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The thing about my new email address is that I can only receive mail using it. Ubuntu doesn’t have a way for me to send mail using it. Luckily Google’s Gmail has a way for me to set up my account to where I can send mail from either my regular email address or from my @ubuntu.com email address. This is great, except.. I have an iPhone, and I quite frequently will check my email on my iPhone, which creates an issue when I want to reply to something from my @ubuntu.com email address, because the iPhone doesn’t know that Gmail is setup to allow me to send email from both my regular email address and my @ubuntu.com email address, so I either can’t respond until I get to a computer, or I have to respond using my personal email address.

Joeb454 from the Ubuntu Beginners Team and myself were discussing using our @ubuntu.com email address on mailing lists and the lack of being able to respond the the mailing list with our @ubuntu.com addresses from our iPhones. After a little bit of searching on the internet, I was able to come up with a working solution on how to send email from an @ubuntu.com email address. To do this, you are going to create a dummy POP account on your iPhone with your @ubuntu.com email address, which will login and send the email through your personal gmail account.

Here are the instructions:

Go to Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Add Account

Click Other

Add Mail Account

Fill out the appropriate information and click save. (Note: Put your @ubuntu.com email address in the Address field)

Select POP for the type of server.

Incoming Mail Server:
Host Name: pop.gmail.com
User Name: your @ubuntu.com email
Password: doesn’t matter.. Make something up

Outgoing Mail Server:
Host Name: smtp.gmail.com
User Name: your Gmail address (NOT your @ubuntu.com email address)
Password: Your Gmail password

Click Save

It will display an error saying POP account verification failed.

Click OK

Click Save again

Now it says This account may not be able to send or receive emails. Are you sure you want to save?

Click Save

That’s it as far as setup. Now when you open the Mail App, you will see your personal email address and your @ubuntu.com email address. The @ubuntu.com is a dummy address, and opening it will do nothing for you. Plus you will get an error.

To send mail from your @ubuntu.com email address, start a new email.

Click on your email address in the “Cc/Bcc, From:” line to expand the different fields.

Now click on your email address in the “From:” line.

Select your @ubuntu.com email address

Now fill out the rest of the email like normal and hit send. You can see that your @ubuntu.com email address is in the From line.

I hope this works well for you. Any comments or questions please feel free to post on my blog!

adv_windowlist.pl – Advanced window list will show you the name of the channel next to the number that Irssi has given it. This script is nice because you no longer have to remember which number corresponds with which channel.

auto_whois.pl – Auto whois is a neat little script that performs a whois function on any user who sends you a private message. I have my PMs set to each open in their own window, so the whois for each user is printed in the PM window and not in the status window.

nickcolor.pl – Nick color is a simple script that assigns each nick a different color. This is nice when looking at the window because you can easily tell when different users are talking.

nicklist.pl – By default, Irssi doesn’t have a way of listing all of the users in a channel other than by using the /names command. Nicklist creates a list of users in each channel and puts it either to the left or to the right (user defined) of the chat window. There is a scrolling feature to this also, which allows you to scroll the nick list up and down. There is a way to make a key combination scroll the list for you, but I have not been able to get that to work. If you have luck with it, please get with me and show me how to do it!

prowlnotify.pl – This script is cool for those who have an iPhone. When your connection is set to away, either by /away or by disconnecting from screen (using the next script), Prowl Notify will use APIs to send your message to your iPhone. It is quite cool if you have an iPhone like I do.

screen_away.pl – If you run Irssi in Screen or Byobu (which you should!), this script will set you away when you disconnect from the screen session and set you back when you reconnect to the screen session. Quite a neat little script.

scriptassist.pl – Script assist does just what it sounds like.. Ok, maybe not, because it sounds confusing to me. Script assist checks your scripts to see if there is a new version available. It also has the ability to fetch the updated scripts for you. I haven’t had the chance to update a script with this yet, but I have checked to see if there are any updates with it, and it’s pretty cool.

trackbar.pl – I have multiple windows open in Irssi all the time. I auto join more than 40 channels, and normally have greater than 50 windows open between PMs and channels. This script is nice because it places a bar across the screen that tells you where you last were when you switched channels. This makes it much easier to keep up with conversations because you no longer have to “figure out where you left off.”

window_switcher.pl – The last script I am going to list is Window Switcher. As I said, I auto join more than 40 channels. When you have that many windows open, it isn’t as easy to switch between them. You have 1-0 which is as easy as just Alt+#, and then Q-O (most of the top row of letters on your keyboard), which is as easy as Alt+Letter. But when you get to window #20, it looses its easiness. You now have to type /window 20 to switch to window number 20.. Not as easy is it? A whole lot more keys to push. Enter Window Switcher. Window switcher takes the /window and converts it to /ws.. That removes 4 keys from what you have to type.. Here is one better.. It allows you to bind a key combination (Ctrl + G) and then you just type the window number. So Ctrl+G 20 will now switch you to window 20. Quite a nice script which has saved me a lot of time changing windows!

I hope you have found some of these scripts useful, and I look forward to reading any comments you may have. Also, if you have a favorite Irssi script that I didn’t list here (or if you use one of the ones I list here differently) please post a comment and let me know!

The Rackspace Cloud just reciently released their API for public use and already Michael Mayo has created an iPhone App called “Rackspace Cloud.” Michael is planning on releasing version 1.0 next week, which will focus mostly on the Cloud Servers side of the app. Version 1.1 he plans on greatly increasing the capabilities of the Cloud Files side.

Initial Startup

When you first startup the Rackspace app by clicking on the icon on your springboard, you are asked to enter in your username and your API key. The username is the same name that you login to the client area on the website, and you can obtain your API key from the control panel. After entering this information the first time, the app will save it, and you will be automatically logged in the next time you run the app.

Cloud Servers

Upon clicking the ‘Servers’ button at the bottom of the app you are greeted with a list of your current Cloud Servers. If you click on one of your servers, you are given the details of that server, including the name, size, amount of drive space, what OS it is running, and your public and private IP(s). If you click on ‘Flavor’ you are able to resize your server from your iPhone. You are also given options to reset your password and perform a soft and hard reboot. Back on the ‘Servers’ screen, at the top right there is a little ‘+’ button which, when clicked allows you to create a new server. You are given the ability to name the server, select the size you would like, as well as select the OS you want to run. You also have the ability to create a server from a backup of another server if you have backups enabled. Once you click ‘Save’ the clouds will begin to align, and you will receive an eMail from The Rackspace Cloud letting you know that your new server has been created and how to login to it. Not bad for playing on your iPhone, huh?

Cloud Files

Currently you can only view a list of the containers and files that you have in Cloud Files. He is working on the ability to view your files from the iPhone, upload images directly from your iPhone to your Cloud Files account, as well as being able to create text files from the iPhone. Hopefully these features will come shortly after the initial 1.0 release.

Screenshots

    

    

    

    

The iPhone 3GS (the “S” stands for SPEED) was also anounced at WWDC today. The new 3GS will have a 3 megapixel autofocus camera, as well as a VIDEO camera (30fps VGA video camera with sound). The camera will be able to be used by developers in their own apps. You will be able to send your videos via eMail and MMS, or also to YouTube. AT&T will support MMS and iPhone Tethering later this summer. The 3GS also has a Voice Control interface to allow you to control your phone by voice. The iPhone 3GS also has a Genius Play List in which you can tell the phone to “Play more songs like this” and iTunes will play similar songs. The 3GS has support for Nike+ and hardware encryption. The battery will last for up to 9 hours of internet wifi, 10 hours of watching video, 30 hours of audio, 12 hours of 2G talk. Price for the iPhone 3GS starts at $199 for a 16GB iPhone (black or white) and $299 for a 32GB iPhone (black or white). The iPhone 3g will stay on the market at $99. The iPhone 3G is available starting today at $99. The iPhone 3GS will come out on June 19th.

There are better options to see your memory usage; however it seems `free` is more attune to creating the confusion I’m attempting to quell here. That said, see the Redhat docs about /proc/meminfo

Other commands to use to see memory usage

$ vmstat -aS M #see the "inactive" column for a rough "free" idea.

The real answer

There’s no reason to clear what’s in RAM until you need more space to write to it.

The short answer analogy

Buffers and cache in RAM being cleared is silly. Imagine a professor, who rather than writing all the way across the chalkboard, finishes a sentence and immediately erases and starts writing in the upper left corner AGAIN and AGAIN and AGAIN.

OR imagine you like a song. You record it to the beginning of a cassette tape. When you want a new song, do you re-record over the first song or record after it?

AKA: The horrible House/Barn analogy

Many people new to Linux or computers in general have a poor understanding of how RAM works. On Linux systems, most users will look at `top` or use `free` to see the amount of memory installed and/or free. Below is an example:

dayid@emiline ~ $ free -m
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:          2024       1970         53          0         19       1669
-/+ buffers/cache:        281       1742
Swap:         1953          4       1948

At first glance, they may look at their machine with 2GB of RAM and wonder how they only have 53MB free! While this is true, the surprise, fear, or angst about this comes from a misunderstanding.

We could take a trip to a million places for this horrible analogy, but let’s pretend we’re on a country farm.
Rather than working with 2024MB of RAM and 1953MB of SWAP, we’ll say we’ve got 20 beds in the house, and 20 beds in the barn.
Rather than programs we’ll have people occupying the space.
For our purposes, ignore costs of cleaning the bedding, water, etc.
The house can hold active workers or non-active workers.

Due to its distance and the time to get to/from it, the barn can only hold non-active workers. When a worker is called from the barn they will have to pass through the house and stay in the house while they work.

• 10 laborers show up to a job. Since the house is closer to the food, showers, and work they’ll be doing, we let them stay in the house.
• 10 of our 20 beds are used by active workers.
• Our farm in `free -m`:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         10           10            0            0           0
  -/+ buffers/cache:               10           10
  Barn:                 20          0           20
  

• 8 more people show up for another job. They also stay in the house since we have the space for them.
• 18 of our 20 beds are used by active workers.
• Our farm in `free -m`:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         18            2            0            0           0
  -/+ buffers/cache:               18            2
  Barn:                 20          0           20
  

• The first job is over, we no longer need to keep around the first 10 laborers; however, letting them stay doesn’t cost us anything, as if they weren’t there the beds would just be empty (i.e., go to waste).
• 18 of 20 beds are used. 8 by active workers, 10 by non-active workers.
• Our farm in `free -m`:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         18            2            0            0          10
  -/+ buffers/cache:                8           12
  Barn:                 20          0           20
  

• Let’s take a timeout and review the above output. Right now we have 20 rooms. 18 are being used so only 2 are free. However, since 10 workers aren’t being used, they are in cache – kept around because we have no reason to kick them out – so, we actually have an operating space of 12 workers we could hire. 2 to stay in the unused rooms, and 10 to replace those that are already here.
• We have a new job on the farm, so we have 4 new people show up. We do not have enough beds for them. 2 of the 10 who are not active leave. We move in those 4 new people.
• 20 of 20 beds are used. 12 by active workers, 8 by non-active workers.
• Our farm:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         20            0            0            0           8
  -/+ buffers/cache:               12            8
  Barn:                 20          0           20
  

• Right now we have 20 rooms filled. 8 are filled by people who aren’t working though, so technically we have 8 beds we can use if we need to. Now let’s get crazy.
• It’s production season and we have a lot to do around the farm. We setup another program and need to hire 14 new workers for it. We’ll have to kick out the 8 non-active workers and move in 8 of the new workers. However, because we run out of rooms in the house, our least important workers will have to stay in the barn. The barn is still good storing area, but it will take them longer to get to and from the job each time they are required to.
• 20 of 20 beds are used by active workers. 6 rooms in the barn are used.
• Our farm:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         20            0           0            0            0
  -/+ buffers/cache:               20            0
  Barn:                 20          6           14
  

• Now, things calm down again and only 4 workers are going to remain active. We’re not going to toss out the rest though as they’re not harming anything just taking up space (at least not until we need the space again)
• Our farm:

                     total       used         free       shared      buffers      cached
  House:                20         20            0           0            0           16
  -/+ buffers/cache:                4           16
  Barn:                 20          6           14
  

• That’s right, our “free” stays 0, as we still have no space available. The important thing to look at here is how much do we have available if we clean out the buffers and cache – which are not necessary to keep, but we generally keep until it needs to be discard.

That’s right. You just read an entire horrible article about RAM just to know to look at your buffers/cache line before wondering why so much RAM is used.

Unused RAM is “wasted RAM”, let it cache!

All you have to do is add the following line to your vhost.

So lets create our vhost. I prefer to create each vhost in a seperate file. We are going to create the vhost for chrisjohnston.org. To start lets create the file:

and then add the following code:

$HTTP["host"] =~ "(^|\.)chrisjohnston\.org$" {
        server.document-root = "/www/chrisjohnston.org/www/htdocs/"
        server.errorlog = "/www/chrisjohnston.org/www/logs/error.log"
        accesslog.filename = "/www/chrisjohnston.org/www/logs/access.log",
        server.error-handler-404 = "/index.php"
}

Now exit out of your vhost configuration file. We need to add chrisjohnston.org.conf to our lighttpd.conf so that it will recognize it.

Now all the way at the bottom add the following line:

Exit out of the lighttpd.conf file and restart lighttpd.

Don’t forget to change your DNS if you need to. Your WordPress install should now be working and have the ability to have “Pretty URL’s.”