aggregated thinking

Updates, finally!

Some of the stuff I've been doing lately: grokking Postfix (again), remapping sites for migration this week, and domain auctions.

I also moved my non-tech stuff to posterous.

Export TweetDeck groups in Ubuntu

If you have multiple installs of TweetDeck on different computers, I bet you wished there were ways to save the groups you set up. These groupings are not saved in your Twitter profile, but are kept in a local database in your computer. This means that for each install of TweetDeck, you will have to re-set up your groups, and any changes won't replicate to your other installs.

This post about copying TweetDeck settings in Windows explains this in detail, and I have been able to do the same for Ubuntu, replicating TweetDeck settings across 3 machines. Just take note of some of the differences that I'm going to point out here.

Adobe Air for Linux uses the .appdata directory in your home directory, for profile settings, configurations, etc. In the computer that has your groups and is the source for the export, change working directory into .appdata, and look for the TweetDeckFast.{some hash here}.

jon@jedi-ntbk:~$ cd .appdata
jon@jedi-ntbk:~/.appdata$ ls
Adobe
cookie_file.txt
de.makesoft.twhirl.0EA062BC275E7ED1E6EC3762EFFD73C7158ADF33.1
jrcf_H7t6Ap
jrcf_RA5I7w
jrcf_wdLW48
Snippage.B28FB424FD6880E47B18D7D649F6CC93BDE9B29B.1
TweetDeckFast.F9107117265DB7542C1A806C8DB837742CE14C21.1
jon@jedi-ntbk:~/.appdata$

Change directory to the one that says TweeDeckFast and list the contents. Change directory into Local Store and you should find two files that has your username. In my case, they are

preferences_jjdoblados.xml
td_26_jjdoblados.db

Simply copy these two files to any target machine in the same directory where you got them. Make sure that TweetDeck is closed before copying. When done copying, start TweetDeck and you will have all of your groups intact!

PIIX3 cannot attach drive to the Secondary Master

I use VirtualBox for my server experimenting requirements, and it's just great!  Just this morning, I got an error message when I started an FC8 virtual machine.

PIIX3 cannot attach drive to the Secondary Master.
VBox status code: -102 (VERR_FILE_NOT_FOUND).

This thread in the forums explains that the virtual machine was looking for a disk that was supposed to be mounted and could not find it.  I was using an external DVD drive and had removed it before I shut down the VM.

You'd get the same problem if you set up a VM to use a mounted disk or some other mass storage device.  To fix this, simply uncheck the non-existent devices in the VM settings while the VM is powered down.  Alternately, you can plug the devices back in before you power up the VM.

If after doing these steps you still get the error, check if the devices do get mounted and are accessible from the host as you may be dealing with broken or non-functional devices.

Removing Adobe Air apps on Ubuntu

I was trying to remove AgileAgenda after fiddling with it for a week and deciding it wasn't going to cut it. There's no Adobe Air Application "uninstaller" in the menu, and search engine results usually point to Mac lurv, or not.  Seems like uninstalling Air apps on OSX is bloody.

I did find this nice article on removing Adobe Air on Linux and gave it (well parts of it) a shot.

jon@jedi-ntbk:/opt$ sudo dpkg -S /opt/*
adobeair-enu: /opt/Adobe AIR
com.agileagenda.agileagenda.f49a4d8df78a1fee7a3be440dc11bab18d922274.1: /opt/AgileAgenda
de.makesoft.twhirl.0ea062bc275e7ed1e6ec3762effd73c7158adf33.1: /opt/twhirl

I merely copied the package name of AgileAgenda, ran dpkg with the right switches, and pfft app's gone! Menu entry seems to be gone too.

jon@jedi-ntbk:/opt$ sudo dpkg -P com.agileagenda.agileagenda.f49a4d8df78a1fee7a3be440dc11bab18d922274.1
(Reading database ... 128350 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing com.agileagenda.agileagenda.f49a4d8df78a1fee7a3be440dc11bab18d922274.1 ...
jon@jedi-ntbk:/opt$

More Plesk Blues

I've had this problem with Plesk since I started relying heavily on it in 2006.  For some reason, after you've added your client, allocated IP address to client's pool, added a domain, and selecting physical hosting, you get the message:

Unable to update hosting preferences: hosting update is failed: object ID is invalid

I didn't know exactly where to get the .skel directory, but some Googling led me to /home/httpd/vhosts/.skel/0, which after some directory skimming, I was able to verify as non-existent. I simply copied an existing .skel directory from one of our other servers and redid the physical hosting setup.

I'll see if I can find out what's causing the .skel directory to cease to exist. This is a fairly easier to solve issue. I so need to start looking in forums of Parallels (formerly SWSoft) for solutions.

cross-posting is about integration

got multiply? this is a test of the multiply-blogger cross-posting feature.

my must-have's for firefox

in not so significant order:

1. mm3-proxyswitch
2. regular expressions tester
3. del.icio.us
4. greasemonkey
4. better gmail
5. firegpg
6. downThemAll
7. save as image

you're looking good, opensource!

on work and blogging

plesk won't start after tweaking mysql

i've had this happen to me again the other week and as always, felt like kicking myself for not remembering.

we do a lot of performance tuning on mysql, and as a result, we almost always manage to get plesk mangled. not its fault, it just can't run without mysql, doh.

not of preference, but plesk happens to be there to make handling domains easier, as a single editing point when you want to change something and not worry about missing something out.

so there's a custom /etc/my.cnf that we use, and with changes to limits done (both on mysql and via ulimit), you'd think that a reload of mysqld would do. (we use InnoDB btw)

normally, that's all you need to have mysqld read off the new settings. if you've grown so dependent on plesk (like i have), you would not notice that mysqld didn't actually start, and you will get an error when you load plesk, thinking that it's a plesk error:


ERROR: PleskMainDBException
MySQL query failed: Incorrect information in file: './psa/misc.frm'

0: /usr/local/psa/admin/plib/common_func.php3:218
db_query(string 'select param, val from misc')
1: /usr/local/psa/admin/plib/common_func.php3:497
get_param(string 'mysql41_compatible')
2: /usr/local/psa/admin/plib/common_func.php3:394
db_set_names()
3: /usr/local/psa/admin/plib/common_func.php3:373
db_connect_real(string 'localhost', string 'admin', string '********', string 'psa')
4: /usr/local/psa/admin/plib/common_func.php3:353
db_connect()
5: /usr/local/psa/admin/auto_prepend/auth.php3:82


even a restart of the plesk service will not work:


[root@jedi]# /etc/init.d/psa restart
Unable to query parameter by query select val from misc where param='mysql41_compatible': Incorrect information in file: './psa/misc.frm'
Unable to query parameter by query select val from misc where param='mysql41_compatible': Incorrect information in file: './psa/misc.frm'
Mysql error: Incorrect information in file: './psa/key_history.frm'
Processing config directory: /usr/local/psa/admin/conf/httpsd.*.include
Syntax OK
/usr/local/psa/admin/bin/httpsdctl restart: httpd restarted
ERROR 1033 (HY000) at line 1: Incorrect information in file: './psa/sessions.frm'


so this is a mysqld failing to start properly problem. to fix this, go to your mysql datadir and see if the sizes of your innodb log files match those in your .cnf. we usually set innodb_log_file_size = 256M and innodb_log_buffer_size = 256M in /etc/my.cnf.

if they don't match, stop mysqld, remove the ib_logfile0 and ib_logfile1 files, and start mysqld. be careful not to delete the ibdata1 or ibdata2 files or you lose your data. avoid using rm -r ib* (yea, wildcards and fast fingers give sysads their most stupefying moments)

innodb will recreate the log files to match your .cnf and mysqld now becomes available for plesk.