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Configuring network in RHEL7

RHEL6 Network Configuration Linux Routing
Trunking / Bonding Multiple Network Interfaces Bonding Ethernet Interfaces in RHEL 6 Bonding Ethernet Interfaces in RHEL 7 Bonding Multiple Network Interfaces in SLES     Setting a Default Gateway in RHEL6
Firewalld setup that allows only selected IPs nmap Traceroute Linux route command tcpdump wireshark ntop
Linux ip command ethtool NetworkManager Disabling Network Manager in RHEL6 Disabling Network Manager in RHEL7    
Suse network configuration Pure-FTPd installation and configuration How to change IP address Linux ifconfig Ethernet Protocol Autonegotiation ntop
Setting a Default Gateway RHEL NTP configuration Troubleshooting NTP on Red Hat Linux RHEL handling of DST change Changing timezone in RHEL6 from the command line Configuring the Services Network Utilities
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RHEL6 and RHEL7 should be viewed two distinct flavors of Linux much  like RHEL and Suse. Most network operations are completely different and use different utilities. So Network  configuration is discussed in two separate pages:


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[Jun 08, 2021] Increasing Network Connections in Centos7

Feb 24, 2016 | blog.dougco.com

I had a client who was losing network connectivity intermittently recently and it turns out they needed to increase the high limit for network connections. Centos7 has some variable name changes from previous versions so here are some helpful tips on how to increase the limits.

In older Centos you might have seen these error messages:

ip_conntrack version 2.4 (8192 buckets, 65536 max) – 304 bytes per conntrack

In newer verions, something like:

localhost kernel: nf_conntrack: table full, dropping packet

The below is for Centos versions that have renamed the ip_conntrack to nf_conntrack.

To get a list of network parameters:

sysctl -a | grep netfilter

This shows current value for the key parameter:

/sbin/sysctl net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max

This shows your system current load:

/sbin/sysctl net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_count

So now to update the value in the kernel to triple the limit, of course make sure your RAM has room with what you choose:

/sbin/sysctl -w net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max=196608

To make it permanent after reboot, please add these values to the /etc/sysctl.conf

net.ipv4.netfilter.ip_conntrack_max=196608

Hope this helps!

[Mar 12, 2021] How to Set a Static IP Address in CentOS Linux by an IP Address. Usually, IP addresses are dynamically assigned to a computer by a dedicated server called DHCP Server ( Dynamic Host Control Protocol ), and hence change from time to time as and when the connection is lost and reestablished. However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . An IP ( Internet Protocol ) Address is a unique numerical representation of a computer on a network. Every computer connected to the Internet is identified by an IP Address. Usually, IP addresses are dynamically assigned to a computer by a dedicated server called DHCP Server ( Dynamic Host Control Protocol ), and hence change from time to time as and when the connection is lost and reestablished. However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . Usually, IP addresses are dynamically assigned to a computer by a dedicated server called DHCP Server ( Dynamic Host Control Protocol ), and hence change from time to time as and when the connection is lost and reestablished. However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . Usually, IP addresses are dynamically assigned to a computer by a dedicated server called DHCP Server ( Dynamic Host Control Protocol ), and hence change from time to time as and when the connection is lost and reestablished. However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . However, there are scenarios where a static IP address is more preferable; Eg. In large corporations, where it removes the load of using DHCP for each computer in the organization. Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . Today, we will learn how to set a static IP address on a local network in CentOS . List Network Interface Name A computer can be connected to one or more network interfaces, for example to a WiFi device and a LAN device, which has different IP addresses for each interface. Run the following command to show the interface names. A computer can be connected to one or more network interfaces, for example to a WiFi device and a LAN device, which has different IP addresses for each interface. Run the following command to show the interface names. Run the following command to show the interface names. Run the following command to show the interface names.
# ifconfig OR # ip addr 
List Network Interface Names
List Network Interface Names
The interface ' enp0s3 ' is the LAN device connected to my computer and the IP Address is ' 10.0.2.15 '. The other interface ' lo ' ( Loopback ) which is nothing but the local network of the computer within itself. Thus my computer is only connected to one interface, ' enp0s3 '. The interface ' enp0s3 ' is the LAN device connected to my computer and the IP Address is ' 10.0.2.15 '. The other interface ' lo ' ( Loopback ) which is nothing but the local network of the computer within itself. Thus my computer is only connected to one interface, ' enp0s3 '. Configuring Static IP Address in CentOS Go to directory ' /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts ' and list the files; you should see a file corresponding to your network interface. Go to directory ' /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts ' and list the files; you should see a file corresponding to your network interface.
$ cd /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts $ ls 
List Network Interface Files
List Network Interface Files
Open the file 'ifcfg-enp0s3' using ' Open the file 'ifcfg-enp0s3' using ' Vim ' or any editor of your choice. Set the following values for the variables. Change the values according to the IP address and subnet that you need to set. Set the following values for the variables. Change the values according to the IP address and subnet that you need to set. Set the following values for the variables. Change the values according to the IP address and subnet that you need to set.
Set IP Address in CentOS
Set IP Address in CentOS
Save and exit the file. Restart the networking service with the following commands: Save and exit the file. Restart the networking service with the following commands:
# nmcli networking off # nmcli networking on 
Finally, run ' ifconfig ' again to verify if static IP has been set. Finally, run ' ifconfig ' again to verify if static IP has been set.
# ifconfig 
Verify IP Address in CentOS
Verify IP Address in CentOS

Conclusion
Mar 12, 2021 | www.linuxshelltips.com

In this article, we saw an easy way to set an IP address in CentOS. The example, in this case, is a static IP on the local network, i.e., it is not a static public IP over the Internet.

To set a static public IP address over the Internet, you need to purchase the IP Address and configure it in the file as shown above, along with other details like DNS server, network prefix, which will be provided by your Internet Service Provider.

Thanks a lot for reading and let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

[Jun 13, 2020] Configure Networking on CentOS 8 with nmcli Command (20 Examples)

Jun 13, 2020 | www.howtoforge.com

1. Check NetworkManager Status

To check whether the Network Manager is running or not using the following command:

nmcli -t -f RUNNING general

You should see the following output:

running

To get a general status, run the following command:

nmcli general

You should see the following output:

STATE      CONNECTIVITY  WIFI-HW  WIFI     WWAN-HW  WWAN    
connected  full          enabled  enabled  enabled  enabled
2. Check All Available Device

You can display all available device in your system, run the following command:

nmcli dev status

You should see the following output:

DEVICE  TYPE      STATE      CONNECTION  
eth0    ethernet  connected  System eth0 
eth1    ethernet  connected  System eth1 
lo      loopback  unmanaged  --
3. Check Active Connection

To list all active connection in your system, run the following command:

nmcli con show

You should get the following output:

NAME         UUID                                  TYPE      DEVICE 
System eth0  5fb06bd0-0bb0-7ffb-45f1-d6edd65f3e03  ethernet  eth0   
System eth1  9c92fad9-6ecb-3e6c-eb4d-8a47c6f50c04  ethernet  eth1
4. Display Information About Ethernet Connection

You can display the brief information about the ethernet connection using the following command:

nmcli con show "System eth0"

You should get the following output:

connection.id:                          System eth0
connection.uuid:                        5fb06bd0-0bb0-7ffb-45f1-d6edd65f3e03
connection.stable-id:                   --
connection.type:                        802-3-ethernet
connection.interface-name:              eth0
connection.autoconnect:                 yes
connection.autoconnect-priority:        0
connection.autoconnect-retries:         -1 (default)
connection.multi-connect:               0 (default)
connection.auth-retries:                -1
connection.timestamp:                   1588217245
connection.read-only:                   no
connection.permissions:                 --
connection.zone:                        --
connection.master:                      --
connection.slave-type:                  --
connection.autoconnect-slaves:          -1 (default)
connection.secondaries:                 --
connection.gateway-ping-timeout:        0
connection.metered:                     unknown
cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 | grep BOOTPROTO
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
5. Change "Automatically Connect" Directive

By default all ethernet connection will connect automatically. You can disable it with the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" connection.autoconnect no

You can verify the changes with the following command:

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 | grep ONBOOT

You should see the following output:

ONBOOT=no
6. Change Network Connection BOOTPROTO Directive

You can change the ethernet connection BOOTPROTO directive from static to DHCP using the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" ipv4.method auto

You can now verify the changes with the following command:

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 | grep BOOTPROTO

You should see the following output:

BOOTPROTO=dhcp

To change the ethernet connection BOOTPROTO directive static to DHCP to static using the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" ipv4.method manual ipv4.address 192.168.0.10/24 ipv4.gateway 192.168.0.1
7. Disable IPv6 Address with nmcli

By default, both IPv6 and IPv4 connection is enabled in CentOS 8. You can disable the IPv6 connection wiht the following command: Advertisements

nmcli con mod "System eth1" ipv6.method ignore
8. Add DNS Server to Existing Connection

To add a new DNS server to an existing connection with the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" ipv4.dns 8.8.4.4

You can verify the changes with the following command:

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 | grep DNS

Output:

DNS1=8.8.4.4

You can also append a new DNS server using the +ipv4.dns option:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" +ipv4.dns 4.4.4.4
9. Remove DNS Server from Existing Connection

To remove the single DNS server from the connection, run the following command: Advertisements

nmcli con mod "System eth1" -ipv4.dns 8.8.4.4

To remove the multiple DNS servers from the connection, run the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth1" -ipv4.dns 8.8.4.4,8.8.2.2
10. Add/Edit Connection Interactively

You can also create a new connection or edit an existing connection using an interactive editor.

For example, edit an existing connection, run the following command:

nmcli con edit "System eth1"

You should see the following output:

===| nmcli interactive connection editor |===

Editing existing '802-3-ethernet' connection: 'System eth1'

Type 'help' or '?' for available commands.
Type 'print' to show all the connection properties.
Type 'describe [.]' for detailed property description.

You may edit the following settings: connection, 802-3-ethernet (ethernet), 802-1x, dcb, sriov, ethtool, match, ipv4, ipv6, tc, proxy
nmcli>

Now, display an existing IP address, run the following command:

nmcli> print ipv4.address

Output:

ipv4.addresses: 192.168.0.10/32

To set a new IP address, run the following command:

nmcli> set ipv4.address 192.168.0.11

You can verify and save the connection with the following command:

nmcli> verify

Output:

Verify connection: OK
nmcli> save

Output: Advertisements

Connection 'System eth1' (9c92fad9-6ecb-3e6c-eb4d-8a47c6f50c04) successfully updated.

You can now verify the saved connection with the following command:

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth1 | grep IPADDR

You should see the following output:

IPADDR=192.168.0.10
IPADDR1=192.168.0.11
11. Monitor Connection Activity

You can also monitor NetworkManager activity using nmcli like, changes in connection state, profiles, devices, etc.

After modifying the ethernet connection, run the following command to monitor it:

nmcli con monitor "System eth1"
12. Create a New Connection with Static IP

You can also create a new static ethernet connection with nmcli. For example, create a new ethernet connection named eth2, IP 192.168.0.12/24, Gateway 192.168.0.1, "onboot=yes" by running the following command:

nmcli con add con-name eth2 type ethernet ifname eth2 ipv4.method manual ipv4.address 192.168.0.15/24 ipv4.gateway 192.168.0.1

You should see the following output:

Connection 'eth2' (cefb3f7d-424c-42f8-b4e8-ed54e7dcb880) successfully added.

Now, verify the connection with the following command:

nmcli con

Output:

NAME         UUID                                  TYPE      DEVICE 
System eth0  5fb06bd0-0bb0-7ffb-45f1-d6edd65f3e03  ethernet  eth0   
System eth1  9c92fad9-6ecb-3e6c-eb4d-8a47c6f50c04  ethernet  eth1   
eth2         cefb3f7d-424c-42f8-b4e8-ed54e7dcb880  ethernet  eth2
13. Create a New Connection with DHCP

You can also create a new DHCP connection with nmcli. For example, create a new DHCP ethernet connection named eth3 with the following command:

nmcli con add con-name eth3 type ethernet ifname eth3 ipv4.method auto

You should see the following output:

Connection 'eth3' (ff54dbd6-255d-4935-abc8-73773bef5b55) successfully added.
14. Activate a New Connection

To activate the new ethernet connection eth2, run the following command:

nmcli con up eth2

You should see the following output:

Connection successfully activated

You can now verify the active connection with the following command:

nmcli con show --active

You should see the following output:

Output:

NAME         UUID                                  TYPE      DEVICE 
System eth0  5fb06bd0-0bb0-7ffb-45f1-d6edd65f3e03  ethernet  eth0   
System eth1  9c92fad9-6ecb-3e6c-eb4d-8a47c6f50c04  ethernet  eth1   
eth2         cefb3f7d-424c-42f8-b4e8-ed54e7dcb880  ethernet  eth2
15. Deactivate a Connection

To deactivate the connection eth2, run the following command:

nmcli con down eth2
16. Delete a Connection

You can also delete a specific ethernet connection with nmcli.

For example, to delete a connection eth2, run the following command:

nmcli con del eth2

You should see the following output:

Connection 'eth2' (cefb3f7d-424c-42f8-b4e8-ed54e7dcb880) successfully deleted.
17. Change Hostname with nmcli

To find the current hostname of your system, run the following command:

nmcli general hostname

You should see the following output:

centos8

Next, change the hostname from centos8 to linux using the following command: Advertisements

nmcli general hostname linux

Next, verify the hostname with the following command:

nmcli general hostname

You should see the following output:

linux
18. Change the DEFROUTE Directive

The DEFROUTE directive is used to disable and enable the default gateway of your ethernet connection.

To enable the DEFROUTE directove for eth2 run the following command:

nmcli con mod "System eth2" ipv4.never-default yes
19. Restart Ethernet Connection

You can restart or reload your ethernet connection with the following command:

nmcli con reload
20. nmcli help

To get more information about nmcli command, run the following command:

nmcli --help

You should see the following output:

Usage: nmcli [OPTIONS] OBJECT { COMMAND | help }

OPTIONS
  -a, --ask                                ask for missing parameters
  -c, --colors auto|yes|no                 whether to use colors in output
  -e, --escape yes|no                      escape columns separators in values
  -f, --fields <field,...>|all|common      specify fields to output
  -g, --get-values <field,...>|all|common  shortcut for -m tabular -t -f
  -h, --help                               print this help
  -m, --mode tabular|multiline             output mode
  -o, --overview                           overview mode
  -p, --pretty                             pretty output
  -s, --show-secrets                       allow displaying passwords
  -t, --terse                              terse output
  -v, --version                            show program version
  -w, --wait                      set timeout waiting for finishing operations

OBJECT
  g[eneral]       NetworkManager's general status and operations
  n[etworking]    overall networking control
  r[adio]         NetworkManager radio switches
  c[onnection]    NetworkManager's connections
  d[evice]        devices managed by NetworkManager
  a[gent]         NetworkManager secret agent or polkit agent
  m[onitor]       monitor NetworkManager changes
Conclusion

In the above guide, we learned how to use nmcli to manage and control ethernet connection in CentOS 8. I hope you can now easily add, edit or create a new connection with nmcli. Feel free to ask me if you have any questions.

Hitesh Jethva

About Hitesh Jethva

Over 8 years of experience as a Linux system administrator. My skills include a depth knowledge of Redhat/Centos, Ubuntu Nginx and Apache, Mysql, Subversion, Linux, Ubuntu, web hosting, web server, Squid proxy, NFS, FTP, DNS, Samba, LDAP, OpenVPN, Haproxy, Amazon web services, WHMCS, OpenStack Cloud, Postfix Mail Server, Security etc.

[Jul 26, 2019] How to check open ports in Linux using the CLI> by Vivek Gite

Jul 26, 2019 | www.cyberciti.biz

Using netstat to list open ports

Type the following netstat command
sudo netstat -tulpn | grep LISTEN

... ... ...

For example, TCP port 631 opened by cupsd process and cupsd only listing on the loopback address (127.0.0.1). Similarly, TCP port 22 opened by sshd process and sshd listing on all IP address for ssh connections:

Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State       User       Inode      PID/Program name 
tcp   0      0      127.0.0.1:631           0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      0          43385      1821/cupsd  
tcp   0      0      0.0.0.0:22              0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      0          44064      1823/sshd

Where,

Use ss to list open ports

The ss command is used to dump socket statistics. It allows showing information similar to netstat. It can display more TCP and state information than other tools. The syntax is:
sudo ss -tulpn

... ... ...

Vivek Gite is the creator of nixCraft and a seasoned sysadmin, DevOps engineer, and a trainer for the Linux operating system/Unix shell scripting. Get the latest tutorials on SysAdmin, Linux/Unix and open source topics via RSS/XML feed or weekly email newsletter.

[Apr 06, 2019] IP Aliasing Assigning multiple IP addresses to single NIC - LinuxTechLab

Apr 06, 2019 | linuxtechlab.com

IP Aliasing : Assigning multiple IP addresses to single NIC

by Shusain · Published April 3, 2019 · Updated April 4, 2019

In this tutorial, we are going to learn to assign multiple IP addresses to a single NIC (Network Interface Card). This process of assigning multiple addresses to a single network interface is called IP aliasing.

Main advantage of using IP aliasing is that we don't need multiple NICs to configure multiple IPs, hence saving us cost & configuration time. IP aliasing is most useful when using Apache IP based virtual hosting.

For this tutorial, we are going to use RHEL/CentOS 7 but the same process can also be used older versions of RHEL/CentOS, the only change being the name of the network interfaces other than that process is same.

Recommended Read: Top 7 commands for Linux Network Traffic Monitoring

Also Read: Monitoring network bandwidth with iftop command

Network interfaces files in RHEL/CentOS 7(on older versions as well) are located at ' /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts ' & name of the interfaces are usually ' ifcfg-en0sX ', where ' X ' is the number of the interface. In my case, its ' ifcfg-en0s0' . So we will be using the same for the purpose of this tutorial.

Using Network Manager

We will be using a tool called 'nmtui' for this method. NMTUI is command line based user interface for Network Manager & even works for the system that does not have GUI installed. Open terminal & enter the command,

$ nmtui

We will get the following window,

IP aliasing <img src="https://i0.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/IP-Alias-1.png?resize=425%2C366&#038;ssl=1" alt="IP aliasing" width="425" height="366" data-recalc-dims="1" />

Click on 'Edit a connection', & then select the network interface from the list of interfaces & press ENTER key,

IP aliasing <img src="https://i1.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/IP-Alias-2.png?resize=795%2C618&#038;ssl=1" alt="IP aliasing" width="795" height="618" srcset="https://i1.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/IP-Alias-2.png?w=795&amp;ssl=1 795w, https://i1.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/IP-Alias-2.png?resize=768%2C597&amp;ssl=1 768w" sizes="(max-width: 795px) 100vw, 795px" data-recalc-dims="1" />
Now we add the required number of IP address here & once done, we can click on 'OK' & then exit from the nmtui menu. Restart the NetworkManager service & we will have our IP aliasing ready.

Manual Method

For this method, we will manually create the necessary files needed. We will assign two different IPs in addition to the one we have already assigned to our interface ' ifcfg-en0s0' . To create IP alias, we are going to use our default network interface file & then will create two copies of the file with names 'ifcfg-en0s0:1 ' & 'ifcfg-en0s0:2'

$ cd /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts
$ cp ifcfg- en0s0 ifcfg- en0s0 :1
$ cp ifcfg- en0s0 ifcfg- en0s0 :2

Now, let's open primary network interface i.e. eth0, & see its content

$ vi ifcfg- en0s0

DEVICE=" en0s0 "
BOOTPROTO=static
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE="Ethernet"
IPADDR=192.168.1.100
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1
HWADDR=32:0A:21:54:ND:6D

We will now configure our other network interfaces, we only need to make changes for 'DEVICE' & 'IPADDR' for aliasing

$ vi ifcfg- en0s0 :1

DEVICE=" en0s0 :1″
BOOTPROTO=static
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE="Ethernet"
IPADDR=192.168.1.110
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1
HWADDR=32:0A:21:54:ND:6D

& same is to be done for 'ifcfg:eth0:2'

$ vi ifcfg- en0s0 :2

DEVICE=" en0s0 :2″
BOOTPROTO=static
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE="Ethernet"
IPADDR=192.168.1.120
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1
HWADDR=32:0A:21:54:ND:6D

Save both files & restart the network service for changes to take effect.

$ systemctl restart network

To check IP addresses have bee assigned or not, run 'ifconfig'

$ ifconfig

ip aliasing <img src="https://i0.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ifconfig.jpg?resize=545%2C301&#038;ssl=1" alt="ip aliasing" width="545" height="301" srcset="https://i0.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ifconfig.jpg?w=545&amp;ssl=1 545w, https://i0.wp.com/linuxtechlab.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/ifconfig.jpg?resize=300%2C166&amp;ssl=1 300w" sizes="(max-width: 545px) 100vw, 545px" data-recalc-dims="1" />

This completes our tutorial, if you are having any issues/comments, please do mention them in the comment box below.

[Mar 22, 2019] Move your dotfiles to version control Opensource.com

Mar 22, 2019 | opensource.com

Move your dotfiles to version control Back up or sync your custom configurations across your systems by sharing dotfiles on GitLab or GitHub. 20 Mar 2019 Matthew Broberg (Red Hat) Feed 11 up 4 comments x Get the newsletter

Join the 85,000 open source advocates who receive our giveaway alerts and article roundups.

https://opensource.com/eloqua-embedded-email-capture-block.html?offer_id=70160000000QzXNAA0

What a Shell Dotfile Can Do For You , H. "Waldo" Grunenwald goes into excellent detail about the why and how of setting up your dotfiles. Let's dig into the why and how of sharing them. What's a dotfile?

"Dotfiles" is a common term for all the configuration files we have floating around our machines. These files usually start with a . at the beginning of the filename, like .gitconfig , and operating systems often hide them by default. For example, when I use ls -a on MacOS, it shows all the lovely dotfiles that would otherwise not be in the output.

dotfiles on master
➜ ls
README.md Rakefile bin misc profiles zsh-custom

dotfiles on master
➜ ls -a
. .gitignore .oh-my-zsh README.md zsh-custom
.. .gitmodules .tmux Rakefile
.gemrc .global_ignore .vimrc bin
.git .gvimrc .zlogin misc
.gitconfig .maid .zshrc profiles

If I take a look at one, .gitconfig , which I use for Git configuration, I see a ton of customization. I have account information, terminal color preferences, and tons of aliases that make my command-line interface feel like mine. Here's a snippet from the [alias] block:

87 # Show the diff between the latest commit and the current state
88 d = !"git diff-index --quiet HEAD -- || clear; git --no-pager diff --patch-with-stat"
89
90 # `git di $number` shows the diff between the state `$number` revisions ago and the current state
91 di = !"d() { git diff --patch-with-stat HEAD~$1; }; git diff-index --quiet HEAD -- || clear; d"
92
93 # Pull in remote changes for the current repository and all its submodules
94 p = !"git pull; git submodule foreach git pull origin master"
95
96 # Checkout a pull request from origin (of a github repository)
97 pr = !"pr() { git fetch origin pull/$1/head:pr-$1; git checkout pr-$1; }; pr"

Since my .gitconfig has over 200 lines of customization, I have no interest in rewriting it on every new computer or system I use, and either does anyone else. This is one reason sharing dotfiles has become more and more popular, especially with the rise of the social coding site GitHub. The canonical article advocating for sharing dotfiles is Zach Holman's Dotfiles Are Meant to Be Forked from 2008. The premise is true to this day: I want to share them, with myself, with those new to dotfiles, and with those who have taught me so much by sharing their customizations.

Sharing dotfiles

Many of us have multiple systems or know hard drives are fickle enough that we want to back up our carefully curated customizations. How do we keep these wonderful files in sync across environments?

My favorite answer is distributed version control, preferably a service that will handle the heavy lifting for me. I regularly use GitHub and continue to enjoy GitLab as I get more experienced with it. Either one is a perfect place to share your information. To set yourself up:

  1. Sign into your preferred Git-based service.
  2. Create a repository called "dotfiles." (Make it public! Sharing is caring.)
  3. Clone it to your local environment. *
  4. Copy your dotfiles into the folder.
  5. Symbolically link (symlink) them back to their target folder (most often $HOME ).
  6. Push them to the remote repository.

* You may need to set up your Git configuration commands to clone the repository. Both GitHub and GitLab will prompt you with the commands to run.

gitlab-new-project.png

Step 4 above is the crux of this effort and can be a bit tricky. Whether you use a script or do it by hand, the workflow is to symlink from your dotfiles folder to the dotfiles destination so that any updates to your dotfiles are easily pushed to the remote repository. To do this for my .gitconfig file, I would enter:

$ cd dotfiles /
$ ln -nfs .gitconfig $HOME / .gitconfig

The flags added to the symlinking command offer a few additional benefits:

You can review the IEEE and Open Group specification of ln and the version on MacOS 10.14.3 if you want to dig deeper into the available parameters. I had to look up these flags since I pulled them from someone else's dotfiles.

You can also make updating simpler with a little additional code, like the Rakefile I forked from Brad Parbs . Alternatively, you can keep it incredibly simple, as Jeff Geerling does in his dotfiles . He symlinks files using this Ansible playbook . Keeping everything in sync at this point is easy: you can cron job or occasionally git push from your dotfiles folder.

Quick aside: What not to share

Before we move on, it is worth noting what you should not add to a shared dotfile repository -- even if it starts with a dot. Anything that is a security risk, like files in your .ssh/ folder, is not a good choice to share using this method. Be sure to double-check your configuration files before publishing them online and triple-check that no API tokens are in your files.

Where should I start?

If Git is new to you, my article about the terminology and a cheat sheet of my most frequently used commands should help you get going.

There are other incredible resources to help you get started with dotfiles. Years ago, I came across dotfiles.github.io and continue to go back to it for a broader look at what people are doing. There is a lot of tribal knowledge hidden in other people's dotfiles. Take the time to scroll through some and don't be shy about adding them to your own.

I hope this will get you started on the joy of having consistent dotfiles across your computers.

What's your favorite dotfile trick? Add a comment or tweet me @mbbroberg . Topics Git GitHub GitLab About the author

Matthew Broberg - Matt loves working with technology communities to develop products and content that invite delightful engagement. He's a serial podcaster, best known for the Geek Whisperers podcast , is on the board of the Influence Marketing Council , co-maintains the DevRel Collective , and often shares his thoughts on Twitter and GitHub ... More about me


James Phillips on 20 Mar 2019 Permalink

See also the rcm suite for managing dotfiles from a central location. This provides the subdirectory from which you can put your dotfiles into revision control.

Web refs:

https://fedoramagazine.org/managing-dotfiles-rcm/

https://github.com/thoughtbot/rcm

Chris Hermansen on 20 Mar 2019 Permalink

An interesting article, Matt, thanks! I was glad to see "what not to share".

While most of my dot files hold no secrets, as you note some do - .ssh, .gnupg, .local/share among others... could be some others. Thinking about this, my dot files are kind of like my sock drawer - plenty of serviceable socks there, not sure I would want to share them! Anyway a neat idea.

Mark Pitman on 21 Mar 2019 Permalink

Instead of linking your dotfiles, give YADM a try: https://yadm.io

It wraps the git command and keeps the actual git repository in a subdirectory.

Tom Payne on 21 Mar 2019 Permalink

Check out https://github.com/twpayne/chezmoi . It allows you to store secrets securely, too. Disclaimer: I'm the author of chezmoi.

[Mar 22, 2019] Program the real world using Rust on Raspberry Pi Opensource.com

Mar 22, 2019 | opensource.com

If you own a Raspberry Pi, chances are you may already have experimented with physical computing -- writing code to interact with the real, physical world, like blinking some LEDs or controlling a servo motor . You may also have used GPIO Zero , a Python library that provides a simple interface to GPIO devices from Raspberry Pi with a friendly Python API. GPIO Zero is developed by Opensource.com community moderator Ben Nuttall .

I am working on rust_gpiozero , a port of the awesome GPIO Zero library that uses the Rust programming language. It is still a work in progress, but it already includes some useful components.

Rust is a systems programming language developed at Mozilla. It is focused on performance, reliability, and productivity. The Rust website has great resources if you'd like to learn more about it.

Getting started

Before starting with rust_gpiozero, it's smart to have a basic grasp of the Rust programming language. I recommend working through at least the first three chapters in The Rust Programming Language book.

I recommend installing Rust on your Raspberry Pi using rustup . Alternatively, you can set up a cross-compilation environment using cross (which works only on an x86_64 Linux host) or this how-to .

After you've installed Rust, create a new Rust project by entering:

[Mar 13, 2019] Virtual filesystems Why we need them and how they work Opensource.com

Mar 13, 2019 | opensource.com

Virtual filesystems in Linux: Why we need them and how they work Virtual filesystems are the magic abstraction that makes the "everything is a file" philosophy of Linux possible. 08 Mar 2019 Alison Chaiken Feed 18 up 6 comments x Get the newsletter

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Robert Love , "A filesystem is a hierarchical storage of data adhering to a specific structure." However, this description applies equally well to VFAT (Virtual File Allocation Table), Git, and Cassandra (a NoSQL database ). So what distinguishes a filesystem? Filesystem basics

The Linux kernel requires that for an entity to be a filesystem, it must also implement the open() , read() , and write() methods on persistent objects that have names associated with them. From the point of view of object-oriented programming , the kernel treats the generic filesystem as an abstract interface, and these big-three functions are "virtual," with no default definition. Accordingly, the kernel's default filesystem implementation is called a virtual filesystem (VFS).

If we can open(), read(), and write(), it is a file as this console session shows.

VFS underlies the famous observation that in Unix-like systems "everything is a file." Consider how weird it is that the tiny demo above featuring the character device /dev/console actually works. The image shows an interactive Bash session on a virtual teletype (tty). Sending a string into the virtual console device makes it appear on the virtual screen. VFS has other, even odder properties. For example, it's possible to seek in them .

More Linux resources

The familiar filesystems like ext4, NFS, and /proc all provide definitions of the big-three functions in a C-language data structure called file_operations . In addition, particular filesystems extend and override the VFS functions in the familiar object-oriented way. As Robert Love points out, the abstraction of VFS enables Linux users to blithely copy files to and from foreign operating systems or abstract entities like pipes without worrying about their internal data format. On behalf of userspace, via a system call, a process can copy from a file into the kernel's data structures with the read() method of one filesystem, then use the write() method of another kind of filesystem to output the data.

The function definitions that belong to the VFS base type itself are found in the fs/*.c files in kernel source, while the subdirectories of fs/ contain the specific filesystems. The kernel also contains filesystem-like entities such as cgroups, /dev, and tmpfs, which are needed early in the boot process and are therefore defined in the kernel's init/ subdirectory. Note that cgroups, /dev, and tmpfs do not call the file_operations big-three functions, but directly read from and write to memory instead.

The diagram below roughly illustrates how userspace accesses various types of filesystems commonly mounted on Linux systems. Not shown are constructs like pipes, dmesg, and POSIX clocks that also implement struct file_operations and whose accesses therefore pass through the VFS layer.

VFS are a "shim layer" between system calls and implementors of specific file_operations like ext4 and procfs . The file_operations functions can then communicate either with device-specific drivers or with memory accessors. tmpfs , devtmpfs and cgroups don't make use of file_operations but access memory directly.

VFS's existence promotes code reuse, as the basic methods associated with filesystems need not be re-implemented by every filesystem type. Code reuse is a widely accepted software engineering best practice! Alas, if the reused code introduces serious bugs , then all the implementations that inherit the common methods suffer from them.

/tmp: A simple tip

An easy way to find out what VFSes are present on a system is to type mount | grep -v sd | grep -v :/ , which will list all mounted filesystems that are not resident on a disk and not NFS on most computers. One of the listed VFS mounts will assuredly be /tmp, right?

Everyone knows that keeping / tmp on a physical storage device is crazy! credit: https://tinyurl.com/ybomxyfo

Why is keeping /tmp on storage inadvisable? Because the files in /tmp are temporary(!), and storage devices are slower than memory, where tmpfs are created. Further, physical devices are more subject to wear from frequent writing than memory is. Last, files in /tmp may contain sensitive information, so having them disappear at every reboot is a feature.

Unfortunately, installation scripts for some Linux distros still create /tmp on a storage device by default. Do not despair should this be the case with your system. Follow simple instructions on the always excellent Arch Wiki to fix the problem, keeping in mind that memory allocated to tmpfs is not available for other purposes. In other words, a system with a gigantic tmpfs with large files in it can run out of memory and crash. Another tip: when editing the /etc/fstab file, be sure to end it with a newline, as your system will not boot otherwise. (Guess how I know.)

/proc and /sys

Besides /tmp, the VFSes with which most Linux users are most familiar are /proc and /sys. (/dev relies on shared memory and has no file_operations). Why two flavors? Let's have a look in more detail.

The procfs offers a snapshot into the instantaneous state of the kernel and the processes that it controls for userspace. In /proc, the kernel publishes information about the facilities it provides, like interrupts, virtual memory, and the scheduler. In addition, /proc/sys is where the settings that are configurable via the sysctl command are accessible to userspace. Status and statistics on individual processes are reported in /proc/<PID> directories.

/proc/ meminfo is an empty file that nonetheless contains valuable information.

The behavior of /proc files illustrates how unlike on-disk filesystems VFS can be. On the one hand, /proc/meminfo contains the information presented by the command free . On the other hand, it's also empty! How can this be? The situation is reminiscent of a famous article written by Cornell University physicist N. David Mermin in 1985 called " Is the moon there when nobody looks? Reality and the quantum theory." The truth is that the kernel gathers statistics about memory when a process requests them from /proc, and there actually is nothing in the files in /proc when no one is looking. As Mermin said , "It is a fundamental quantum doctrine that a measurement does not, in general, reveal a preexisting value of the measured property." (The answer to the question about the moon is left as an exercise.)

The files in /proc are empty when no process accesses them. ( Source )

The apparent emptiness of procfs makes sense, as the information available there is dynamic. The situation with sysfs is different. Let's compare how many files of at least one byte in size there are in /proc versus /sys.

virtualfilesystems_6-filesize.png

Procfs has precisely one, namely the exported kernel configuration, which is an exception since it needs to be generated only once per boot. On the other hand, /sys has lots of larger files, most of which comprise one page of memory. Typically, sysfs files contain exactly one number or string, in contrast to the tables of information produced by reading files like /proc/meminfo.

The purpose of sysfs is to expose the readable and writable properties of what the kernel calls "kobjects" to userspace. The only purpose of kobjects is reference-counting: when the last reference to a kobject is deleted, the system will reclaim the resources associated with it. Yet, /sys constitutes most of the kernel's famous " stable ABI to userspace " which no one may ever, under any circumstances, "break." That doesn't mean the files in sysfs are static, which would be contrary to reference-counting of volatile objects.

The kernel's stable ABI instead constrains what can appear in /sys, not what is actually present at any given instant. Listing the permissions on files in sysfs gives an idea of how the configurable, tunable parameters of devices, modules, filesystems, etc. can be set or read. Logic compels the conclusion that procfs is also part of the kernel's stable ABI, although the kernel's documentation doesn't state so explicitly.

Files in sysfs describe exactly one property each for an entity and may be readable, writable or both. The "0" in the file reveals that the SSD is not removable.
Snooping on VFS with eBPF and bcc tools

The easiest way to learn how the kernel manages sysfs files is to watch it in action, and the simplest way to watch on ARM64 or x86_64 is to use eBPF. eBPF (extended Berkeley Packet Filter) consists of a virtual machine running inside the kernel that privileged users can query from the command line. Kernel source tells the reader what the kernel can do; running eBPF tools on a booted system shows instead what the kernel actually does .

Happily, getting started with eBPF is pretty easy via the bcc tools, which are available as packages from major Linux distros and have been amply documented by Brendan Gregg. The bcc tools are Python scripts with small embedded snippets of C, meaning anyone who is comfortable with either language can readily modify them. At this count, there are 80 Python scripts in bcc/tools , making it highly likely that a system administrator or developer will find an existing one relevant to her/his needs.

To get a very crude idea about what work VFSes are performing on a running system, try the simple vfscount or vfsstat , which show that dozens of calls to vfs_open() and its friends occur every second.

vfsstat.py is a Python script with an embedded C snippet that simply counts VFS function calls.

For a less trivial example, let's watch what happens in sysfs when a USB stick is inserted on a running system.

Watch with eBPF what happens in /sys when a USB stick is inserted, with simple and complex examples.

In the first simple example above, the trace.py bcc tools script prints out a message whenever the sysfs_create_files() command runs. We see that sysfs_create_files() was started by a kworker thread in response to the USB stick insertion, but what file was created? The second example illustrates the full power of eBPF. Here, trace.py is printing the kernel backtrace (-K option) plus the name of the file created by sysfs_create_files(). The snippet inside the single quotes is some C source code, including an easily recognizable format string, that the provided Python script induces a LLVM just-in-time compiler to compile and execute inside an in-kernel virtual machine. The full sysfs_create_files() function signature must be reproduced in the second command so that the format string can refer to one of the parameters. Making mistakes in this C snippet results in recognizable C-compiler errors. For example, if the -I parameter is omitted, the result is "Failed to compile BPF text." Developers who are conversant with either C or Python will find the bcc tools easy to extend and modify.

When the USB stick is inserted, the kernel backtrace appears showing that PID 7711 is a kworker thread that created a file called "events" in sysfs. A corresponding invocation with sysfs_remove_files() shows that removal of the USB stick results in removal of the events file, in keeping with the idea of reference counting. Watching sysfs_create_link() with eBPF during USB stick insertion (not shown) reveals that no fewer than 48 symbolic links are created.

What is the purpose of the events file anyway? Using cscope to find the function __device_add_disk() reveals that it calls disk_add_events(), and either "media_change" or "eject_request" may be written to the events file. Here, the kernel's block layer is informing userspace about the appearance and disappearance of the "disk." Consider how quickly informative this method of investigating how USB stick insertion works is compared to trying to figure out the process solely from the source.

Read-only root filesystems make embedded devices possible

Assuredly, no one shuts down a server or desktop system by pulling out the power plug. Why? Because mounted filesystems on the physical storage devices may have pending writes, and the data structures that record their state may become out of sync with what is written on the storage. When that happens, system owners will have to wait at next boot for the fsck filesystem-recovery tool to run and, in the worst case, will actually lose data.

Yet, aficionados will have heard that many IoT and embedded devices like routers, thermostats, and automobiles now run Linux. Many of these devices almost entirely lack a user interface, and there's no way to "unboot" them cleanly. Consider jump-starting a car with a dead battery where the power to the Linux-running head unit goes up and down repeatedly. How is it that the system boots without a long fsck when the engine finally starts running? The answer is that embedded devices rely on a read-only root fileystem (ro-rootfs for short).

ro-rootfs are why embedded systems don't frequently need to fsck. Credit (with permission): https://tinyurl.com/yxoauoub

A ro-rootfs offers many advantages that are less obvious than incorruptibility. One is that malware cannot write to /usr or /lib if no Linux process can write there. Another is that a largely immutable filesystem is critical for field support of remote devices, as support personnel possess local systems that are nominally identical to those in the field. Perhaps the most important (but also most subtle) advantage is that ro-rootfs forces developers to decide during a project's design phase which system objects will be immutable. Dealing with ro-rootfs may often be inconvenient or even painful, as const variables in programming languages often are, but the benefits easily repay the extra overhead.

Creating a read-only rootfs does require some additional amount of effort for embedded developers, and that's where VFS comes in. Linux needs files in /var to be writable, and in addition, many popular applications that embedded systems run will try to create configuration dot-files in $HOME. One solution for configuration files in the home directory is typically to pregenerate them and build them into the rootfs. For /var, one approach is to mount it on a separate writable partition while / itself is mounted as read-only. Using bind or overlay mounts is another popular alternative.

Bind and overlay mounts and their use by containers

Running man mount is the best place to learn about bind and overlay mounts, which give embedded developers and system administrators the power to create a filesystem in one path location and then provide it to applications at a second one. For embedded systems, the implication is that it's possible to store the files in /var on an unwritable flash device but overlay- or bind-mount a path in a tmpfs onto the /var path at boot so that applications can scrawl there to their heart's delight. At next power-on, the changes in /var will be gone. Overlay mounts provide a union between the tmpfs and the underlying filesystem and allow apparent modification to an existing file in a ro-rootfs, while bind mounts can make new empty tmpfs directories show up as writable at ro-rootfs paths. While overlayfs is a proper filesystem type, bind mounts are implemented by the VFS namespace facility .

Based on the description of overlay and bind mounts, no one will be surprised that Linux containers make heavy use of them. Let's spy on what happens when we employ systemd-nspawn to start up a container by running bcc's mountsnoop tool:

The system- nspawn invocation fires up the container while mountsnoop.py runs.

And let's see what happened:

Running mountsnoop during the container "boot" reveals that the container runtime relies heavily on bind mounts. (Only the beginning of the lengthy output is displayed)

Here, systemd-nspawn is providing selected files in the host's procfs and sysfs to the container at paths in its rootfs. Besides the MS_BIND flag that sets bind-mounting, some of the other flags that the "mount" system call invokes determine the relationship between changes in the host namespace and in the container. For example, the bind-mount can either propagate changes in /proc and /sys to the container, or hide them, depending on the invocation.

Summary

Understanding Linux internals can seem an impossible task, as the kernel itself contains a gigantic amount of code, leaving aside Linux userspace applications and the system-call interface in C libraries like glibc. One way to make progress is to read the source code of one kernel subsystem with an emphasis on understanding the userspace-facing system calls and headers plus major kernel internal interfaces, exemplified here by the file_operations table. The file operations are what makes "everything is a file" actually work, so getting a handle on them is particularly satisfying. The kernel C source files in the top-level fs/ directory constitute its implementation of virtual filesystems, which are the shim layer that enables broad and relatively straightforward interoperability of popular filesystems and storage devices. Bind and overlay mounts via Linux namespaces are the VFS magic that makes containers and read-only root filesystems possible. In combination with a study of source code, the eBPF kernel facility and its bcc interface makes probing the kernel simpler than ever before.

Much thanks to Akkana Peck and Michael Eager for comments and corrections.


Alison Chaiken will present Virtual filesystems: why we need them and how they work at the 17th annual Southern California Linux Expo ( SCaLE 17x ) March 7-10 in Pasadena, Calif.


01101001b on 08 Mar 2019 Permalink

Many years ago while I was still a Wind*ws user, I tried the same thing. It was a total failure, so I ditched that idea. Now reading your article, my first thought was "this is not going to..." and then I realized that indeed it would work! I'm such a chump. Thank you for your article!

Alison Chaiken on 13 Mar 2019 Permalink

The idea of virtual filesystems appears to originate in a 1986 USENIX paper called "Vnodes: An Architecture for Multiple File System Types in Sun UNIX." You can find it at

http://www.cs.fsu.edu/~awang/courses/cop5611_s2004/vnode.pdf

Figure 1 looks remarkably like one of the diagrams I made. I thank my co-worker Sam Cramer for pointing this out. You can find the figure in the slides that accompany the talk at http://she-devel.com/ChaikenSCALE2019.pdf

Clark Henry on 11 Mar 2019 Permalink

Alison, this presentation at SCaLE 17x was my favorite over all 4 days and 15 sessions! Awesome lecture and live demos. I learned an incredible amount, even as a Linux kernel noob. Really appreciate the bcc/eBPF demo as well - it was really encouraging to see how easy it is to get started.

So grateful that you also created this blog post... the recording from SCaLE was totally botched! Ugh.

Thank you!

Alison Chaiken on 13 Mar 2019 Permalink

Thanks for your kind words; I'm sorry to learn that the SCALE video is botched. Here at least are the slides:

http://she-devel.com/ChaikenSCALE2019.pdf

I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Pyrax on 13 Mar 2019 Permalink

Hey, Clark could you please a link to the lectures and the live demos i would really love to have a look.

Alison Chaiken on 13 Mar 2019 Permalink

Have a look here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiIkx0doVB0&t=15596s

at about 4:00. You'll want to look at the slides separately. They are are at http://she-devel.com/ChaikenSCALE2019.pdf

[Mar 13, 2019] Getting started with the cat command by Alan Formy-Duval

Mar 13, 2019 | opensource.com

6 comments

Cat can also number a file's lines during output. There are two commands to do this, as shown in the help documentation: -b, --number-nonblank number nonempty output lines, overrides -n
-n, --number number all output lines

If I use the -b command with the hello.world file, the output will be numbered like this:

   $ cat -b hello.world
   1 Hello World !

In the example above, there is an empty line. We can determine why this empty line appears by using the -n argument:

$ cat -n hello.world
   1 Hello World !
   2
   $

Now we see that there is an extra empty line. These two arguments are operating on the final output rather than the file contents, so if we were to use the -n option with both files, numbering will count lines as follows:

   
   $ cat -n hello.world goodbye.world
   1 Hello World !
   2
   3 Good Bye World !
   4
   $

One other option that can be useful is -s for squeeze-blank . This argument tells cat to reduce repeated empty line output down to one line. This is helpful when reviewing files that have a lot of empty lines, because it effectively fits more text on the screen. Suppose I have a file with three lines that are spaced apart by several empty lines, such as in this example, greetings.world :

   $ cat greetings.world
   Greetings World !

   Take me to your Leader !

   We Come in Peace !
   $

Using the -s option saves screen space:

$ cat -s greetings.world

Cat is often used to copy contents of one file to another file. You may be asking, "Why not just use cp ?" Here is how I could create a new file, called both.files , that contains the contents of the hello and goodbye files:

$ cat hello.world goodbye.world > both.files
$ cat both.files
Hello World !
Good Bye World !
$
zcat

There is another variation on the cat command known as zcat . This command is capable of displaying files that have been compressed with Gzip without needing to uncompress the files with the gunzip command. As an aside, this also preserves disk space, which is the entire reason files are compressed!

The zcat command is a bit more exciting because it can be a huge time saver for system administrators who spend a lot of time reviewing system log files. Where can we find compressed log files? Take a look at /var/log on most Linux systems. On my system, /var/log contains several files, such as syslog.2.gz and syslog.3.gz . These files are the result of the log management system, which rotates and compresses log files to save disk space and prevent logs from growing to unmanageable file sizes. Without zcat , I would have to uncompress these files with the gunzip command before viewing them. Thankfully, I can use zcat :

$ cd / var / log
$ ls * .gz
syslog.2.gz syslog.3.gz
$
$ zcat syslog.2.gz | more
Jan 30 00:02: 26 workstation systemd [ 1850 ] : Starting GNOME Terminal Server...
Jan 30 00:02: 26 workstation dbus-daemon [ 1920 ] : [ session uid = 2112 pid = 1920 ] Successful
ly activated service 'org.gnome.Terminal'
Jan 30 00:02: 26 workstation systemd [ 1850 ] : Started GNOME Terminal Server.
Jan 30 00:02: 26 workstation org.gnome.Terminal.desktop [ 2059 ] : # watch_fast: "/org/gno
me / terminal / legacy / " (establishing: 0, active: 0)
Jan 30 00:02:26 workstation org.gnome.Terminal.desktop[2059]: # unwatch_fast: " / org / g
nome / terminal / legacy / " (active: 0, establishing: 1)
Jan 30 00:02:26 workstation org.gnome.Terminal.desktop[2059]: # watch_established: " /
org / gnome / terminal / legacy / " (establishing: 0)
--More--

We can also pass both files to zcat if we want to review both of them uninterrupted. Due to how log rotation works, you need to pass the filenames in reverse order to preserve the chronological order of the log contents:

$ ls -l * .gz
-rw-r----- 1 syslog adm 196383 Jan 31 00:00 syslog.2.gz
-rw-r----- 1 syslog adm 1137176 Jan 30 00:00 syslog.3.gz
$ zcat syslog.3.gz syslog.2.gz | more

The cat command seems simple but is very useful. I use it regularly. You also don't need to feed or pet it like a real cat. As always, I suggest you review the man pages ( man cat ) for the cat and zcat commands to learn more about how it can be used. You can also use the --help argument for a quick synopsis of command line arguments.

Victorhck on 13 Feb 2019 Permalink

and there's also a "tac" command, that is just a "cat" upside down!
Following your example:

~~~~~

tac both.files
Good Bye World!
Hello World!
~~~~
Happy hacking! :)
Johan Godfried on 26 Feb 2019 Permalink

Interesting article but please don't misuse cat to pipe to more......

I am trying to teach people to use less pipes and here you go abusing cat to pipe to other commands. IMHO, 99.9% of the time this is not necessary!

In stead of "cat file | command" most of the time, you can use "command file" (yes, I am an old dinosaur from a time where memory was very expensive and forking multiple commands could fill it all up)

Uri Ran on 03 Mar 2019 Permalink

Run cat then press keys to see the codes your shortcut send. (Press Ctrl+C to kill the cat when you're done.)

For example, on my Mac, the key combination option-leftarrow is ^[^[[D and command-downarrow is ^[[B.

I learned it from https://stackoverflow.com/users/787216/lolesque in his answer to https://stackoverflow.com/questions/12382499/looking-for-altleftarrowkey...

Geordie on 04 Mar 2019 Permalink

cat is also useful to make (or append to) text files without an editor:

$ cat >> foo << "EOF"
> Hello World
> Another Line
> EOF
$

[Feb 04, 2019] How to disable NetworkManager on CentOS - RHEL 7 by admin

Feb 04, 2019 | www.thegeekdiary.com

Disabling NetworkManager

The following steps will disable NetworkManager service and allows the interface to be managed only by network service.

1. To check which are the interfaces managed by NetworkManager

# nmcli device status

This displays a table that lists all network interfaces along with their STATE. If Network Manager is not controlling an interface, its STATE will be listed as unmanaged . Any other value indicates the interface is under Network Manager control.

2. Stop the NetworkManager service:

# systemctl stop NetworkManager

3. Disable the service permanently:

# systemctl disable NetworkManager

4. To confirm the NetworkManager service has been disabled

# systemctl list-unit-files | grep NetworkManager

5. Add the below parameter in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ethX of interfaces that are managed by NetworkManager to make it unmanaged.

NM_CONTROLLED="no"
Note: Be sure to change the NM_CONTROLLED="yes" to " no " or the network service may complain about "Connection activation failed" when it cannot find an interface to start Switching to "network" service

When the NetworkManager is disabled, the interface can be configured for use with the network service. Follow the steps below to configure and interface using network services.

1. Set the IP address in the configuration file: /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0. Set the NM_CONTROLLED value to no and assign a static IP address in the file.

NAME="eth0"
HWADDR=...
ONBOOT=yes
BOOTPROTO=none
IPADDR=...
NETMASK=...
GATEWAY=...
TYPE=Ethernet
NM_CONTROLLED=no

2. Set the DNS servers to be used by adding into the file: /etc/resolv.conf :

nameserver [server 1]
nameserver [server 2]

3. Enable the network service

# systemctl enable network

4. Restart the network service

# systemctl restart network
CentOS / RHEL 5, 6 : how to disable NetworkManager
Linux OS Service 'NetworkManager'

[Jan 30, 2019] How to take back control of /etc/resolv.conf on Linux

Jan 30, 2019 | www.ctrl.blog

Opting-out of NetworkManager

NetworkManager is by far the most common auto-configuration tool for the entire networking stack including DNS resolution. It's responsible for /etc/resolv.conf on many popular distribution including Debian and Fedora. After you've disable other programs that manages resolv.conf, you may also discover that NetworkManager will jump in to fill the job -- as happens on Ubuntu 16.10 and later.

Set the dns option in the main configuration section to none to disable DNS handling in NetworkManager. The below commands sets this option in a new conf.d/no-dns.conf configuration file, restarts the NetworkManager service, and deletes the NetworkManager-generated resolv.conf file.

   echo -e "[main]\ndns=none" > /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/no-dns.conf
   systemctl restart NetworkManager.service
   rm /etc/resolv.conf

If you discover that NetworkManager is still managing your resolv.conf, then you may have a configuration conflict (usually caused by dnsmasq). Recursively search through your NetworkManager configuration to discover any conflicts.

   grep -ir /etc/NetworkManager/

Refer to the last section of this article for instructions on recreating a /etc/resolv.conf file with manual configuration

[Jan 30, 2019] TCP - IP communication of RHEL 7 is extremely slow compared with RHEL 6 and earlier. - Red Hat Customer Portal

Jan 30, 2019 | access.redhat.com

TCP / IP communication of RHEL 7 is extremely slow compared with RHEL 6 and earlier.
My application transferd from RHEL 5 to RHEL 7.
That application makes TCP / IP communication with another application on the same server.
That communication speed is about twice slower.

Apart from that, we compared it with "ping localhost". RHEL 7 averaged 0.04 ms, RHEL 6 and RHEL 5 average 0.02 ms. RHEL 7 is twice as slow as RHEL 6 or earlier.

The environment is the minimum installation, stop firewalld and postfix, then do "ping localhost".

Why was communication delayed like this?
Or, what is going on late?
Is not it worth it?

RED HAT GURU 7422 Points


24 January 2019 11:09 PM Jamie Bainbridge

Guesses: differences in process scheduling, memory fragmentation, other CPU workload, timing inaccuracy, incorrect test method, firewall behaviour, system performance differences, code difference like the security vulnerability mentioned above, probably much more that I have not thought of.

A good troubleshooting path forward is to identify:

And then look into possible causes. I would start with perf collection during an application run, and possibly strace of the application although that can negatively affect performance too.

There are some more questions to give ideas at Initial investigation for any performance issue .

I see you have "L3 support" through your hardware vendor, possibly you bought RHEL pre-installed on your system, so the hardware vendor's tech support would be the first place to ask. The vendor will contact us if they identify a bug in RHEL.

25 January 2019 12:18 AM R. Hinton. Community Leader

One side note, make sure you really have your dns resolver /etc/resolv.conf set properly. The suggestions above are of course indeed good, but if your dns is not set properly, you'll have another round of slowness. Remember that /etc/resolv.conf is populated generally from the "DNSx" and "DOMAIN" directives found in the active '/etc/sysconfig/netowrk-scripts/ifcfg-XYZ" file. You can find what interfaces are actually active by using ip -o -4 a s which will reveal all IPV4 active interfaces with the interface name in the results at the very far left.

There are instances where if you have a system that is doing a lot of actions that rely on dns, you could make a dns caching server at your location that would assist with lookups and cache relevant things for your system.

Again, the other answers above are very useful, on spot, but if your /etc/resolv.conf is off, or not optimal, it could cause issue.

Another thing to review, and yes, it is exhaustive, the Red Hat tuning guide would be a good reference to double-check.

One method to test network bandwidth and latency performance is here .

I have not fully vetted this article where someone did some additional tuning and it would be good to validate what is in that article for legitimacy, and make backups of any configurations before making changes.

One last thing, using the rpm iftop can give you an idea of what systems are hitting your server, or visa versa.

Regards,

RJ

25 January 2019 2:05 AM Jamie Bainbridge

and yes, it is exhaustive, the Red Hat tuning guide

For reference, the Network Performance Tuning Guide PDF is only the original publish. We have updated the knowledgebase article a couple of times since then:

I have not fully vetted this article

Using tuned is a good idea... if the tuning profile matches your use case. Users are encouraged to think of the shipped profiles as just a starting point and develop their own more customised tuning profile.

An overview of the default profiles is at: https://access.redhat.com/solutions/369093

[Oct 27, 2018] Linux Kernel /etc/sysctl.conf Security Hardening

Oct 23, 2018 | www.cyberciti.biz

... ... ...

sysctl is an interface that allows you to make changes to a running Linux kernel. With /etc/sysctl.conf you can configure various Linux networking and system settings such as:

  1. Limit network-transmitted configuration for IPv4
  2. Limit network-transmitted configuration for IPv6
  3. Turn on execshield protection
  4. Prevent against the common 'syn flood attack'
  5. Turn on source IP address verification
  6. Prevents a cracker from using a spoofing attack against the IP address of the server.
  7. Logs several types of suspicious packets, such as spoofed packets, source-routed packets, and redirects.
Linux Kernel /etc/sysctl.conf Security Hardening with sysctl

The sysctl command is used to modify kernel parameters at runtime. /etc/sysctl.conf is a text file containing sysctl values to be read in and set by sysct at boot time. To view current values, enter:
# sysctl -a
# sysctl -A
# sysctl mib
# sysctl net.ipv4.conf.all.rp_filter
# sysctl -a --pattern 'net.ipv4.conf.(eth|wlan)0.arp'

To load settings, enter:
# sysctl -p

Sample /etc/sysctl.conf for Linux server hardening

Edit /etc/sysctl.conf or /etc/sysctl.d/99-custom.conf and update it as follows. The file is documented with comments. However, I recommend reading the official Linux kernel sysctl tuning help file (see below):

# The following is suitable for dedicated web server, mail, ftp server etc. 
# ---------------------------------------
# BOOLEAN Values:
# a) 0 (zero) - disabled / no / false
# b) Non zero - enabled / yes / true
# --------------------------------------
# Controls IP packet forwarding
net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0
 
# Do not accept source routing
net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_source_route = 0
 
# Controls the System Request debugging functionality of the kernel
kernel.sysrq = 0
 
# Controls whether core dumps will append the PID to the core filename
# Useful for debugging multi-threaded applications
kernel.core_uses_pid = 1
 
# Controls the use of TCP syncookies
# Turn on SYN-flood protections
net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_synack_retries = 5
 
########## IPv4 networking start ##############
# Send redirects, if router, but this is just server
# So no routing allowed 
net.ipv4.conf.all.send_redirects = 0
net.ipv4.conf.default.send_redirects = 0
 
# Accept packets with SRR option? No
net.ipv4.conf.all.accept_source_route = 0
 
# Accept Redirects? No, this is not router
net.ipv4.conf.all.accept_redirects = 0
net.ipv4.conf.all.secure_redirects = 0
 
# Log packets with impossible addresses to kernel log? yes
net.ipv4.conf.all.log_martians = 1
net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_source_route = 0
net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_redirects = 0
net.ipv4.conf.default.secure_redirects = 0
 
# Ignore all ICMP ECHO and TIMESTAMP requests sent to it via broadcast/multicast
net.ipv4.icmp_echo_ignore_broadcasts = 1
 
# Prevent against the common 'syn flood attack'
net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1
 
# Enable source validation by reversed path, as specified in RFC1812
net.ipv4.conf.all.rp_filter = 1
 
# Controls source route verification
net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 1 
 
########## IPv6 networking start ##############
# Number of Router Solicitations to send until assuming no routers are present.
# This is host and not router
net.ipv6.conf.default.router_solicitations = 0
 
# Accept Router Preference in RA?
net.ipv6.conf.default.accept_ra_rtr_pref = 0
 
# Learn Prefix Information in Router Advertisement
net.ipv6.conf.default.accept_ra_pinfo = 0
 
# Setting controls whether the system will accept Hop Limit settings from a router advertisement
net.ipv6.conf.default.accept_ra_defrtr = 0
 
#router advertisements can cause the system to assign a global unicast address to an interface
net.ipv6.conf.default.autoconf = 0
 
#how many neighbor solicitations to send out per address?
net.ipv6.conf.default.dad_transmits = 0
 
# How many global unicast IPv6 addresses can be assigned to each interface?
net.ipv6.conf.default.max_addresses = 1
 
########## IPv6 networking ends ##############
 
#Enable ExecShield protection
#Set value to 1 or 2 (recommended) 
#kernel.exec-shield = 2
#kernel.randomize_va_space=2
 
# TCP and memory optimization 
# increase TCP max buffer size setable using setsockopt()
#net.ipv4.tcp_rmem = 4096 87380 8388608
#net.ipv4.tcp_wmem = 4096 87380 8388608
 
# increase Linux auto tuning TCP buffer limits
#net.core.rmem_max = 8388608
#net.core.wmem_max = 8388608
#net.core.netdev_max_backlog = 5000
#net.ipv4.tcp_window_scaling = 1
 
# increase system file descriptor limit    
fs.file-max = 65535
 
#Allow for more PIDs 
kernel.pid_max = 65536
 
#Increase system IP port limits
net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 2000 65000
 
# RFC 1337 fix
net.ipv4.tcp_rfc1337=1
Reboot the machine soon after a kernel panic
kernel.panic=10
Addresses of mmap base, heap, stack and VDSO page are randomized
kernel.randomize_va_space=2
Ignore bad ICMP errors
net.ipv4.icmp_ignore_bogus_error_responses=1
Protects against creating or following links under certain conditions
fs.protected_hardlinks=1
fs.protected_symlinks=1
How do I tune Linux VM subsystem? How do I tune Linux network stack? Other Linux security tips

[Aug 05, 2017] Disabling NetworkManager on RHEL 7

Aug 01, 2017 | superuser.com
Andrew 46

I was setting up a RHEL7 server in vmware vSphere and I'm having trouble getting it on the network without NetworkManager. I configured the server to have a static IP during the install process and it set everything up using NetworkManager. While this does work we do not use NetworkManager in my office, so I went and entered what we usually put the config file to get RHEL6 servers online without NetworkManager.

/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ens192 is the following:

NAME=ens192
TYPE=Ethernet
ONBOOT=yes
NM_CONTROLLED=no
BOOTPROTO=static
IPADDR=10.0.2.15
PREFIX=24
GATEWAY=10.0.2.2

However when I disable NetworkManager the network service fails to start with the following error

#service network restart

Restarting network (via systemctl): Job for network.service failed. See 'systemctl status network.service' and 'journalctl -xn' for details.

And both commands output the following:

network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
network[1838]: RTNETLINK answers: File exists
systemd[1]: network.service: control process exited, code=exited status=1
systemd[1]: Failed to start LSB: Bring up/down networking

Also, here's what the command 'ip addr' outputs:

1: lo: mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN
link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
inet6 ::1/128 scope host
valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: ens192: mtu 1500 qdisc noop state DOWN qlen 1000
link/ether 08:00:27:98:8e:df brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
asked Jul 11 '14 at 22:19

Pavel Šimerda Apr 5 '15 at 5:40

I recently debugged an issue with network.service and the best way to track the ip commands was strace . You shouldn't generally get this type of error. It might be worth reporting (ideally via support). –

nickg Oct 25 '14 at 16:46

Check your MAC Address for the VM. It should be 08:00:27:98:8e:df since that is what is shown you ran ip addr. If it's anything else, you will need to set it in your ifcfg-ens192 file with the following, but replace the address with the actual.

HWADDR="08:00:27:98:8e:df"

I had the same issue and this solved it for me.

Pavel Šimerda Apr 5 '15 at 5:43

The configuration file in the Question apparently relies on NAME=ens192 without any MAC address matching.

Dec 30 '14 at 14:46 0ldd0g

All I found that it takes to resolve this is that MAC in the Config
 NAME=ens192
 TYPE=Ethernet
 ONBOOT=yes
 HWADDR="08:00:27:98:8e:df"
 NM_CONTROLLED=no
 BOOTPROTO=static
 IPADDR=10.0.2.15
 PREFIX=24
 GATEWAY=10.0.2.2

If you are not sure of the hardware address you can find it in.

 cat /sys/class/net/ens192/address
you should put that information (GATEWAY=10.0.2.2) in /etc/sysconfig/network once it's done, restarting the service should succeed

Try to go to the virtual machine network settings and make sure the network cable is connected and check if you have blocked this with a firewall

NetworkManager dictates the default route ( ip route ) even though your interface has nm disabled, it is just that interface not the whole system.
ps aux | grep -I net   # will probably find NetworkManager still running.
chkconfig NetworkManager off
systemctl disable NetworkManager.service

systemctl disable doesn't stop a service, nor does chkconfig ... off which basically translates to the same command anyway. – Pavel Šimerda

I too came across "Failed to start LSB: Bring up/down networking" error, since disabling NetworkManager. It took two minutes to be brought up interfaces after boot. The cause of confusion was "... LSB". It turned out the message comes out from just the traditional /etc/rc.d/init.d/network script. In my case, following solved the problem;

To network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 added

NMCONTROLLED=no

Removed unnecessary ifcfg-* files which NetworkManager has left behind

# rm /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-Wired_connection_?
Abdullah  May 11 at 10:26
This will solve the problem!
# rm /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-ipoib.rules 

# reboot

-Restart the networking service

 #systemctl restart network.service

NOW! Working.

I was having the same issue. So I just delete the backup files I made in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts , such as ifcfg-Bridge_connection_1.home and ifcfg-Bridge_connection_1.office which I created for backup usage. They should not be created there. The /etc/init.d/network restart could work well after delete those useless ifcfg-*.

[Aug 02, 2017] Issue with RHEL7 and disabling NetworkManager

Aug 02, 2017 | serverfault.com

cjmaio Jul 2 '14 at 15:14

Okay community, let's see if we can figure this one out, cause I'm out of answers.

Where I work I am setting up a bunch of RedHat Enterprise Linux servers. There is a collection of RHEL6 and RHEL7 servers.


On the RHEL6 servers, I am using the standard network configuration tool by configuring it in /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 and a dhclient configuration file in /etc/dhclient-eth0.conf . Everything works properly, I am assigned the custom FQDN by our DNS servers (e.g. hostname.ad.company.tld ) and when the DHCP lease is up, it is renewed automatically.


Here is the issue:

In RHEL7, NetworkManager is enabled by default. On our Kickstart, I have removed NetworkManager and went back to configuring network and dhcp the way it is done in RHEL6. All of the configuration is the same (sans using /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ens192 instead of eth0) and works fine for the first DHCP lease.

Once the lease is up, it seemingly doesn't renew it until I issue a systemctl restart network command.


I have looked and looked and I am coming up short. There must be something different in RHEL7 or something not configured when you disable NetworkManager , but I cannot for the life of me figure it out.

Anyone have any thoughts?

As I know these usually help, I'll post my RHEL7 configuration files, and the snippet from the logs where it loses the DHCP lease.


/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ens192

# Generated by dracut initrd
DEVICE="ens192"
ONBOOT=yes
NETBOOT=yes
UUID="c23045ff-7b60-4dff-b052-30a61923a852"
IPV6INIT=yes
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
HWADDR="00:0c:29:b6:d8:cc"
TYPE=Ethernet
NAME="ens192"
NM_CONTROLLED=no

/etc/dhclient-ens192.conf

send host-name "hostname";
send fqdn.fqdn "hostname.ad.company.tld";
send fqdn.server-update off;

/var/log/messages

Jun 27 23:06:09 sa-kbwiki01 avahi-daemon[591]: Withdrawing address record for 129.89.78.221 on ens192.
Jun 27 23:06:09 sa-kbwiki01 avahi-daemon[591]: Leaving mDNS multicast group on interface ens192.IPv4 with address xxx.xx.xx.xxx.
Jun 27 23:06:09 sa-kbwiki01 avahi-daemon[591]: Interface ens192.IPv4 no longer relevant for mDNS.

That log snippet doesn't show your DHCP lease being lost. Keep looking, there should be other more relevant entries. – Michael Hampton ♦ Jul 2 '14 at 15:24

From what I recall hearing pre-launch is that networkManager is not the same PoS it was years ago and Red Hat more or less forces you to learn to live with it. Having said that, the documentation mentions that NetworkManager has been made responsible for starting dhclient, so it could be that without NM, dhclient is run with the -1 option and doesn't become a daemon. – HBruijn ♦ Jul 2 '14 at 15:36

@MichaelHampton I do not see anything else in /var/log/messages. Other things that use the network are operating fine until that line, at which point everything starts saying no network available. – cjmaio Jul 2 '14 at 15:59

@HBruijn That gives me somewhere to start... though when doing a ps aux | grep dhclient I do see that the -1 flag is being set... is there anywhere else that dhclient would log to other than /var/log/messages ? – cjmaio Jul 2 '14 at 16:00

Yeah, NM is fairly safe to use these days unless you have a very complicated setup. I do wonder why you're running Avahi though. – Michael Hampton ♦ Jul 2 '14 at 16:01

[Aug 26, 2015] Changing timezone in RHEL6 from the command line

[Apr 29, 2011] Disabling avahi-daemon Len

One of the things I quickly found to be bothering me is the fact that there was an apparently long and unexplicable delay for all new network connections which resembled to a dns resolving. No reason for lengthy dns resolving though. So I did a strace:
socket(PF_FILE, SOCK_STREAM, 0)         = 4
fcntl64(4, F_GETFD)                     = 0
fcntl64(4, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC)         = 0
connect(4, {sa_family=AF_FILE, path="/var/run/avahi-daemon/socket"}, 110) = 0
fcntl64(4, F_GETFL)                     = 0x2 (flags O_RDWR)
fstat64(4, {st_mode=S_IFSOCK|0777, st_size=0, ...}) = 0
mmap2(NULL, 4096, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0xb7f35000_
llseek(4, 0, 0xbfa7d918, SEEK_CUR)     = -1 ESPIPE (Illegal seek)
write(4, "RESOLVE-ADDRESS 10.0.0.6\n", 25) = 25read(4,  <unfinished ...>

the results shows a connection to a avahi-daemon which I have no ideea what is good for so I should not need it. I disabled it in /etc/default/avahi-daemon

cat /etc/default/avahi-daemon # 0 = don't start, 1 = start
AVAHI_DAEMON_START=0

Hope it helps.

[Jul 25, 2010] Configure The Network Card In Redhat 5.3 Advanced Server

Edit The Network Configuration Files Directly

From a terminal window type:

cd /etc/sysconfig/networking-scripts

You will need to edit the following filess:

/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0  (and eth1 if you have another card.)
/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0

Change or Add New Info

cd /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/
vi ifcfg-eth0

Change or Add The Following Lines

# Xen Virtual Ethernet
DEVICE=eth0
BOOTPROTO=none
BROADCAST=10.10.1.255
HWADDR=56:36:DC:8F:D5:59
IPADDR=10.10.1.73
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
NETWORK=10.10.1.0
ONBOOT=yes
GATEWAY=10.10.1.1
TYPE=Ethernet
 

Setup A Default Gateway

vi /etc/sysconfig/network

NETWORKING=yes
NETWORKING_IPV6=no
HOSTNAME=myhostname
GATEWAY=10.10.1.1

Make sure your DNS entries are correct. Set them to the correct values, whatever those are. For example:

vi /etc/resolv.conf

nameserver 10.10.1.13
nameserver 10.10.1.14
search mydomain.com

Save the file & restart the network service:

service network restart
The GUI Tool

You can also launch the system-config-network tool in GUI mode. From a command line where you are running X-Windows, type system-config-network, or chose System / Administration / Network from the menu

Linux Network Administrator's Guide, 2nd Edition Chapter 5 Configuring TCP-IP Networking

A couple of commands are used to configure the network interfaces and initialize the routing table. These tasks are usually performed from the network initialization script each time you boot the system. The basic tools for this process are called ifconfig (where "if" stands for interface) and route.

ifconfig is used to make an interface accessible to the kernel networking layer. This involves the assignment of an IP address and other parameters, and activation of the interface, also known as "bringing up" the interface. Being active here means that the kernel will send and receive IP datagrams through the interface. The simplest way to invoke it is with:

ifconfig interface ip-address

This command assigns ip-address to interface and activates it. All other parameters are set to default values. For instance, the default network mask is derived from the network class of the IP address, such as 255.255.0.0 for a class B address. ifconfig is described in detail in the section "All About ifconfig".

route allows you to add or remove routes from the kernel routing table. It can be invoked as:

route [add|del] [-net|-host] target [if]

The add and del arguments determine whether to add or delete the route to target. The -net and -host arguments tell the route command whether the target is a network or a host (a host is assumed if you don't specify). The if argument is again optional, and allows you to specify to which network interface the route should be directed -- the Linux kernel makes a sensible guess if you don't supply this information. This topic will be explained in more detail in succeeding sections.

The Loopback Interface

The very first interface to be activated is the loopback interface:

# ifconfig lo 127.0.0.1

Occasionally, you will see the dummy hostname localhost being used instead of the IP address. ifconfig will look up the name in the hosts file, where an entry should declare it as the hostname for 127.0.0.1:

# Sample /etc/hosts entry for localhost
localhost     127.0.0.1

To view the configuration of an interface, you invoke ifconfig, giving it only the interface name as argument:

$ ifconfig lo
lo        Link encap:Local Loopback  
          inet addr:127.0.0.1  Mask:255.0.0.0
          UP LOOPBACK RUNNING  MTU:3924  Metric:1
          RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          Collisions:0 

As you can see, the loopback interface has been assigned a netmask of 255.0.0.0, since 127.0.0.1 is a class A address.

Now you can almost start playing with your mini-network. What is still missing is an entry in the routing table that tells IP that it may use this interface as a route to destination 127.0.0.1. This is accomplished by using:

# route add 127.0.0.1

Again, you can use localhost instead of the IP address, provided you've entered it into your /etc/hosts.

Next, you should check that everything works fine, for example by using ping.

# ping localhost
PING localhost (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=0.4 ms
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=0.4 ms
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=0.4 ms
^C
--- localhost ping statistics ---
3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 0.4/0.4/0.4 ms
#

When you invoke ping as shown here, it will continue emitting packets forever, unless interrupted by the user. The ^C marks the place where we pressed Ctrl-C.

The previous example shows that packets for 127.0.0.1 are properly delivered and a reply is returned to ping almost instantaneously. This shows that you have successfully set up your first network interface.

If the output you get from ping does not resemble that shown in the previous example, you are in trouble. Check any errors if they indicate that some file hasn't been installed properly. Check that the ifconfig and route binaries you use are compatible with the kernel release you run, and above all, that the kernel has been compiled with networking enabled (you see this from the presence of the /proc/net directory). If you get an error message saying "Network unreachable," you probably got the route command wrong. Make sure you use the same address you gave to ifconfig.

The steps previously described are enough to use networking applications on a standalone host. After adding the lines mentioned earlier to your network initialization script and making sure it will be executed at boot time, you may reboot your machine and try out various applications. For instance, telnet localhost should establish a telnet connection to your host, giving you a login: prompt.

However, the loopback interface is useful not only as an example in networking books, or as a test bed during development, but is actually used by some applications during normal operation.[5] Therefore, you always have to configure it, regardless of whether your machine is attached to a network or not.

[5] For example, all applications based on RPC use the loopback interface to register themselves with the portmapper daemon at startup. These applications include NIS and NFS.

Ethernet Interfaces

Configuring an Ethernet interface is pretty much the same as the loopback interface; it just requires a few more parameters when you are using subnetting.

At the Virtual Brewery, we have subnetted the IP network, which was originally a class B network, into class C subnetworks. To make the interface recognize this, the ifconfig incantation would look like this:

# ifconfig eth0 vstout netmask 255.255.255.0

This command assigns the eth0 interface the IP address of vstout (172.16.1.2). If we omitted the netmask, ifconfig would deduce the netmask from the IP network class, which would result in an incorrect netmask of 255.255.0.0. Now a quick check shows:

# ifconfig eth0
eth0      Link encap 10Mps Ethernet HWaddr  00:00:C0:90:B3:42
          inet addr 172.16.1.2 Bcast 172.16.1.255 Mask 255.255.255.0
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING  MTU 1500  Metric 1
          RX packets 0 errors 0 dropped 0 overrun 0
          TX packets 0 errors 0 dropped 0 overrun 0

You can see that ifconfig automatically sets the broadcast address (the Bcast field) to the usual value, which is the host's network number with all the host bits set. Also, the maximum transmission unit (the maximum size of IP datagrams the kernel will generate for this interface) has been set to the maximum size of Ethernet packets: 1,500 bytes. The defaults are usually what you will use, but all these values can be overidden if required, with special options that will be described under "All About ifconfig".

Just as for the loopback interface, you now have to install a routing entry that informs the kernel about the network that can be reached through eth0. For the Virtual Brewery, you might invoke route as:

# route add -net 172.16.1.0

At first this looks a little like magic, because it's not really clear how route detects which interface to route through. However, the trick is rather simple: the kernel checks all interfaces that have been configured so far and compares the destination address (172.16.1.0 in this case) to the network part of the interface address (that is, the bitwise AND of the interface address and the netmask). The only interface that matches is eth0.

Now, what's that -net option for? This is used because route can handle both routes to networks and routes to single hosts (as you saw before with localhost). When given an address in dotted quad notation, route attempts to guess whether it is a network or a hostname by looking at the host part bits. If the address's host part is zero, route assumes it denotes a network; otherwise, route takes it as a host address. Therefore, route would think that 172.16.1.0 is a host address rather than a network number, because it cannot know that we use subnetting. We have to tell route explicitly that it denotes a network, so we give it the -net flag.

Of course, the route command is a little tedious to type, and it's prone to spelling mistakes. A more convenient approach is to use the network names we defined in /etc/networks. This approach makes the command much more readable; even the -net flag can be omitted because route knows that 172.16.1.0 denotes a network:

# route add brew-net

Now that you've finished the basic configuration steps, we want to make sure that your Ethernet interface is indeed running happily. Choose a host from your Ethernet, for instance vlager, and type:

# ping vlager
PING vlager: 64 byte packets
64 bytes from 172.16.1.1: icmp_seq=0. time=11. ms
64 bytes from 172.16.1.1: icmp_seq=1. time=7. ms
64 bytes from 172.16.1.1: icmp_seq=2. time=12. ms
64 bytes from 172.16.1.1: icmp_seq=3. time=3. ms
^C
----vstout.vbrew.com PING Statistics----
4 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 0
round-trip (ms)  min/avg/max = 3/8/12

If you don't see similar output, something is broken. If you encounter unusual packet loss rates, this hints at a hardware problem, like bad or missing terminators. If you don't receive any replies at all, you should check the interface configuration with netstat described later in "The netstat Command". The packet statistics displayed by ifconfig should tell you whether any packets have been sent out on the interface at all. If you have access to the remote host too, you should go over to that machine and check the interface statistics. This way you can determine exactly where the packets got dropped. In addition, you should display the routing information with route to see if both hosts have the correct routing entry. route prints out the complete kernel routing table when invoked without any arguments (-n just makes it print addresses as dotted quad instead of using the hostname):

# route -n
Kernel routing table
Destination  Gateway  Genmask         Flags Metric Ref Use    Iface
127.0.0.1    *        255.255.255.255 UH    1      0      112 lo
172.16.1.0   *        255.255.255.0   U     1      0       10 eth0

The detailed meaning of these fields is explained later in "The netstat Command". The Flags column contains a list of flags set for each interface. U is always set for active interfaces, and H says the destination address denotes a host. If the H flag is set for a route that you meant to be a network route, you have to reissue the route command with the -net option. To check whether a route you have entered is used at all, check to see if the Use field in the second to last column increases between two invocations of ping.

Routing Through a Gateway

In the previous section, we covered only the case of setting up a host on a single Ethernet. Quite frequently, however, one encounters networks connected to one another by gateways. These gateways may simply link two or more Ethernets, but may also provide a link to the outside world, such as the Internet. In order to use a gateway, you have to provide additional routing information to the networking layer.

The Ethernets of the Virtual Brewery and the Virtual Winery are linked through such a gateway, namely the host vlager. Assuming that vlager has already been configured, we just have to add another entry to vstout's routing table that tells the kernel it can reach all hosts on the Winery's network through vlager. The appropriate incantation of route is shown below; the gw keyword tells it that the next argument denotes a gateway:

# route add wine-net gw vlager

Of course, any host on the Winery network you wish to talk to must have a routing entry for the Brewery's network. Otherwise you would only be able to send data to the Winery network from the Brewery network, but the hosts on the Winery would be unable to reply.

This example describes only a gateway that switches packets between two isolated Ethernets. Now assume that vlager also has a connection to the Internet (say, through an additional SLIP link). Then we would want datagrams to any destination network other than the Brewery to be handed to vlager. This action can be accomplished by making it the default gateway for vstout:

# route add default gw vlager

The network name default is a shorthand for 0.0.0.0, which denotes the default route. The default route matches every destination and will be used if there is no more specific route that matches. You do not have to add this name to /etc/networks because it is built into route.

If you see high packet loss rates when pinging a host behind one or more gateways, this may hint at a very congested network. Packet loss is not so much due to technical deficiencies as to temporary excess loads on forwarding hosts, which makes them delay or even drop incoming datagrams.

Configuring a Gateway

Configuring a machine to switch packets between two Ethernets is pretty straightforward. Assume we're back at vlager, which is equipped with two Ethernet cards, each connected to one of the two networks. All you have to do is configure both interfaces separately, giving them their respective IP addresses and matching routes, and that's it.

It is quite useful to add information on the two interfaces to the hosts file as shown in the following example, so we have handy names for them, too:

172.16.1.1      vlager.vbrew.com    vlager vlager-if1
172.16.2.1      vlager-if2

The sequence of commands to set up the two interfaces is then:

# ifconfig eth0 vlager-if1
# route add brew-net
# ifconfig eth1 vlager-if2
# route add wine-net

If this sequence doesn't work, make sure your kernel has been compiled with support for IP forwarding enabled. One good way to do this is to ensure that the first number on the second line of /proc/net/snmp is set to 1.

IBM Redbooks Linux Performance and Tuning Guidelines

Abstract

Over the past few years, Linux has made its way into the data centers of many corporations all over the globe. The Linux operating system has become accepted by both the scientific and enterprise user population. Today, Linux is by far the most versatile operating system. You can find Linux on embedded devices such as firewalls and cell phones and mainframes. Naturally, performance of the Linux operating system has become a hot topic for both scientific and enterprise users. However, calculating a global weather forecast and hosting a database impose different requirements on the operating system. Linux has to accommodate all possible usage scenarios with the most optimal performance. The consequence of this challenge is that most Linux distributions contain general tuning parameters to accommodate all users.

IBMฎ has embraced Linux, and it is recognized as an operating system suitable for enterprise-level applications running on IBM systems. Most enterprise applications are now available on Linux, including file and print servers, database servers, Web servers, and collaboration and mail servers.

With use of Linux in an enterprise-class server comes the need to monitor performance and, when necessary, tune the server to remove bottlenecks that affect users. This IBM Redpaper describes the methods you can use to tune Linux, tools that you can use to monitor and analyze server performance, and key tuning parameters for specific server applications. The purpose of this redpaper is to understand, analyze, and tune the Linux operating system to yield superior performance for any type of application you plan to run on these systems.

The tuning parameters, benchmark results, and monitoring tools used in our test environment were executed on Red Hat and Novell SUSE Linux kernel 2.6 systems running on IBM System x servers and IBM System z servers. However, the information in this redpaper should be helpful for all Linux hardware platforms.

Update 4/2008: Typos corrected

[Feb 25, 2009] How to troubleshoot RHEL performance bottlenecks by Ken Milberg

09.30.2008

You've just had your first cup of coffee and have received that dreaded phone call. The system is slow. What are you going to do? This article will discuss performance bottlenecks and optimization in Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL5).

Before getting into any monitoring or tuning specifics, you should always use some kind of tuning methodology. This is one which I've used successfully through the years:

1. Baseline – The first thing you must do is establish a baseline, which is a snapshot of how the system appears when it's performing well. This baseline should not only compile data, but also document your system's configuration (RAM, CPU and I/O). This is necessary because you need to know what a well-performing system looks like prior to fixing it.

2. Stress testing and monitoring – This is the part where you monitor and stress your systems at peak workloads. It's the monitoring which is key here – as you cannot effectively tune anything without some historic trending data.

3. Bottleneck identification – This is where you come up with the diagnosis for what is ailing your system. The primary objective of section 2 is to determine the bottleneck. I like to use several monitoring tools here. This allows me to cross-reference my data for accuracy.

4. Tune – Only after you've identified the bottleneck can you tune it.

5. Repeat – Once you've tuned it, you can start the cycle again – but this time start from step 2 (monitoring) – as you already have your baseline.

It's important to note that you should only make one change at a time. Otherwise, you'll never know exactly what impacted any changes which might have occurred. It is only by repeating your tests and consistently monitoring your systems that you can determine if your tuning is making an impact.

RHEL monitoring tools

Before we can begin to improve the performance of our system, we need to use the monitoring tools available to us to baseline. Here are some monitoring tools you should consider using:

Oprofile

This tool (made available in RHEL5) utilizes the processor to retrieve kernel system information about system executables. It allows one to collect samples of performance data every time a counter detects an interrupt. I like the tool also because it carries little overhead – which is very important because you don't want monitoring tools to be causing system bottlenecks. One important limitation is that the tool is very much geared towards finding problems with CPU limited processes. It does not identify processes which are sleeping or waiting on I/O.

The steps used to start up Oprofile include setting up the profiler, starting it and then dumping the data.

First we'll set up the profile. This option assumes that one wants to monitor the kernel.

# opcontrol --setup –vmlinux=/usr/lib/debug/lib/modules/'uname -r'/vmlinux

Then we can start it up.

# opcontrol --start

Finally, we'll dump the data.

# opcontrol --stop/--shutdown/--dump

SystemTap

This tool (introduced in RHEL5) collects data by analyzing the running kernel. It really helps one come up with a correct diagnosis of a performance problem and is tailor-made for developers. SystemTap eliminates the need for the developer to go through the recompile and reinstallation process to collect data.

Frysk

This is another tool which was introduced by Red Hat in RHEL5. What does it do for you? It allows both developers and system administrators to monitor running processes and threads. Frysk differs from Oprofile in that it uses 100% reliable information (similar to SystemTap) - not just a sampling of data. It also runs in user mode and does not require kernel modules or elevated privileges. Allowing one to stop or start running threads or processes is also a very useful feature.

Some more general Linux tools include top and vmstat. While these are considered more basic, often I find them much more useful than more complex tools. Certainly they are easier to use and can help provide information in a much quicker fashion.

Top provides a quick snapshot of what is going on in your system – in a friendly character-based display.

It also provides information on CPU, Memory and Swap Space.

Let's look at vmstat – one of the oldest but more important Unix/Linux tools ever created. Vmstat allows one to get a valuable snapshot of process, memory, sway I/O and overall CPU utilization.

Now let's define some of the fields:

Memory
swpd – The amount of virtual memory
free – The amount of free memory
buff – Amount of memory used for buffers
cache – Amount of memory used as page cache

Process
r – number of run-able processes
b – number or processes sleeping.
Make sure this number does not exceed the amount of run-able processes, because when this condition occurs it usually signifies that there are performance problems.

Swap
si – the amount of memory swapped in from disk
so – the amount of memory swapped out.

This is another important field you should be monitoring – if you are swapping out data, you will likely be having performance problems with virtual memory.

CPU
us – The % of time spent in user-level code.
It is preferable for you to have processes which spend more time in user code rather than system code. Time spent in system level code usually means that the process is tied up in the kernel rather than processing real data.
sy – the time spent in system level code
id – the amount of time the CPU is idle wa – The amount of time the system is spending waiting for I/O.

If your system is waiting on I/O – everything tends to come to a halt. I start to get worried when this is > 10.

There is also:

Free – This tool provides memory information, giving you data around the total amount of free and used physical and swap memory.

Now that we've analyzed our systems – lets look at what we can do to optimize and tune our systems.

CPU Overhead – Shutting Running Processes
Linux starts up all sorts of processes which are usually not required. This includes processes such as autofs, cups, xfs, nfslock and sendmail. As a general rule, shut down anything that isn't explicitly required. How do you do this? The best method is to use the chkconfig command.

Here's how we can shut these processes down.
[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_140_234 ~]# chkconfig --del xfs

You can also use the GUI - /usr/bin/system-config-services to shut down daemon process.

Tuning the kernel
To tune your kernel for optimal performance, start with:

sysctl – This is the command we use for changing kernel parameters. The parameters themselves are found in /proc/sys/kernel

Let's change some of the parameters. We'll start with the msgmax parameter. This parameter specifies the maximum allowable size of a single message in an IPC message queue. Let's view how it currently looks.

[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]# sysctl kernel.msgmax
kernel.msgmax = 65536
[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]#

There are three ways to make these kinds of kernel changes. One way is to change this using the echo command.

[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]# echo 131072 >/proc/sys/kernel/msgmax
[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]# sysctl kernel.msgmax
kernel.msgmax = 131072
[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]#

Another parameter that is changed quite frequently is SHMMAX, which is used to define the maximum size (in bytes) for a shared memory segment. In Oracle this should be set large enough for the largest SGA size. Let's look at the default parameter:

# sysctl kernel.shmmax
kernel.shmmax = 268435456

This is in bytes – which translates to 256 MG. Let's change this to 512 MG, using the -w flag.

[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]# sysctl -w kernel.shmmax=5368709132
kernel.shmmax = 5368709132
[root ((Content component not found.)) _29_139_52 ~]#

The final method for making changes is to use a text editor such as vi – directly editing the /etc/sysctl.conf file to manually make our changes.

To allow the parameter to take affect dynamically without a reboot, issue the sysctl command with the -p parameter.

Obviously, there is more to performance tuning and optimization than we can discuss in the context of this small article – entire books have been written on Linux performance tuning. For those of you first getting your hands dirty with tuning, I suggest you tread lightly and spend time working on development, test and/or sandbox environments prior to deploying any changes into production. Ensure that you monitor the effects of any changes that you make immediately; it's imperative to know the effect of your change. Be prepared for the possibility that fixing your bottleneck has created another one. This is actually not a bad thing in itself, as long as your overall performance has improved and you understand fully what is happening.

Performance monitoring and tuning is a dynamic process which does not stop after you have fixed a problem. All you've done is established a new baseline. Don't rest on your laurels, and understand that performance monitoring must be a routine part of your role as a systems administrator.

About the author: Ken Milberg is a systems consultant with two decades of experience working with Unix and Linux systems. He is a SearchEnterpriseLinux.com Ask the Experts advisor and columnist.

[Feb 23, 2009] Deployment_Guide/Gathering System Information

Before you learn how to configure your system, you should learn how to gather essential system> information. For example, you should know how to find the amount of free memory, the amount of available hard drive space, how your hard drive is partitioned, and what processes are running. This chapter discusses how to retrieve this type of information from your Red Hat Enterprise Linux system using simple commands and a few simple programs.

1. System Processes

The ps ax command displays a list of current system processes, including processes owned by other users. To display the owner alongside each process, use the ps aux command. This list is a static list; in other words, it is a snapshot of what was running when you invoked the command. If you want a constantly updated list of running processes, use top as described below. The ps output can be long. To prevent it from scrolling off the screen, you can pipe it through less:

ps aux | less

You can use the ps command in combination with the grep command to see if a process is running. For example, to determine if Emacs is running, use the following command:

ps ax | grep emacs

The top command displays currently running processes and important information about them including their memory and CPU usage. The list is both real-time and interactive. An example of output from the top command is provided as follows:

To exit top press the q key. Useful interactive commands that you can use:

For more information, refer to the
top(1) manual page.

Recommended Links

IBM Redbooks Linux Performance and Tuning Guidelines (June 05, 2007)

Over the past few years, Linux has made its way into the data centers of many corporations all over the globe. The Linux operating system has become accepted by both the scientific and enterprise user population. Today, Linux is by far the most versatile operating system. You can find Linux on embedded devices such as firewalls and cell phones and mainframes. Naturally, performance of the Linux operating system has become a hot topic for both scientific and enterprise users. However, calculating a global weather forecast and hosting a database impose different requirements on the operating system. Linux has to accommodate all possible usage scenarios with the most optimal performance. The consequence of this challenge is that most Linux distributions contain general tuning parameters to accommodate all users.

IBMฎ has embraced Linux, and it is recognized as an operating system suitable for enterprise-level applications running on IBM systems. Most enterprise applications are now available on Linux, including file and print servers, database servers, Web servers, and collaboration and mail servers.

With use of Linux in an enterprise-class server comes the need to monitor performance and, when necessary, tune the server to remove bottlenecks that affect users. This IBM Redpaper describes the methods you can use to tune Linux, tools that you can use to monitor and analyze server performance, and key tuning parameters for specific server applications. The purpose of this redpaper is to understand, analyze, and tune the Linux operating system to yield superior performance for any type of application you plan to run on these systems.

The tuning parameters, benchmark results, and monitoring tools used in our test environment were executed on Red Hat and Novell SUSE Linux kernel 2.6 systems running on IBM System x servers and IBM System z servers. However, the information in this redpaper should be helpful for all Linux hardware platforms. >

dkftpbench

http://www.kegel.com/

http://linuxperf.nl.linux.org/

http://www.citi.umich.edu/projects/citi-netscape/

NFS Performance Tunging

http://home.att.net/~jageorge/performance.html

http://www.linux.com/tuneup/

http://www.psc.edu/networking/perf_tune.html#Linux

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Fifty glorious years (1950-2000): the triumph of the US computer engineering : Donald Knuth : TAoCP and its Influence of Computer Science : Richard Stallman : Linus Torvalds  : Larry Wall  : John K. Ousterhout : CTSS : Multix OS Unix History : Unix shell history : VI editor : History of pipes concept : Solaris : MS DOSProgramming Languages History : PL/1 : Simula 67 : C : History of GCC developmentScripting Languages : Perl history   : OS History : Mail : DNS : SSH : CPU Instruction Sets : SPARC systems 1987-2006 : Norton Commander : Norton Utilities : Norton Ghost : Frontpage history : Malware Defense History : GNU Screen : OSS early history

Classic books:

The Peter Principle : Parkinson Law : 1984 : The Mythical Man-MonthHow to Solve It by George Polya : The Art of Computer Programming : The Elements of Programming Style : The Unix Hater’s Handbook : The Jargon file : The True Believer : Programming Pearls : The Good Soldier Svejk : The Power Elite

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The Last but not Least Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt. Ph.D


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