Joikuspot problems under Linux Mint 17

Keywords: Joikuspot, Linux, MTU, adhoc, Ubuntu, Mint, tethering, Nokia

This might be useful for some people still using Nokia phones to share internet connection with Linux machine using excellent JoikuSpot 2012. I googled up several problem reports over last 3-4 years, listing Ubuntu, Mint, Arch, etc. Usual symptoms of the trouble – you can connect to some sites – google, news, even some https sites (for me,  friendfeed.com worked), but some other sites (in my case feedly, facebook, and any other site requiring Google Accounts authorization) did not load, or loaded only partially, with connection indicator spinning endlessly. Imagine internet circa 1994… What heplped me to identify rootcause, was the fact, that iPad mini (iOS 7.1) and Windows laptops worked well with Joikuspot (after some vodoo to enable adhoc connection under Windows 8.1).

Change MTU size from default 1500 in Ubuntu 14/Mint17 to 1280.

Go to Network Manager, disconnect from all networks, edit your wifi Joikuspot connection properties, there is setting in the GUI to do that. Upon reconnecting, every site should open flawlessly. Below is the picture I found quickly for editing MTU for wired connection. It’s same for WiFi.

Cloud storage update

While AeroFS is good, I think that in the coming months I will be switching all my data sync over to BitTorrent Sync. I am currently using it to sync one folder between my laptop and a server in another country and see that it matured to the point that sync is reliable. Moreover, it offers some serious advantage over AeroFS (which is going to focus on enterprise), and it is that it works on Windows, Linux and Android/iOS. I now spend more time in Linux, but my shares are on NTFS volume, and AeroFS refuses to work with fuse-mounted volumes, while BT Sync just keeps going. And Android/iOS apps perform real syncing, which is a pure win.

Bootable ext4 Micro SDHC card reported as “Damaged SD card” by Android phone

TL/DR – if you have ext3/4 partition on your Micro SDHC card (e.g. you boot some Linux from it) and then try to put this card into Android phone, it will complain about “Damaged SD card” until you erase (zero out) bootloader from ext3/ext4 partition.

 

Android phone complains about damaged sdcard after bootloader installation. But not just any bootloader. It actively dislikes any bootloader on ext3/4 partions. It complains and refuses to mount sdcard. If you force mount in terminal/ADB - it will mount, but bootloader will be corrupted (do not know exactly why, but has to do something with security and signing of Android system bootloader). My card is multi-partition, and while I mount PRT1 (FAT32), Android corrupts Partition Boot Record (PBR) on PRT4 (EXT4). To avoid this problem I zeroed out PBR on PRT4 (where Linux resides) and Android immediately stopped compaining about the card. Mounts it, scans it, uses for camera/gallery storage, etc.

NOTICE AGAIN: ZERO OUT EXT3/4 PARTITION BOOTSECTOR to allow mounting of FAT32 partition in Android. Strange, I know. I think Android is crazy cautious about EXT3/4 bootloaders, to prevent booting unsigned ROMs from any EXT3/4 filesystem, no matter if it is on internal or external sdcard.

I couldn’t google up anything on this topic, and spent couple of days understanding and then solving this issue. Here goes more detailed explanation. Hopefully it saves time to other people trying to read bootable FAT32/EXT4 card in Android (keywords: USB multi-boot, Micro SDHC, Android, SD Card is Damaged, bootloader, grub, mbr)

I use Sandisk Ultra Micro SDHC (UHS-1) 64 GB card in my phone (LG Optimus 3D, ICS 4.0.4) and in compact Lexar USB3.0 card reader on a keychain.

On Android, I use excellent app DriveDroid to expose bootable IMGs to PC via USB cable (mostly Windows Defender Offline x32/x64, and Windows 8 Install/Recovery). But I also use USB 3.0/MicroSDHC reader with  multiple ISOs, Porteus Linux and a real installation of Linux Mint on EXT4. It is fast enough. Boots in a minute. Speed is OK, feels like a slow laptop HDD of 2010.

Card is partitioned into:
MBR  with BOOTMGR (here and in other cases, installed with BOOTICE (free Windows app) 
PRT1: FAT32 -50GB with BOOTMGR (NT6) - Largest partition for data - compatibile with most devices
PRT2: NTFS - 1GB NTLOADER*
PRT3: NTFS - 1GB NTLOADER*
PRT4: EXT4 - 12GB - used to be GRUB2, now empty boot sector

*PARTITIONS 2 and 3 are small stubs between FAT32 (max space) and EXT4 (limited space at the end of  card). I figured that one day I might want to reduce FAT32 and experiment with another or two partitions, without having to move EXT4. I guess PRT2 and PRT3 are not relevant further to this topic.

I played quite a lot with the PRT1, it boots Windows 8 BootMgr, and from there I have added syslinux and grub4dos and can go between them, chainloading each other in circles.  What is interesting, is that I can put any bootloader on FAT32 (PRT1) and it will not affect my card when I put it into Android phone.

THE PROBLEM BEGAN AFTER INSTALLATION OF LINUX ON PRT4(EXT4). Android refuses to mount the card. I forced it through terminal with
su
mount -t vfat /dev/block/mmcblk1p1 /mnt/sdcard/_ExternalSD

File explorers then can see the card but message about Damaged SD Card still hangs there in notifications. When I unmount the card and try booting Linux, it freezes silently. Turns out bootloader of GRUB2 in PRT4 is corrupted.

In order to solve this problem, I booted Mint's vmlinuz/initrd directly from GRUB4DOS on PRT1 and reinstalled GRUB2 on PRT4, then used BOOTICE to copy PBR from EXT4 partition (512 bytes) and save it into file on FAT32. Now I can boot it from BOOTMGR directly into GRUB2.mbr file and use Linux. Then, I used BOOTICE's sector editor functionality, to fill first sector (512 bytes) of PRT4 with zeroes. After doing, this, Android stopped compaining about the card and happily mounts FAT32 partition.

Enjoy, and share in the comments your weird and geeky setup. I am really interested in miniscule and versatile computers and what you use them for.

In search of the holy grail of home servers

ATM my home server runs Windows 7 Ultimate (trial mode till end of December) and I am researching free alternatives like freenas, openfiler, ubuntuserver, freebsd. Need this machine to support administration via web gui and provide following services for me

1. file sharing via SMB/Samba
2. torrenting with webgui
3. http web server
4. webdav
5. vpn
6. upnp/dlna media serving to multiple upnp/dlna players simultaneously
7. continuous data backup (windows live sync style, propagating changes between machines immediately, rather than overnight)
8. advanced disk/RAID management, described below.
9. seems that vitrtualisation is high on my list too.

Found this thread discussing freenas and drobo functionality, and thought that this post decsribes my needs too.

I'm also looking for the holy grail of RAID solutions and really hope someone can come up with or find something. I want the following features: REQUIRED: - Redundancy, allowing for at least 1 drive failure - Mix and match drive sizes WITHOUT being limited by the smallest drive (and thus wasting space) - Ability to add drives to increase capacity - Ability to replace drives and increase capacity - NAS functionality, accessible via a Windows share - Ability to create multiple partitions, with respective shares (or one large partition with multiple shares mapped to folders on the NAS? Who really cares about the "internal" file structure..) PREFERRED: - Performance that isn't terrible - In my case, fast enough to steam 1080P over ethernet - Minimal data capacity loss due to parity (< 50% - Else I'd just mirror.) - "NTFS" Volumes larger than 2TB (Not sure if this is possible via a share.. perhaps "Emulate" NTFS and actually store on a file system with larger volume capacities to achieve this? I could care less if Windows reports my remaining space correctly, as long as the NAS would.) - Software-based, so I can also use the box for other purposes.

I already run freenas in virtualbox on my server with bridged network interface on my server, and it appears as separate machine with web gui on my network. I already see some of the drawbacks of freenas, like no webdav, vpn, virtualisation (the kind that allows me to test freenas in VM like I do it now).

Downloading freebsd, openfiler and ubuntu server to install as VMs too and give ‘em a try this month.

Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade in Latvia

So, Windows 7 is here. Since trying W7 beta in the beginning of 2009, I knew that this was the first OS that I’ll upgrade my home computers to and will be willing to pay for it. I will need several copies for my home:

1. gaming/multimedia PC – currently runs W7 RC. It absolutely needs a Windows license, because I use it to for playing games, and Linux just can’t compete here. Will update it to Windows 7 Home Premium (which has all I need, including Windows Media Center).

2. home server- has Ubuntu and W7 trials at the moment. I can use it in this mode for another 100 days. It is now fully configured to provide the functionality I need – filesharing, utorrent, orb, wuala, https web server, webdav and vpn. In the upcoming 3 months I will try get same functionality (except orb) under Ubuntu. If that works, fine. Otherwise, will upgrade to W7 too. Home Premium does not support Remote Desktop server, but I can manage with VNC I think.

3. 2 laptops – running W7 trials atm, need to upgrade.

So, I am going to buy 3-4 upgrade licenses. Today, I checked pricing and availability of Windows 7 here in Riga, Latvia. Unfortunately, there is no Family Pack available (some people say it might appear after Oct, 31st, when Latvian language Windows is promised). But, price for Home Premium OEM upgrade is quite good ($70 or 50 EUR). Buying Family pack of 3 licenses at amazon UK, would cost the same after shipment. I think I will rather buy HP OEM upgrades here.

I do not have that many Vista or XP licenses (basically all my PC were self made, and laptops came with Linux), but will try to find some old/written-off licenses from sysadmin friends. I know that OEM will work only with one machine, but Retail copy is almost 4 times more expensive (180 EUR) and for that money, I can buy new OEM upgrades later if needed.

I checked to computer shops today and in both, was asked to prove that I have a copy of Windows to upgrade from. Windows label on the bottom of laptop is enough of the proof they said. Interesting, can I show the same laptop in various shops to buy 3-4 upgrade licenses? I think I can.

SSL, certificates, VPN and WebDAV under Windows 7

Under Windows 7 (and Vista too, I think) WebDAV and VPN fail if you use a self-signed (and therefore, untrusted) server certificate. Too bad that error messages are cryptic, and talk about failure to establish connection, or something like it, but never complains about SSL cert. Hmm. If you try to access such server with IE then (unlike Firefox) there is no way to turn off warnings. Also, if you try to play media from such website, IE and Firefox  will launch associated media player (WMP in my case), which will also fail to connect to net resource to play it. Long story, short, kids – use trusted certificate if you need to use SSL in Windows.

And the good news is that now there is a provider of free SSL certificates (really free, not a 30-day trial as some advertise), who is also included into default Windows Certificate storage as a Certified Root Authority. This is Free SSL service from Startcom. With their cert for my server, WebDAV and VPN began to work.

 

The only fly in the ointment – Windows 7 implementation of WebDAV is buggy and slow and compared to Ubuntu.

Playing Steam games on Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala)

Installation of Wine 1.31 amd64 went ok, but Steam client failed after installation and self update. Had to switch to 1.3 amd64 deb and also make sure that Windows version=XP in wine configuration tool. Now Steam works and I am downloading my games. Quickly tried Ricochet Infinity and it work well, in full screen, in windowed mode and downloading extension packs from internet works too.

CoLinux Ubuntu 9.04

Yesterday I played with CoLinux on my laptop with Vista x32. Tried it first with Windows 7 x64 but turns out that CoLinux is only available for x32 bit environments. Anyway, it started find with Vista x32 and I even upgraded the original image (Ubuntu 8.04) in two steps to 8.10 and then to 9.4. Had to increase image size from 1.7GB to 8GB. Increasing image size involves creating a new empty image file under windows, then mounting it under CoLinux and copying all information to it, quitting CoLinux and restarting with new image file. Instructions are in the Colinux FAQ section. Maybe 8GB is an overkill, and 4GB would have been enough, but I made it bigger just in case I will want to install more programs.

It works great, faster than virtual machine. Internet works, but I still have to figure out how to see local network.

What’s best for your netbook – Ubuntu, Moblin, Solaris or Windows?

During last week, expecting new Ubuntu 904 to appear shortly, I cleared the partition where my Ubuntu 810 used to reside, and played a bit with various alternatives. I installed and tried in quick succession OpenSolaris 906, Ubuntu low power MID edition, Ubuntu netbook edition, Moblin Alpha 2.

Disclaimer! This is a rant that do not in any way intend to claim to be the ultimate truth. I am only using Linux for half a year. While I feel comfortable digging through forums to enable support for various network and graphics hardware when I have free time to do this, I feel that at the moments it is not worth it. E.g. spending couple of nights to get Linux drivers working, costs me more than buying a Windows license. Having said that, I still enjoy Linux in a freaky kind of the way, treating it as a brain muscle stretching Lego for adults, and enjoying the process whenever time allows it.

OpenSolaris is interesting alternative to other Linux distributions, but not for a netbook. While I spent couple of days last year customizing Ubuntu 810 to work with all my hardware in eeepc 1000h. I do not feel like I want to spend such time again, since Ubuntu 904 supports all of it out-of-the-box. And I do not feel like I need ZFS on netbook. Its benefits are in ease of use of multi-disk storage, and all netbooks have only one disk.

Various Ubuntu derivatives – Netbook edition and lowpower MID edition. Netbook edition could be useful for touch enabled netbooks. Larger icons that make it easier to navigate with big fat fingertips. You do not need it on non-touch device. As to the the low-power MID edition - I had problems using it. It has increased fonts and icons, and after that, does not fit 1024x600. I wonder what kind of display they had in mind developing it.

Ubuntu 904. Loads quite fast (I use new ext4 file system) and supports all hardware features of eeepc 1000h. Compiz is still the best eyecandy you can get. Recommended.

Moblin – still in a hardcore alpha stage. Promising. Not recommended.

Windows 7 – RC (builds 7077 and 7100) are very stable. If you want to do any light gaming, or connect with Microsoft exchange or some other MS only corporate services,  or comfortably play 720p videos (1080p still out of question) then you have to get Windows 7.

Conclusion – for web browsing and document editing, watching movies and taking notes, ease of setup and use – Ubuntu 904 finally matches Windows. I like eye candy of Ubuntu more, but Windows still feels speedier to use. I am going to multiboot Ubuntu 904, Windows 7, and OSX on my laptop.

Ubuntu + Compiz + Virtual Box

Installed Windows 7 with new taskbar on Asus Eee 1000H

Today I bought a new Ebony Black Asus Eee PC 1000H. My specs – Atom 1.6Ghz, 80GB HDD, 2GB RAM. Installed latest developer build (6801) on it. It loads during same 40 seconds but works faster than the stock Xandros.

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