Linux How To

By Webologist • May 30th, 2009

I have recently been experimenting more with Linux (Ubuntu distribution) and have recently discovered the power of running Virtual Machines. I started investigating after it was suggested that the safest way to run Windows was inside a Virtual Machine running on Linux, as this helps to stop and contain viruses and Trojans. However, virtual boxes [...]

Just spent the last few days trying to get clean urls to work on my Ubuntu apache2 server, and finally found a thread on a Drupal forum. It turned out that you have to activate mod rewrite in Apache before any of the settings in the .htaccess file will take place. Also need to remember [...]

This morning my Ubuntu OS was running really slowly, and eventually Firefox become unresponsive. I was forced to hit the power switch to reboot, but the reboot failed, due to a “bad block” and duplicates. All a bit worrying. This morning I could get nothing to work, and the instructions onscreen were a bit of [...]

While browsing through the Synaptic package manager on Ubuntu, I spotted a web building application called webgen, which is a static website generator. When I first started looking into building websites, I assumed that such a package would be standard, but only now have I found something that seems to be what I have been [...]

As I use JAlbum to generate web albums, I need to install it onto my Linux machine. To do so I had to upgrade my Java Virtual Machine to Sun’s latest version. I decided to use the Synaptic Package Manager for this, as I was not entirely sure which packages I needed to install. With [...]

I have almost got my server set up. Today I managed to get the FTP server set up, using ProFTPD. Installing it was a breeze with Linux, as usual, but configuring it was much trickier for me. More steep learning curves. I have managed to set up users with FTP access to their home directories, [...]

Today I set up MySQL and managed to transfer a Pligg CMS over from my paid hosting to my home server. Had a few problems to start with, as I was trying to use phpmyadmin (also installed today) to import the .sql file, but this was resulting in errors. I attempting to increase the max [...]

What a night. I have spent most of the last few days faffing around trying to set up virtual hosts on my Ubuntu Apache server. I had almost given up. I tried using Webmin, but failed. I read many tutorials, which led me to installing Virtualmin at one point, which was useless. Some tutorials suggested [...]

I just tried to add some php to a site, and there is an error message that reads “GD Support not detected! GD required for this script.”
A quick search on Google led to this solution:
$ sudo apt-get install php5-gd
http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/ubuntu-linux-install-or-add-php-gd-support-to-apache/
But one of the messages that came up on install suggests a conflict, i.e.:
dpkg: libgd2-noxpm: dependency problems, [...]

OK. just read up on what Molly-Guard is, and it is just a way to prevent the server being accidentely shut down remotely. There is a nice little story behind its definition:
What is Molly Guard?
A shield to prevent tripping of some Big Red Switch by clumsy or ignorant hands. Originally used of the plexiglass covers [...]