Author Archives: Rob Terhaar
Guide to using Virtualenv and Python
There are a few different methods for managing your Python development projects. Virtualenv tends to be at the core of these management systems. When I first got started with Python, my really smart Python friends said “Use Virtualenv!!” And honestly, I didn’t really listen to my smart Python friends at first. I didn’t listen to [...]
Posted in Apple, Code, Python 2 Comments
You should be using cloud-init
cloud-init is a feature of the Ubuntu Server EC2 images that implements a standard way of reading per-instance meta-data from the Amazon API and provisioning/bootstraping systems.
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Cloud Management Layers, or Don’t Use Templates!
I was recently talking to a client (let’s call him Carl…) who had just begun the initial research phase into how he was going to redesign his server management infrastructure. Carl, like many people, had been using a template-based workflow, but was tired of the inherit difficulties and problems in managing non-congruent systems created from [...]
Postgres 8.4 is Broken in Debian Squeeze
Debian shipped an unstable, crippled version of Postgres 8.4 in the Winter 2010/2011 release of 6.0 (aka Squeeze.) Postgres contributor, Peter Eisentraut confirms this on his blog. Read more about it here. So how do you fix this? Luckily, Debian has packaged a new version of Postgres that will use the libreadline6 library if it [...]
Solaris 11 Swap File Location
Because of ZFS, working with Swap files in Solaris is surprisingly easy. On our development server, the OS is running on a single SSD device, and there is a large array of standard SATA disks attached to the AHCI controller. Although this system has plenty of RAM, swap space is important so we avoid OOM [...]
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Using Puppet instead of Bash
If you’ve done any amount of heavy UNIX systems administration work, you’ve undoubtedly written several big ugly Bash scripts. #!/bin/bash for i in `more standard_package_list.txt ` do apt-get install $i done This simple code example will read a txt file with a list of required packages, and then install all packages. So how can Puppet [...]
SSL/TLS Insecure Renegotiation and Payment Processors
This week, we ran into an issue with a client’s Java/Tomcat application that connects to FirstData’s WSDL API for Credit Card payment processing. The problem was related to the recently discovered SSL renegotiation protocol flaw. (read more about the protocol flaw over at Slashdot) Problem symptoms included Tomcat freezing while initializing, then after 10mns timing [...]
Optimizing OS X for SSD
A few minor changes can be made to OS X 10.6 in order to maximize performance with solid state disks (SSD.) The settings changes recommended in this post start out from very simple to implement and progressively become more complicated. Read on to find out more!
MacPro (2010) BSOD in Boot Camp 3.1
Quick fix for Windows 7 x64 BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) after installing Boot Camp 3.1. Boot into Windows Safe Mode Navigate to c:\windows\system32\drivers\ Rename applehfs.sys to applehfs.sys.BACKUP Rename applemnt.sys to applemnt.sys.BACKUP Reboot into normal Windows mode Before you can rename these files, make sure that Windows is showing file extensions. You may notice after [...]
Web server performance analysis : 2012