Unix as a Second Language

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Sandra Henry-Stocker has been administering Unix systems for more than 25 years. She describes herself as "USL" (Unix as a second language) but remembers enough English to write books and buy groceries. She currently works for TeleCommunication Systems -- a company that builds innovative technologies to make critical connections happen -- where no one else necessarily shares any of her opinions. This blog offers advice for everyday Unix systems administration and some clever ways to approach more challenging problems. Send comments and suggestions to mailto:bugfarm@gmail.com.

by Sandra Henry-Stocker

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Sandra Henry-Stocker has been administering Unix systems for more than 25 years. She describes herself as "USL" (Unix as a second language) but remembers enough English to write books and buy groceries. She currently works for TeleCommunication Systems -- a company that builds innovative technologies to make critical connections happen -- where no one else necessarily shares any of her opinions. Send comments and suggestions to bugfarm@gmail.com.

Unix: Impossible File Types

Posted Jul 01, 2009 - 03:27 pm

In spite of its long history as one of the tried and true Unix commands, even the tar command can offer some surprises. My first encounter with "impossible file type" errors took place earlier today.
Offbeat, impossible file type, length
Unix: Adding swap space on the fly

Posted Jun 24, 2009 - 09:02 pm

Swap space can be critical to the performance of a Unix system. Even if you think you have sufficient memory (1-2 GB), you might find that the demands on your system cry out for more. You can resolve a swap space shortage in a pinch if you have an unused partition on your disk or just extra disk space on a mounted drive.
IT Management, increase, Sandra Henry-Stocker
Network Know-How: An Essential Guide for the Accidental Admin

Posted Jun 17, 2009 - 07:51 pm

If you find yourself getting calls from all your neighbors just because you're a systems geek and can pull a network together in your sleep, here's a great source of fundamental network know how that you might recommend.
Networking, home LAN, home user
So many passwords, so few hiding places

Posted Jun 10, 2009 - 03:40 pm

Maybe so, but the hiding places are getting so much better! Let's take a look at what technology hath wrought for solving this age old problem.
Endpoint Security, biometric USB drives, encryption
Redirecting errors with exec

Posted Jun 03, 2009 - 07:27 pm

When you're preparing scripts for people less wizardly in the art of Unix than yourself, you might want to temper minor problems by sending system errors on their way. Let's take a look at how easily the exec command squelches system output.
IT Management, /dev/null, Exec
Unix tip: Password complexity for users

Posted May 27, 2009 - 07:23 pm

User password security has improved a lot over the years. In Solaris, for example, users are generally required to have at least six characters in their passwords and they have to include a digit or a special character like a $ or an !. What might not be immediately obvious is that the rules that govern what kind of passwords your users are allowed to assign to themselves in Solaris 10 are actually highly tunable. Let's cd over to the /etc/default directory and take a look.
IT Management, /etc/default/passwd, history
Unix tip: Making do with less

Posted May 20, 2009 - 12:26 pm

Know the less command? Really know the less command? If you don't use it routinely, you might be surprised at how many things this modest little command can do.
IT Management, head, less command
Wizzywig volumes 1: Phreak and 2: Hacker

Posted May 13, 2009 - 02:24 pm

Think you've read enough security books? Think again. Here are some that are going to surprise you and maybe teach you about some aspects of security you simply hadn't considered.
Security, Boingthump, Ed Piskor
Mapping Ports and PIDs

Posted May 06, 2009 - 12:56 pm

To quickly determine which process is responsible for an open port or which ports some particular process has opened, you can install some new software, run a command you infrequently use or run an easy-to-use little script named pcp.
IT Management, pcp, pfiles
Unix tip: Recursively removing empty directories

Posted Apr 29, 2009 - 02:53 pm

Recursively removing empty directories from a file system might seem like a lot of work. How do you find all the directories and how do you determine programmatically which of them are empty? But let's look at how this task can be made very easy by taking advantage of the normal behavior of the rmdir command.
IT Management, find, remove empty directories

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