Tech From the Trenches

This post is in reference to http://tracker.moodle.org/browse/MDL-10993 I had a little trouble finding the fix for this problem, and the resolution in the moodle bugtracker weren’t obvious.  So, to keep it short and sweet, here is the fix that I used. The problem is a result of multiple restore processes running when the course import [...]

If you are a Zimbra administrator and have an account setting that is incorrect, you might find that you just want to remove the setting completely or reset it to the default value. You can list all the attributes for the account in question with this command: zmprov ga <accountname> Once you find the incorrect [...]

Our organization has been with Alltel for next to forever.  Old news Verizon gobbled them up, basically  swallowed them whole.  So in order to get over to the Verizon government plans (deeper savings, standard billing for line, etc). We need to replace our old phones (less than 3 months for some).  So I have been waffling [...]

I have fought for several days trying to get drive forwarding to show on my Blackboard server. The client tool I use Cord for OSX is a lot like Remote Desktops in the Administration Kit. I have Drive Mapping on in the client and they never show on the server. I finally figured the problem [...]

Firefox has a great built in Spell Checker. However when setting up this site in Drupal, we chose to implement FCKeditor. The problem is FCKeditor uses its own menu system, so the right click context menu is not available for the Firefox spell Check.  Also the Firefox spell checker is not on by default with [...]

Sometimes I have to work on our linux servers (command line only) remotely using the console provided by the vcenter client for our ESXi servers.  I have to use vmware Fusion to run the vcenter client.  The problem is that you have to use the shift + page up/down buttons to scroll the console window [...]

Here is something I found very useful when working with DRBD.  After running some system updates on my Openfiler server that is running DRBD and Heartbeat, my logical volumes were showing up as “Diskless” when I looked at the DRBD status.  Looks something like this: vg0             Connected       Secondary/Primary     Diskless/UpToDate    C When I tried to [...]

I am a huge fan of Expose and Spaces on OSX.  However, as a PC convert, I really miss the Cascade Windows or Tile Features of windows, which allows for all windows or program specific windows to be resized automagically.  When Snow Leopard released I thought for sure I would find this built into the core [...]

I often have routines that run though the night in tandem with my Vampire hours.  However, default power settings often lock up my jobs, because the system decides to sleep or the hard drive goes to sleep. Each of these should recover but I have found that is not always the case.  So as a common [...]

This one will probably get me shot, but here goes.  I am by birth a PC users. Not really, because I wish the Commodore 64 would have lasted longer.  Anyway. Almost all the way through my 20 something years of computing. I have worked on/built/managed/etc PC’s. Windows 3.1 to Windows 7/Server 2008. To this day, I still [...]