Thursday, May 31, 2012
Adonis Server
The Check in/Check out feature enables Adonis administrators to effectively pull (check out) theconfiguration file directly from the Adonis server, make modifications to it, deploy the changes, andthen push (check in) the configuration back to the server. This way, multiple administrators can workon the same configuration by temporarily creating a local copy and then updating the server copy.Built in is a lock-out feature that eliminates the possibility of more than one administrator working onthe configuration at the same time, and possibly overwriting changes. The lockout feature preventsother administrators from obtaining a configuration file that is checked out.Check in is a process for storing the latest configuration on the Adonis appliance, as opposed todeployment, which is a process designed to install and activate the latest changes on the server(s).Before checking the configuration file in or out, you can view the log of all check-in/out server activity byclicking the
View Log
button. This log indicates who has performed management functions to theserver.The following procedures explain how to initially set up and use the check in feature, and how tomake changes once the configurations are set up.
Checking In a Configuration File
When you are satisfied with the changed you have made to the configuration file, you should check inthe file so that other Adonis administrators can work on it.Before you check in a configuration file, you should deploy the file to the server. This activates thechanges you have made.
Ready to go for:
- Web Hosting
- Network Printing
- File Sharing
- Mail Serving
- SQL Databases
- SSH
Drupal at Warp Speed
Doesn’t it give you a warm feeling when you’re asked to do a week’s work in twelve hours or less? It should. It should give you a warmer feeling when you can do it in far less time. Give your C-Level suitors this one in under an hour and they’ll think you’re as magical as Mr. Scott aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise. Mr. Scott often surprised the always demanding Captain Kirk with his ability to fix just about anything within the very tight time constraints placed on him. Instead of dilithium crystals and altered phaser electronics, you’ll have to work with Ubuntu and Drupal.
As of this writing, the latest version of Drupal is 7.0 and the version that installs to your system via the default Ubuntu repositories is 6.18. The speed of setup should sufficiently offset the fact that the software isn’t the latest available.
The Basics
This installation involves Ubuntu 10.10. Your mileage may vary with
other distributions and versions. Prior to your Drupal installation,
install MySQL or PostgreSQL. During the Drupal installation, you’ll have
to provide the administrative user’s password for the database system
that you install. Other dependencies should download and install with
Drupal.The installation is simple but you should search your distribution’s repository for the correct name for Drupal’s package.
$ sudo apt-cache search drupal
aegir-provision - backend of the Aegir hosting system
dh-make-drupal - Create Debian packages from Drupal modules and themes
drivel - Blogging client for the GNOME desktop
drupal6 - a fully-featured content management framework
drupal6-mod-i18n - i18n module for Drupal 6
drupal6-mod-inline - inline module for Drupal 6
drupal6-mod-ldap-integration - ldap_integration module for Drupal 6
drupal6-mod-masquerade - masquerade module for Drupal 6
drupal6-thm-arthemia - arthemia theme for Drupal 6
drupal6-trans-ru - Russian translation for Drupal 6
drush - command line shell and Unix scripting interface for Drupal
khmerconverter - converts between legacy Khmer encodings and Unicode
qtm - Web-log interface program
A quick search reveals that drupal6 is the name of the package you need.
$ sudo apt-get install drupal6
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
apache2-mpm-prefork curl dbconfig-common libapache2-mod-php5 php5 php5-cli
php5-common php5-gd php5-mysql wwwconfig-common
Suggested packages:
php-pear php5-suhosin postgresql-client apache apache-ssl
The following packages will be REMOVED:
apache2-mpm-worker
The following NEW packages will be installed:
apache2-mpm-prefork curl dbconfig-common drupal6 libapache2-mod-php5 php5
php5-cli php5-common php5-gd php5-mysql wwwconfig-common
0 upgraded, 11 newly installed, 1 to remove and 84 not upgraded.
Need to get 8,369kB of archives.
After this operation, 24.6MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?
For quick setup, select Yes as shown in Figure 2.
Figure 3 prompts you to choose your preferred database (mysql or pgsql).
Next, you’re prompted to enter the password for the database’s administrative user. See Figure 4.
The screen shown in Figure 5 is a bit confusing because it looks as if the system requires you to enter the MySQL administrator password again. This prompt is for a password to manage the Drupal application within your database server. As stated in the prompt, if you don’t enter one, the installer will generate a random one for you.
If you decide to enter your own password (recommended), the installer prompts you to confirm the password you entered. See Figure 6.
At this point, the installer completes its tasks and drops you back to a shell prompt.
Finishing the Installation
Now, you’re ready to proceed with the second half of the Drupal
install process. Do you remember the two post-install tasks? The first
one is to restart the Apache web server.
$ sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart
[sudo] password for khess:
* Restarting web server apache2
... waiting [ OK ]
Open a browser and point it to your new Drupal system’s install page:
http://drupal-server/drupal6/install.php to continue. See Figure 7.
Click Install Drupal in English or click Install how to install Drupal in other languages. This demonstration uses the English installation option.
Figure 8 is the Drupal configuration screen. Here, you’ll need to enter your site name, site e-mail address, and a Drupal administrative account name, e-mail address and password. Scroll down and select Save and Continue.
Figure 9 notifies you of any problems* encountered during this phase of installation and that Drupal is now installed. If your installation was generally successful, click on the your new site link and check it out.
See Figure 10. Congratulations, you’ve successfully installed Drupal. From here, you can customize your Drupal site by adding users, installing new modules, creating content, and satisfying your chain of command.
You’re not done yet but either you can take it from here by yourself or wait until next week for a Drupal 6 configuration tutorial. If you need to wait until next week, don’t overcommit yourself, Mr. or Ms. Scott, or you might find yourself in a red shirt** with the landing party.
* My ISP doesn’t allow SMTP or POP3 services on home accounts. Yes, I’ve thought of protesting it.
** Every real Trekkie knows that if you’re wearing a red shirt and you’ve beamed down to the planet’s surface with the landing party, your chances of survival are pretty slim.
Diablo 3 on Linux
Like many nerds around the world this evening I am prepping for what, odds are, will be the first of many all-nighters involving Blizzard's soon-to-be-released Diablo III (which releases tonight at midnight!). If you have been by my blog before then odds are you will know that I prefer to do as much of my gaming as possible on my operating system of choice: Linux. Something else you may or may not know is that I am also a large fan of the company Code Weavers that produces the commercial Wine software Crossover.
Want to know the reason I am such a fan of Crossover? A few weekends ago I spent about 6 hours trying to get Wine sources to compile with various patches to make the Diablo 3 open beta work on Linux. The result? I ended up hanging my head in defeat and just playing on my OSx86 system so I didn't miss the weekend event. At that point Diablo 3 didn't work OOTB on default Wine builds or Crossover.
This morning I dropped by #crossover on FreeNode to check in with the Crossover folks to see what their plans were for the Diablo 3 release due out tonight - were us Linux folks going to have to wait?
Nope!
The Diablo 3 release is something they had been very aware of and had
been testing rigorously in-house. I was informed they had internal
builds of Crossover where Diablo 3 was functional enough to play this
very day. In fact within three hours of my speaking with them they had
an "unsupported build"
release that was functional with the Diablo 3 installer (note: if you
are not a current Crossover customer that above link will not work for
you).
I promptly installed the update and was on my merry way:
As of now if you are using Crossover 11.1 or newer Diablo 3 is now officially supported,
Now - if you are not interested in supporting Crossover - you can
attempt to succeed where I failed and compile Wine with some of the
patches listed on the Diablo 3 Beta AppDB page.
Odds are if you wait for the next Wine developmental release or two,
Diablo 3 will just start working by default - the Crossover folks are
one of the lead contributors to the Wine project and most of their code
improvements go upstream.
Trouble Shooting Tips:
If you are having issues getting it to run via the latest Wine builds it might be worth your while to use winetricks to install the "vcrun2008" package.
Trouble Shooting Tips:
If you are having issues getting it to run via the latest Wine builds it might be worth your while to use winetricks to install the "vcrun2008" package.
If your login attempt is hanging at the "authenticating credentials" step, exit Diablo, open a terminal and run:
echo 0|sudo tee /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope
Debian 7 "Wheezy" to introduce multiarch support
multiarch supporta release goal for the coming Debian release 7
Wheezyto be released in 2013. Multiarch is a radical rethinking of the filesystem hierarchy with respect to library and header paths, to make programs and libraries of different hardware architectures easily installable in parallel on the very same system.
Multiarch is a major enhancement to Debian's ability to deliver on the promise of being a universal operating systemexplains Steve Langasek, driving force of the implementation,
not only will it make crossbuilding easier, but also enables better support for legacy 32-bit applications on new 64-bit installations and in the future will even allow live migrations from 32-bit to 64-bit systems.
People interested in the topic can watch the talk by Steve Langasek
Multiarch in Debian: 6 months (or 6 years) ontoday at 16:00 CEST (14:00 UTC) by using the DebConf web frontend.
About Debian
The Debian Project was founded in 1993 by Ian Murdock to be a truly free community project. Since then the project has grown to be one of the largest and most influential open source projects. Thousands of volunteers from all over the world work together to create and maintain Debian software. Available in 70 languages, and supporting a huge range of computer types, Debian calls itself theuniversal operating system.
Doom 3 BFG Edition will feature entire Doom series, seven new Doom 3 levels
id Software is Dooming us like we’ve never been Doomed before. Publisher Bethesda Softworks has announced the Doom 3 BFG Edition, which will feature the series’ entire catalog, including Doom, Doom 2, Doom 3, and Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil, as well as an added “Lost Mission” with seven new levels. The release date and pricing are TBA, but it’s coming sometime this year.
In addition to new content, id has spent the past year addressing complaints about Doom 3′s darkness and difficulty (enter the new “armor-mounted flashlight”), tweaking its lighting and rendering, and adding 3D monitor and 5.1 surround sound support. Many of the modifications are bigger news for the console versions, as we’ve already been blessed with smooth framerates and the famous Duct Tape Mod.
“Doom 3 was enthusiastically embraced by gamers worldwide at its release,” said id Software’s John Carmack in today’s statement. “Today, the full experience has been enhanced and extended to be better than ever, and is delivered across all the platforms with a silky smooth frame rate and highly responsive controls.”
If id were working on it, this definitive Doom collection would be an excellent precursor to Doom 4, and Polygon‘s Russ Pitts made the same leading statement to id’s Tim Willits, who repeated back, “If one were working on that, it would be a perfect precursor.”
So, yeah, it seems likely that we’ll get a Doom 4 re-announcement sometime this year.
Bodhi Linux 2.0.0 Alpha
Parted Magic
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Diablo 3 Wizard build guide
The Wizard is one of the toughest classes to survive as on Hell and Inferno. Here are the Wizard builds we’ve found to be most fun and effective so far. Our Diablo 3 class build guide has builds for every class in Diablo 3: Barbarian, Demon Hunter, Monk, Witch Doctor, and Wizard. Be sure to check back often—we’re updating it almost every day.
Wizard build: The Storm Mage
See the build: Wizard Storm MageBring the chaos and destruction of the raging storm to bear, unleashing lightning and ice an an unpredictable maelstrom of destruction around you. This build does best at mid to close range, with Shock Pulse flooding the field before you with volatile bolts while your runed Ray of Frost and Frost Nova send cold annihilation in all directions. Diamond Skin and Storm Armor will let you survive to get in close enough for your AoEs to have maximum effect, while also discounting all of your damaging spells significantly, so the storm never really stops raging. Blizzard gives you a longer-range option for dealing mass murder.
Preferred stats: Weapon Damage, Intelligence, Attack Speed, Max Arcane Power
Wizard build: The Z Fighter (Ranged)
See the build: Wizard Z FighterThe week of theme builds continues with inspiration from Akira Toriyama’s Dragonball universe! Note that you will be required to yell the names of your attacks loudly into your monitor for this build to function. Unleash volley after volley of devastating energy attacks in true Dragonball fashion with Magic Missile, Arcane Orb (SPIRT BOMB!) and Disintegrate (Kaaaaaaa meeeeeeeee…) Teleport lets you zip around the battlefield like a boss. When it comes time to power up, Storm Armor will take you to the next level. And against the greatest of foes, unlock the transformation power of Archon — it’s just a shame there isn’t a rune that makes it turn your hair gold and spiky.
Preferred stats: Weapon Damage, Intelligence, Vitality, Max Arcane Power
Wizard build: The Glass Cannon
See the build: Wizard Glass Cannon - Updated 5/17A primal urge within all of us wants to see big numbers flash on the screen when we attack, and this build lets you get the biggest digits of any class in Diablo 3. Core skills get a bonus effect on crit: your primary, Electrocute, and Storm Armor lash out lightning attacks, and Meteor‘s molten fire boils over when it crits. The Critical Mass passive reduces the cooldown on your spells by 1 second every time you crit, and Arcane Dynamo lets you boost your next attack by 75% to achieve truly absurd single-hit numbers to brag about to your buddies. The other abilities center on making sure you crit as often as possible, with Disintegrate, Frost Nova and Explosive Blast all hitting multiple targets with some absurdly high weapon percentages–each with its own chance to be crit. With all these perks tossed in, an explosion from Volatile blast is doing 800% weapon damage before crit and with no gear stats calculated in (that’s 1,200% or higher on a crit)!
Preferred stats: Critical Chance, Critical Hit Damage, Weapon Damage, Intelligence
Wizard build: The Battle Mage
See the build: Wizard Battle MageNot every Wizard is squishy, but the battle mage is one of the most coveted archetypes that rarely makes it way into games because, frankly, it’s usually way overpowered. The first step is to give your Wizard a melee weapon: Spectral Blade takes it one step further by making your primary attack a massive, magical sword that heals you when it crits. Next, you’ve got to bolster your defenses so you can stand on the front lines without crumbling like wet tissue paper. Diamond Skin, Ice Armor, Archon and the passive skills Galvanizing Ward and Blur turn you into a veritable tank with insane armor and a ton of sweet spells. The last thing you need to complete your battle mage toolkit is a couple devastating aoes to unleash when things get hairy. Arcane Torrent and Energy Twister can both be runed into the perfect tools, and the Unstable Anomaly passive gives you a boost right when you need it most.
Clonezilla Live 1.2.12-60
KNOPPIX 7.0.1
Crysis 2 back on Steam as Maximum Edition
This contract conundrum between Crytek and digital distributors seems to’ve been resolved: Crysis 2 is back on Steam as a $40 re-release. The Maximum Edition bundles existing multiplayer map pack content for the game. This version of the game is also available on Origin today, duh.
What’s in Crysis 2′s Maximum Edition:
- Bonus XP – Access to preset classes plus a custom class
- Scar weapon Skin – Scar assault rifle digital camouflage
- Weapon Attachment – Day 1 access to scar hologram decoy
- Unique Platinum Dog Tag – Display your multiplayer rank and stats
The Maximum Edition also includes the content of C2′s Retaliation and Decimation packs:
- Nine additional multiplayer maps supporting all game modes
- Two new weapons – FY71 Assault Rifle and M18 Smoke Grenade
If you purchased Crysis 2 on Steam before it was removed, you can upgrade to the Maximum Edition for 50% the cost, EA says.
Grml 2012.05
Fedora 17
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Far Cry 3 trailer teases E3 showing (Cd Key)
E3 is tantalisingly close. Far Cry 3 raised eyebrows at E3 2011 with trailers introducing the game’s psychotic antagonist, Vaas. Hopefully we’ll get more of a sense of what the game will be like to play at Ubisoft’s conference next week. The misty flashes above tease a few new characters, but it’d be nicer to see more in-game action, to find out exactly how open Far Cry 3′s jungle will be. The footage so far has felt a little rail roaded. We’ll be covering E3 in force, so stay tuned for more on this year’s biggest games from the year’s biggest games conference next week.
Diablo 3 patches incoming: “we’re planning to just straight-out buff Legendary items”
Items
- Blacksmith gold and page costs will be reduced.
- Jeweller gem costs will be reduced, gems up to flawless square level can be crafted with two gems instead of three.
- Legendary items to be buffed, likely in PvP patch 1.1. These buffs won’t apply retroactively.
- Item levels will be visible on 60+ level items to make them easier to compare to lower level Legendaries.
Cheaper items. Yes! It costs thousands and thousands thousands of gold to craft items and gems on Hell difficulty and beyond, which quickly becomes prohibitive. The Legendary item buff is good news as well, though there’s a risk that Legendary drops that occur before the 1.1 patch may lose some of their worth when the Legendary item buff hits. Legendary items are really living up to their name. in my experience. I’ve played 50 odd hours with my level 56 Barbarian and haven’t seen a single one. It feels like I’m missing out, but apparently Legendary items are “not designed to necessarily be the best items in the game.”
“They’re just one additional type of item as you level up, and they are not meant to be the primary items you’re chasing at the end-game. They can — and should — be exciting to find, but they’re not supposed to serve as the single driving force of the item hunt. Rare items, for example, have the possibility to roll up “perfect” stats that can, if you’re lucky, outpace the predetermined stats of a Legendary. That’s by design.”
Class Balance
There will be more alterations to class balance over the course of the next few patches. Blizzard recently released a series of quiet hotfixes in recent weeks to nerf a few key Wizard, Monk and Demon Hunter skills, but they say that hotfixes will only deployed when they discover something severely affecting game balance, and in future they plan to highlight incoming hotfixes in “Upcoming Changes” posts on the forums.
“We don’t want you to be worried that a hotfix nerf is lurking around the corner every day. If a skill is strong, but isn’t really breaking the game, we want you to have your fun. Part of the enjoyment of Diablo is finding those super-strong builds, and we want players to be excited to use something they discovered that feels overpowered.”
Blizzard don’t mention any specific changes they’re planning to make to characters or skills, but they suggest that any abilities that come to be seen as absolutely essential to surviving Hell or Inferno may be in trouble. Their main aim is to encourage build experimentation and make sure that there are multiple viable builds at Diablo 3′s highest difficulty tiers.
“If any single skill or rune feels absolutely required to progress, it means that skill is working against our goal of encouraging build diversity — and those “required” skills need to be corrected.”
Inferno
The developers are “keeping a close eye on Inferno.” Many players have been posting on the Battle.net forums to say that Inferno is too tough for melee classes. Blizzard admit there may be some problems with the nature of Inferno’s difficulty, but reiterate that it is supposed to be immensely hard.
“Right now, there’s a lot more damage “spikiness” occurring than feels right, and that’s one major area we’re looking to adjust in patch 1.0.3,” they say, later adding that “While damage is a bit spikier than we’d like, we’re actually seeing a pretty significant number of people attempting Inferno without sufficient gear.
“There’s a good chance that returning to the previous Act to farm upgrades will do the most to help you survive. That said, we’d like to shift some of the focus away from survival and more toward using a variety of offensive tactics to succeed. Survival will still be important, but finding ways to maximize your damage while staying alive is more exciting.”
At the moment, defensive passives and escape skills are often essential in high difficulty fights. Blizzard say that they would “like to shift some of the focus away from survival and more toward using a variety of offensive tactics to succeed. Survival will still be important, but finding ways to maximize your damage while staying alive is more exciting.”
Player Stats
Finally, Blizzard revealed a few interesting facts about the millions of Diablo players out there. Apparently, less than 2% of players have reached Inferno so far.
- On average players have created 3 characters each
- 80% of characters are between levels 1 and 30
- 1.9% of characters have unlocked Inferno difficulty
- 54% of Hardcore players chose a female character
- The majority of Hardcore deaths (35%) occur in Act I Normal
- The most common level 60 build in the game is only used by 0.7% of level 60 characters of that class (not including Passive diversity)
- The most used runes for each class at level 60 are Barbarian: Best Served Cold, Demon Hunter: Lingering Fog, Wizard: Mirror Skin, Monk: Peaceful Repose, Witch Doctor: Numbing Dart
And here’s a rough outline of the patch line up for Diablo 3 as it stands.
1.02 – Due in the next week or so
Connection and client stability fixes.
1.03 – game balance changes, date TBA
Blacksmith and Jeweller alterations, class and skill balancing.
1.1 – PvP mode, legendary item changes, date TBA
Player vs. player arena mode that the developers showed at Blizzcon last year, but was taken out for polishing before Diablo 3 was released. Buff to Legendary items.