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- Category: Xen Howtos
The lastest version of Xen as of this writing is 4.0 but there's been some issues with blktap2 and other things with it so I'm still holding onto Xen 3.4. This tutorial shows how to upgrade a CentOS/RHEL 5 system to Xen 3.4. As soon as Xen 4.0 is as mature as I want it I'll update it again. I'm also retesting all of this as I'm not sure I had the problems with upgrading to 3.4 that I had with 3.3. I'll update it as soon as I'm done testing.
1. First we need to download the YUM repository file for the updated Xen. Then uninstall the old Virtualization group and reinstall it. This will upgrade the packages.
wget http://www.gitco.de/linux/x86_64/centos/5/CentOS-GITCO.repo -O /etc/yum.repos.d/gitco.repo
yum groupremove Virtualization
yum update
yum clean all
yum groupinstall -y Virtualization
Yum will probably want to upgrade some other files along with the ones we've chosen.
Warning! If you get an error message from grubby this is bad!
Installing: kernel-xen ####################### [ 9/13]
grubby fatal error: unable to find a suitable template
This means that your grub.conf file couldn't be written to for whaterver reason so you won't be able to successfully reboot. If you get this message you need to edit your /boot/grub/grub.conf file and make the kernel lines match the kernel you installed.
Get your installed kernel version:
[ root@vs / ] rpm -q kernel-xen
kernel-xen-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5
Now edit your /boot/grub/grub.conf to match this
# grub.conf generated by anaconda
#
# Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making changes to this file
# NOTICE: You have a /boot partition. This means that
# all kernel and initrd paths are relative to /boot/, eg.
# root (hd0,0)
# kernel /vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/vgsys/lvroot
# initrd /initrd-version.img
#boot=/dev/sda
default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title CentOS (2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /xen.gz-3.4.0
module /vmlinuz-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen ro root=/dev/vgsys/lvroot rhgb quiet
module /initrd-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen.img
4. Reboot - no really I mean it.
5. Try it out by using the xm dmesg command
[ root@vs ~ ] xm dmesg
__ __ _____ _ _ ___
\ \/ /___ _ __ |___ /| || | / _ \
\ // _ \ '_ \ |_ \| || |_| | | |
/ \ __/ | | | ___) |__ _| |_| |
/_/\_\___|_| |_| |____(_) |_|(_)___/
(XEN) Xen version 3.4.0 (
That's about all. If you have any questions drop a comment here.
- Details
- Category: Xen Howtos
1. First we need to download the YUM repository file for the updated Xen. Then uninstall the old Virtualization group and reinstall it. This will upgrade the packages.
wget http://www.gitco.de/linux/x86_64/centos/5/CentOS-GITCO.repo -O /etc/yum.repos.d/gitco.repo
yum groupremove Virtualization
yum groupinstall -y Virtualization
Yum will probably want to upgrade some other files along with the ones we've chosen.
Warning! If you get an error message from grubby this is bad!
Installing: kernel-xen ####################### [ 9/13]
grubby fatal error: unable to find a suitable template
This means that your grub.conf file couldn't be written to for whaterver reason so you won't be able to successfully reboot. If you get this message you need to edit your /boot/grub/grub.conf file and make the kernel lines match the kernel you installed.
Get your installed kernel version:
[ root@vs / ] rpm -q kernel-xen
kernel-xen-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5
Now edit your /boot/grub/grub.conf to match this
# grub.conf generated by anaconda
#
# Note that you do not have to rerun grub after making changes to this file
# NOTICE: You have a /boot partition. This means that
# all kernel and initrd paths are relative to /boot/, eg.
# root (hd0,0)
# kernel /vmlinuz-version ro root=/dev/vgsys/lvroot
# initrd /initrd-version.img
#boot=/dev/sda
default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
hiddenmenu
title CentOS (2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /xen.gz-3.4.0
module /vmlinuz-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen ro root=/dev/vgsys/lvroot rhgb quiet
module /initrd-2.6.18-128.4.1.el5xen.img
4. Reboot - no really I mean it.
5. Try it out by using the xm dmesg command
\ \/ /___ _ __ |___ / |___ / / _ \
\ // _ \ '_ \ |_ \ |_ \| | | |
/ \ __/ | | | ___) | ___) | |_| |
/_/\_\___|_| |_| |____(_)____(_)___/
(XEN) Xen version 3.3.0 (
(XEN) Latest ChangeSet: unavailable
(XEN) Command line:
(XEN) Video information:
(XEN) VGA is text mode 80x25, font 8x16
(XEN) VBE/DDC methods: V2; EDID transfer time: 2 seconds
(XEN) Disc information:
(XEN) Found 1 MBR signatures
(XEN) Found 1 EDD information structures
(XEN) Xen-e820 RAM map:
That's about all. If you have any questions drop a comment here.
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- Category: Xen Howtos
This is just a beta at this point
1. Install CentOS from CD. Do not choose Virtualization
2. Follow installing Xen 3.4 the easy way
3. Follow installing DomU the easy way
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- Category: Site News
I've gotten some feedback about this site never having comments and since I spend a bit of time answering comments I realized that most people that come here do so though a web search engine hit which means they're asking questions after the article has been long gone from the main page. So with that in mind I set out to find a way to make a latest comments block for Disqus the system I use for commenting. This task turned out to be easier than I thought since Disqus has an RSS feed (somewhat hidden for unknown reasons) for each domain. After finding the RSS feed I was able to add a feed module in Joomla and point it at the RSS feed for comments. It needs to be dolled up which I'll do later with CSS but for now there's a comment module on the main page to show which articles have had recent comments.
While I was farting around in the code I cleaned up a few other things. I use the Superblogger plugin to add blogging features to Joomla! such as trackbacks, Disqus comments, Gravitar support and RSS feeds for comments. My Superblogger theme is completely custom as I wanted to maintain Joomal!'s PDF, Print and Email buttons in addition to having comments, ratings, bookmarks and social bookmarking on each article. After staring at the article layout I've decided it's too busy and I've dropped Reddit, MySpace and a couple other social bookmarking engines from the article header. I've also cleaned up some wording in what's left. You can still share the article via Facebook, Digg and Delicious. Twitter support has been disabled temporarily because if the module can't connect to tweetmeme the whole site goes offline - this is not acceptable. However you can tweet the URL manually just fine. Changes were made to the Disqus comment boxes at the bottom of the article as well to make for a cleaner and simpler experience.
Also a little while ago I was curious about how many people are coming to this site over a period of time so I added a new counter module but it looked a bit skanky so I got into the code on that one as well. Now the left hand column shows Who's Online, the number of guests and members currently, the number of people for the day, week, month and ever followed by the login form. Even though this looks like it's one module it's really 3 that I've stacked together.
There will be other slight changes in the future but what I really need to do is get into the CSS and clean up the look even more. The left hand column is bothering me because I don't think there's enough color difference from the main body to set it off. I'd also like to have a bit more white space around articles and there's always the Superblogger article header which is a bit heavy. And don't get me started on the pixelization of my logo. Considering what little time I have it will have to wait.
I'm getting a little antsy over Joomla! 1.6 because it will probably get rid of the remaining 2 or 3 criticisms about Joomla! that I have. With the 1.0 series I cussed quite a bit. With Joomla! 1.5 I cuss once in a while (hierarchical categories anyone?) but it seems that Joomla! 1.6 is fixing the remaining couple of issues. Moving to 1.6 will be a big change as I'll need to upgrade to a version of PHP that isn't included with my Server OS. I don't like that situation but I don't have to worry about it until fall it seems as that's when 1.6 is supposed to be released. Once I move to 1.6 I might be able to get rid of a couple more third party components. Now I'd only need to find a native Joomla! photo gallery to replace my embedded gallery. Too bad that the Joomla! photo gallery people are smoking crack. An example of this is Phoca Gallery's insistance that the size and aspect ratio of photo frames be hard coded so every image has to be the same size and aspect ratio! No amount of debating has changed this situation with the Phoca team and even though there's features added to it at a feverish pace this one "feature" may never change. This means you have to crop and or resize every single image to they're exactly the same aspect otherwise they look like shite. Yes, that also means that you can only have horizontal or vertical images, not both. I don't understand the short sightedness of some people.
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- Category: Tech Blog
I'm thinking that Amazon has an issue with their database and the photo isn't matching up exactly to the description.
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- Category: Site News
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- Category: Linux
I got tired of the Update Manager in Ubuntu complaining that I had software packages to update and I sort of wanted to play with Ubuntu One so I started the 2 hrs process of updating from 9.10 to 10.04. The first thing I noticed after the update was done was that there was a "communication" app on my toolbar that allowed me to all of my Facebook, Twitter, and chat accounts. It also had a section for Ubuntu One which I set up and will play with later.
My biggest issue with Lucid Lynx was that they changed where the gadgets were on the windows. Why? Because it's gnome and they want to make our life easier that's why. Of course they never asked us, they just assumed Apple style that they knew what was best. Below is a picture of the old window border (gadgets on the right) and the new window border (gadgets on the left). Below that is a command line string to put your new border back to the way it's been for thousands of years.
To set the gadgets back to the top right had corner paste this into a terminal.
gconftool-2 –set “/apps/metacity/general/button_layout” –type string “menu:minimize,maximize,close”
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- Category: Food Blog
I have a short list of Mexican restaurants that can actually pull off any sort of edible mole in the Seattle area and currently that list has 3 items in it - La Carta de Oaxaca, Frida's and Todo Mexico. However, in Mexico just about every restaurant makes decent mole, some better than others but most good. In America you're lucky to have one in 20 that can make it well enough to get past the gag reflex so we have a great many people who say they don't like mole. Which of course throws me into the usual rage and I climb up on my soapbox to explain with my magaphone what they had wasn't mole to which they stick their fingers in their ears and say na na na until I'm done. I've had this conversation with a lot of food items, the most common being duck, lamb and escargot. Mole only misses the top 3 out of a lack of awareness of it's existance by the general populus. So back to my list of perveyors of good mole. You don't have to question me on the first - just go to Yelp and type in La Carta de Oaxaca which currently has 386 reviews which must be some sort of limit because it's had that for years. La Carta de Oaxaca makes the only great Mole Negro in the city. Frida's is less well known but makes a decent Mole Poblano. The last and the focus of this article is Todo Mexico in Lynnwood WA.
Todo should be on everyone's todo list. I'm sure it's pronounced "to-doe" and not "to do" but I digress.The very interesting think about Todo is that it has a section of the menu with foods from different regions of Mexico. If you've been to Mexico the odds that you've seen anything but sand is small so you may not realize that Mexico resembles Europe in it's cultural diversity. Pre-hispanic Mesoamerica had many competing civilizations with different languages and cultures. The Spanish were only partially successful in integrating these people so food in Veracruz doesn't resemble food in Mexico City which doesn't resemble food in Oaxaca and so on (and none of it resembles Mexican food where I live). There are many dishes you can only get in a certain region (chiles en nogado for example) so travelling to different regions is a must if you want to experience Mexican cuisine. The other interesting thing that has been pointed out to me recently is that the French created their wonderful style of cuisine about 150 years ago, the Italians a bit more than that and so on. The food that you eat in Mexico spans to the time of the Romans. You're eating 2000 years of history with Mexican food. You can't say that with any European culture. Italian tomato sauce, polenta, Belgian chocolate, Irish potatoes, squash filled ravioli, Hungarian paprika and so on all came from ingredients from Mexico so those countries could not have been making those foods for very long.
This section of the Todo Mexico menu is very interesting because you can get Yukatan style tacos el Pastor, Mole from Puebla and so on. You can take a little journey around Mexico in one restaurant which is genius in my opinion as long as the quality is good which it is. Back to the Mole. Todo makes a mole poblano that isn't too sweet and has a noticeable touch of cinnamon to it and I have to say that I'm always suprised at how well I like it. Having been to Oaxaca several times I've had quite a lot of Mole and considering the bad track record of U.S. based Mexican restaurants ability to make Mole I usually try to avoid it but I never regret ordering Mole Poblano from Todo. I highly recommend it.
The other plate I enjoy is the Todo Special (the name may be different but close, my memory fails me) that includes a very neat idea, take strips of chicken and wrap them in bacon and grill them. They also take prawns and wrap them in bacon and grill them. I think anything wrapped in bacon and grilled would be great. My general rule is that bacon added to anything usually improves it. Not sure I'm sold on baconaise though, hmm.
The other thing I'd like to mention is that the day when you have warm cozy restaurants seems to have faded. Restaurants these days seem to want high ceilings, little directional lights 12 inches above the table and jazz playing which gets drowned out by noisy conversations because of the horrible acoustics of 14 ft ceilings . The waiter will come by with his hair spiked and those ridiculous tiny square black rimmed glasses. Everyone wants to be trendy, nobody cares about comfort. Todo bucks that trend and has booths everywhere and even a fireplace. Look at the photo above and tell me that doesn't look like a wonderful place to bring your family and just sit back, relax, eat great food and spend time with those who you care about in front of the fire. It doesn't matter what you eat because the feel of the place is worth the visit. I wish for a return to this style of restaurant but I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon. Even La Carta de Oaxaca leans heavily toward the trendy side with black and white photos adorning the walls and enough noise to make you feel like you're at a football game. Not saying you shouldn't go to La Carta de Oaxaca as you should but I yearn for the Todo style of restaurant more often then not and Todo delivers. The yelp reviews for Todo are a bit confusing, there are many people saying they really like it but only gave it 3 stars. There are also several people saying the service is slow. . Service slow in a Mexican restaurant? If you want fast go to Taco Bell. Mexico is about siestas and kicking back. The environment is good, the fire is roaring, have a margarita and relax, the waiter will be a round in a bit.
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- Category: Food Blog
Considering the grocery store product signs are in both English and French and we hear so much French being spoken it sort of makes sense that we'd be able to find a French restaurant in Vancouver. I know that Quebec is not France but still it seems that the odds are greater than in Seattle where people still think the French hate them. So in our wandering the streets of Vancouver we kept our eyes peeled for French restaurants and found one that looked good - The Hermitage on Robson. Hermitage's chef (and owner) trained for eight years in France and also trained as a Pastry Chef and a Butcher prior to serving as the private chef to the King Leopold of Belgium. He has worked at some of the finest 3 star Michelin restaurants in Europe and then went on to be the executive chef at some of the best hotels in Europe, the United States, and Canada. In 1985 Hervé Martin came to Vancouver to open the Pan Pacific Hotel after which he decided to open his own restaurant - the Hermitage. We chose this restaurant not based on their self-promotion but rather in the same way that we choose any French restaurant - on their variety of duck offerings! The clincher was the seared foie gras, caramelized pear on toasted buttered brioche which by the way was fabulous. My Mom had froi gras for the very first time and now understands our fascination with it. The duck's psychological well being be damned, it's good.
I also ate as my main dish duck breast with pears and roasted potatoes millefeuille in a pear William reduction. They asked me if I wanted it cooked to medium (which would ruin it) so I responded how I do in France - "I want it pink". They didn't do too bad but it was still cooked a bit too much and only showed a bit of pink. Duck breast is best when the whole interior of the meat is pink without a shade of gray. The sauce was good and the potatoes millefeuille were excellent. The asparagus stayed on my plate though.
Piper had mussels in a wine sauce which she didn't like at first because of the flavor of the wine. In Paris they're basically straight up with butter and lemon. No need to get fancy when the basic food is fine by itself.
My mother had duck confit raviolis with a Madeira sauce which was oddly different but very nice nonetheless. I'm not sure she was sold on them but I liked it as did Natalya.
The service was excellent an our waiter was from Paris so he had an authentic Parisen accent as apposed to the harsher Quebecian accent of the other waiters. The environment was also very nice and even though we were drastically underdressed we were treated well and nobody batted an eyelash at my Babylon 5 t-shirt. My one complaint is this sort of food costs a great deal more to eat here than in Paris. Our meal for 5 (with two eating appetizers in place of their main dish) it cost us $175. If our party of 5 were to eat here once a month for a year it would cost enough over eating at our favorite restaurant in Paris to buy one round trip ticket to France. I think overall each dish cost about 50% more than it would in Paris (factoring in current exchange rate). Should French food cost more here than in France? I don't think so but it does. But then Mexican costs more than in Mexico, Italian costs more than in Italy and just about every other type costs more than in it's home country.
A word of advice, if you plan on going to The Hermitage you should have the Froie Gras and you can eat off the Appetizers menu because they're nice sized plates. If you want to drop the $30 then order the Duck Breasts and make sure they understand to cook it as they would in France - pink everywhere.