vmware esxi disk conversion

In order to use a disk imported from another vmware version, either use vmware converter first, then transfer the machine, or convert the disk and insert it into a new esxi vm.


to do the latter for example

 vmkfstools -i itvmgr41.vmdk -d zeroedthick itvmgr40sp1.vmdk

will convert the disk.  There are other options for the -d parameter, but this will result in a fully allocated disk image with the sparse portions of the original file filled in with zeros.

vncserver issues, nice reference

this link discusses a lot of issues about setting up vncserver on a system.


http://movingtofreedom.org/2007/02/16/howto-remote-desktop-with-vnc-in-ubuntu-edgy-gnu-linux/

cute way to distribute software via tar link on web page

this gets the tar info from a web site via port 80, pipes it 

to tar which in turn expands and stores it 

wget -O- http://status.calibre-ebook.com/dist/src | tar xvz

Stolen from calibre installer page for linux os.

remainder of install if one uses the above:

cd calibre*
sudo python setup.py install

static mac address on vmware

in the vmx file, enter:

ethernetN.addressType = “static”
ethernetN.address = “<address>”

statements with desired mac address, : delimited


works on bridged and private to host, causes dictionary error if you try nat connection for some reason.
http://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=507

using gmailfs

umount -l <path> if the python support process dies. 

fuser file system will give you "Transport endpoint is not connected" if you try to umount any other way (fusermount -u doesn't work either).

still hunting for a graceful way to make it go away.

links:

http://www.commandlinefu.com/commands/view/1763/use-a-gmail-virtual-disk-gmailfs-on-ubuntu
http://sr71.net/projects/gmailfs/
http://code.google.com/p/gmailfs/issues/detail?id=1#c2  has a fix to problem with env variable
http://blog.philippklaus.de/2010/04/mount-a-gmail-account-as-filesystem-using-gmailfs/

autoconf / automake / pkgconfig

The library package uses configure.ac files to build a configure file when autoconf and automake are run.

a pkgconfig file is usually generate in the form of a .pc.in file

the resulting .pc file should be installed when one runs make install.

subsequent references to the library will find the library information using pkgconfig

flight notes

seat utility:   http://seatexpert.com/
flightaware:    http://flightaware.com/
flytecomm:      http://www.flytecomm.com/
flightwise:     http://flightwise.com/default.aspx
satellites:     http://www.n2yo.com/satellite/?s=25544

Mainframe Assembler references

cbt / Jim Morrison page    http://cbttape.org/~jmorrison/
Assembler connection       http://www.simotime.com/indexasm.htm
opcode list                http://www.hlasm.com/english/oplist.htm
green card                 http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/gcard.html 

postscript, pdf tools command line linux

from:  http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~rennie/ps_notes.html

Central to all PostScript and PDF manipulations is the program GhostScript. This interprets files in any of these formats, and it can then output the document or image after applying various operations: rotation, scaling, cropping, and rasterization. GhostScript is rather user-hostile. Fortunately there are various less hostile wrapper programs, which shield users from GhostScript. The most important one is

gv            displays ps, eps or pdf files

display       displays, manipulates and converts image files

Gnome and KDE have their own variants of gv.
Other utilities, specific to .ps and .eps, are:

psbook        rearrange pages in PostScript file into signatures

psselect      selects pages from a PostScript file

pstops        Ghostscript's PostScript distiller for PS and EPS

epsffit       fit encapsulated PostScript file (EPSF) into constrained size

ps2epsi       embeds a thumbnail image within a PS or EPS file

psnup         multiple pages per sheet

psresize      multiple pages per sheet

psmerge       filter to merge several PostScript files into one

ps2ps         optimizer for PS files

eps2eps       optimizer for EPS files

ps2ascii      extract text from PS file

ps2pdf        translator from PS to PDF

fig2ps        translator from FIG, via Latex, to PS/EPS

Utilities specific to .pdf are:

pdf2ps        translator from PDF to PS

pdfimages     extracts images from PDF documents

pdftotext     extracts text from PDF documents

pdftops       converts PDF to PS

pdftopbm      converts each page to a PBM image

pdftoppm      converts each page to a PPM image

pdfcrop       reduces/increases margins

set vim or vi as default editor

useful for setting editor from "nano" for such as crontab -e and svn commit command line commands which require using editor to prepare a parameter file. 

In defense of Nano, you can do an control O and then control X, but my fingers like vi

sudo update-alternatives –config editor 

There are 3 choices for the alternative editor (providing /usr/bin/editor).

  Selection    Path               Priority   Status
------------------------------------------------------------
  0            /bin/nano           40        auto mode
  1            /bin/ed            -100       manual mode
  2            /bin/nano           40        manual mode
* 3            /usr/bin/vim.tiny   10        manual mode

select desired editor from the list