Working with Solaris 10 zones

This year, while creating the disaster backup server, I decided to but all 6 systems on one V490 with a 3310 SCSI array made into a ZFS filesystem with double parity RAIDz2 and a hot spare.  I allocated 90% and then carved it up among the Oracle Application Servers and Oracle database.

A couple of things I wanted to make note of: I found that if you simply specify the mask in the zonecfg, you do not have to add any /etc/netmasks or /etc/network entries.  After issuing an "add net" simply say "set address=192.168.1.1/24" and it saves times.  It will, of course, assume the class C mask (which is correct in this case) but the ugly nag message can be avoided if you do either of the above.

The other thing I got bit by was sub-zone Ethernet connections.  I had a sub-zone that needed a special VLAN not used by the global zone.  So, I just added the Ethernet connection and forgot about it.  After rebooting, NOTHING WORKED!  It turns out the special VLAN was the connection used by my (virtual) DNS server. Since the global instance wasn't using it, it didn't get plumbed up after reboot and then it wasn't there for the DNS system and so nothing had DNS which caused a lot of slow timeouts, black screens, etc.  I didn't want or need that VLAN in the global zone so I experimented with touching /etc/hostname.ce2 (the unused card in the global zone).  That is, a created an empty file placeholder.  Amazingly - it worked.

I can't believe this actually worked!

I'm using Slackware 13 with XFCE. Love how fast and stable it is! But, I'm not much of a KDE fan. Especially KOffice - yuckko! So, I tried to install OpenOffice. It wouldn't compile due to some missing libraries and with the way Slackware is, getting the dependencies looked hopeless. Then I ran across this link: How do I install OpenOffice.org on Slackware? It was for OO 2 but I tried it anyway. I unpacked the OO 3 tar.gz, changed into the RPMS dir anbd ran the Slackware "rpm2tgz" tool. Then, unlike the instructions, I went crazy and just ran "pkgtool" on the whole directory. And it worked! So far, so good. No instabilities - but I'll post a reply to this if it blows up. Wish me luck!

New Linux

I've gotten spoiled by Ubuntu.  I think it's a great desktop OS (if you're into Linux).  I was recently using Fedora 11 as a Desktop at home (off of a bootable USBish device).  It's okay - I prefer it for server apps that are designed for Fedora.  I also loaded CentOS in a zone on  Solaris.  It's okay too.  Still - Ubuntu makes a lot of things too easy to pass up.  I've got Karmic Koala at home.  It's fine.  Can't see any difference between that and the 9.04 (whatever fuzzy animal that was named after - Feisty Fawn?)

Anyway, this guy was beating it up.  His reasons seem silly.  He's probably just trying to get some hits on his web site.

But I ran across this: Hadn't seen Lubuntu before (but noticed Knoppix's been using that desktop for a while). (I'm on Linux-Mag's mailing list since I *had* to see the answer to a forum there the other day).

So anyway, lot's of fanfare about Karmic this week.  This guy mentions ArchLinux as an easier alternative to Gentoo.  I wondered if anyone had tried it.  Then I remembered we had this mailing
list... but it bounced.  Maybe we don't have a mailing list anymore...

Beautiful Weekend Brings Out Bees

It got up over 70 today and was sunny and windy. That brought the girls out in force with not much to do (November being a low nectar time). So I refilled the sugar water - TWICE! And, I'm fairly certain it's empty again. I'll do the same tomorrow. I really should make that winter top cover they demo'd in Bee Culture last month. Could make feeding a lot less trouble (although I got away with feeding without the gear this morning).

First Astronomy Post Since 2005!

I stopped logging my astronomy sessions a few years back. It was was such a beautiful dark sky when I got home at 7pm I couldn't resist setting up the scope. My criteria for a dark sky was met: I could detect Andromeda with the naked eye! NOt bad for an object 2,500,000 light years away (well, of course, it IS an entire galaxy)! Even better - I nailed it on the first try! Got it in thr view finder and had it centered in the scope!! Next I looked at Pleiades. Meh. No nebular cloudiness so - kinda boring tonight. I was able to split the binary star in Cynus with low power. I've never done that before. Jupiter was not too interesting either. Even with a dark green filter I had to use my imagination to see one equatorial band. I detected and viewed a large open cluster down and to the left of Cygnus. I don't remember that that was. Tried to view the Ring Nebula in Vega with low power to no avail. I think there was a lot of moisture in the sky and the horizons in every direction were washed out with light. It didn't used to be that bad out here. The city folk moving out here are scared of the dark and leave lots of flood lights on. Ever since they paved the road it's gotten worse! :-)

Finally! The Harvest!

We finally got our first harvest of HONEY! It's not much - less than 8 pounds. It's also a bit too high in moisture but I figured we'd give it away and eat it ourselves quick enough that it wouldn't have a chance to granulate. Wow! There's a lot to learn about beekeeping. I'm pretty sure I know what went wrong. I was WAY too late adding the second hive body. They are packed into the two hove bodies pretty well and I have reduced the entrance to keep out mice (and drafts). I'm going to make a modified top entrance with a pivoting top to allow feeding during winter. If all goes well with the wintering, I am hoping for 40-60 pounds next year!

I like weeds

I scattered a lot of wild flower seeds around this summer. Not sure if this is one of them or not. There were a few interesting, unusual wildflowers. I'd say 98% didn't come up. This box of seeds obviously did not adhere to the "growing like a weed" philosophy. I'm definitely going to till first next year before sewing the seeds (I know: "duh!"). We had a bumper crop of black eyed susans but I can't take credit for those.