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Articles, sustainability work, and the occasional take on what it means to keep critical systems running.

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2021.10.09

Setup 2FA on centos 8/fedora/rhel based distros

Important note!! If you are facing issues with logging in, check if selinux is running and either disable it or change the contexts. selinux blocks reading your google-authenticator key files. trial and error dnf…

kevin
2021.10.08

Docker day 1

This article is a work in progress. Email your suggestions to kevin@fivemin.net. Build, swap and remove infrastructure in a text file Docker containers are a set of tools to quickly and easily build, swap out and remove…

Containersdockerkevinvirtualization
2021.09.23

What is the difference between tagged and untagged vlan ports? Tagged = trunk ports, untagged = access ports

VLAN-enabled ports are generally categorized in one of two ways, tagged or untagged. These may also be referred to as “trunk” or “access” respectively. The purpose of a tagged or “trunked” port is to pass traffic for…

GlossarykevinNetworking General
2021.09.23

List of networking management software

# software Age Link Comment 1 SNMP-C 23/01/1990 https://www.castlerock.com/products/snmpc/ # software Age Link Comment

kevinsoftwareTools
2021.09.22

What are NNI and UNI ports on access switches?

These distinctions are common in metro area networking were an ISP needs to keep track of their uplink and downlink ports. NNI ports = Network Interface Port = Uplink port = WAN ports. NNI port characteristics include…

Tutorials
2021.09.21

why is the command line interface needed cant we just write configurations by hand?

Sure! If you know the configuration language its easy to write a configuration file. Command line interfaces are often used to format your configuration file in a very specific manner, one can think of the CLI as an…

kevin
2021.09.21

What is the difference between console ports and management ports on switches?

Console ports enable console connections using, usually, a USB to db9 connector. These ports are usually used when first setting up a switch were the technician has physical access to the switch. Management ports are…

kevin
2021.09.19

virt-manager is deprecated and moving to the cockpit project, RHEL/CENTOS/FEDORA

Different alternatives exists to manage kvm guests: * Cockpit Webgui - Limited functionality, works in any webbrowser after enabling webgui and the webgui virtualization plugin on the server * Virt-manager GUI -…

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.19

qemu/kvm/libvirt guests, up and running checklist

Updated continually, Getting started with libvirt, a checklist Requirements: KVM hypervisor/virtualization packages on your virtualization host/libvirt host Management can either be done using: * Command line, the virsh…

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.19

SPICE server slow performance, change display server from wayland to xorg

This post is a part of “up and running with libvirt guests series” myLibvirtGuest# echo $XDG_SESSION_TYPE #check current display server wayland myLibvirtGuest# logout At the login screen, select the "gear" icon and…

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.19

Enable copy paste in libvirt guests, Install spice-vdagent using libvirt centos 8

This post is a part of “up and running with libvirt guests series” Tldr: see below instructions for centos 8 myLibvirtHost# virsh destroy myguest myLibvirtHost# virsh edit --domain myguest # ADD BELOW CODE SNIPPET…

dnfkevinrpmspice-vdagentxml
2021.09.18

What is localhost, 127.0.0.1 and loopback-address ? Hint: Different ways to reference your computer

tldr: the dns name Localhost or ip address 127.0.0.1 is a reserved network address that always mean YOUR OWN COMPUTER/HOST/NODE, these addreses are assigned to the loopback interface. Localhost or 127.0.0.1 are by…

Tutorials
2021.09.17

vlc transparent

To make the playback window always on top select Video -> Always On Top from the menu. (Mac Video -> “Float on Top”) I don’t see a way to change the transparency when VLC goes out of focus without using a window manager…

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.17

KVM vs ILO/IDRAC/IPMI for out of band management

tldr: ILO is integrated and requires more configuration, KVM can be installed a top of rack switch but not give power on/off functionality like KVM more here soon

Tutorials
2021.09.14

"Open message in conversation" does not work or do anything Thunderbird solution

This can be because the message gets marked as 'hot', when unchecking 'hot' from the message it can be read in the 'open conversation' view again. Go to the 'send' inbox and search for the conversation using the info in…

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.13

What is "Cut-through", "store and forward" and "fragment free" switching methods?

Switching methods forward layer 2 frames in different ways * Cut through * Store and forward * Fragment free Cut-through switching reads only the the destination part of mac header which means that the switch will begin…

Tutorials
2021.09.13

What is a nonblocking switch fabric / architecture?

Switchports are tied to a back-plane or “fabric”, the back-plane coordinates switching between ports and end devices. Sometimes there is a discrepancy between the processing power of the back-plane and its switchports:…

explainedkevinnonblocking
2021.09.12

Cant connect to hyper v manager, probably because you don't have permissions for your current user

Solution: COMPUTER MANAGEMENT > Local Users and groups > groups > hyper v > add user to hyper v group > sign in and out

Other-Tutorials
2021.09.12

The Virtual Machine Management Service encountered and error while configuring the hard disk

TLDR: you already have a hard disk created in your save folder with this name. Remove it or rename your vm.

Other-Tutorials