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Today seems like a good day to catch up on some random thoughts gathering dust over the past few weeks.

I've remarked on it before, but it still strikes me as strange how we go through Linux distro release cycles. Consistent with recent past history, we're looking at two more releases over the next few weeks. Mandrake 9.1 is scheduled for release in April, as is the next release of Red Hat. I haven't seen any plans for a new SuSE release, but a release following closely on the heels of Mandrake and Red Hat wouldn't surprise me in the least. It seems that either a) the development cycles of these three distros pretty closely parallel one another or b) the position of Linux in the marketplace is much more competitive than many would assume. Either scenario is good, really. The former means that the manufacturers have a clear idea of needed improvements and a great plan for making them. The latter means that the marketplace is and likely will continue to drive commercial Linux development into the foreseeable future. Truth is, I hope they stay pretty close in their cycles. That would mean they continue to be viable commercial Linux entities. There's a trickle-down in the Linux world that will pull the smaller distro manufacturers along with them.

The weather is beginning to move toward spring in Iowa. I got some time in the sun this past weekend - with the laptop in the driveway. Before I did that, I took a bit of time to reconfigure my Linksys. I was having a bit of trouble maintaining a connection to the network outside the house. I found that when I set the speed down, the coverage got considerably better. I was able to walk back outside with the laptop, park my behind in the lawn chair on the far side of my driveway, and surf away without so much as a single interruption in the connection. It makes sense, it's just something I hadn't realized or explored.

Aside from being able to surf outdoors, warmer weather in Iowa also marks the beginning of some of my favorite pastimes.

First, of course, is riding loose through the Iowa countryside on the motorcycle. I've been out several times in the past few weeks, letting the wind ripple my cheeks and water my eyes. It takes a bit early in the season to find that perfect lean into the curves, but it's a process that's terribly fun to practice, nonetheless. Iowa is a completely different riding environment early in the year that in mid to late summer. The fields are completely bare. The wind has a bit more of an edge. The streets in town still have a dusting of the sand and chemicals that were only recently used to clear the snow. That last makes riding in town a proposition that requires even more attention than normal. By mid July, the streets will be clear, the fields green and rich, and the wind under my half-shell helmet warm and refreshing.

Of course, by mid July, the sound of bats striking baseballs will be in full swing, as well. If you're a longtime Penguin Shell reader, you already know that baseball is a personal passion - the St. Louis Cardinals, in particular. Yeah, the Final Four can be exciting. Yes, the Superbowl has its appeal. For my money, though, there's nothing like a 162 game season that spans the year from April through October. Scanning the box scores will fill my mornings, a kind companion to that first cup of coffee, for a full six months. Each box is the full story of a game in a language all its own. The inevitable ebb and flow of the season will pull me through the summer, as it has for as long as I can remember. The "dark months" are finally rolling to an end.

Of course, the summer holds other highlights. If you missed it last week, the head Gnome made a reference or two to the best summer geek bash on the planet. Though I'm not sure it's been officially announced, Gnomedex 3 is on. "The Fellowship of the Geeks" should be the biggest, baddest, most fun Gnomedex experience yet. I know - if you've been to the first two, bigger, badder and more fun hardly seem possible. Well - count on it. If you miss it this year, you really will have missed it, that mystical "it" that takes you to a higher plane of Geekdom. Clear off your late July calendar and watch for the magical details in all the Lockergnome newsletters.

There now. A little spring cleaning for the brain goes a long ways. Have a great Tuesday and come back on Thursday.

Happy just sittin' here in my tux,              
Tony Steidler-Dennison       

GnomeTWEAK

Sharing Feeds

I've written a bit in the past few weeks about syndication - reading RDF, RSS and XML files via an installed newsreader on your machine. After having covered both AmphetaDesk and Newsmonster, I've landed on AmphetaDesk as the permanent feed reader. While I liked the features of Newsmonster, it seemed to grab bandwidth constantly. AmphetaDesk is nice and light and provides all the features I'm looking for.

AmphetaDesk also provides a feature I've been taking advantage of on the new laptop. When I first set up the Dell and hung it on the wireless network at home, I installed AmphetaDesk almost as a matter of course. Then I realized that I was going to need to take the time to research and reconfigure all my feeds for the laptop. At this moment, I'm pulling 65 different syndicated sites, so I wasn't too thrilled by the thought of searching them all out and adding them to the laptop AmphetaDesk.

That's when I remembered that AmphetaDesk offers the opportunity to share the news feeds with other machines. I opened it on one of my home desktop machines and clicked over to the MySettings link. Near the bottom of the page, I found the setting I only vaguely remembered from the original setup. Should AmphetaDesk Be Accessible From Other Computers? I pulled down the dropdown and selected Allow Other Computers.

Now, I can connect to the local AmphetaDesk server on that machine from the laptop, using the IP address and port 8888. Actually, I've added that machine name to my /etc/hosts file, so it's simply a matter of opening the browser on the laptop and entering http://cerebellum:8888. There are all 65 channels in glorious syndication.

If you don't want to reconfigure multiple machines for reading news via AmphetaDesk, and you know the IP address of the machine on which it currently resides (or, alternatively, have added the machine to the /etc/hosts file), you can have your news feeds anywhere. Tweak your AmphetaDesk settings, and you'll always be informed.

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GnomeCORE

Get your favorite Linux flavor on CD: Pick your favorite Linux flavor and get it on CD for as low as $1.95. Find Linux gear, books, and software for Linux at Linux Central . Check out the selection today!

We all know that Linux is built around the ability to network machines. That explains why the majority of server on the 'net are Linux-based machines. The built-in networking capabilities in Linux also make it possible to, for example, log in directly to my machine at home to check my email from work. Nearly all the functionality you'll need to network one machine to another, or even one to many, is available right out of the box with Linux.

One of those capabilities is the ability to share filesystems over the network as if they were on your local machine. Using NFS (Network File System), you can mount a remote filesystem on your local machine, making the sharing of files from one to the other a transparent operation.

To establish NFS, you'll need to make a few configuration changes on the machine from which you'll be sharing. We'll call this machine the NFS server. First, you'll need to open the /etc/exports file on the NFS server, making a few edits with your favorite text editor. Add the following line: directory     hostname (options)

This represents the directory that will be mounted on the remote machine and the hostname of the machine on which it will be mounted. The options include rw for read-write and ro for read-only. So, for instance, if I want to share a directory from my desktop machine Cerebellum to the laptop (Callosum), the line would look like this:

/mnt/share     callosum(rw)

That takes care of phase one of your sharing setup.

The next step is to allow the remote machine access to the services necessary to share the file. For this, you'll need to edit the /etc/hosts.allow file, adding the following lines:

portmap:     remote.machine
lockd:       remote.machine
rquotad:     remote.machine
mountd:      remote.machine
statd:       remote.machine

This allows the remote machine access to the services necessary to share a directory via NFS: portmap, lockd, rquotad, and mountd
Having allowed access to these services in hosts.allow, you'll want to take the additional security precaution to lock all others out of these services. Open /etc/hosts.deny in a text editor and add the following:

lockd:ALL
mountd:ALL
rquotad:ALL
statd:ALL

What you've accomplished with these two steps is to allow only a single machine access to these services. All others will be denied.

Now, with the security measures addressed, you're ready to start the services. Use the following commands:

/sbin/service/portmap start
/sbin/service/nfs start
/usr/sbin/rpc.mountd

(Your path may vary - the above example represent a Red Hat or Red Hat-like system).

A quick check will tell you whether you're up and running, ready to share a filesystem with another machine:

/usr/sbin/rpcinfo -p

At a minimum, you should see the following services running in the results returned by the above command: portmapper, nfs and mountd. With these services running, you'll be able to connect to the shared filesystem from the machine noted in /etc/hosts.allow and /etc/exports.

To connect, simply mount the filesystem from the remote machine like you would any other:

mount server:/mnt/export /mnt/share

In this example, server is the nfs server, /mnt/export is the directory shared by the nfs server and /mnt/share is the local directory on which you'll mount the remote filesystem. You can configure these according to your tastes.

With the above completed, you should be able to look into the shared filesystem using, for example, the ls command. It's as if it's located on your local machine.

Networking becomes more critical and more useful each and every day. With Linux, you're ahead of the curve with the ability to mount remote filesystems as if they were located on your local machine.

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GnomeFILE

nut 7.21

http://www.lafn.org/~av832/

"nut is nutrition software to record what you eat and analyze your meals for nutrient composition. The database included is the USDA Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Release 15, which contains 6,220 foods. This database contains values for vitamins, minerals, fats, calories, protein, carbohydrates, fiber, etc., and includes the essential polyunsaturated fats, Omega-3 and Omega-6. Nutrient levels are expressed as a percentage of the Daily Value, the familiar standard of food labeling in the United States, but also can be fully customized. Recipes can be added. The program is completely menu-driven and there are no commands to learn."

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Debian and Wireless
Scribbled by Brandon Danner

"I have a WPC11 ver 3 and just put Debian on my system. I'm quite happy with it - and after editing my config.opts file in /etc/pcmcia to match the manfid and binding it to orinoco_cs, I'm up and running with Woody. Lots of luck with Mandrake 9.1.

"I liked it, but I'm switching to Debian. Odd, you're a Debian guy (if I remember correctly) and I used to be a Mandrake guy...seems the tables have turned.

"Keep on pumping out the good stuff for the ole penguin."

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GnomeCLICK

Really Linux

http://www.reallylinux.com/

"Perhaps we should begin by telling you who we are not!

"We are not directly affiliated or sponsored by any organization or company, and we absolutely do not sell advertising on our website.

"All of the information on our site is based on the book Linux for the Rest of Us that includes more updated tips and details. And most importantly, the proceeds of this book are being donated to charity.

"We know getting started with Linux is often toughest. We provide help, documents, and direction on finding Linux information you need so you can avoid frustration!

"Absolutely, unequivocally we believe in the benefits of using Linux over other operating systems for three simple key reasons: it’s FREE, it’s FLEXIBLE, and it’s FAST."

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