HOWTOs

Jarvis, Please Lock the Front Door

Years ago, we put out a request for articles on home automation. About the time Eureka came out on TV, people wanted to have their very own SARAH (Self Actuated Residential Automated Habitat), and it seemed like the perfect time for nerds everywhere to make their houses smart.

Pandas

Serious practitioners of data science use the full scientific method, starting with a question and a hypothesis, followed by an exploration of the data to determine whether the hypothesis holds up.

Analyzing Data

My first Web-related job was in 1995, developing Web applications for a number of properties at Time Warner. When I first started there, we had a handful of programmers and managers handling all of the tasks. But over time, as happens in all growing companies and organizations, we started to specialize.

All about printf

In my last article, "Fancy Tricks for Changing Numberic Base", I explored the surprising ability of the Linux shell to convert numeric bases on the fly, including this sweet little snippet that converts FF hexadecimal into decimal notation: $ echo $(( 0xFF )) 255

Stunnel Security for Oracle

Oracle has integrated modern Transport Layer Security (TLS) network encryption into its eponymous database product, and TLS usage no longer requires the Advanced Security option beginning with the 10.2 database release.

Managing Linux Using Puppet

At some point, you probably have installed or configured a piece of software on a server or desktop PC. Since you read Linux Journal, you've probably done a lot of this, as well as developed a range of glue shell scripts, Perl snippets and cron jobs.

Client-Side Performance

In past articles, I've covered different ways to understand, analyze and improve the performance of your web applications. I've shown that between your network connections, server hardware, database design and HTTP server configuration, you can change and improve the performance of your web application—well, sort of.

Profiles and RC Files

I love Linux, and if you're reading this, chances are you do too. To be honest though, some aspects of the Linux environment are confusing. Near the top of the list for me is the profile system.

Infinite BusyBox with systemd

Lightweight virtual containers with PID 1. In this article, I demonstrate a method to build one Linux system within another using the latest utilities within the systemd suite of management tools. The guest OS container design focuses upon BusyBox and Dropbear for the userspace system utilities, but I also work through methods for running more general application software so the containers are actually useful.

Raspi-Sump

In June 2013, we had the unfortunate luck of a basement flood, caused by a tripped electrical breaker connected to our sump pump. There are so many things that can go wrong with a sump pump. You always are on guard for power outages, blown breakers, sump pump failures, clogged pipes and all manner of issues that can arise, which ultimately can end with a flooded basement.

Tails above the Rest: the Installation

A few columns ago, I started a series aimed at helping everyone improve their privacy and security on the Internet. The first column in this series was an updated version of a Tor column I wrote a few years ago.

Super Pi Brothers

I don't game as much as I used to. Although I've certainly spent countless hours of my life in front of a Nintendo, SNES, or after that, playing a first-person shooter on my computer (Linux only, thank you), these days, my free time tends to go toward one of the many nongaming hobbies I've accumulated.

Debugging Web Sites

I know, I'm in the middle of a series of columns about how to work with ImageMagick on the command line, but when other things arise, well, I imagine that a lot of you are somehow involved in the management of servers or systems, so you all understand firefighting.

BirdCam, Round Two

In the October 2013 issue, I described the hardware and software I used to create my "BirdTopia Monitoring Station", more commonly called BirdCam. If you've been visiting BirdCam recently, which a surprising number of folks have been doing, you'll notice quite a few changes (Figure 1). In this article, I describe the upgrades, the changes and some of the challenges along the way.

Command-Line Cloud: gcalcli

If you follow my columns in Linux Journal, you probably are aware that I'm a big fan of the command line. When it comes to getting things done efficiently, most of the time the command line can't be beat.
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