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New Server, Day 3 November 18, 2009

Posted by jmcomputer in Linux, Projects.
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Okay, so after my success with the VirtualBox install of vTiger, I went to the office to try to install vTiger on the server again. This time I am following a couple walkthroughs that I found earlier here and here. The first link is how to do the initial install, and written very nicely on a forum. The second link is how to finish the installation using vTiger’s Installation Wizard (completely html/php based).

So, I completely removed the old database, deleted the entire directory of vTiger in /var, and re-extracted the files again (good thing I saved that .tar file). After getting apache2 setup, and working my way through, I got to the configuring of vTiger, and had access denied messages, seems I had forgotten I had altered the envvars for Apache on my last few attempts. At this point, everything seems to be flowing nicely. Now I take a moment and write down all the different users/passwords that are being used (mysql, vtiger, user accounts, etc)…

Well, that went off nicely, now we have an empty CRM that we can start using (as soon as I start adding users into it). I’ve also got a couple bandwidth monitoring things running (I think I’ll have to start using screen on this too). Got Dovecot, Postfix, and SSH configured.

TODO: Add users to the CRM, add the mail server to the CRM, get hostname configured properly (aside from localhost stuff), and finally contact the network provider to get NAT tables set up for this server.

WOW! Almost finished on this thing!

VirtualBox Presentation November 14, 2009

Posted by jmcomputer in Linux, Presentation.
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While I am not extremely fond of public speaking in general, there are topics that I do love to talk about. I was recently asked to do a presentation on Virtualization and Linux at a local Community College where I live. Seems they have a Linux class that the instructor teaches, and the instructor enjoyed my presentation when they first saw it last year. So this morning I packed up my trusty System76 laptop andheaded down there. Presentation was very smooth for being my style of a free-form presentation (no slides, no outline, etc.), students had great questions, and some good ideas already on virtualization.

Ran through the typical “How-To” for VirtualBox, described a little on the differences I’ve noticed between VirtualBox and VMWare’s Server2. Even got to throw in some interesting commentary for prepping for real world (“Don’t completely believe advertising from any direction”, “There is always the right tool for a job, sometimes it’s Linux, sometimes it’s not”, “Coolest thing in virtualization, in VMWare’s ESX moving a RUNNING VM from one host to another seamlessly”, “OpenGL and DirectX Support in Windows Guests, as long as Guest Additions installed in Safe Mode”, etc).

Also a good mix of students in the class as well (and only one playing games during half of my talk that I noticed, oh well). Had some who immediately recognized what a TI-99, and a Tandy 1000 was, others familiar with BBS’s, to those where computers are still somewhat foreign to them.

Can’t really say if I made any new converts to the Linux side, but was definitely an eye-opener when they saw my Ubuntu/Kubuntu laptop instead of Fedora’s desktop that they are using in class. Also, this does show that I should really consider becoming a teacher; while I have fancied the idea of teaching part-time at a community college as  a supplement to a “real” job, it would also give “warm fuzzies” and “feel good”s for hopefully making a difference. No, I would not consider high school or lower, and there’s a reason, I wouldn’t be able to put up with three things: the mentality of the students, the politics, nor the parents.

New Server, Testing… November 13, 2009

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One of the reasons I love Linux, you google an issue and you can find a solution if you have enough time to sift. So I found two install manuals/write-ups, tested them on a test install on virtualbox, so I got the CRM installed, then just needed to configure it. Enter the second manual, and WOOHOO! after a little bit, I had it fully up and running! Now to just do the same on the server I was working on.

Side note, checked into phpmyadmin hoping it had some user utilities, seems that it doesn’t, and mysql navigator kept giving me errors when trying to add users… dunno if I will have to investigate that one further or not.

New server, Day 2 November 12, 2009

Posted by jmcomputer in Linux, Projects.
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Okay, so I came in today with 4 hours to spare and had planned on finishing up the server. At the point where I am having to leave soon, I realize I should have planned my approach rather than just taking a shotgun approach… sigh

Tried to install the vTiger CRM (http://vtiger.com) from their provided binary, and unfortunately it does not seem to be adapted for the apache builds from Ubuntu’s repos; or there is something that I am missing in the setup of Apache 2.2.12. Either way, even when I specified the apache root directories (both the content and the binaries) it wouldn’t take (could this have something to do with the fact that it’s not using httpd binary but the apache2 binary instead?)

Okay, time for the long way, or rather what seemed like the long way… downloaded source, dumped it into /var/www and point firefox to localhost/vtigercrm… Hey, at least that works, but now vtiger is telling me it doesn’t have a lot of permissions, so now to hunt for that. Seems Ubuntu’s apache install didn’t add the apache user or group. Okay, let’s add that… vtiger now says that it can access the IMAP, but now all the permissions that were shown are missing??? Does this mean it worked? Wait, it’s also saying that the php.ini file is not configured right (*confused*)!

Okay, fire up gedit and check it, seems I made the changes right, does vtiger not see what directory it’s in? Let’s just see where the installation goes, not putting much faith into it, and seems it’ll have to build 300+ tables, WOW! SO I finish the walkthrough web interface, and it finally gets around to “setting up”; impressive, looks like it worked, reasonably well, let’s sign into it… Oh wait, I didn’t specify users or passwords to get into it…. (*HEAVY sigh*)

And now I have run out of time, will have to look into this more next week sometime.

Mental Note: How about firing up a Virtualbox, install UB9.10, and see if I can get this thing to work at home and document steps… or maybe should I switch to CentOS or something?

To be continued….

New Server Install November 11, 2009

Posted by jmcomputer in Linux, Projects.
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Okay, so my first post.

Set up a server today as one of my projects, hardware’s a little on the aged side, and somewhat smaller than I would like for a production server, but beggers cannot be chosers, right?

Specs:

2 Ghz Celeron, 768M mem, 40G ATA-33, 2x 18G SCSI, everything else integrated on motherboard.

So I had the debate over which distro to install since there’s not much money for software.  So debated between Ubuntu or CentOS, ended up with Ubuntu, so then time for Desktop or Server install. Both good options, but the “client” would like to have a desktop environment for some administration. So it came down to the Desktop CD. The standard install went through without a problem, even got most of the services installed (apache, Dovecot, postfix, etc). Now here’s where the fun begins, I have been searching for an Open Source CRM, and had checked out quite a few (SugarCRM, and a couple others), found vTiger CRM, contacted clients and asked them to see the demo. Come to find out they really liked it, so that’s on the plan to install later. Now what to do with those SCSI drives…

Since I’m installing a CRM and IMAP mail server, I decided to make the SCSI drives a RAID1 (mirroring). So I started researching this so that I was at least somewhat prepared as to what packages to install and steps to take and the like. Found a nice walkthrough (wish I hadn’t deleted the link already) that talked about setting up software RAIDs using mdadm. Followed it through generally, although on the first run somehow I ended up with the /dev/md0 missing the superblock (or was it just /dev/sdb1?), so it took me another hour or so attempting to delete the /dev/md0 and then the partition tables on the drives. Eventually I did get the RAID assembled and running, got the /home directory copied over, so later I’ll copy again and mount it as the /home directory.

Also interesting, if the Ubuntu devs ever read this, I used the User and Groups administration tool to create some users and change root’s password, oddly enough the users were created but none of the passwords worked, I actually had to use the terminal to change the passwords (yeah, I know, lazy using the GUI, but was trying to do that at the same time I was mucking with the package installs, RAID setup, etc).

TODO: finish configuring apache, sshd, imap, contact the company handling the network and have the network configured for the server. Then I can finally pull down the pages from GoDaddy and hand out the usernames/passwords.