Upgrade Simple Machines Forum to version 2.0 from 1.1

admin Fixes 0 Comment

Simple Machines Forum (SMF) is one of the most used PHP forum’s avaible. I like it very much because it’s very easy to integrate with your web site. The SMF API is very easy to use and gives you a good way to use the forum session on the whole website.

Last year SMF finally officially upgraded to version 2.0 with some nice new features and a better framework. The upgrade procedure is in fact not very different from upgrades between minor version and the few issues that can present you are easy to resolve.

Before starting it could be useful to check your MODs writing down which one you are currently using because later you have to reinstall them all.

First of all go to Simple Machines Forum’s download section and grab the large upgrade package. If you have a non english installation I suggest you to download even the last language package. Pay attention to download the right version between the standard and the utf-8 package.

Next step is to extract all files from the packages and upload them to the server in the right position. Now access the upgrade.php script in your forum’s main folder.

If the upgrade script notices something wrong it will suggest you to run the settings repair utility. You can find it in SMF’s Tools section. If the wrong think is a missing script.js (The upgrade script cannot find script.js or it is out of date. Make sure your theme paths are correct. You can download a setting checker tool from the Simple Machines Website) in your theme folder then your theme is not compatible with SMF 2.0. Simply ignore the notice and proceed, the forum will switch to the default theme.

Now you’re ready to run the upgrade.  It’s a good idea to make a backup of your database, the upgrade script will do it for you if you want, just check the option. Another good idea is to set the forum in maintenance mode, this way you will avoid data inconsistency.

The upgrade process will work by it’s own way. Once finished you have to cleanup your installation from upgrade files and you’re done with upgrading and you can start to customize your forum by reinstalling the MODs and choosing a new theme.

Resettare un cellulare Nokia

admin Cellphones, Smartphones 1 Comment

Ogni tanto può capitare di avere la necessità di riformattare il proprio smartphone. Può tornare utile per fare una pulizia rapida e veloce oppure per risolvere un problema non ben identificato. In ogni caso la procedura non è complicata anche se bisogna stare attenti per evitare di perdere i propri dati.

Effettuare il backup

Il primo passo da fare è quello di effettuare un backup utilizzando Nokia Suite. Se non c’è il link sulla sinistra basta andare su Strumenti > Backup. Il backup permette di selezionare varie categorie di elementi e credo che sicuramente si andranno selezionare almeno la rubrica, l’agenda e le impostazioni.

La procedura di deep reset cancellerà tutte le informazioni presenti sulla memoria interna C: e sull’archivio di massa E: Si salveranno invece le cose presenti sull’eventuale memory card F: Quindi fate attenzione a mettere in salvo anche tutte le foto, i video e altri file che avete memorizzato sullo smartphone.

Avviare il deep reset

Il deep reset permette di ripristinare il cellulare, come se fosse appena uscito di fabbrica. Per avviare questa procedura è necessario digitare *#7370#

Il cellulare vi chiederà conferma e se darete l’assenso si riavvierà dopo pochi secondi. A questo punto verrà visualizzato il logo Nokia per qualche minuto e poi il sistema operativo ripartirà come nuovo.

Ripristinare contatti, agenda e tutto il resto

Possiamo ora ripristinare tutte le cose che abbiamo intelligentemente salvato tramite backup tramite Nokia Suite > Strumenti > Ripristina. Se non abbiamo fatto altre cose nel frattempo basterà scegliere l’ultimo backup.

Ripristinare le applicazioni

Sfortunatamente la procedura di deep reset cancella le applicazioni presenti. Comunque è semplice ripristinare quelle che ci servono tramite tramite il Nokia Store che tiene traccia di tutto quello che installiamo.

Port rewriting with iptables

admin Hints 0 Comment

Sometime it is useful to rewrite incoming connection to a different port. It’s very easy with iptables:

iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -i eth0 -p tcp –dport 443 -j REDIRECT –to-ports 9090

Obviously you have to change source port (443 in my example) and the destination post (9090 in the example) and maybe the interface.

I used this solution for a Apache server running inside a VirtualBox that offers HTTPS through VB’s NAT. The problem is that I don’t launch the VirtualBox using root, but with a not privileged user, so I cannot map the NAT on hosts’ 443 port, but I choose for a not standard 9090 port. Unfortunately external applications need to access the service on the standard port. Rewriting the port with iptable was a cheap solution 🙂

 

Using command line subversion with svn+ssh and identity file

admin Fixes, Hints 0 Comment

Apache Subversion (SVN) is a good and commonly used versioning tool. Even if there are a lot of graphical interfaces for it you sometimes have the need to use it on command line (using the svn client) or it can be your choice. Anyway using Subversion this way isn’t very difficult, just a little bit less comfortable.

A secure system configuration requires that connections to your remote repository will be tunneled through SSH and a more secure configuration avoids password and uses identity files. The question is: how can i pass the position of my identity file to svn? And the user to use on the remote machine?

The solution is not obvious, but really simple: use the ~/.ssh/config file!

The SSH config file allows you to set different values to be used when connecting with SSH. This is a example:

Host example
HostName www.example.com
IdentitiesOnly yes
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_dsa
User admin

Every time you try to connect to www.example.com the given identity file and username will be used. Very easy!

Amarok doesn’t play Mp3s with GStreamer backend

admin Fixes 2 Comments

I think Amarok is the best music player available. It organizes your music in a good way and the various plugins gives you a lot of useful informations about what you are hearing.

Unfortunately by updating my Slackware to KDE 4.8, using Alien Pastures packages, my Amarok doesn’t play Mp3 files anymore. Ok, I now Mp3 is not the best format for many reasons (audio rendering, licence, …), but the most music I have on my PC is in this format and converting it to something else is not a good idea. Anyway when I try to start a Mp3 Amarok notifies me that he is not able to play this format and suggest to take a look in the FAQs. But i had no luck there.

On my KDE box I need to use GStreamer as Phonom backend because it’s the only that works with my configuration where the monitor is connected through HDMI. I want to use mainly the monitor’s audio boxes, so I have to use HDMI as the main audio interface and apparently only GStreamer makes the job.

GStreamer uses a lot of plugins to play different audio files formats. This plugins are commonly grouped into several packages: base, good, bad and ugly. The first one are the absolutely necessary. The second one are good quality plugins and a good license. Bad plugins are not to good about quality or don’t have some feature. Finally the ugly group are plugins with a good quality, but a bad licence… like Mp3!

So, I think you have already understood, to play Mp3s with GStreamer you have to install the ugly plugins package. For Slackware you can retrive it on Slacky.eu.

 

Choqok, un client di microblogging per KDE

admin Software 0 Comment

Il microblogging è una delle tendenze di questi anni e Twitter è il progetto che ha dato a questa idea una forma importante. Microbloggare vuol dire scrivere post frequenti e molto corti, tipicamente un massimo di 140 caratteri. Per questa attività è quindi importante dotarsi di uno strumento che faciliti il compito e che quindi sia sempre a portata di click. Sui device mobile ci sono una miriade di app che fanno al caso, per KDE c’è Choqok.

  Read more

Slow connection to VirtualBox guest with NAT port forwarding

admin Fixes 0 Comment

I noticed that when you have a VirtualBox guest, no matter what kind of OS, making a lot of connection to the Internet, the incoming connection using NAT port forwarding will became very slow. In my case the inbound SSH connection froze after a few minutes and the HTTP connection has a very huge latency. The load on both guest and host will be low as usual, so no bottleneck could be found.

It seems like a VirtualBox  problem because, as said before, it happens with different guests and hosts.

The workaround is very simple: just use two NATs! Use the first for the many outbound connections (configure it as guest’s default gateway), the second for the few inbound connection (configure port forwarding for this one).

Novità Nokia in arrivo il 27 Febbraio tra cui Symbian Carla

admin Nokia, Symbian 3 Comments

Dal 27 Febbraio al 1 Marzo Nokia sarà al Mobile World Congress per presentare le ultime novità. Verrà sicuramente data l’anticipazione riguardo al futuro Lumia 900 anche perché è ormai chiaro che tutte le attenzioni della casa finlandese sono rivolte ai dispositivi Windows. Eppure sembra che si parlerà anche di Symbian Carla che potrebbe vedere la luce nel terzo trimestre 2012.

Read more