The Misadventures of Penoi

beware of this scam, i just received a call claiming they are from microsoft and said that my computer was sending malicious info in the net. Curiously, i removed my network connection(for safety reason) and followed their instruction..they asked me to go to the Event Viewer and asked if theres any error.. obviously there wil be erros in windows.they requested me to delete the error logs.. obviously i wasnt able to delete the logs.. after that he told me that a microsoft certified technician will scan my computer online by opening something which irritates me.. if theres any issues with my pc.. i will deal with it.. i can reformat anytime or use Linux.. and i dont want microsoft support to mess around with my pc.. the caller even says that if there will be any problem with my computer, it will not be Microsoft's fault.. to hell Microsoft cares???i hung up the phone.

Did some research on this scam and found the following sites.. please be warned and this kind of modus operandi is still on the loose

http://www.computerrepairtips.net/phone-call-from-microsoft-about-virus-is-a-scam/

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_vista-security/i-received-a-phone-call-from-someone-claiming-i/4489f388-d6de-416d-9158-0079764bb001

 

2 days to go before i join my family for KC's birthday party. Pretty darn excited. Been stressed lately and i need a break. Maybe, goodbye CLI for 1 week. After Redhat, next target Veritas filesystem and clustering.

It has been a long day for me.. RHCSA exam in the morning and RHCE exam in the afternoon. Finally after months of self study and 4 days on the rapid track course, i nailed both exam.
Pretty much to say that i'm so proud  on the cert. This is not the type of exam that you will just choose among the multiple choice or configure in a simulated environment. It will test your knowledge on how well you understood Redhat.
On future takers, i advised you to know the exam objectives inside and out. SELinux looks like intimidating at first, but as soon as you understand how it works,it will be a piece of cake for you :)

Materials/books used

RHCSA/RHCE Red Hat Linux Certification Study Guide (Exams EX200 & EX300), 6th Edition (Certification Press)  -- Michael Jang
Highly recommend!!! Comes with a CD with pdfs and labs exams at the end of every chapter. My fav source of info for the exam.

Hands-on Guide to the Red Hat® Exams: RHCSA™ and RHCE® Cert Guide and Lab Manual (Certification Guide) -- Damian Tommasino
Lots of errors, but hey, as soon as you pointed the errors in the book, it just shows that you know your stuffs. Used to counter check configs and setup.

RH300 RHCE Rapid Track course
Final review for the exam. It cost much but highly recommended also. It guides me and helps to fill in the gaps on what i have learned already on my home lab. Before taking the course, i advised that you first do your home work. Learn the exam objectives, build your own home lab, simulate the configs as advised on Michael and Damian's book. In this way when you attend the course, you can ask all the questions that you have on your instructor. This is fast-paced course so make full use of it.

texastwister/OpenRHCE - GitHub - This is a beast study guide. I used this as a last minute review before taking the exam. Reading the whole week while in the train :) Highly recommended also

As  always, we signed the Non-disclosure Agreement so i will not divulge anything specific about the exam. I might update this blog,but will not be on the RHCE exam specific anymore.
Study!!! study!!!! study!!!!! lab!!!! lab!!!! lab!!!! simulate!!!! simulate!!!! and always follow the KISS principle..

 

It's wAs a long day. Yesterday my wife surprise me of the thing that I wanted since it came out... An Ipad2.. It is the 64G white version. This morning another gift she put on my home office table.. A Tommy Hillfiger watch... I'm deeply touched and appreciate the effort she and KC did this Father's day. Love you both...

Im using Tweetdeck for almost a month now. Since my Chrome freezes my computer and switched to Opera(in which Tweetdeck doesnt have apps for Opera) i installed the desktop version.

Twitter is not bad at all. It depends on how you use it. For example, i want to know the latest news on a certain topics, i will just add a column in Tweetdeck with the corresponding keywords search.

My current keywords are:

RHCE RHCSA centos Redhat

Scientific Linux 6 was released for i386 and x86_64

Redhat 6 used KVM(?) in virtualization but Rhel6 DVD doesnt have kvm rpms. You can't rum KVM on a virtualized environment in Virtualbox. Virtualized processor doesnt support hardware virtualization(VT-x and AMD-v). On that note, i might need new computer just to simulate KVM that i cant afford as of now..

Initialize disk using pvcreate

[root@rhel01 ~]# pvcreate /dev/sda1
Physical volume "/dev/sda1" successfully created

[root@rhel01 ~]# vgcreate lab_group1 /dev/sda1
Volume group "lab_group1" successfully created

In this sample i created 10MB of logical volume mount to /mnt
[root@rhel01 ~]# lvcreate -L 10M lab_group1 -n lab01
Rounding up size to full physical extent 12.00 MiB
Logical volume "lab01" created
[root@rhel01 ~]# mkfs.ext4 /dev/lab_group1/lab01
mke2fs 1.41.12 (17-May-2010)

[root@rhel01 ~]# mount /dev/lab_group1/lab01 /mnt

[root@rhel01 ~]# df -h /mnt

Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on

/dev/mapper/lab_group1-lab01

12M  1.2M   10M  11% /mnt

[root@rhel01 ~]# pvcreate /dev/sdb1
Wiping software RAID md superblock on /dev/sdb1
Physical volume "/dev/sdb1" successfully created

Extend lab_group1 volume group
[root@rhel01 ~]# vgextend lab_group1 /dev/sdb1
Volume group "lab_group1" successfully extended
[root@rhel01 ~]# vgdisplay lab_group1
--- Volume group ---
VG Name               lab_group1
System ID
Format                lvm2
Metadata Areas        2
Metadata Sequence No  3
VG Access             read/write
VG Status             resizable
MAX LV                0
Cur LV                1
Open LV               0
Max PV                0
Cur PV                2
Act PV                2
VG Size               56.00 MiB
PE Size               4.00 MiB
Total PE              14
Alloc PE / Size       3 / 12.00 MiB
Free  PE / Size       11 / 44.00 MiB
VG UUID               o8kB09-P20F-QLFx-UmPE-5BB5-mlu9-o867qV

Extend logical volume lab01
[root@rhel01 ~]# lvextend -L +10M /dev/lab_group1/lab01
Rounding up size to full physical extent 12.00 MiB
Extending logical volume lab01 to 24.00 MiB
Logical volume lab01 successfully resized
[root@rhel01 ~]# df -h /mnt
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/lab_group1-lab01
12M  1.2M   10M  11% /mnt
[root@rhel01 ~]# resize2fs /dev/lab_group1/lab01
resize2fs 1.41.12 (17-May-2010)
Filesystem at /dev/lab_group1/lab01 is mounted on /mnt; on-line resizing required
old desc_blocks = 1, new_desc_blocks = 1
Performing an on-line resize of /dev/lab_group1/lab01 to 24576 (1k) blocks.
The filesystem on /dev/lab_group1/lab01 is now 24576 blocks long.
[root@rhel01 ~]# df -h /mnt
Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/lab_group1-lab01
24M  1.2M   22M   5% /mnt

Passing score:63

Your Score : 70

Result: PASS

Whoa i barely passed  Oracle Certified System Admin for Solaris 10 (310-202) Part 2 exam. Caught off guard on LDAP and I just hate Jumpstart questions. Already convinced myself that  i failed the exam because of the low percentile per topic, but what a relief when the examiner handed me the test printout with the word PASS.

Have to relax first this weekend before i go back to my labs.. hopefully RHCE eh :)

running install...

running /sbin/loader

linux apm=off acpi=off pci=noacpi

I just came from my night shift and found AVG was updated and needed for a computer reboot. To my amaze, the New AVG Internet Security 2011 update causes Windows 7 to crash. Even in Safe Mode, it wont boot at all. As of now, AVG haven't release a quick fix yet. Or in worst case scenario, reinstall Windows.

====

Update

How to fix your computer after AVG Internet Security 2011 update windows crash

1. download and burn AVG Rescue CD http://www.avg.com/ww-en/download-file-cd-arl-iso

2. Boot thru AVG rescue CD. Go to Utilities > File Manager then navigate to /mnt/sda(x) where x depends on the partition of your computer.

3. Rename the following files

\Program Files(x86)\AVG\AVG10\avgrs*.exe     >>  avgrs*.exe.bak
\Program Files(x86)\AVG\AVG10\avgchsv*.exe >> avgchsv*.exe.bak

4. Press ctrl+alt+del to reboot your computer. Make sure that you remove your AVG Rescue CD.

5. Once your computer successfully booted. Download the latest AVG Internet Security 2011 Installer http://www.avg.com/ww-en/download-trial

6. Run the installer and click Repair. After the repair, reboot your computer

(or you skip step 5  and 6. Uninstall AVG and install other free Antivirus software)

You can also use Linux-based live CDs as an alternative to AVG Rescue CD

As of now, the issue is being tracked on the following sites:

AVG Official Fix: AVG FIX FOR WIN 7 64 BIT CUSTOMERS NOW RELEASED

AVG Forum : Some Windows 7 operating systems cannot be started after latest update

AVG Facebook : http://www.facebook.com/avgfree

#AVG Twitter: http://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23AVG

I'm using Trendmicro Internet Security Pro for almost one year and my license will expire Jan 2011. Since it will be SITEX this coming weekend, its time for me to hunt and try other antivirus system. First choice is Kaspersky. When im trying to check the pricing online, i was amazed that Kaspersky's online store was tagged as Dangerous by Trendmicro's Web filter. Now thats what i call "killing the competition" :)

But i wont settle with Kaspersky as the review is not that quite good. Will try AVG or Nod32 or avast. Lets see..

Microsoft's Kinect was recently lunched in Singapore and thru impulse buying, we scored our very own Xbox 360 with Kinect. Let's see whats inside the box...



xbox 360 4gb with Kinect



We bought other Kinect games as well



The box



as per the box.. Jump in!!!



Manuals





Xbox 360 console



Free Kinect Adventures game



Cables and controllers



Xbox 360 Kinect

Today is our last day of stay in Astoria Park singapore. We will surely miss this place because its nere Kembangan MRT. But hopefully next year when rental in Singapore goes down we will be back.

At last, my new domain myiphone5.net propagated. I did not know that i have to use free NS of web.com.ph. Thanks to the online tools provided by network-tools.com.

I never liked games since Final Fantasy era in Sony Playstation, but i admit, im hooked on NY Zombies for Iphone. You will earn money for every people that you saved and by killing zombies. Money is needed in upgrading bombs and guns. Blasting zombies head will never the same again. NY Zombies is available in Itunes and its FREE!!!!

My wife is back into blogging!!! Go Mommy!!!! Visit her site in Mga Kuwento ni Mommy

Picture edit using adobe photoshop express for iphone

Press and hold the Home button of your iphone then press the "Sleep" button found at the top right side of the phone. Your screen shots can be found on the Camera Roll under Photos.