- Roundtable - muug.ca

muug.ca server upgraded to Debian 13
by Trevor Cordes 13 Mar '26

13 Mar '26

The muug.ca mirror server has been upgraded from Debian 12 to 13. The upgrade took a few hours in the wee hours of March 13. If you encounter any issues with services/daemons please notify the board, or me directly (with MUUG in the subject). Nothing much has changed in the way of features: more of a maintenance release.

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File attributes
by Kevin McGregor 05 Mar '26

05 Mar '26

Further to my question about the "." at the end of the permissions I saw on a file: On Oracle Linux 8.10 (minimal install, anyway) there is no "lsattr" command. Also, the file system is xfs and I think lsattr doesn't work on xfs. At any rate, I was able to install the "attr" command which supports xfs. I got this result: [root@cowsvtora810 ~]# cd /etc/sudoers.d [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# ls -l total 12 -r--r-----. 1 root root 26 Mar 3 02:56 ansible -r--r-----. 1 root root 25 Mar 3 02:56 packer -r--r----- 1 root root 26 Mar 3 16:54 systems [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# attr -l ansible Attribute "selinux" has a 31 byte value for ansible [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# attr -l packer Attribute "selinux" has a 27 byte value for packer [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# attr -l systems [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# attr -g selinux packer attr_get: No data available Could not get "selinux" for packer [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# getfattr --name selinux packer packer: selinux: Operation not supported [root@cowsvtora810 sudoers.d]# getfattr --name root.selinux packer packer: root.selinux: Operation not supported That's probably sufficient to answer my question. There are additional attributes and they relate to selinux. I don't need to pursue this any further than that, although if anyone knows what the 31- and 27-byte attribute values might be, I'm curious.

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Reminder: MUUG Meeting, Tonight, Mar 3, 7:30pm (NEW LOCATION) -- NetworkManager
by Gilbert Detillieux 03 Mar '26

03 Mar '26

A reminder that the MUUG meeting will be this evening, both in person and online. See below for details on NEW LOCATION... The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting IN PERSON, on Tuesday, March 3rd, at 7:30pm. Yes, that's the FIRST Tuesday of the month... NetworkManager: The ifcfg (But Not) Way It's coming... are you ready? NetworkManager is a replacement for the venerable ifcfg or interfaces files that let you configure your network interfaces. Red Hat World(TM) forced every Fedora user to switch to NM in Fedora 41. And a great disturbance in the force was felt. Just as with systemd, your <insert slower distro here> will force you to abandon your cherished way of doing things one of these months/years. "But I love my simple text files!" - so did Trevor Cordes, who will demonstrate at the next meeting how to use NM as close to the ifcfg way as possible using nmconnection files. So when you're forced to change, you can spend 3 minutes on it instead of 3 days. Where to find the Meeting: **NOTE NEW LOCATION** Winnipeg Senior Citizens Radio Club, 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor WSC is located at 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor, a block South from the St. Mary's / St. Anne's fork, on the West side beside the Miller's Meats. It's in the old fire hall, so you really can't miss it! Look for the red door. There are a limited number of parking spaces for WSC around the building. If you arrive early you'll probably snag one. If not, there is parking available on the nearby streets, such as Mager Dr, or the streets off of St. Mary's such as Blenheim or Clonard Ave. Be careful not to park in nearby private parking lots unless otherwise indicated. There is no elevator, so attendees will have to be able to climb a flight of stairs. Apologies to anyone requiring accessibility. *Please Remove Your Footwear!* To keep the carpets clean and dry, please remove your outdoor footwear at the top of the stairs. Feel free to bring a pair of indoor shoes, sandals, or Crocs to use indoors. *Entry Log Book:* To support WSC operations, we ask all guests to sign the log book provided by WSC as you enter the meeting space. Online Meeting Option: For those unable or preferring not to attend in person, the meeting will also be available online, using BBB as usual. Stay tuned to our muug.ca home page for the official URL, which will be made available about a half hour before the meeting starts. (Reload the page if you don't see the link, or if there are issues with connecting.) The group now holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the *first* Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board, or linking to it on social media: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://muug.ca/

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MUUG Meeting, Tuesday, Mar 3, 7:30pm (NEW LOCATION) -- NetworkManager
by Gilbert Detillieux 24 Feb '26

24 Feb '26

The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting IN PERSON, on Tuesday, March 3rd, at 7:30pm. Yes, that's the FIRST Tuesday of the month... NetworkManager: The ifcfg (But Not) Way It's coming... are you ready? NetworkManager is a replacement for the venerable ifcfg or interfaces files that let you configure your network interfaces. Red Hat World(TM) forced every Fedora user to switch to NM in Fedora 41. And a great disturbance in the force was felt. Just as with systemd, your <insert slower distro here> will force you to abandon your cherished way of doing things one of these months/years. "But I love my simple text files!" - so did Trevor Cordes, who will demonstrate at the next meeting how to use NM as close to the ifcfg way as possible using nmconnection files. So when you're forced to change, you can spend 3 minutes on it instead of 3 days. Where to find the Meeting: **NOTE NEW LOCATION** Winnipeg Senior Citizens Radio Club, 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor WSC is located at 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor, a block South from the St. Mary's / St. Anne's fork, on the West side beside the Miller's Meats. It's in the old fire hall, so you really can't miss it! Look for the red door. There are a limited number of parking spaces for WSC around the building. If you arrive early you'll probably snag one. If not, there is parking available on the nearby streets, such as Mager Dr, or the streets off of St. Mary's such as Blenheim or Clonard Ave. Be careful not to park in nearby private parking lots unless otherwise indicated. There is no elevator, so attendees will have to be able to climb a flight of stairs. Apologies to anyone requiring accessibility. *Please Remove Your Footwear!* To keep the carpets clean and dry, please remove your outdoor footwear at the top of the stairs. Feel free to bring a pair of indoor shoes, sandals, or Crocs to use indoors. *Entry Log Book:* To support WSC operations, we ask all guests to sign the log book provided by WSC as you enter the meeting space. Online Meeting Option: For those unable or preferring not to attend in person, the meeting will also be available online, using BBB as usual. Stay tuned to our muug.ca home page for the official URL, which will be made available about a half hour before the meeting starts. (Reload the page if you don't see the link, or if there are issues with connecting.) The group now holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the *first* Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board, or linking to it on social media: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://muug.ca/

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Reminder: MUUG Meeting, Tonight, Feb 3, 7:30pm (NEW LOCATION) -- /bin Diving Duo
by Gilbert Detillieux 03 Feb '26

03 Feb '26

A reminder that the MUUG meeting will be this evening, both in person and online. See below for details on NEW LOCATION... The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting IN PERSON, on Tuesday, February 3rd, at 7:30pm. Yes, that's the FIRST Tuesday of the month... /bin Diving Duo Wyatt Zacharias will dive into the /bin a couple times, and see what interesting nuggets can be found, studied, and explained this time. Wyatt may also do a more traditional RTFM-style presentation on a specific (and predetermined) command, such as cowsay. Come for the fun of it, stay for the group participation and shared learning opportunity! Where to find the Meeting: **NOTE NEW LOCATION** Winnipeg Senior Citizens Radio Club, 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor WSC is located at 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor, a block South from the St. Mary's / St. Anne's fork, on the West side beside the Miller's Meats. It's in the old fire hall, so you really can't miss it! Look for the red door. There are a limited number of parking spaces for WSC around the building. If you arrive early you'll probably snag one. If not, there is parking available on the nearby streets, such as Mager Dr, or the streets off of St. Mary's such as Blenheim or Clonard Ave. Be careful not to park in nearby private parking lots unless otherwise indicated. There is no elevator, so attendees will have to be able to climb a flight of stairs. Apologies to anyone requiring accessibility. *Please Remove Your Footwear!* To keep the carpets clean and dry, please remove your outdoor footwear at the top of the stairs. Feel free to bring a pair of indoor shoes, sandals, or Crocs to use indoors. *Entry Log Book:* To support WSC operations, we ask all guests to sign the log book provided by WSC as you enter the meeting space. Online Meeting Option: For those unable or preferring not to attend in person, the meeting will also be available online, using BBB as usual. Stay tuned to our muug.ca home page for the official URL, which will be made available about a half hour before the meeting starts. (Reload the page if you don't see the link, or if there are issues with connecting.) The group now holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the *first* Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board, or linking to it on social media: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://muug.ca/

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MUUG Meeting, Tuesday, Feb 3, 7:30pm (NEW LOCATION) -- /bin Diving Duo
by Gilbert Detillieux 26 Jan '26

26 Jan '26

The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting IN PERSON, on Tuesday, February 3rd, at 7:30pm. Yes, that's the FIRST Tuesday of the month... /bin Diving Duo Wyatt Zacharias will dive into the /bin a couple times, and see what interesting nuggets can be found, studied, and explained this time. Wyatt may also do a more traditional RTFM-style presentation on a specific (and predetermined) command, such as cowsay. Come for the fun of it, stay for the group participation and shared learning opportunity! Where to find the Meeting: **NOTE NEW LOCATION** Winnipeg Senior Citizens Radio Club, 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor WSC is located at 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor, a block South from the St. Mary's / St. Anne's fork, on the West side beside the Miller's Meats. It's in the old fire hall, so you really can't miss it! Look for the red door. There are a limited number of parking spaces for WSC around the building. If you arrive early you'll probably snag one. If not, there is parking available on the nearby streets, such as Mager Dr, or the streets off of St. Mary's such as Blenheim or Clonard Ave. Be careful not to park in nearby private parking lots unless otherwise indicated. There is no elevator, so attendees will have to be able to climb a flight of stairs. Apologies to anyone requiring accessibility. *Please Remove Your Footwear!* To keep the carpets clean and dry, please remove your outdoor footwear at the top of the stairs. Feel free to bring a pair of indoor shoes, sandals, or Crocs to use indoors. *Entry Log Book:* To support WSC operations, we ask all guests to sign the log book provided by WSC as you enter the meeting space. Online Meeting Option: For those unable or preferring not to attend in person, the meeting will also be available online, using BBB as usual. Stay tuned to our muug.ca home page for the official URL, which will be made available about a half hour before the meeting starts. (Reload the page if you don't see the link, or if there are issues with connecting.) The group now holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the *first* Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board, or linking to it on social media: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://muug.ca/

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strongswan
by Trevor Cordes 08 Jan '26

08 Jan '26

A quick note, for anyone running strongswan (an ipsec ike2 vpn): switch over to the new conf file format and daemon system sooner rather than later. If you are upgrading to a newer distro (F42 for me), the old strongswan system just doesn't work propely. It'll rekey improperly and just drop SAs (connections) in H2H/N2N scenarios. Nothing you can do will fix this. Switch to the new format and everything just works. Unfortunately, translating between the old & new conf formats isn't the easiest thing (even with the automated python conversion script) as there isn't a 1-to-1 mapping of options. Hint: you'll probably need 2 children for a roadwarrior connection... if you know, you know.

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MUUG Meeting, Tuesday, Jan 6, 7:30pm (NEW LOCATION) -- Linux File System Encryption
by Gilbert Detillieux 30 Dec '25

30 Dec '25

The Manitoba UNIX User Group (MUUG) will be holding its next monthly meeting IN PERSON, on Tuesday, January 6th, at 7:30pm. Yes, that's the FIRST Tuesday of the month... Linux File System Encryption With increased threats to information security, and increased demands for compliance with privacy laws, data encryption is becoming an important requirement. But deciding between available solutions can be complicated. Multiple options are of course available for Linux, but which one is best may depend on your use case. In this presentation, Gilbert Detillieux will describe 3 different options: LUKS works at the raw disk/partition level, and may be best for removable media, laptops, and systems where full disk encryption is needed. At the file-system level, eCryptfs and Fscrypt allow for encryption on a file or directory basis, with support for multiple users and keys. Each solution has its limitations and advantages. Where to find the Meeting: **NOTE NEW LOCATION** Winnipeg Senior Citizens Radio Club, 598 St. Mary?s Road, 2nd Floor WSC is located at 598 St. Mary's Road, 2nd Floor, a block South from the St. Mary's / St. Anne's fork, on the West side beside the Miller's Meats. It's in the old fire hall, so you really can't miss it! Look for the red door. There is no elevator, so attendees will have to be able to climb a flight of stairs. Apologies to anyone requiring accessibility. *Please Remove Your Footwear!* To keep the carpets clean and dry, please remove your outdoor footwear at the top of the stairs. There are a limited number of parking spaces for WSC around the building. If you arrive early you'll probably snag one. If not, there is parking available on the nearby streets, such as Mager Dr, or the streets off of St. Mary's such as Blenheim or Clonard Ave. Be careful not to park in nearby private parking lots unless otherwise indicated. For those unable or preferring not to attend in person, the meeting will also be available online, using BBB as usual. Stay tuned to our muug.ca home page for the official URL, which will be made available about a half hour before the meeting starts. (Reload the page if you don't see the link, or if there are issues with connecting.) The group now holds its meetings at 7:30pm on the *first* Tuesday of every month from September to June. (There are no meetings in July and August.) Meetings are open to the general public; you don't have to be a MUUG member to attend. For more information about MUUG, and its monthly meetings, check out their web server: https://muug.ca/ Help us promote this month's meeting, by putting this poster up on your workplace bulletin board or other suitable public message board, or linking to it on social media: https://muug.ca/meetings/MUUGmeeting.pdf -- Gilbert E. Detillieux E-mail: <gedetil(a)muug.ca> Manitoba UNIX User Group Web: http://muug.ca/

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suppress broken pipe error
by Trevor Cordes 28 Dec '25

28 Dec '25

I have a little bit of bash (see bottom) that basically checks to see if any box is pingable on the LAN. But with a trick: it'll quit/return the instant it gets a single reply. That's so my script doesn't have to wait for nmap to finish (which can take a minute vs maybe 1 sec for the first computer to respond). It works great. One problem though... on one box only, sometimes (not always) I'll get a: grep: write error: Broken pipe in the output. I would like to suppress that error. I ran bash with -x and the grep error appears in the debug output after the grep -q RCVD line... however I'm not sure that's not a red herring as the entire stanza may be counted as one line for the debug? And I fail to see how there can be a write error on that part of the pipe -- there's nothing it's piping to! A read error, sure. But write? Yes, the kill makes huge swathes of the pipe just "go away", and maybe that's part of it. But I'm trying to redirect most 2>&1's as you can see. I don't need to solve the "problem" of pipes disappearing, I just want it to shut up. I also want to solve it without putting the meat of the code into a separate script (that seems like cheating). Any ideas? sint=192.168.100 timeout 20 bash -c \ " \ (nmap -ddd -vvv --send-ip \ --host-timeout 5s --max-rtt-timeout 1s --initial-rtt-timeout 500ms \ --max-retries 1 -S $sint.1 -sn -PE $sint.2 $sint.100-254 2>&1 & \ echo \$! >&3) \ 3>pidnmap \ | grep --line-buffered -P 'RCVD.{0,30}?ICMP.{0,60}?Echo reply' \ | (head -1 && /bin/kill \$(<pidnmap) >/dev/null 2>&1) \ " \ |grep -q RCVD || { # do some network-restart stuff }

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ECC motherboards w/PCIe x16?
by Adam Thompson 13 Dec '25

13 Dec '25

Since we’ve been talking about ECC… I’m looking for a motherboard that does ECC *and* has a real PCIe x16 slot on it. Right now, the best deal I can find is C$360 for a GigaByte MX33-BS0 and … a used Xeon E-2314 off eBay for C$200, so ~C$560. (Not including RAM, yikes.) Supposedly, AMD chips as cheap as the AMD Ryzen 5 7600X (C$250) support ECC, if paired with the right motherboard – which I’m not sure even exists. I want 32GB minimum (preferably supports 64GB+), a “real” x16 slot, and either a real x4 slot or an onboard 10G SFP+ NIC… but even PCPartPicker has no idea which AM5 mobos support ECC! From Reddit, the other usual source, I learn that I can basically “try one and see”, which isn’t what I want at all! Should I just pay mildly silly amounts of money for a previous-generation Intel solution? I can go get a used Dell PowerEdge 720 for not much money, and I have the rack to put it in, but I really really really do not want the PERC RAID controllers they all come with. (I don’t mind Dells of that era, they would otherwise be perfectly fine.) -Adam athompso(a)athompso.net<mailto:athompso@athompso.net> Feel free to email me directly rather than cluttering the list with commercial emails, if you have something you can sell me directly. P.S. yes I’m aware that many, but definitely not all, Dell PERCs can be reflashed to IT mode, but that creates issues with the Lifecycle Controller and some BIOS revisions. And when buying used, it’s hard to be certain which PERC is included – the R720 could come with, IIRC, 9 different RAID cards.

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