My new Technoblog over at typepad

Now that I've completed my migration to a new blogging service which I believe better suits my needs and taste, I will be no longer posting to my technoblog at blogger.com. You will need to update your bookmarks or RSS aggregator program.

My new blog is now at:
http://jarednevans.typepad.com/technoblog/

or you can subscribe to the RSS feed of my new blog at:
http://jarednevans.typepad.com/technoblog/index.rdf

Using Blogger for one year was a good learning experience for a new blogger like myself but now I'm ready to move on to a more professional blogging service. With the features on my new blog I really like being able to categorize my posts and I should be adding a search engine link soon.

I won't remove the blogger blog anytime soon and leave it up for future reference.

Be seeing you all over at typepad.com!

Techworld.com - Pervasive posts rival to MySQL

Techworld.com - Pervasive posts rival to MySQL: "Pervasive Software, best known for embedded databases aimed at
medium-sized businesses, is making the leap into the enterprise with a
customised version of the open-source PostgreSQL database."

Twiki Authentication working on FreeBSD

Install Apache13 (Apache13-modssl could work but not tested)
get it up and running

install twiki from /usr/ports
get basic configuration up and running (be sure to set the mail options in TWikiPreferences)
register yourself on the twiki

Follow authentication setup instructions very carefully.

Finally, Inside /usr/local/etc/apache/access.conf, add:

< d i r e c t o r y /usr/local/www/twiki/bin >
AllowOverride All
< d i r e c t o r y >

Holbrook: Flash: FreeBSD beats Debian for getting newer software

This has been my experience too:

--------------------
Flash: FreeBSD beats Debian for getting newer software

I've been playing with FreeBSD recently, and it brought home a point Paul Beard has made to me a number of times. Debian packages make it trivial to install new software, but there's a good chance that that software will be an older version that what you want. If you want a newer version, expect pain. FreeBSD ports will more than likely have the version you want, but it will take longer to install it, because you'll have to compile it from scratch. But if you want that newer version, you'll get there faster with FreeBSD than with Debian. See my essay on the subject for more details.

Installing SSL and Apache13-modssl

To Install Apache with modssl:

After the UpdatePorts, install apache as follows:

cd /usr/ports/security/openssl
make
make install
cd /usr/ports/www/apache13-modssl
make
make install

Create a self signed certificate initially:

openssl req -new -x509 -nodes -out /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.crt/server.crt -keyout /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.key/server.key -days 3650

Edit /usr/local/etc/apache/httpd.conf and set ServerName to the correct hostname.

To obtain a UW/IST signed certificate, visit The UW/IST Certificate Authority, then...

Edit /usr/local/etc/apache/httpd.conf and change:

SSLCertificateFile /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.crt/server.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.key/server.key

to:

SSLCertificateFile /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.crt/uwserver.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.key/uwserver.key

Save the public certificate to /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.crt/uwserver.crt

Save the private key to /usr/local/etc/apache/ssl.key/uwserver.key

Add the following to /etc/rc.conf...

apache_enable="YES"
apache_flags="-DSSL"
apache_pidfile="/var/run/httpd.pid"

Restart apache to start using the new certificate...

/usr/local/etc/rc.d/apache.sh stop
/usr/local/etc/rc.d/apache.sh start

To allow cgi scripts, edit /usr/local/etc/apache/httpd.conf as follows

Add the ExecCGI options

Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews ExecCGI

uncomment

AddHandler cgi-script .cgi

portupgrade on FreeBSD

These are good commands to try to resolve any compiling errors that are dependencies-related:

update your ports and make new index then do a portupgrade

portsnap fetch
portsnap update (do a portsnap extract instead only for the very first time)
cd /usr/ports
make fetchindex
portsdb -u
portversion -v -l "<" to see which apps are out of date
check /usr/ports/UPDATING for information you need to do before portupgrading
portupgrade -varR

using /usr/bin/manpath in bash login

export MANPATH=$(/usr/bin/manpath)

startx of KDE takes too long!

Startx too long start of kde! please help
When i start tke KDE (with startx command) i must wait a long time.

Here are two things to immediately try: Check the permissions of /tmp/.ICE-Unix which should be owned by root:wheel and set to 1777 (or drwxrwxrwt)
KDE will still work without these permissions, but it will cause a pause during startup if it's not.

Also, Check your machine knows it's own address. Make sure you have a proper entry in /etc/hosts with the real hostname and ip address (not just the localhost one.) Messed up DNS can cause a 2 minute or more timeout when KDE is starting up.

startx to use KDE on FreeBSD

Q.
I have FreeBSD 5.1 installed, I know the startx command and am familiar with using it from Mandrak-Linux. However, when I use the startx command with FreeBSD it gives me an X-Window environment. What file do I have to configure to have KDE start by using the startx command and how do I configure it?

A.
The long and short of it is make sure you have KDE installed and then do

echo 'exec startkde' > ~/.xinitrc"

FreeBSD > How to customized Home, Del, Insert keys for BASH shell?

By default when you use FreeBSD's BASH shell and you hit Home, Del, Insert keys all of them just prints ~. Here is the way to get rid of this problem:

1) Open bash global profile file:
vi /etc/profile

2) Add following line to it:
export INPUTRC=/etc/inputrc

3) Save file

4) Open file /etc/inputrc and define key binding:
vi /etc/inputrc Here is my FreeBSD inputrc file.

5) Add key binding to it:
set meta-flag on
set input-meta on
set convert-meta off
set output-meta on

'\e[1~': beginning-of-line
'\e[4~': end-of-line
'\e[5~': beginning-of-history
'\e[6~': end-of-history
'\e[3~': delete-char
'\e[2~': quoted-insert
'\e[5C': forward-word
'\e[5D': backward-word


6) Save file

7) Test it by login into FreeBSD box"