My Linux-based IPCop firewall / router has been online for 34 days without interruption. Pretty amazing to witness coming from a system that’s over 12 years old.
Posts Tagged ‘Linux’
chmod: cannot operate on dangling symlink `lastsnap.jpg’
Friday, June 22nd, 2012If you’re running a webcam server using motion and all of a sudden your lastsnap.jpg file becomes inaccessible or displays forbidden, in part of troubleshooting you might end up checking the permissions of the file.
ls-l lastsnap.jpg
…and in doing so, you might get this error returned to you:
chmod: cannot operate on dangling symlink `lastsnap.jpg'
I Googled for about an hour trying to find a solution and nothing seemed to work. The problem in my case was that lastsnap.jpg was a symbolic link to the last snapshot image captured that hadn’t been captured yet. The way I have motion.conf configured images are placed in directories by the day then sub-directories are created by the hour.
/var/www/cam/media/cam1/images/day01/hour19/
The problem was that the next day’s directory was not being created. And that was the issue I was searching Google for a solution. I couldn’t find one. Finally, I decided to just manually create the directory myself and that’s when I got a fresh lead on the problem.
mkdir /var/www/cam/media/cam1/images/day22mkdir: cannot create directory `day22': No space left on device
Oops… I was out of disk space:
/dev/sda9 11G 11G 0 100% /var
So, if you happen to run into the same problem as I did, it might be a good idea to check to see if you ran out of disk space. Depending on how you have motion.conf configured, you can eat up quite a bit of disk space fairly quickly.
Live Debian Squeeze Linux Webcam Server: motion vs webcam-server
Sunday, June 3rd, 2012I want to setup a few Debian webcam servers on my property for surveillance. I just dug out an older Gateway E-4200 500 Pentium III desktop tower from my attic. It’s been up there baking in the heat and freezing in the cold for 477 days. I discovered this after pulling the computer down from the attic and powering it up. Debian noted during startup that it had been 477 days since the hard drives were checked. After the scan, Debian 5 Lenny loaded right up. Amazing! (more…)
How To Build a Linux Firewall and Router With an Old Computer
Monday, May 21st, 2012You might be surprised to discover how capable and functional older computers are — and when I say older, I mean very very old! The computer I use for my own Linux firewall and router is a Compaq Deskpro EN P667. It has a timestamp of 08/25/2000 printed on the 686P2 v2.04 bios information. That’s over 12 years old!
The key to giving older computers a second life is using Linux. Installing a more recent version of Windows is not the way to go. This will completely kill the system — well let’s just say the system will run so slow that you will want to kill it. Linux can be used to power older systems and deliver a wide range of functionality. (more…)
Download Linux Mandriva 2011 (Hydrogen)
Wednesday, August 31st, 2011
Last week when I was going nuts downloading and installing many of the different Linux distributions I came across Mandriva but decided to wait to download and install it because the 2011 version, code name Hydrogen, was about to be released.
Well now it’s available and I am excited to download, install, and try it. I haven’t used Mandriva Linux since it was originally called Mandrake Linux. And that was quite a few years ago. (more…)
First Impressions of PCLinuxOS
Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011Over the last few days I have been downloading and installing different Linux distributions to try them out. My Linux journey started over ten years ago but didn’t take off full time until a few years ago when I installed Ubuntu. Shortly after using Ubuntu I felt it was too commercialized for my tastes, it started to remind me of Microsoft. My journey carried me over to the Debian world, and I have been using that since then.
Having some extra free time I have been able to try out other Linux distros. PCLinuxOS is one of them. My first impressions of the operating system compared to the others two I already reviewed (Puppy Linux and Linux Mint) is that it’s like the Windows XP of Linux operating systems. It has a very basic and bland appearance. It reminds me of a bare-bones tank. It’s strong, stable, secure, and without thrills. (more…)
First Impressions of Linux Mint 11 Katya
Monday, August 22nd, 2011If you have been using Ubuntu for awhile and you’re looking for a change, then installing Linux Mint 11 Katya should be an excellent choice. Things are different but the changes aren’t too drastic from what you are comfortable with, and what you have come to expect from Ubuntu. Linux Mint is based on Debian and Ubuntu. In my first impressions though I think it’s more similar to Ubuntu compared to Debian.
My initial impression of Linux Mint is that it resembles a very elegant and high class version of Ubuntu. I would referred Linux Mint as being the Cadillac version of Ubuntu. By appearance it’s crisp, glossy, and very shiny with a very glassy looking green theme. Just like the name, it reminds me of spearmint. It’s refreshing and ice cool. I can almost smell the aromatic and minty oils oozing from the screen. (more…)