.

I can still boot into a console session, and use startx to switch to DWM - and automount works for Thunar

Further Information

dbus, startx, thunar, automount

Updated : 16/02/26 08:40 GMT

DokuWiki Unison Backup

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 07:17:50 +0000

DokuWiki Unison Backup

Using unison to sync a copy of the full dokuwiki data on the VPS to a Dropbox folder on my Shack PC, so that I have a backup copy, in the cloud in case of disaster. I'd hate to lose all the work that goes into writing this stuff…

Config Files

on the Shack PC create a ~/.unison/dokuwiki.prf file

root = /home/gm4slv/Dropbox/Documents/dokuwiki
root = ssh://gm4slv.org.uk//var/www/html/dokuwiki
sshargs = -C

To account for making the laptop's copy into a git repository I added:

ignore = Path .git

to the laptop config (see Github Repository ) — John Pumford-Green 29/05/22 00:29

on the VPS server create a similar ~/.unison/dokuwiki.prf file

root = /home/gm4slv/dokuwiki
root = ssh://gm4slv.plus.com:27659/Dropbox/Documents/dokuwiki
sshargs = -C

First Run

Run the first time on the Shack PC to download the dokuwiki directory tree from the VPS

unison dokuwiki

gm4slv@laptop:~/.unison $ unison dokuwiki
Unison 2.51.3 (ocaml 4.11.1): Contacting server...
Connected [//gm4slv//var/www/html/dokuwiki -> //laptop//home/gm4slv/Dropbox/Docu                                                                                                 ments/dokuwiki]
Looking for changes
Warning: No archive files were found for these roots, whose canonical names are:
        /home/gm4slv/Dropbox/Documents/dokuwiki
        //gm4slv//var/www/html/dokuwiki
This can happen either
because this is the first time you have synchronized these roots,
or because you have upgraded Unison to a new version with a different
archive format.

Update detection may take a while on this run if the replicas are
large.

Unison will assume that the 'last synchronized state' of both replicas
was completely empty.  This means that any files that are different
will be reported as conflicts, and any files that exist only on one
replica will be judged as new and propagated to the other replica.
If the two replicas are identical, then no changes will be reported.

If you see this message repeatedly, it may be because one of your machines
is getting its address from DHCP, which is causing its host name to change
between synchronizations.  See the documentation for the UNISONLOCALHOSTNAME
environment variable for advice on how to correct this.

Donations to the Unison project are gratefully accepted:
http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison


Press return to continue.[<spc>]
  Waiting for changes from server
Reconciling changes

local          gm4slv
         <---- file       .htaccess.dist  [f]
         <---- file       COPYING  [f]
         <---- file       README  [f]
         <---- file       VERSION  [f]
         <---- dir        bin  [f]
         <---- dir        conf  [f]
         <---- dir        data  [f]
         <---- file       doku.php  [f]
         <---- file       feed.php  [f]
         <---- dir        inc  [f]
         <---- file       index.php  [f]
         <---- file       install.php  [f]
         <---- dir        lib  [f]
         <---- dir        vendor  [f]

Proceed with propagating updates? [] y
Propagating updates

........

Everything is downloaded from the VPS and saved in the Dropbox folder, from where it is uploaded to the cloud.

Future runs...

I could automate the process, using various command line switches to automatically “do the right thing” without needing to answer Yes/No questions

unison -auto -batch -silent dokuwiki

and even put it in a cron job, but for now just running it every now and again manually might be enough.

restore from backup

If the VPS version of the dokuwiki ever gets totally screwed up I can restore it by running the same script from the other side and chosing which direction to do the sync in ( shack → VPS )

on the VPS server

unison dokuwkiki

which will pull the last sync'd version from my backup to my home directory on the VPS ( i.e. not straight to /var/www/html/dokuwiki) from where I can copy it back to the webserver directory.

I can run this command regularly to keep a mirror of the Dropbox backup on the VPS in case I need it later.

(update 28/5/22) I've added it to crontab to run daily at 04:30:

#!/bin/bash
 
unison -batch -auto -silent dokuwiki

crontab:

30 04 * * * /home/gm4slv/bin/dokuwiki_unison.sh >/dev/null 2>&1

Github Repository

I made a new github repository to hold the Dokuwiki folder tree, too. The laptop / Dropbox backup, taken via Unison from the VPS server, is the local repository.

The workflow to keep things backed up:

on Shack Laptop
1. run unison to retrieve the current production copy of the DokuWiki directory tree:
  1. ```
   unison -batch -auto dokuwiki 
```
2. there was an error flagged → the .git folder isn't present on the VPS's webserver root but is in the unison backup directory on the laptop. Just ignore it?
3. I found you can tell unison to ignore the .git folder by adding
```
  ignore = Path .git
```
  to the prf config file on laptop — John Pumford-Green 29/05/22 00:30
2. cd into ~/Dropbox/Documents/dokuwiki
3. add all files to git
```
git add .
```
4. commit
```
git commit -m "backup"
```
5. push to github
```
git push
```
on VPS
1. in home directory, run
```
unison -batch dokuwiki
```
  to pull the dropbox copy back to the VPS
2. copy the dokuwiki tree to /var/www/html/ (is unison also useful here?) (or rsync Dokuwiki Mirror)
in extremis it should be possible to simply clone the github repository instead of using unison

Page Updated : 04/06/26 08:17 BST

linux, vps, dokuwiki, unison, github

Dokuwiki Mirror

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 07:17:18 +0000

←Archive

Dokuwiki Mirror

I'm running a SANDBOX installation of dokuwiki on the small headless server in have in the shack.

This is to allow me to mess around with templates and layouts and things without impacting the real wiki.

To give it some data - a full mirror of the existing real wiki - I've used rsync

cd /var/www/html/
sudo rsync -av --delete gm4slv@gm4slv.org.uk:/var/www/html/dokuwiki/ ./dokuwiki/

This copies the production wiki into the web server root on the little sandbox machine.

UPDATE — John Pumford-Green 27/04/23 05:53

Added –delete to the command, to remove pages in the Mirror copy that have been deleted from the VPS (production) server, to keep them properly in step.

I can then play around to my heart's content.

The same mechanism would work to retrieve/install the whole wiki from a backup

I've put it in a shell script:

#!/bin/bash
 
WEBDIR=/var/www/html/dokuwiki/
 
SERVERDIR=/var/www/html/dokuwiki/
 
SERVER=gm4slv.org.uk
 
 
sudo  rsync -e "ssh -l gm4slv -i /home/gm4slv/.ssh/id_rsa"  -av $SERVER:$SERVERDIR $WEBDIR

This means I can automate the mirroring with crontab of I wanted to, but it would mean the sandbox will lose any local modifications I've done. Perhaps it's best to keep the option to revert to production version as something I do from time to time, rather then automatically.

(UPDATE — John Pumford-Green 30/05/22 19:37 )

Encrypted Password Plugin…. see Sandbox Server

Page Info

— John Pumford-Green 30/05/22 13:37

Page last updated: 04/06/26 08:17 BST

dokuwiki, linux

Dropbox

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Dropbox

Quitting Dropbox

Thought process

I've had a Dropbox Plus account for many years, but lately I find I use it less and less, and it's becoming bloated with useless features.

I have other options for backup and easy access :

Dokuwiki (two separate wikis : personal and business) - accessible via web from anywhere - VPS has a 20GB hard drive for file storage
VPS directly - using rsync or Unison
NAS - 2TB on home LAN (make accessible externally via HTTP?)
Google Drive - Free 15GB - sync with PC, Web, Phone - simpler replacement for Dropbox
Photos from phone automatically back-up (low resolution) to Google Photos
- Download occasionally via USB to Shack Laptop then delete originals from phone
- rsync from Shack Laptop → NAS1 Pictures share

Steps

~~Move wanted document files etc. from Dropbox to NAS, until up against the big “Pictures” folder….~~
~~Delete large bulk of files (i.e. those already safe on NAS1) from Dropbox~~
~~Start caja-dropbox on shack laptop and allow it to sync the remaining files (predominantly Pictures plus some remaining documents etc.)~~
~~Once everything is on Shack Laptop or NAS box → stop caja-dropbox on Laptop → delete Dropbox's copies of everything needed to get below 2GB~~
~~rsync everything else to NAS1 from Shack Laptop~~
~~Downgrade Dropbox account cancel subscription → Confirm refund of this year's subscription → when absolutely certain Delete Dropbox account~~

Plus Side

This Laptop now seems not to get bogged down every time you do anything, once Dropbox is gone!

— John Pumford-Green 02/05/23 08:28

Further Information

Code & Command Snippets

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 20:03:26 +0000

←Archive

Code & Command Snippets

Windows WiFi Disconnect

Windows will disconnect a WIFI connection when it discovers there's no WAN internet - presumably Windows thinks ALL networks are connected to the Internet and this prevents using WIFI for an isolated LAN, and also throws you off the WLAN whenever the ADSL connection fails, even when you're busy using only internal LAN sessions.

THIS IS WRONG BEHAVIOUR.

I found a solution, and typically it's a REGEDIT task:

From : https://superuser.com/questions/1650052/how-to-keep-windows-10-connected-to-wifi-without-internet

Add a Registry DWORD “NoActiveProbe” value “1” at Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\NetworkConnectivityStatusIndicator

Job Done. You stay on your LAN even when the interwebs is down.

Chrome redirects

To remove a “permanent redirect” - e.g. from an http to an https URL - I found the answer here:

https://www.neilwithdata.com/chrome-redirect-forget

Open the Chrome Developer Tools (F12)
Go to the Network tab and make sure Disable cache is ticked
Reload (or navigate to) the page you no longer want to be redirected while keeping the dev tools open.

— John Pumford-Green 27/04/23 06:12

Vim Pasting

I recently had problems pasting text into Vim by the traditional RIGHT click method. Vim would enter Insert(VISUAL) mode instead.

One solution when using Putty is to use its own mechanism :

SHIFT+INS

I prefer to use RIGHT click, as it's more natural so I found the solution is to add

set mouse-=a

to ~/.vimrc

This solves the problem, and I don't need to use nano when editing text files on my remote server via SSH using Putty.

Raspberry Pi Stuff

find Raspberry Pi Model : cat /sys/firmware/devicetree/base/model
mount a raspberry pi image

gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo losetup -Pf igate.img
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ lsblk
NAME      MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
loop0       7:0    0   4.3G  0 loop
├─loop0p1 259:0    0   256M  0 part
└─loop0p2 259:1    0     4G  0 part
sda         8:0    0 298.1G  0 disk
├─sda1      8:1    0 235.1G  0 part /
├─sda2      8:2    0     1K  0 part
├─sda3      8:3    0  50.9G  0 part
└─sda5      8:5    0  12.1G  0 part [SWAP]
sr0        11:0    1  1024M  0 rom
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo mount /dev/loop0p2 /mnt

remove mounted image

gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo umount /mnt
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo losetup -D

Git

Basic Workflow

do all changes to code
git add . to add changed files to staging
git commit -m “commit message” to do the commit
git push to push new commits to github

Windows Host File

Start → Windows Accessories → Notepad → <right click> … more…Run as Administrator
edit C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts (set All files rather than txt to be able to see the hosts file in the file chooser)
Save

Auto SSH Tunnels

Used on remote installations to create persistent SSH reverse tunnels.

An example

svxlink hotspot

Page Info

Page created Thu May 26 14:00:21 2022 by John Pumford-Green

Page last updated: 04/06/26 21:03 BST

linux, pi

Github Config File Repos

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

Github Config File Repos

John Pumford-Green Tue May 3 20:09:19 2022

New GitHub account https://github.com/gm4slv
Upload ssh ip_rsa.pub to Git account
create GitHub repository for each machine (more later)
Create a “backup” folder hierarchy ~/backup/config/, ~/backup/data/ and ~/backup/bin/
create Git repository in the ~/backup/data/ directory
put script in ~/backup/bin/copy_files.sh

Inspired by : https://helgeklein.com/blog/linux-config-file-version-control-backup-on-github/

#!/bin/bash
 
# Remove all previously copied files and folders (excluding metadata) in the current (backup) directory
find /home/gm4slv/backup/data -maxdepth 1 -mindepth 1 -not -iname ".git" -not -iname ".ssh" | xargs --no-run-if-empty rm -r
 
# Copy the files and directories on the list to the current (backup) directory
# xargs does not start a shell, so we need to do it ourselves or globbing won't be available
# Enable globstar (two asterisks = recurse into subdirectories) and include files starting with a dot in filename expansion
cat /home/gm4slv/backup/config/backup_src.txt | xargs -I % bash -c "shopt -s globstar dotglob; cp --parents -R % ."

put list of files to be git-backed up in ~/backup/config/backup_src.txt

/etc/hosts
/etc/resolv.conf
/home/gm4slv/codeplugs/
/home/gm4slv/python_lost_found/

put another script ~/git_backup.sh in home directory, to fire it all off in the correct order

#!/bin/bash
#
DATE=`date +%c`
 
cd ~/backup/data
../bin/copy_files.sh
git add --all
git commit -m "updated $DATE"
git push

Page Updated : 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

github, linux

Another diversion... I3 Tiling WM

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 07:18:16 +0000

Another diversion... I3 Tiling WM

— John Pumford-Green 09/10/22 13:58

After setting up Alpine and some other console-mode software I got the urge to try going back to another window manager I've played with in the past - I3 WM

I used it on my touchscreen Raspberry Pi that used to live in the LandRover as a control panel for the Icom IC-M710 HF radio - as it's good for simple mouse-less control.

I delved into the usual round of other tiling WMs:

I3
DWM
Herbstluftwm (HLWM)

After setting up some things on I3 to work the way I wanted I didn't see the need to re-invent the wheel by spending time learning/configuring DWM or HLWM so I've settled on I3

There are some snippets of info and configs on a page in the Wiki:

I3 Window Manager

I have it setup on my laptop which runs Antix Linux from a USB memory stick, without using the Hard Drive, and with Persistent Storage working well it's a great, fast and responsive, Linux-on-the-desktop user machine. I'm limited by how much software can be installed, as it all has to fit in 3GB of RAM once it boots. There's some USB storage available for data/documents etc. too.

I'm also setting I3 up on the old laptop I have in the shed as my main fixed machine - which is where I'm learning to write 6502 Assembly, and using I3 tiling WM is great for this - one large tile can have a VIM session to edit the source code, smaller tiles with terminal/shell can be used to assemble the code and to write/burn it to EEPROM, and to handle GIT commits/uploads to GITHUB.

Linux is just so versatile!

I3 Window Manager

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

I3 Window Manager

Various Things related to I3

Background & Conky

Some tiled windows

Floating scratchpad terminal with ranger file manager

Floating scratchpad terminal with Alpine email client

I3 Config and tweaks

Autotile

Make new windows be created in alternating horizontal / vertical arrangement, depending on aspect ratio of the current window.

https://github.com/nwg-piotr/autotiling

I3 Config File

config

# This file has been auto-generated by i3-config-wizard(1).
# It will not be overwritten, so edit it as you like.
#
# Should you change your keyboard layout some time, delete
# this file and re-run i3-config-wizard(1).
#
 
 
 
# i3 config file (v4)
#
# Please see https://i3wm.org/docs/userguide.html for a complete reference!
 
set $mod Mod4
 
# Font for window titles. Will also be used by the bar unless a different font
# is used in the bar {} block below.
#font pango:monospace 8
 
# This font is widely installed, provides lots of unicode glyphs, right-to-left
# text rendering and scalability on retina/hidpi displays (thanks to pango).
font pango:DejaVu Sans 10
 
 
default_border normal 3
hide_edge_borders none
binding_mode_indicator yes
 
#set $bg-color #2f446f
#set $inactive-bg-color #2f343f
#set $text-color #ffb25a
#set $inactive-text_color #676e7d
#set $urgent-bg-color #bd2c40
 
#client.focused $bg-color $bg-color $text-color #2255ff
#client.unfocused $inactive-bg-color $bg-color $text-color #225ff
#client.focused_inactive $inactive-bg-color $inactive-bg-color $inactive-text-color #2255ff
#client.urgent $urgent-bg-color $urgent-bg-color $text_color #2255ff
 
workspace_auto_back_and_forth yes
 
# The combination of xss-lock, nm-applet and pactl is a popular choice, so
# they are included here as an example. Modify as you see fit.
 
# xss-lock grabs a logind suspend inhibit lock and will use i3lock to lock the
# screen before suspend. Use loginctl lock-session to lock your screen.
#exec --no-startup-id xss-lock --transfer-sleep-lock -- i3lock --nofork
 
# NetworkManager is the most popular way to manage wireless networks on Linux,
# and nm-applet is a desktop environment-independent system tray GUI for it.
#exec --no-startup-id nm-applet
 
exec --no-startup-id synclient tapbutton1=-1
exec --no-startup-id /home/gm4slv/noblank.sh
exec --no-startup-id conky
exec --no-startup-id xsetroot -solid midnightblue
 
 
exec --no-startup-id ~/background.sh
 
#exec --no-startup-id polybar example
 
exec_always --no-startup-id autotile
#exec_always --no-startup-id ~/autosplit
 
bindsym $mod+p exec --no-startup-id ~/promote-window
 
# Use pactl to adjust volume in PulseAudio.
set $refresh_i3status killall -SIGUSR1 i3status
bindsym XF86AudioRaiseVolume exec --no-startup-id pactl set-sink-volume @DEFAULT_SINK@ +10% && $refresh_i3status
bindsym XF86AudioLowerVolume exec --no-startup-id pactl set-sink-volume @DEFAULT_SINK@ -10% && $refresh_i3status
bindsym XF86AudioMute exec --no-startup-id pactl set-sink-mute @DEFAULT_SINK@ toggle && $refresh_i3status
#bindsym XF86AudioMicMute exec --no-startup-id pactl set-source-mute @DEFAULT_SOURCE@ toggle && $refresh_i3status
 
#bindsym XF86AudioMute exec amixer sset 'Master' toggle
#bindsym XF86AudioLowerVolume exec amixer sset 'Master' 5%-
#bindsym XF86AudioRaiseVolume exec amixer sset 'Master' 5%+
 
 
# Use Mouse+$mod to drag floating windows to their wanted position
floating_modifier $mod
 
# start a terminal
#bindsym $mod+Return exec i3-sensible-terminal
bindsym $mod+Return exec lxterminal
 
# kill focused window
bindsym $mod+Shift+q kill
 
# start dmenu (a program launcher)
bindsym $mod+d exec --no-startup-id dmenu_run
# A more modern dmenu replacement is rofi:
# bindcode $mod+40 exec "rofi -modi drun,run -show drun"
# There also is i3-dmenu-desktop which only displays applications shipping a
# .desktop file. It is a wrapper around dmenu, so you need that installed.
# bindcode $mod+40 exec --no-startup-id i3-dmenu-desktop
 
# change focus
bindsym $mod+h focus left
bindsym $mod+j focus down
bindsym $mod+k focus up
bindsym $mod+l focus right
 
# alternatively, you can use the cursor keys:
bindsym $mod+Left focus left
bindsym $mod+Down focus down
bindsym $mod+Up focus up
bindsym $mod+Right focus right
 
# move focused window
bindsym $mod+Shift+h move left
bindsym $mod+Shift+j move down
bindsym $mod+Shift+k move up
bindsym $mod+Shift+l move right
 
# alternatively, you can use the cursor keys:
bindsym $mod+Shift+Left move left
bindsym $mod+Shift+Down move down
bindsym $mod+Shift+Up move up
bindsym $mod+Shift+Right move right
 
# split in horizontal orientation
#bindsym $mod+h split h
 
# split in vertical orientation
#bindsym $mod+v split v
 
# enter fullscreen mode for the focused container
bindsym $mod+f fullscreen toggle
 
# change container layout (stacked, tabbed, toggle split)
bindsym $mod+s layout stacking
bindsym $mod+w layout tabbed
bindsym $mod+e layout toggle split
 
# toggle tiling / floating
bindsym $mod+Shift+space floating toggle
 
# change focus between tiling / floating windows
bindsym $mod+space focus mode_toggle
 
# focus the parent container
bindsym $mod+a focus parent
 
# focus the child container
#bindsym $mod+d focus child
 
# Define names for default workspaces for which we configure key bindings later on.
# We use variables to avoid repeating the names in multiple places.
set $ws1 "1"
set $ws2 "2"
set $ws3 "3"
set $ws4 "4"
set $ws5 "5"
set $ws6 "6"
set $ws7 "7"
set $ws8 "8"
set $ws9 "9"
set $ws10 "10"
 
# switch to workspace
bindsym $mod+1 workspace number $ws1
bindsym $mod+2 workspace number $ws2
bindsym $mod+3 workspace number $ws3
bindsym $mod+4 workspace number $ws4
bindsym $mod+5 workspace number $ws5
bindsym $mod+6 workspace number $ws6
bindsym $mod+7 workspace number $ws7
bindsym $mod+8 workspace number $ws8
bindsym $mod+9 workspace number $ws9
bindsym $mod+0 workspace number $ws10
 
# move focused container to workspace
bindsym $mod+Shift+1 move container to workspace number $ws1
bindsym $mod+Shift+2 move container to workspace number $ws2
bindsym $mod+Shift+3 move container to workspace number $ws3
bindsym $mod+Shift+4 move container to workspace number $ws4
bindsym $mod+Shift+5 move container to workspace number $ws5
bindsym $mod+Shift+6 move container to workspace number $ws6
bindsym $mod+Shift+7 move container to workspace number $ws7
bindsym $mod+Shift+8 move container to workspace number $ws8
bindsym $mod+Shift+9 move container to workspace number $ws9
bindsym $mod+Shift+0 move container to workspace number $ws10
 
# reload the configuration file
bindsym $mod+Shift+c reload
# restart i3 inplace (preserves your layout/session, can be used to upgrade i3)
bindsym $mod+Shift+r restart
bindsym $mod+Shift+x exec i3lock
# exit i3 (logs you out of your X session)
bindsym $mod+Shift+e exec "i3-nagbar -t warning -m 'You pressed the exit shortcut. Do you really want to exit i3? This will end your X session.' -B 'Yes, exit i3' 'i3-msg exit'"
 
 
 
##############################
#
#  Program Shortcuts
#
##############################
 
# "b" for "browser"
bindsym $mod+b exec --no-startup-id firefox
 
 
##############################
#
#  SCRATCHPAD
#
#
###############################
 
set $scratchpad-size 1000 700
 
bindsym $mod+Shift+minus move scratchpad
bindsym $mod+minus scratchpad show
 
bindsym $mod+m [title="AlpineMail"] scratchpad show ; move position center
bindsym $mod+n [title="NewsboatReader"] scratchpad show ; move position center
bindsym $mod+comma [title="RangerFM"] scratchpad show ; move position center
bindsym $mod+period [title="Connman"] scratchpad show ; move position center
 
exec --no-startup-id lxterminal -T AlpineMail -e ~/rpine 
exec --no-startup-id lxterminal -T NewsboatReader -e /usr/bin/newsboat
exec --no-startup-id lxterminal -T RangerFM -e ranger
exec --no-startup-id cmst -M
 
for_window [title="Connman System Tray"] floating enable, resize set $scratchpad-size, move scratchpad
for_window [title="AlpineMail"] floating enable, resize set $scratchpad-size, move scratchpad
for_window [title="NewsboatReader"] floating enable, resize set $scratchpad-size, move scratchpad 
for_window [title="RangerFM"] floating enable, resize set $scratchpad-size, move scratchpad 
 
 
################################################
#
#
#
 
 
# resize window (you can also use the mouse for that)
mode "resize" {
        # These bindings trigger as soon as you enter the resize mode
 
        # Pressing left will shrink the window’s width.
        # Pressing right will grow the window’s width.
        # Pressing up will shrink the window’s height.
        # Pressing down will grow the window’s height.
        bindsym j resize shrink width 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym k resize grow height 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym l resize shrink height 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym semicolon resize grow width 10 px or 10 ppt
 
        # same bindings, but for the arrow keys
        bindsym Left resize shrink width 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym Down resize grow height 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym Up resize shrink height 10 px or 10 ppt
        bindsym Right resize grow width 10 px or 10 ppt
 
        # back to normal: Enter or Escape or $mod+r
        bindsym Return mode "default"
        bindsym Caps_Lock mode "default"
        bindsym $mod+r mode "default"
}
 
bindsym $mod+r mode "resize"
 
 
 
# Start i3bar to display a workspace bar (plus the system information i3status
# finds out, if available)
bar {
     font pango:DejaVu Sans mono 10
     status_command i3status -c ~/i3status.conf
}

i3status bar

i3status.conf

# i3status configuration file.
# see "man i3status" for documentation.
 
# It is important that this file is edited as UTF-8.
# The following line should contain a sharp s:
# ß
# If the above line is not correctly displayed, fix your editor first!
 
general {
        colors = true
        interval = 5
}
 
#order += "ipv6"
order += "wireless _first_"
order += "ethernet _first_"
order += "battery 0"
#order += "disk /"
order += "load"
order += "cpu_usage"
order += "cpu_temperature 0"
#order += "memory"
order += "tztime local"
 
wireless _first_ {
        format_up = "W: (%quality at %essid) %ip"
        format_down = "W: down"
}
 
ethernet _first_ {
        format_up = "E: %ip (%speed)"
        format_down = "E: down"
}
 
battery 0 {
	status_chr = "⚡"
        status_bat = "🔋"
        status_unk = "? "
        status_full = "☻ "
	low_threshold = 10
        format = "B: %status %percentage %remaining"
}
 
 
 
disk "/" {
        format = "%avail"
}
 
load {
        format = "L: %1min"
}
 
cpu_temperature 0 {
	format = "T: %degrees°C"
}
 
cpu_usage {
	format = "CPU0 %cpu0 / CPU1 %cpu1"
}
 
memory {
	memory_used_method = "classical"
        format = "%free / %used"
	threshold_degraded = "2G"
        format_degraded = "MEMORY < %available"
}
 
tztime local {
        format = "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M"
}

Conky

.conkyrc

# Standard antiX .conkyrc file
# For conky editing help and commands visit = Casey's Conky Reference with Examples {http://www.ifxgroup.net/conky.htm}
 
# set to yes if you want Conky to be forked in the background
background yes
 
short_units yes
 
cpu_avg_samples 1
net_avg_samples 1
 
out_to_console no
 
# X font when Xft is disabled, you can pick one with program xfontsel
#font 7x12
#font 6x10
#font 7x13
font 8x12
#font 7x12
 
# Use Xft?
use_xft yes
 
# Xft font when Xft is enabled
#xftfont gentium:size=12
#ftfont DejaVu Sans:size=10
xftfont DejaVu Sans:bold:size=9
#xftfont DejaVu Sans:size=9
 
# Create own window instead of using desktop (required in nautilus, pcmanfm and rox desktops)
own_window yes
own_window_class Conky
own_window_transparent yes
own_window_hints undecorated,below,sticky,skip_taskbar
own_window_type override
 
# Text alpha when using Xft
xftalpha 1.0
 
#on_bottom no
 
# Update interval in seconds
update_interval 1
 
# Use double buffering (reduces flicker, may not work for everyone)
double_buffer yes
 
# Minimum size of text area
minimum_size 55
maximum_width 190
 
# Draw shades?
draw_shades no
 
# Draw outlines?
draw_outline no
 
# Draw borders around text
draw_borders no
 
# Stippled borders?
stippled_borders 0
 
# border margins
#border_margin 10
 
# border width
border_width 2
 
# Default colors and also border colors
default_color white
default_shade_color white
default_outline_color white
 
#color ffffff
color4 yellow
color8 77ccff
color9 5599cc
 
# Text alignment, other possible values are commented
# alignment top_left
alignment top_right
#alignment bottom_left
#alignment bottom_right
 
# Gap between borders of screen and text
 
gap_x 20
gap_y 40
 
# Add spaces to keep things from moving about?  This only affects certain objects.
use_spacer right
 
# Subtract file system buffers from used memory?
no_buffers yes
 
# if_up_strictness link:  up | link | address
if_up_strictness address
 
# set to yes if you want all text to be in uppercase
uppercase no
 
TEXT
${alignc}$nodename
${alignc}${color8}${font DejaVu Sans:size=12}${time %H:%M} ${font} ${color}
${alignc}${time %a %d %b}
${alignc}Uptime: $uptime
#${alignc}${exec disp=${DISPLAY#:}; disp=${disp%.[0-9]}; cat $HOME/.desktop-session/desktop-code.$disp 2>/dev/null}
#res:${alignr}${execi 60 xdpyinfo | sed -n -r "s/^\s*dimensions:.*\s([0-9]+x[0-9]+).*/\1/p"}
#dpi:${alignr}${execi 60 sed -nr "s/^\s*Xft.dpi:\s*([0-9]+(x[0-9]+)?).*/\1/p" $HOME/.Xresources | grep "[0-9]" || echo 96}
#Automount: ${alignr}${execi 60 grep -q "^automount=TRUE" $HOME/.desktop-session/automount.conf 2>/dev/null && echo "enabled" || echo "disabled"}
Freq:${alignr}${freq}
CPU:${alignr}${cpu}%
#${color}Init:${alignr}${color3}${execi 60 detect-init.sh}
${alignr}${cpugraph cpu0 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
Disk:${alignr}${diskio}
${alignr}${diskiograph 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}${if_up eth0}
eth0 up: $alignr ${upspeed eth0}
${alignr}${upspeedgraph   eth0 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
eth0 down: $alignr ${downspeed eth0}
${alignr}${downspeedgraph eth0 30,170  5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up eth1}
eth1 up: $alignr ${upspeed eth1}
${alignr}${upspeedgraph   eth1 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
eth1 down: $alignr ${downspeed eth1}
${alignr}${downspeedgraph eth1 30,170  5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up wlan0}
 
Wireless 
IP  $alignr ${addr wlan0}
Gate $alignr  $gw_ip
NS $alignr $nameserver
 
wlan0 up: $alignr ${upspeed wlan0}
${alignr}${upspeedgraph   wlan0 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
wlan0 down: $alignr ${downspeed wlan0}
${alignr}${downspeedgraph wlan0 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up wlan1}
wlan1 up: $alignr ${upspeed wlan1}
${alignr} ${upspeedgraph   wlan1 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
wlan1 down: $alignr ${downspeed wlan1}
${alignr}${downspeedgraph wlan1 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}${endif}
${alignr}${color8}Used / Total ${color}
RAM:${alignr}$mem / $memmax
Swap:${alignr}$swap / $swapmax
/ Disk:${alignr}${fs_used /} / ${fs_size /}
#${alignc}${execi 1000 persist-enabled}
 
${font DejaVu Sans Mono:size=10}${execi 30 ~/ruptime}

Gather ruptime information about local LAN Linux boxes from the rwhod service and format it with a small script ~/ruptime called from conkyrc

${font DejaVu Sans Mono:size=10}${execi 30 ~/ruptime}

ruptime local script

#!/bin/bash
 
/usr/bin/ruptime -a | cut -c1-8,13-16,18-27

Real ruptime returns:

gm4slv@antix1:~ $ ruptime 
antix1        up    1+04:34,     0 users,  load 0.63, 0.48, 0.47
aprs          up  116+04:03,     0 users,  load 0.00, 0.01, 0.00
laptop        up    9+16:04,     0 users,  load 1.27, 1.09, 1.04
nas1          up  185+23:19,     0 users,  load 0.33, 0.48, 0.47
shack         up      16:19,     0 users,  load 0.16, 0.22, 0.21

My small script formats it for conky

gm4slv@antix1:~ $ ./ruptime 
antix1    up   1+04:34
aprs      up 116+04:03
laptop    up   9+16:04
nas1      up 185+23:19
shack     up     16:19

add neofetch output as image to root window

background.sh

#!/bin/bash



while :
do
	
	neofetch --disable term > fetch

	ansilove -q -m transparent fetch

	feh --bg-center -B midnightblue fetch.png

	sleep 300

done

Keys cheatsheet

$mod+p = promote window

$mod+Return = terminal

$mod+Shift+q = kill window

$mod+d = dmenu

$mod+h = focus left
$mod+j = focus down
$mod+k = focus up
$mod+l = focus right


$mod+Shift+h = move left
$mod+Shift+j = move down
$mod+Shift+k = move up
$mod+Shift+l = move right


$mod+f = fullsreen toggle


=== When using Autotile these are for the next window to be created ====

$mod+s = stacking
$mod+w = tabbed
$mod+e = toggle h or v

=== Toggle a window between tiled and floating ===

$mod+Shift+space = floating toggle

=== Switch focus between a floating window and the tiled window(s)

$mod+space focus mode_toggle


$mod+a = focus parent

Additional Software

urxvt

Configured vi ~/.Xdefaults

For Ranger icons use DejavuSansMono NFM:size=11:style=Book

A bug makes font rendering odd, with too much space between characters (kerning is wrong)

A fix is to put Xft.rgba: none into ~/.Xdefaults

Another fix is to put URxvt.letterSpace=-1 into ~/.Xdefaults

Here's the ~/.Xdefaults I use:

Some un-used lines are commented out, but might be useful in testing….

Xft.rgba: none
#Xft.hintstyle: hintfull
#URxvt.letterSpace:-1
 
Xcursor.size:10
#URxvt.skipBuiltinGlyphs: true
URxvt.scrollBar: false
URxvt.boldFont: 
#URxvt.font: xft:DejaVuSansMono:style=Book:size=11
#URxvt.font: xft:Monospace:size=11, xft:DejaVuSansMono NFM:style=Book
URxvt.font: xft:DejaVuSansMono NFM:size=11:style=Book

Ranger

Image Previews: /etc/ranger/config/rc.conf :

set preview_images true

set preview_images_method w3m

Draw borders round segments of display /etc/ranger/config/rc.conf :
```
set draw_borders both
```
Icons following instructions here: https://github.com/alexanderjeurissen/ranger_devicons
- /etc/ranger/config/rc.conf :
```
default_linemode devicons
```
Font for icons : https://github.com/ryanoasis/nerd-fonts/releases/download/v2.2.2/DejaVuSansMono.zip
- unzipped into : ~/.fonts
- font cache re-built with
```
fc-cache -fv
```
Use Lxterminal - handles icons and image previews (st is poor for image previews)
commands for exracting and creating compressed archives (zip, tar, tar.gz etc) from here https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/ranger#Archives
- added both python snippets to /etc/ranger/config/commands.py
- added keybindings to /etc/ranger/config/rc.conf
```
 
map ,n console compress 
map ,m compress temp.zip
map ,e console extract_here 
```
- extract a zip/tar/tar.gz by the keystroke ,e
- create an automatically named temp.zip archive by selecting the files (Space) and then ,m
- create a named archive of your choice ,n your_archive_name.[tar|zip|tar.gz]

<insert> : touch (new file)

gg   : move to top
G    : move to bottom

<F1> : help
<F2> : rename
<F3> : view (less)
<F4> : edit (vim) 
<F5> : copy
<F6> : cut
<F7> : mkdir
<F8> : delete
<F10>: quit


<space> : select
uv : un-select

yy : yank (copy)
dd : cut

ud : un-cut
uy : un-cut(yank)

pp : paste


gh : GoHome
zh : show hidden dotfiles

Archive operation commands
,n : new named archive 
,m : new "temp.zip"
,e : extract_here

— John Pumford-Green 09/10/22 12:38

Further Information

Java JRE and Echolink Proxy

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Java JRE and Echolink Proxy

Setting up Echolink Proxy on VPS

sudo apt-get install default-jre-headless
 
wget http://echolink.org/downloads/EchoLinkProxy_1_2_3.zip
 
sudo apt-get install unzip
 
unzip EchoLinkProxy_1_2_3.zip
 
chmod 755 EcholinkProxy.jar
 
vi ELProxy.conf

and set new password

VPS Firewall

on fasthost control panel open

TCP/8100

UDP/5198

UDP/5199

Start Proxy

java -jar EcholinkProxy.jar

gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ java -jar EchoLinkProxy.jar
EchoLink Proxy version 1.2.3
Listening for connections on port 8100
Ready for new client connection.
Client connected: 80.229.223.86
Client authenticated (call=GM4SLV).

This runs and works okay.

Start in tmux

start_proxy.sh

#!/bin/bash
 
session="proxy"
 
tmux start-server
 
tmux new-session -d -s $session
 
tmux rename-window "echolink"
 
tmux selectp -t 0
tmux send-keys "java -jar /home/gm4slv/EchoLinkProxy.jar" C-m

add crontab to start @reboot

@reboot sleep 30 && sudo -u gm4slv /home/gm4slv/start_proxy.sh > /dev/null 2>&1

Page Info

— John Pumford-Green 04/06/22 07:26

Page last updated: 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

svxlink, echolink, linux, radio

Linux Serial Console

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Linux Serial Console

To configure Debian 11 for a serial console

Grub

Edit /etc/default/grub to add the console setting to the end of

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash resume=UUID=d6a8791e-201a-4207-99e1-eafadec6713f console=ttyS0,19200n8"

Then update grub to use the new setting.

sudo update-grub

Once the systemd changes are made it's worth rebooting to see that the boot process appears on the console.

systemd

sudo systemctl enable serial-getty@ttyS0.service
sudo systemctl start serial-getty@ttyS0.service

— John Pumford-Green 30/09/22 11:59

Further Information

Using some old text mode software again….

email with Old stuff but good

MediaWiki VPS Install

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

MediaWiki VPS Install

— John Pumford-Green 27/04/23 06:21

I have recenlty rebuilt the VPS install during a hardware upgrade, and the Mediawiki install is no longer in place.

The following guide would allow it to be re-installed should I decide to.

To compare mediawiki with dokuwiki I installed mediawiki on my little shack server.

I followed the instructions here

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Running_MediaWiki_on_Debian_or_Ubuntu

and did a few tweaks etc. to get things running.

I forgot to document the tweaks!

So I thought there would be no harm in installing it on my VPS to run alongside the main dokuwiki site, with a view to deciding whether to switch to mediawiki later.

Here are my steps to install mediawiki on the VPS machine, which already has a fully configured and working webserver & PHP. The main addition will be setting up a SQL server (probably MariaDB).

Installing pre-requisites

sudo apt-get install apache2 mariadb-server php php-mysql libapache2-mod-php php-xml php-mbstring

wget https://releases.wikimedia.org/mediawiki/1.38/mediawiki-1.38.1.tar.gz

tar zxvf mediawiki-1.38.1.tar.gz

sudo mkdir /var/www/html/mediawiki

sudo mv mediawiki-1.38.1/* /var/www/html/mediawiki

That has installed a SQL server and the mediawiki files into the webserver root. Next is to configure the SQL database to hold the wiki.

SQL Configuration

gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ sudo service mysql START
gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ sudo mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
Welcome TO the MariaDB monitor.  Commands END WITH ; OR \g.
Your MariaDB connection id IS 36
Server version: 10.3.34-MariaDB-0+deb10u1 Debian 10
 
Copyright (c) 2000, 2018, Oracle, MariaDB Corporation Ab AND others.
 
TYPE 'help;' OR '\h' FOR help. TYPE '\c' TO clear the CURRENT INPUT statement.
 
MariaDB [(NONE)]> CREATE USER 'new_mysql_user'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'mwPass';
Query OK, 0 ROWS affected (0.018 sec)
 
MariaDB [(NONE)]> quit;
Bye

Create the database and grant the user access

gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ sudo mysql -u root -p
Enter password:
Welcome TO the MariaDB monitor.  Commands END WITH ; OR \g.
Your MariaDB connection id IS 37
Server version: 10.3.34-MariaDB-0+deb10u1 Debian 10
 
Copyright (c) 2000, 2018, Oracle, MariaDB Corporation Ab AND others.
 
TYPE 'help;' OR '\h' FOR help. TYPE '\c' TO clear the CURRENT INPUT statement.
 
MariaDB [(NONE)]> CREATE DATABASE my_wiki;
Query OK, 1 ROW affected (0.003 sec)
 
MariaDB [(NONE)]> USE my_wiki;
DATABASE changed
MariaDB [my_wiki]> GRANT ALL ON my_wiki.* TO 'new_mysql_user'@'localhost';
Query OK, 0 ROWS affected (0.001 sec)
 
MariaDB [my_wiki]> quit;
Bye

Browse to https://gm4slv.org.uk/mediawiki and got an error message that there was a PHP component missing intl

sudo apt-get install php-intl

sudo service apache2 restart

Browse to mediawiki again and all seems well. The message now is that LocalSettings.php is missing, which is created at the next step, following the on screen link.

Configure the SQL access:

Database Username : new_mysql_user
Database Password : mwPass

Complete the questions, select the required extensions etc. and download the LocalSettings.php file. Then upload the file to the VPS and put it in /var/www/html/mediawiki

Tweaks

File uploads

Make sure images directory has ugo+rwx permissions

Logo

Somehow upload a logo.png into images and edit LocalSetting.php to point at the log:

$wgLogos = [
        '1x' => "$wgResourceBasePath/images/logo.png",
 
 
        'icon' => "$wgResourceBasePath/images/logo.png",
];

Image thumbnails & pdf

to be continued

sudo apt install ghostscript imagemagick xpdf-utils

add to LocalSettings.php:

$wgPdfProcessor = '/usr/bin/gs';
$wgPdfPostProcessor = $wgImageMagickConvertCommand; // if defined via ImageMagick
// $wgPdfPostProcessor = '/usr/bin/convert';  // if not defined via ImageMagick
$wgPdfInfo = '/usr/bin/pdfinfo';
$wgPdftoText = '/usr/bin/pdftotext';
 
 
$wgFileExtensions[] = 'pdf';

Now upload a pdf file and it should appear in the file brower.

Try putting it in a page with the <gallery> funtion

<gallery>
File:Blog.pdf|page=1
</gallery>

Page Info

— John Pumford-Green 29/06/22 15:15

Page last updated: 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

mediawiki

Mercurial

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Mercurial

Snippets to help remember how to use Mercurial Version Control

Create a Repository

Work on files until ready to start version control
Create a repository in the directory
- hg init
add the files
- hg add
commit the changes
- hg commit
- edit the comments and save them
- or use hg commit -m “adding initial version of hello.txt” to add comments directly to the commit log
This has made the first version of the repository.

Simple workflow

Work on files in the repository directory (or copy in files edited and tested elsewhere)
Add any new files
- hg add
Commit any changes
- hg commit -m “comments…..”
This keeps the local (master?) repository up to date with all the changes, in case a reversion to a previous version is necessary. All changes are tracked.

Remote copies

on another machine you can clone a repository - to work on it or as a backup
by ssh
- hg clone ssh://gm4slv@xgate//path/to/repo
- this will pull the repo files across and make an exact copy
- in future you can pull any new changes made on the other (master?) repo by hg pull
- any changes will be brought over, but the working directory won't be brought up to date until you update it:
  - hg update
  - to make this automatic add to the clone repo's .hg/hgrc:

[hooks]
changegroup = hg update

any changes made in the clone repo can he sent back to the master by hg push
- remember to log into the master machine's repo and use hg update - or add the same lines to its .hg/hgrc

[hooks]
changegroup = hg update

any changes made in the master repo can be pushed to the clone(s) using hg push too.
the hgrc file holds the paths for push and pull destinations - should be self explanatory.

The log of commits hg log looks like:

changeset:   12:f69a03ef230f
tag:         tip
user:        John Pumford-Green <john@wire2waves.co.uk>
date:        Sun Mar 24 22:15:09 2024 +0000
summary:     removed previous test comment

changeset:   11:caeb761265b2
user:        John Pumford-Green <john@wire2waves.co.uk>
date:        Sun Mar 24 21:30:03 2024 +0000
summary:     added a comment to check push back to xgate

changeset:   10:146123c9688c
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Sun Mar 24 21:12:45 2024 +0000
summary:     catch up commit. various tweaks. moved to single xgate script that can

changeset:   9:482ed4c74b93
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Sun Feb 20 18:05:13 2022 +0000
summary:     heartbeat watchdog script added to repository

changeset:   8:8a7f5ff9839c
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Sun Feb 20 18:02:49 2022 +0000
summary:     added watchdog heartbeat

changeset:   7:0b870c3f0bc4
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Mon Dec 14 06:45:06 2020 +0000
summary:     simplex version with monitor command disabled

changeset:   6:a8d3082edc19
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Mon Dec 14 06:44:38 2020 +0000
summary:     update

changeset:   5:0b654aa5948a
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Sun Nov 15 22:04:11 2020 +0000
summary:     removed old commented functions etc.

changeset:   4:00b921d165c6
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Sun Nov 15 21:48:59 2020 +0000
summary:     changes to use dual-band V/UHF access

changeset:   3:bb599b01bd56
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Thu Nov 12 16:21:40 2020 +0000
summary:     ATU Tune returns "... complete"

changeset:   2:c9a9e04c7ad2
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Thu Nov 12 16:08:35 2020 +0000
summary:     ignore pyc files

changeset:   1:d668512ccedd
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Thu Nov 12 16:03:47 2020 +0000
summary:     remove unneeded file

changeset:   0:45cc8998c62b
user:        John Pumford-Green <gm4slv@gmail.com>
date:        Thu Nov 12 15:55:29 2020 +0000
summary:     first commit - current running code for xGate using IC-M710 HF transceiver.

— John Pumford-Green 24/03/24 22:23

Further Information

Pinouts

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 20:33:46 +0000

←Archive

Pinouts

Ethernet RJ45 B

The normal straight cable is a 568B

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
O/W	O	G/W	B	B/W	G	Bn/W	Bn

Ethernet X-over A-B

for use without a switch/hub and where the device cannot do automatic cross-over itself.

Raspberry Pi GPIO

PyBoard

Page Info

Page created Thu May 26 10:39:13 2022 by John Pumford-Green

Page last updated: 04/04/24 21:33 BST

network

Pure Blog

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 07:32:20 +0000

←Archive

Pure Blog

I've installed Pure Blog

After trying the Blog Plugin in dokuwiki and Chyrp-Lite PHP/SQLite blogging platform I switched to Pure Blog.

It's just what I need, and nothing extra to make it big and bloated.

Installation & Configuration

See https://g4slv.info/installing-pure-blog for some info.

Webfonts used

CSS

.tag-cloud a {
   margin: 0 0.5rem;
   line-height: 2rem;
 
}
 
.archive li {
  line-height: 1.5rem;
  font-size: 1.1rem;
  list-style-type: none;
}
 
body {
  font-size: 1rem;
  line-height: 1.25rem;
}
 
main {
  max-width: 50rem;
}
 
article {
  margin-bottom: 0;
}
 
p.post-archive-view {
  font-size : 1.1rem;
  line-height: 1.1rem;
}
main h1 {
  font-size: 2.8rem;
}
 
header, footer{
  font-family: "atkinson_next", sans-serif;
  font-size: 1.1rem;
}
 
footer {
  margin-top: 3rem;
}
 
main h1, main h2, main h3, main h4, main h5, main h6 {
  margin-left: -1rem;
  font-family: "atkinson_next", sans-serif;
}
 
.tag-list {
    border-top: 1px solid var(--border-color);
    padding-top: 2rem;
}
 
.post-nav {
  margin-top : 0;
  margin-bottom: 3rem;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_next';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleNext-Regular.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: normal;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: normal;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_next';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleNext-Bold.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: bold;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: normal;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_next';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleNext-RegularItalic.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: normal;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: italic;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_next';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleNext-BoldItalic.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: bold;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: italic;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_mono';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleMono-Regular.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: normal;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: normal;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_mono';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleMono-RegularItalic.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: normal;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: italic;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_mono';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleMono-Bold.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: bold;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: normal;
}
@font-face {
  font-family: 'atkinson_mono';
  src: url('/content/fonts/AtkinsonHyperlegibleMono-BoldItalic.woff2') format('woff2');
       font-weight: bold;
       font-display: swap;
       font-style: italic;
}
 
:root {
  --font-stack: "atkinson_mono", system-ui, monospace;
}
 
pre {
  font-family: "atkinson_mono", monospace;
}
 
code {
  font-family: "atkinson_mono", monospace;
}

Addons

Kev sent me 2 PHP scripts to provide a Tag-Cloud and a full site Archive page.

I tweaked them a bit, and here are my current versions.

tag-cloud.php

<?php
 
 
 
declare(strict_types=1);
 
 
 
$pageTitle = 'Tag Cloud';
 
$metaDescription = 'All tags, sized by how often they appear.';
 
 
 
$tagIndex = load_tag_index();
 
$tagCounts = [];
 
if ($tagIndex) {
 
    foreach ($tagIndex as $slug => $slugs) {
 
        $tagCounts[$slug] = count($slugs);
 
    }
 
}
 
 
 
// Collect original display names from posts (slugs alone lose capitalisation/spaces)
 
$originalNames = [];
 
foreach (get_all_posts(false) as $post) {
 
    foreach (($post['tags'] ?? []) as $tag) {
 
        $slug = normalize_tag($tag);
 
        if (!isset($originalNames[$slug])) {
 
            $originalNames[$slug] = $tag;
 
        }
 
    }
 
}
 
 
 
// Sort alphabetically by display name
 
uksort($tagCounts, function (string $a, string $b) use ($originalNames): int {
 
    return strcasecmp($originalNames[$a] ?? $a, $originalNames[$b] ?? $b);
 
});
 
 
 
$maxCount = $tagCounts ? max($tagCounts) : 1;
 
$minCount = $tagCounts ? min($tagCounts) : 1;
 
$range    = $maxCount > $minCount ? $maxCount - $minCount : 1;
 
 
 
require PUREBLOG_BASE_PATH . '/includes/header.php';
 
render_masthead_layout($config, ['page' => null]);
 
?>
 
<main>
 
    <h1>Tag Cloud</h1>
 
 
 
    <?php if (empty($tagCounts)): ?>
 
        <p>No tags found.</p>
 
    <?php else: ?>
 
        <p class="tag-cloud">
 
            <?php foreach ($tagCounts as $slug => $count):
 
                $name     = $originalNames[$slug] ?? $slug;
 
                $ratio    = ($count - $minCount) / $range;
 
                $fontSize = round(0.85 + $ratio * 1.4, 2);
 
                $postWord = $count === 1 ? 'post' : 'posts';
 
                echo '<a href="/tag/' . e(rawurlencode($slug)) . '"'
 
                   . ' style="font-size: ' . $fontSize . 'em"'
 
                   . ' title="' . e((string) $count) . ' ' . $postWord . '">'
 
                   . e($name) .  '(' .  e((string) $count) . ')' .  '</a>' . '&emsp;&emsp;';
 
            endforeach; ?>
 
        </p>
 
    <?php endif; ?>
 
</main>
 
<?php render_footer_layout($config, ['page' => null]); ?>
 
</body>
 
</html>

archive.php

<?php
declare(strict_types=1);
 
$allPosts = get_all_posts(false);
$postsByYear = [];
 
foreach ($allPosts as $entry) {
    $year = !empty($entry['date']) ? date('Y', strtotime((string) $entry['date'])) : 'Unknown';
    $postsByYear[$year][] = $entry;
}
 
krsort($postsByYear, SORT_NATURAL);
 
$pageTitle = 'Archive';
$metaDescription = 'Browse all published posts by year.';
?>
<?php require PUREBLOG_BASE_PATH . '/includes/header.php'; ?>
<?php render_masthead_layout($config); ?>
<main class=archive>
    <article>
        <h1>Archive</h1>
        <p><?= e((string) count($allPosts)) ?> published posts.</p>
 
        <?php if (!$allPosts): ?>
            <p>No published posts yet.</p>
        <?php else: ?>
            <?php foreach ($postsByYear as $year => $yearPosts): ?>
                <h3><?= e((string) $year) ?> (<?= e((string) count($yearPosts)) ?>)</h3>
                <ul>
                    <?php foreach ($yearPosts as $postItem): ?>
                        <li>
                            <?php if (!empty($postItem['date'])): ?>
                              <!--  <small> -->
                                    <time datetime="<?= e((string) $postItem['date']) ?>">
                                        <?= e(date('D Y-m-d H:i', strtotime((string) $postItem['date']))) ?>
                                    </time>
			   <!--     </small> -->
				&emsp;
                            <?php endif; ?>
                            <a href="/<?= e((string) ($postItem['slug'] ?? '')) ?>">
                                <?= e((string) ($postItem['title'] ?? 'Untitled')) ?>
                            </a>
                        </li>
                    <?php endforeach; ?>
                </ul>
            <?php endforeach; ?>
        <?php endif; ?>
    </article>
</main>
<?php render_footer_layout($config); ?>
</body>
</html>

Further Information

pure, blog

Page created : 02/03/26 08:50 GMT

Page updated : 03/03/26 07:32 GMT

Python2

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Python2

Debian Bullseye forcing move to Python3

How to install pip2 and then any required python2 modules, and continue to use Python2 code I've already written, and don't want/need to re-write to python3.

1. Python-is-python2

sudo apt-get install python-is-python2

2. pip2

from https://www.linuxcapable.com/how-to-install-python-pip-pip3-on-debian-11-bullseye

sudo apt install curl -y
 
curl https://bootstrap.pypa.io/pip/2.7/get-pip.py --output get-pip.py
 
sudo python2 get-pip.py

Then it's possible to install python2 modules via pip2

gm4slv@shack:~$ sudo pip2 install numpy
DEPRECATION: Python 2.7 reached the end of its life on January 1st, 2020. 
Please upgrade your Python as Python 2.7 is no longer maintained. 
pip 21.0 will drop support for Python 2.7 in January 2021.
More details about Python 2 support in pip can be found at https://pip.pypa.io/en/latest/development/release-process/#python-2-support 
pip 21.0 will remove support for this functionality.
Collecting numpy
  Downloading numpy-1.16.6-cp27-cp27mu-manylinux1_x86_64.whl (17.0 MB)
     |████████████████████████████████| 17.0 MB 196 kB/s
Installing collected packages: numpy
Successfully installed numpy-1.16.6

— John Pumford-Green 12/07/22 19:20

Further Information

R Pi Image files

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

R Pi Image files

Various tips and tricks for working with Raspberry Pi Disk Images

Taking an image

remove SD card from Pi
insert into PC
unmount the image partitions if they get auto-mounted

take the image using dd

sudo dd if=/dev/mmblahblah of=name_of_image.img bs=4M

wait….. and wait….
this can now be either
1. saved as it is (possibly a big file)
2. compressed with gzip
```
gzip name_of_image.img
```
an alternative is to make sure the image is as small as it needs to be, appropriate to the space actually needed by the installed OS.

Using ''losetup'' to work with the image file

The image can be used as a loop device and then mounted as a normal disk to allow access to the files etc.

To access the image as a loop device you let losetup find the partitions automatically and convert them to to loop partitions loop0p1 (the /boot partition) and loop0p2 the root partition. You can then mount whichever one you need.

gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo losetup -Pf igate.img
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ lsblk
NAME      MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
loop0       7:0    0   4.3G  0 loop
├─loop0p1 259:0    0   256M  0 part
└─loop0p2 259:1    0     4G  0 part
sda         8:0    0 298.1G  0 disk
├─sda1      8:1    0 235.1G  0 part /
├─sda2      8:2    0     1K  0 part
├─sda3      8:3    0  50.9G  0 part
└─sda5      8:5    0  12.1G  0 part [SWAP]
sr0        11:0    1  1024M  0 rom
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo mount /dev/loop0p2 /mnt
gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ cd /mnt
gm4slv@laptop:/mnt $ ls
bin  boot  dev  etc  home  lib  lost+found  media  mnt  opt  proc  root  run  sbin  share  srv  sys  tmp  usr  var
gm4slv@laptop:/mnt $ cd etc/
gm4slv@laptop:/mnt/etc $ cat hostname
igate
gm4slv@laptop:/mnt/etc $

This allows you to change files (one example is to set a fixed IP address in /etc/dhcpcd.conf) as required.

Shrinking the image

If the OS had been expanded after install to fill the whole SD Card space there is now a lot of pointless wasted space in the image that

takes up disk space to store
makes copying to a new SD card slow
makes it impossible to copy to a smaller card

The image can be shrunk to a more appropriate size.

The gist of it is here

unmount the loop device:
```
sudo umount /mnt
```
use gparted (need to be at a machine with a graphical session) to shrink the partition to a more suitable size, leaving some room for safety
dispose of the loop device
```
sudo losetup -d loop0
```
The *.img file is still the same size, but the partitions within the file are smaller, the rest of the space needs to be stripped from the *.img file with truncate
Use fdisk to inspect the image file to see where the partitions start and end

gm4slv@laptop:~/piimg $ sudo fdisk -l igate.img
Disk igate.img: 4.25 GiB, 4563402752 bytes, 8912896 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: dos
Disk identifier: 0x38ea48c4
 
Device     Boot  Start     End Sectors  Size Id Type
igate.img1        8192  532479  524288  256M  c W95 FAT32 (LBA)
igate.img2      532480 8912895 8380416    4G 83 Linux

The second partition ends at block 8912895 so you shrink the filesystem to this point (plus one). This requires the calculation of the actual number of bytes, based on the block size of 512 bytes.
Either calculate it yourself, or put the calculation in the command:
- ```
 sudo truncate --size=$[(8912895+1)*512] name_of_image.img
```

Voila, a smaller image on file which uses just enough space for the already known to be working OS

Page Updated: 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

linux, pi

Laptop Backup via rsync

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 29 Jan 2026 15:22:08 +0000

←Archive

Laptop Backup via rsync

A simple way to keep a backup of my laptop Home directory

Backup hosts

where to put the backups for safe keeping

A NAS box on my home LAN : nas1
An old Lenovo Laptop acting as a LAN file server : laptop
My cloud VPS server : g4slv.info

Rsync Script

To automate the backup to any of the three backup hosts above I've got a script, obviously.

The script checks which hosts are currently online and reachable and backs up the same data to each of them. This check means any of the hosts can be turned off but the script won't simply hang waiting for connection timeout before trying the next hosts.

To reduce the traffic, and to limit backing up needless data (i.e. don't just backup the whole of $HOME) I have an exclude file that lists files and directories that should be ignored.

The backups are saved in a remote Directory called “devuan” - the laptop being backed up is running Devuan linux and has the hostname devuan

I also backup a mirror of the wiki to the local NAS and Laptop hosts (as long as I remember to pull a backup/mirror down from the wiki server first). There's no point in backing this up to the remote VPS - since that's the machine where the wiki lives in the first place!

Exclude

/fetch
/fetch.png
/.fehbg
.lesshst
.viminfo
*mutt*
aur/
muttheadercache
muttmessagecache/
*.img
*.iso
.cache/
.claws-mail/
.cups/
.dbus/
.fonts/
.mozilla/
.librewolf/
Kate/
.config/chromium/*
.config/pulse/*
.config/xfce4*
.config/libreoffice
.local/bin/*
.local/share/*
.zoom/*
Pictures/*
Downloads/*
Nextcloud/
yadd_full*
eSIM*
bin/dokuwiki/*

Rsync Script

#!/bin/bash
#
 
# The NAS1 destination is a share called  Backups
# which is accessed via "daemon rsync" at nas1::Backups
# rather than a directory in /home/g4slv
# this allows passwordless rsync. Necessary since the ssh
# server @ nas1 is too old to accept identity keys from
# modern ssh clients - so normal rsync-over-ssh would require
# a password.
#
# Using a "module" overcomes this, and allows for automatic
# backups.
#
 
 
EXCLUDEFROM=~/exclude
SOURCE=/home/g4slv/
 
DEST=devuan
WIKI=wiki
#CLOUD=217.154.53.244
CLOUD=g4slv.info
 
# Test if the destinations are reachable
NAS=` ping -c 1 -w 1 192.168.21.5 | grep received | awk '{print $4}'`
LAPTOP=` ping -c 1 -w 1 192.168.21.101 | grep received | awk '{print $4}'`
INFO=` ping -c 1 -w 1 $CLOUD | grep received | awk '{print $4}'`
 
if [ $NAS == 1 ]
then
	rsync -av --delete /var/www/html/ 192.168.21.5::Backups/$WIKI
	rsync -av  --exclude-from=$EXCLUDEFROM $SOURCE 192.168.21.5::Backups/$DEST
else
	echo "NAS1 not found"
fi
 
if [ $LAPTOP == 1 ]
then
	rsync -av --delete /var/www/html/ 192.168.21.101:backups/$WIKI
	rsync -av --exclude-from=$EXCLUDEFROM $SOURCE 192.168.21.101:backups/$DEST
else
	echo "Laptop not found"
fi
 
if [ $INFO == 1 ]
then
rsync -av -e 'ssh -p xxxx' --exclude-from=$EXCLUDEFROM $SOURCE $CLOUD:backups/$DEST
else
	echo "Server INFO not found"
fi

Dokuwiki Mirror/Backup

I have a script to pull a copy of the dokuwiki files from the VPS and put them in /var/www/html/* on my laptop. The laptop runs apache2 and can server the wiki itself. This mirror can be backed up through the above script to the other backup hosts nas1 and laptop

#!/bin/bash
 
rsync -av -e "ssh -p xxxx" --progress  xxxx@g4slv.info:/var/www/html/dokuwiki/ dokuwiki/
 
sudo rsync -av dokuwiki/ /var/www/html/dokuwiki/
 
sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/dokuwiki

— John Pumford-Green 29/01/26 13:48 GMT

Further Information

computer, backup

Sandbox Server

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Sandbox Server

UPDATE — John Pumford-Green 04/03/25 08:02 GMT

The hardware running this little machine has recently become unreliable, the SSD is dying, so I've turned it off. I'll leave any old information about this box for future reference

UPDATE — John Pumford-Green 27/04/23 06:16

I have removed the self-signed SSL configuration on the shack sandbox server and reverted it to plain HTTP. I may re-instate it at some point in the future, but I decided I didn't want the hassle of persuading Chrome to accept the self-signed unsafe certificate all the time.

The details below show how it was originally set up, and can be used in future should I decide to repeat the process.

Encryption

The shack webserver has a mirror of my real dokuwiki, to use as a test-bed and after setting it up I discovered that the encryption plugin I was using on the real wiki Encrypted Passwords Plugin didn't work.

After some head scratching, and after trying out another plugin (dokucrypt2 plugin), I figured out the difference between the 2 web servers….

The real server is configured to do proper HTTPS, with a real, signed SSL certificate. The shack server only does plain old HTTP, no encryption.

To test out my theory that this is what was breaking Encrypted Password Plugin I setup self-signed SSL on the shack webserver. It's just for local testing so there's no need for traceable certification, just the ability to handle HTTPS traffic.

It turned out to be quite simple….

I found the information here : https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-create-a-self-signed-ssl-certificate-for-apache-in-ubuntu-16-04

gm4slv@shack:~/ssl_setup$ sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes -days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -keyout /etc/ssl/private/apache-selfsigned.key -out /etc/ssl/certs/apache-selfsigned.crt
Generating a RSA private key
.......................+++++
...........+++++
writing new private key to '/etc/ssl/private/apache-selfsigned.key'
-----
You are about to be asked to enter information that will be incorporated
into your certificate request.
What you are about to enter is what is called a Distinguished Name or a DN.
There are quite a few fields but you can leave some blank
For some fields there will be a default value,
If you enter '.', the field will be left blank.
-----
Country Name (2 letter code) [AU]:GB
State or Province Name (full name) [Some-State]:Shetland
Locality Name (eg, city) []:Clousta
Organization Name (eg, company) [Internet Widgits Pty Ltd]:GM4SLV
Organizational Unit Name (eg, section) []:GM4SLV
Common Name (e.g. server FQDN or YOUR name) []:shack
Email Address []:

The certificates are put in the directories already pointed to in the default SSL site config file so all I had to do was tell apache to enable ssl

sudo a2enmod ssl

and enable the default SSL site

gm4slv@shack:/etc/apache2/sites-enabled$ sudo a2ensite default-ssl.conf
Enabling site default-ssl.
To activate the new configuration, you need to run:
  systemctl reload apache2
gm4slv@shack:/etc/apache2/sites-enabled$ sudo service apache2 restart

SSL enabled

Browse to https://shack/dokuwiki and I got the usual dire Chrome warning

…. but chose to continue anyway…

and it works!

Encrypted Password Plugin

Then I tested the Encrypted Passwords Plugin and it also works

UPDATE— John Pumford-Green 31/05/22 21:13

The plugin page does say that HTTPS is needed:

Please note that the modern encryption mechanisms used within this Plugin require a modern Browser, JavaScript enabled and a wiki served via HTTPS!

Result!

I can now use the sandbox wiki to test everything that's running on the real wiki server.

Redirect to https

(UPDATE — John Pumford-Green 31/05/22 10:08)

edit

/etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default.conf

to add

ServerName gm4slv.plus.com
Redirect permanent / https://gm4slv.plus.com/

Open & forward router's port TCP/443 to the shack webserver

sudo service apache2 restart

Hey presto - external access to HTTPS

Page Info

— John Pumford-Green 30/05/22 19:05

Page last updated: 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

ssl, apache, dokuwiki

Diversion into the Linux Serial Console...

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 07:16:30 +0000

Diversion into the Linux Serial Console...

— John Pumford-Green 01/10/22 22:26

In preparation to my plan of adding a pair of RS232 serial ports to the next iteration of the 6502 computer I dug out an old Wyse serial terminal to use. I thought I'd check it still worked after many idle years gathering dust. It was last used when I first started playing with Linux on an old 486/DX2 machine (Red Hat 6 I think) and used it to access the headless 486 machine through a serial console.

To re-live the experience I hooked it up to my little “pico-ITX” Linux server, which has a real serial port with a 9-pin D connector (!) and set about configuring Debian 11 with systemd (urgh!) to provide a console and login on /dev/ttyS0.

Linux Serial Console

Then I remembered using Pine as an email client via a terminal session (and in xterm windows, and a non-X linux virtual terminal) so I thought I'd install it and re-live those days. Pine is no longer (easily) available but a new version is still being maintained - Alpine

Installed it and spent a happy evening getting it to work with 2 different IMAP accounts (and the correct SMTP servers) Old stuff but good

And then, telnet and telnetd….. and ftp and ftpd….. oh, those were the days..!

I wanted to install and run slrn for USENET NNTP news, like the old days, but I discovered there was no point even trying, as there seems to be no freely available NNTP servers around any more. Back in the day most ISPs seemed to provide a server even if it was limited in the newsgroups it carried. That doesn't seem to be the case any more.

On the subject of Wyse terminals and Linux I stumbled on a You Tube video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQTr9ZOJkC0&feature=share&si=ELPmzJkDCLju2KnD5oyZMQ and this led to another interesting video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUmTaRu6o8g&feature=share&si=ELPmzJkDCLju2KnD5oyZMQ describing a console-mode RSS reader Newsboat so I had to try it….

I've enabled the RSS feed from this dokuwiki WiKi/Blog, just to play…. point your RSS software at https://www.gm4slv.org.uk/dokuwiki/feed.php

Well, now I've got Alpine, Lynx and Newsboat running in a Tmux session, accessed from a nice amber glowing CRT with the Wyse-185.

Now I need to build Mk2 of the 6502 - which is going to be wire-wrapped and much more compact than the rat's nest of Mk1

computer, linux

SSL Install on VPS

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

SSL Install on VPS

I decided to bite the bullet and obtain an SSL certificate and install it on this VPS, and configure Apache2 to use HTTPS instead of plain HTTP.

I used Fasthost again to obtain the SSL certificate, and some of their instructions were a little dodgy regarding the steps to install it and get Apache to work with SSL. I managed in the end though.

gm4slv.org.uk now has a SSL certificate and connections to port 80 HTTP will be automatically redirected to port 443 HTTPS.

The steps with Apache (ignoring the process of obtaining the certificates):

There are 3 certificate files:

*.key is generated on the VPS itself with

openssl req -new -newkey rsa:2048 -nodes -keyout gm4slv.org.uk.key -out gm4slv.org.uk.csr

the signed *.crt file obtained from the signing authority via FastHost (it's the gm4slv.org.uk.csr key signed by the authority's key)
the “intermediate” file obtained from the signing authority via FastHost (this is the “chain of authority” file?)

Once the keys are to hand:

copy the 3 certificate files to a directory on the VPS. I used /usr/local/ssl/
tell Apache where to find the keys:
- add to default-ssl.conf virtual host site file
  - SSLCertificateFile /usr/local/ssl/signed.crt
  - SSLCertificateKeyFile /usr/local/ssl/gm4slv.org.uk.key
  - SSLCertificateChainFile /usr/local/ssl/ca.pem
add ssl mod to Apache:
```
 a2enmod ssl 
```
make symbolic link in sites-enabled pointing to sites-available/default-ssl.conf
restart apache
open VPS firewall port 443 in FastHost control panel
browse to https://gm4slv.org.uk

set up redirect of plain HTTP to SSL HTTPS by adding to 000-default.conf

    ServerName gm4slv.org.uk
    ServerAlias www.gm4slv.org.uk
    Redirect permanent / https://gm4slv.org.uk/

restart apache

Job Done

ssl, apache, vps

Tmux tips and tricks

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 20:37:08 +0000

←Archive

Tmux tips and tricks

prefix key

From https://gist.github.com/JikkuJose/7509315

Change “prefix” key to the backtick ` add to ~/.tmux.conf

unbind C-b
set-option -g prefix `
bind ` send-prefix

the last line means typing two backticks in succession will pass the second one to the application - so can still enter ` into app. running in the tmux window.

terminal colours

Colours in tmux… need TERM “xterm-256color”…

add to ~/.bashrc:

export TERM=xterm-256color

also to ~/.tmux.conf

set -g default-terminal "xterm-256color"

start programs in tmux

Something like this:

start_direwolf.sh

#!/bin/bash
 
session="Igate"
 
tmux start-server
 
tmux new-session -d -s $session
 
tmux rename-window "direwolf"
 
tmux selectp -t 0
tmux send-keys "direwolf -t 1 -T "%c" -c /home/gm4slv/direwolf.conf" C-m

linux, tmux

Unison

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 30 Dec 2025 09:55:07 +0000

←Archive

Unison

I used unison previously to maintain sync/backup of files between machines on my own LAN.

This has been used to keep files on a PC synchronized to the Dropbox folders on another PC, and thereby with the Dropbox cloud.

Now that I have access to a remote Debian Linux VPS machine I thought I'd revisit the use of Unison to keep folders synchronised - perhaps to keep a remote backup of certain files.

You can never have too many backups

I installed the Debian package of unison on the new VPS machine and made a matching pair of configurations - one on the VPS and one on the Shack Laptop (which already has unison installed).

The configurations:

Laptop

root = /home/gm4slv/test_dir
root = ssh://gm4slv.org.uk/test_dir
sshargs = -C

VPS

root = /home/gm4slv/test_dir
root = ssh://gm4slv.plus.com:27659/test_dir
sshargs = -C

Unison version

I put some files in one “test_dir” and ran

unison vps

from the Shack Laptop and got this:

Unison 2.51.3 (ocaml 4.11.1): Contacting server...
Fatal error: Received unexpected header from the server:
 expected "Unison 2.51 with OCaml >= 4.01.2\n" but received "Unison 2.48\n\000\000\000\000\017",
which differs at "Unison 2.4".
This can happen because you have different versions of Unison
installed on the client and server machines, or because
your connection is failing and somebody is printing an error
message, or because your remote login shell is printing
something itself before starting Unison.

Incompatible versions. Laptop is running Debian 11 “Bullseye” and the packaged version of Unison is 2.51.3, whereas the VPS machine is running Debian 10 “Buster” and that has Unison version 2.48.

I've had this happen before, Unison is very touchy about having the same version at both sides.

I removed the older 2.48 from the VPS and downloaded a matching V2.51.3(ocaml 4.11.1) from github:

https://github.com/bcpierce00/unison/releases/tag/v2.51.3

Unpacked and moved unison to /usr/local/bin on the VPS.

Success

Now I was able to sync between the machines.

Adding the SSH public keys from both machines to the '~/.ssh/authorized_keys2'' of its peer meant it all went ahead without password prompting.

Now I have two “mirrored” directories on two separate machines I can use the VPS as a low-key remote file store.

Page Updated : 30/12/25 09:55 GMT

John Pumford-Green Tue May 3 22:29:31 2022

unison, vps, linux

VPS Notes

anonymous@undisclosed.example.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 04 Jun 2026 07:20:09 +0000

←Archive

VPS Notes

GM4SLV.ORG.UK VPS : New VPS created 6^th March 2025

To separate my personal wiki site from yaddnet.org server
Wiki backed-up and moved from yaddnet.org to new gm4slv.org.uk VPS
SSL Certificate replaced to enable HTTPS

New VPS : March 2025

New VPS 1 obtained at Fasthosts

Type:Virtual Machine
Size:vps 1 2 60
Cpu:1 vCore
RAM:2 GB
Disk:60 GB NVMe SSD

Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description:    Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS
Release:        24.04
Codename:       noble

Installed PHP and Apache2

gm4slv@gm4slv:~ $ php --version
PHP 8.3.6 (cli) (built: Dec  2 2024 12:36:18) (NTS)
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Zend Engine v4.3.6, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
    with Zend OPcache v8.3.6, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies

configured SSL per previous method SSL Install on VPS
changed SSH port from default 22 to a new port, changed VPS firewall to suit new SSH port
Ubunto OS brought up to date: sudo apt-get update and sudo apt-get upgrade and sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

Dokuwiki Security

previous installations used .htaccess to prevent web access to data/conf/lib/bin etc. directories
this time I decided not to use .htaccess but to follow the alternative instructions in https://www.dokuwiki.org/security to use LocationMatch

LocationMatch method

Apache is told which directories (data, conf, bin, inc, vendor) to make private. The downside is that this configuration might need altering if new directories are added during dokuwiki upgrades.

add to /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

<LocationMatch "/(data|conf|bin|inc|vendor)/">
    Order allow,deny
    Deny from all
    Satisfy All
</LocationMatch>

sudo service apache2 restart

.htaccess method

the secured directories in dokuwiki have suitable .htaccess files already. Apache needs to betold to allow them to alter behaviour

AllowOverride All

add to /etc/apache2/apache2.conf

         <Directory /var/www/html>
                Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
                AllowOverride All
                Order allow,deny
                allow from all
        </Directory>

sudo service apache2 restart

SSH Security

Configured sshd to disallow password-logins and only accept public-key authentication
- be careful to check the files in /etc/ssh/sshd_conf.d for hidden config options!
uploaded public keys from
- Puttygen for putty on laptop
- ConnectBot app on phone
saved both in ~/.ssh/authorized_keys
now only logins with a valid public key will succeed.
- In the event of a loss of the public keys it's still possible to gain access via Fasthosts account dashboard
  - → then reconfigure sshd to accept password logins again until new keys can be uploaded.

06/04/25 : Renew SSL certificate

Same procedure as before
- Download “Certificate” → signed.crt
- Download “Intermediate Certificate” → ca.pem
- Upload via WinSCP to VPS
- Copy old /usr/local/ssl/signed.crt → signed.crt.old
- Copy old /usr/local/ssl/ca.pem → ca.pem.old
- Copy new files into /usr/local/ssl
- Restart Apache
There were 2 “Intermediate Certificate” for download from Fast Hosts…
- I used the one named 7D5B5126B476BA11DB74160BBC530DA7.cer
- This is the same as the one used when I renewed YaddNet.org SSL yaddnet_ssl_renewal
- It seems that the intermediate certificate is not unique to the domain being secured, it's a certificate that verifies the identity of the authenticator of the domain's SSL certificate.

UPDATE ON TWO INTERMEDIATE CERTIFICATES 05/07/25

I've discovered that the 2 Intermediate Certificates are necessary to complete the chain of authority.

What should be done is to join them together into one ca.pem file (and in the correct order…. )

[root@wiki:/home/g4slv/ssl]# cat 397A66CC2756362E0DAA87CA6EABE3B1.cer 00D27FBBC1DE359E5216AD6149586099C4.cer > ca.pem
 
[root@wiki:/home/g4slv/ssl]# cp ca.pem /usr/local/ssl
 
[root@wiki:/home/g4slv/ssl]# systemctl restart apache2

Check correct SSL operation at https://www.ssllabs.com/ssltest/analyze.html

Old information below is for historical information

GM4SLV.ORG.UK VPS : CANCELLED AND DELETED 9^th October 2024

Wiki functionality easily provided by yaddnet.org VPS
wiki pages & data transferred to yaddnet.org
Fasthosts deleted VPS following telephone confirmation
- deletion/cancellation not possible via Control Panel
- telephone call-back needed to confirm

OS      : Debian 10 (Buster)
RAM     : 0.5GB
Network : 400MB 
SSD     : 10GB

IP Address : 213.171.209.127
Hostname   : gm4slv.org.uk
Open Ports : ssh, http, https

Domain Name  : gm4slv.org.uk
Renewal date : 3/4/2024

Access via FastHosts

browse to https://admin.fasthosts.co.uk/Servers/VPS/1116040162 and login with credentials

Installing SSL for HTTPS

Create Certificates

First : obtain SSL Certificates

Configure APACHE

Second : configure Apache to use HTTPS

copy self generated gm4slv.org.uk.key from the “openssl” command to /usr/local/ssl/
copy the *crt for the newly obtained signed *.crt file renamed as signed.crt to /usr/local/ssl
copy the “intermediate” file to /usr/local/ssl/ (renamed as ca.pem)
edit apache config… looks like /etc/apache2/sites-available/default-ssl.conf
- SSLCertificateFile /usr/local/ssl/signed.crt
- SSLCertificateKeyFile /usr/local/ssl/gm4slv.org.uk.key
- SSLCertificateChainFile /usr/local/ssl/ca.pem
make symlink sites-enabled/default-ssl.conf pointing to sites-available/default-ssl.conf
a2enmod ssl
restart apache2
will it be listening on port 443? yes
open firewall port 443 on Fasthost control panel
Can I reach it with https://gm4slv.org.uk? yes
Can I still reach it with http://gm4slv.org.uk? yes
force redirect of plain HTTP: to HTTPS:
add to 000-default.conf:

        ServerName gm4slv.org.uk
        ServerAlias www.gm4slv.org.uk
        Redirect permanent / https://gm4slv.org.uk/

taken from https://linuxize.com/post/redirect-http-to-https-in-apache/
restart apache2
verify SSL access ok - yes
verify non-SSL is redirected to SSL - yes

Confirm proper security

Browse to https://gm4slv.org.uk

20/04/23 Renew SSL Certificate

new Signed and CA (intermediate) certificates obtained and installed in /usr/local/ssl

Hardware Upgrade 20/4/23

Original configuration VPS XS : 500MB RAM and 10GB SSD @ £1 per month (plus VAT)
Upgrade to VPS S : 1GB RAM and 20GB SSD @ £3 per month (plus VAT)
VPS rebooted for upgrade
RAM seems to have increased to 1GB but reported 'df -h' still shows 7.5GB total for / and 1.9GB for Swap. This is only 10GB.
Perhaps more time is needed for VM to catch up and expand the Virtual Hard Drive?
Gotcha…. the Virtual Drive was increased to 20GB, but not the partition or the filesystem… the only way to get a full 20GB was to “rebuild” the VPS….
took a backup of the dokuwiki files (rsync mirrored them to shack PC). Hit “Rebuild” and built a new VPS. Applied for replacement SSL keys (had to make a new CSR/KEY first)…
Used rsync to send back the dokuwiki files (from the shack PC mirror)
set up Apache2 to use the new SSL certificates…
VPS is now rebuilt and all wiki files restored & Apache2 uses HTTPS.

Debian Upgrade 15/2/24

Upgraded from Buster (10) → Bullseye (11)
Upgraded Dokuwiki (this needed PHP7.4 from Buster, which is why the Debian upgrade was necessary) to the newest version (Release 2024-02-06a “Kaos”)
Upgraded from Bullseye (11) → Bookwork (12) - might as well get to STABLE

Debian Upgrade 16/2/24

Upgraded to Trixie (testing)

gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Debian
Description:    Debian GNU/Linux trixie/sid
Release:        n/a
Codename:       trixie

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian trixie main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian trixie main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
 
 
#deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm-updates main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
#deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm-updates main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
 
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security trixie-security main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian-security trixie-security main contrib non-free non-free-firmware

Dokuwiki still working correctly with latest versions of Apache and PHP

gm4slv@gm4slv:~$ php --version
PHP 8.2.12 (cli) (built: Jan  8 2024 06:21:20) (NTS)
Copyright (c) The PHP Group
Zend Engine v4.2.12, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies
    with Zend OPcache v8.2.12, Copyright (c), by Zend Technologies

2024 gm4slv.org.uk domain renewed

03/04/24 Domain Name auto-renewed for 2 years until April 2026
04/04/24 SSL Certificate auto-renewed for 1 year until May 2025

04/04/24 : Install Renewed SSL Certificate

SSL Certificates Auto Renewed by Fasthosts
download new certificates from Fasthosts control panel:
- New “Certificate” downloaded and renamed “signed.crt”
- New “Intermediate Certificate” downloaded and renamed “ca.pem”
copied both → VPS $HOME dir via SCP
On VPS →
- copied current /usr/local/ssl/ca.pem → ca_old.pem
- copied current /usr/local/ssl/signed.crt → signed_old.crt
- copied new ca.pem from $HOME to /usr/local/ssl/ca.pem
- copied new signed.crt from $HOME to /usr/local/ssl/signed.crt
- restarted apache sudo service apache2 restart
check new valid certificate now in use in web browser
- Validity Issued on & Expires on dates now show new certificate is in use

Page Updated : 04/06/26 08:20 BST

vps, linux, ssl