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How to use speedtest on a Linux server to check, store and report internet speeds graphically
by Peter Reutemann 08 Sep '17

08 Sep '17

'Following on from a set of problems of poor broadband connectivity I was experiencing I decided that I wanted to monitor the Mbps speed I was getting from my provider on a regular basis. I was seeing especially poor figures when trying to download files in the evening, with much faster speeds achieved very early in the morning. I have a Linux Debian server sitting in a corner, which is my test and development machine for ISPConfig-hosted websites, as well as some Let's Encrypt code I like to play around with, so I looked for some software that would enable bandwidth testing, runnable from a linux command line, which could form the basis of an automated shell script system to produce the raw data I needed. I wanted to store the data in a SQL database to make querying simple (I could then easily gather more data and just extract a smaller subset for time periods I was interested in) and to have a web front-end that could produce a simple chart to visualise the data and help highlight the connectivity issues.' -- source: https://www.howtoforge.com/tutorial/how-to-use-speedtest-on-a-linux-server-… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Android Oreo Bug Eats Up Mobile Data Even When On Wi-Fi
by Peter Reutemann 07 Sep '17

07 Sep '17

'An apparent bug with Android Oreo has been discovered which means Google's mobile operating system could be munching its way through your data allowance, even if you're connected to a wireless network. A thread on Reddit highlighted the issue, with many people pointing out that it could prove expensive for anyone not using an unlimited data plan. Google is apparently aware of the problem and is working on a patch, but in the meantime Oreo users are being warned to consider disabling mobile data when they are at home or using a wireless connection elsewhere.' -- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/17/09/06/2240208 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Linux Kernel 4.13 Officially Released
by Peter Reutemann 06 Sep '17

06 Sep '17

'As expected, the Linux 4.13 kernel series was made official this past weekend by none other than its creator, Linus Torvalds, which urges all Linux users to start migrating to this version as soon as possible. Work on Linux kernel 4.13 started in mid-July with the first Release Candidate (RC) milestone, which already gave us a glimpse of the new features coming to this major kernel branch. There are, of course, numerous improvements and support for new hardware through updated drivers and core components. Highlights of Linux kernel 4.13 include Intel's Cannon Lake and Coffee Lake CPUs, support for non-blocking buffered I/O operations to improve asynchronous I/O support, support for "lifetime hints" in the block layers and the virtual filesystem, AppArmor enhancements, and better power management. There's also AMD Raven Ridge support implemented in the AMDGPU graphics driver, which received numerous improvements, support for five-level page tables was added in the s390 architecture, and the structure randomization plugin was added as part of the build system.' -- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/17/09/05/1637226 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Use Aircrack-ng To Test Your WiFi Password
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Most people have terrible passwords, and WiFi is no exception. Your WiFi password is your primary line of defense against unwanted access to your network. That access can result in a whole host of other nasty things because an attacker can monitor the traffic on your network and even gain direct access to your computers. The best way to prevent such an intrusion is to use the same tools an attacker would to test the security of your WiFi password. [...] Remember this process should only ever be used to test your own security. Using it on someone else's network is illegal.' -- source: https://linuxconfig.org/use-aircrack-ng-to-test-your-wifi-password Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Geo – A Simple BASH Utility To Get Network And Geolocation Details
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'A while ago, we wrote a blog post about “Bash-Snippets”, a set of BASH scripts for heavy command-line users. Those scripts consists of many useful utilities such as crypt, geo, cheat, weather, ytview and more. Using bash-Snippets, you can install all utilities or a particular one. In this brief guide, we are going to discuss about only one utility in the Bash-Snippets called “Geo”. It is used to display wan, lan, router, dns, mac address, and geolocation output, with clean stdout for piping.' -- source: https://www.ostechnix.com/geo-simple-bash-utility-get-network-geolocation-d… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Oracle Finally Killed Sun
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'The news from the ex-Sun community jungle drums is that the January rumours were true and Oracle laid off the core talent of the Solaris and SPARC teams on Friday (perhaps hoping to get the news lost in the Labor Day weekend). With 90% gone according to Bryan Cantrill that surely has to mean either a skeleton-staffed maintenance-only future for the product range, especially with Solaris 12 cancelled, or an attempt to force Solaris workloads onto Oracle’s SPARC Cloud offering. A classic Oracle “silent EOL”, no matter what they claim as they satisfy their contractual commitments to Fujitsu and others. ' -- source: https://meshedinsights.com/2017/09/03/oracle-finally-killed-sun/ Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Linux Mint 18.3 to Launch with Revamped Backup Tool, Window Progress, and More
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Last month, we reported that development of Linux Mint 18.3 kicked off with HybridSleep support for the Cinnamon desktop environment, HiDPI support and GTK3 porting for the Software Sources tool, as well as the revamp of the Software Manager graphical package manager, which was also ported to latest GTK+ 3 technologies. And now, the Linux Mint creator reveals the fact that Linux Mint 18.3 will be shipping with a revamped Backup Tool that won't require root anymore, offers a much easier to use interface that no longer requires you to select the type or source of a backup, and it's capable of backing up your entire Home directory. The tool will restore files in their initial location, with the same permissions and timestamps.' -- source: http://news.softpedia.com/news/linux-mint-18-3-to-launch-with-revamped-back… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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To Linux Mint KDE 18.2… and back
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Linux Mint KDE is just one of several flavours of Linux Mint, and obviously not the flagship of this distribution. However, I liked that distribution in my test of the Live version of Linux Mint KDE 18.2. I liked it so much that I decided to give it a go in installed mode. How was that? Let’s check.' -- source: http://linuxblog.darkduck.com/2017/09/to-linux-mint-kde-182-and-back.html Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Vulnerabilities Discovered In Mobile Bootloaders of Major Vendors
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Android bootloader components from five major chipset vendors are affected by vulnerabilities that break the CoT (Chain of Trust) during the Android OS boot-up sequence, opening devices to attacks. The vulnerabilities were discovered with a new tool called BootStomp, developed by nine computer scientists from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Researchers analyzed five bootloaders from four vendors (NVIDIA, Qualcomm, MediaTek, and Huawei/HiSilicon). Using BootStomp, researchers identified seven security flaws, six new and one previously known (CVE-2014-9798). Of the six new flaws, bootloader vendors already acknowledged five and are working on a fix. "Some of these vulnerabilities would allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code as part of the bootloader (thus compromising the entire chain of trust), or to perform permanent denial-of-service attacks," the research team said (PDF). "Our tool also identified two bootloader vulnerabilities that can be leveraged by an attacker with root privileges on the OS to unlock the device and break the CoT."' -- source: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/17/09/05/0257221 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Android One Is Anything But Dead, Google Reaffirms With Xiaomi Mi A1
by Peter Reutemann 05 Sep '17

05 Sep '17

'Google executives shared the stage with Xiaomi chiefs at a media event in New Delhi on Tuesday as the Chinese phone maker unveiled its "new flagship" Mi A1 smartphone. Google's presence at the event was essential. Xiaomi's Mi A1 is the latest phone to be launched under Google's Android One program, a three-year-old initiative from Google, which in the past year has been presumed dead by many. It's anything but that, Google executives said. The Xiaomi Mi A1 smartphone features a 5.5-inch full-HD (1080x1920 pixels) display. It also offers a duo of 12-megapixel rear cameras, one with telephoto capability and 2X optical zoom feature. On the front, for the selfie enthusiasts is a 5-megapixel shooter. The dual-SIM capable Mi A1 smartphone houses a Snapdragon 625 octa-core SoC, 4GB of RAM, 64GB internal storage, IR blaster, a 3080mAh battery, a fingerprint scanner, modems for 4G LTE bands in its gold- and black-coloured thin, full-metal unibody form factor. It is priced at $235, and will be available in dozens of markets including Mexico, India, Indonesia, Russia, and Singapore.' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/17/09/05/1014235 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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