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Installing wget in Mac OS X 10.6

The exclusion of wget in OS X is rather mystifying.  In any case, its quite easy to build from source and this post will explore how to do just that.

First, you need to have Xcode installed with “Unix Dev Support” which includes gcc and other packages for software compilation.  Xcode is located on your Mac OS X install DVD under the “optional installs” section.  You can also download Xcode from Apple. If you aren’t sure if Xcode is already loaded on your system or not, if you don’t have a “Developer” folder listed in the top level of your HD, then it is not installed.

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Categories: Apple / Mac.

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By Andrei Matei
— December 26, 2010 at 2:53 am

Debian Router/Gateway in 15 Minutes

A multitude of reasons exist as to why one would want to build a custom router vs. suffer with the performance, reliability issues, and limitations of an off-the-shelf solution. In the spirit of keeping this post short, I won’t launch into a long diatribe on the pros and cons of each here, but I have plenty of thoughts on this, so if you are interested, just ask.

What we are about to do is configure an incredibly fast and stable router/gateway solution for your home/office in about 15 minutes. (Note: This post assumes you already have your machine loaded up with a fresh copy of Debian 5.0 Lenny and you have the two needed NICs installed.

First, let’s make three initial assumptions:

  • eth0 is the public interface (the Cable/DSL modem is attached to this NIC)
  • eth1 is the private interface (your switch is connected to this NIC)
  • All of the client computers, servers, WAPs, etc. are connected to the switch

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Categories: Linux.

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By Andrei Matei
— December 22, 2010 at 10:56 pm

Restoring Horizonal iTunes 10 Window Controls

With the introduction of iTunes 10, several new and rather unusual UI changes have arrived as well.  Perhaps the most troublesome, for me personally, have been the vertical window control buttons.  I prefer consistency in all of my applications, so luckily a quick fix is available to restore the standard horizontal buttons.

Simply run the following command in your Terminal:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes full-window -1

Now, just restart your iTunes application and you should be all set. A special thank you goes out to Ars Technica’s Review of iTunes 10 for this information.

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Categories: Apple / Mac.

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By Andrei Matei
— September 3, 2010 at 2:41 pm

eAccelerator Installation on Debian

Today’s post covers the joys and benefits of opcode caching.  If you have a very active site, this caching method can provide a great deal of relief to your servers by significantly reducing load averages and CPU utilization.

How does it work?
It’s quite simple, actually.  Without caching configured, each time a PHP-based page is requested by a user, the server gathers all of the needed files and “compiles” them into a result which it can understand and deliver.  This result is known as “opcode”.

The technique of opcode caching preserves this generated code into a cache so compilation only needs to happen once and then can be used over and over again for numerous requests by numerous users.

Why eAccelerator?
Several PHP caching choices exist including APC, Zend, and XCache.  I’ve chosen eAccelerator based on numerous reports such as this one which show its distinct performance advantage and also in large part due to the personal recommendation of seasoned server architects such as RackerHacker.

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Categories: Linux.

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By Andrei Matei
— August 10, 2010 at 1:30 am

VirtualBox on a Headless Debian Server

I’ve got too many computers.  It’s become increasingly difficult to convince people “I’m not *that* nerdy” when I have servers and wires laying around everywhere.  A consolidation project is in order.

For this exercise, our goal is to combine a Linux file server and a Windows workstation elegantly into one machine.  “Windows?!?!” you gasp in horror?  No need to be alarmed; I use Linux/BSD exclusively on servers and Mac OS X on my desktops.  I have only one very specific need for a standalone Windows machine, so let’s leave it at that for now.

The Linux file server is headless and of course doesn’t run X-Windows or any other GUI.  I need to have a full Windows environment available which I can RDP into at any time.  I first experimented with Xen which is a solid enterprise solution but overkill for this project.  Next, I spent a significant amount of time with KVM which is easy to set up but has a bit of quirky management in my opinion.  Finally, I settled upon Oracle VirtualBox; it’s free, fast, and can be elegantly controlled at the command line.

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Categories: Linux.

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By Andrei Matei
— July 6, 2010 at 11:43 pm