I’m often asked how someone can easily learn linux, the shell, and all the fancy stuff, which makes linux or unix based operating systems much easier than working with windows.

First their is no easy way to learn something new, you need experience and yes, you need good tutorials as well. I personally believe that linuxcommand.org is one of the best ressource these days to get a well explained overwiew on linux and the shell commands.

I’ll add more resource I know in the future. Promised.

Lenny will be the next stable release after Debian Etch. It has today still the status unstable, but worked for me without any issues in a virtual machine on my mac. Hence, I decided today to move my servers on Lenny. Upgrade on a 1&1 AMD Rootserver is quite easy.

Juste replace in your /etc/apt/sources.list all ‘etch’ statements with ‘lenny’.

then type the following:

aptitude update
aptitude dist-upgrade
aptitude upgrade
aptitude update
aptitude upgrade

Upgrade worked for my without any major issues within a couple of minutes. However mySQL will not start properly and Apache2 will reset your may-be redirect commands (e.g. AllowOverride All to AllowOverride None in apache2.conf or httpd.conf). Please correct the Apache2 conf files and restart your server with /etc/init.d/apache2 restart.

As for the mySQL Error, the error message is self-explaining:

/etc/init.d/mysql:ERROR: Using expire_logs_days without log_bin crashes

Just go to your /etc/myqsl/my.conf file. The parameter ‘expire_logs_days’ requires now the ‘log_bin’ parameter be turned on. Open the file and turn ‘log_bin’ on (e.g, removing the ‘#’ character infront of it).

Afterwards you only need to restart your mysql server with /etc/initd./mysql restart, and you whole rootserver should now run smoothly on Debian Lenny.

If you’re running an own rootserver you often are in the situation that you need to make changes on your DNS settings mainly through a web interface of your provider. One main issue is that worldwide update of all DNS servers can easily take over 48 hours.

Zoneedit.com solves this issue. Just connect once your DNS server settings to zoneedit and you’re done. Make all necessary changes then on your zoneedit.com account (for instance rooting of emails to google.com etc.). All these changes are updated in a minute and give you all the freedem you need for all your plans you have with your dedicated rootserver.

Alexander Kasper from Hockwald-ITcompiled a 2.6.25.1 Kernel for 1&1 AMD64-Bit Server.

After downloading (i.e. to /tmp/ folder), you can install your brand new kernel with the following command:
Now we have to install the kernel by the following command.

dpkg --install linux-image-26251_custom10002052008_amd64.deb

Please check /boot/grub/menu.lst for the correct settings.

Either you check the pointer of vmlinuz to your new kernel in /boot/

ln -sf /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.1 /boot/vmlinuz

or you change /boot/grub/menu.lst accordingly. For the above mentioned kernel it has to look somehow like this:

serial –unit=0 –speed=57600
terminal –timeout=10 serial console

default=0
timeout=5

title linux with serial console
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.25.1 ro root=/dev/md1 console=tty0 console=ttyS0,57600

title linux.old
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz.old ro root=/dev/md1 console=tty0 console=ttyS0,57600

### BEGIN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST
## lines between the AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST markers will be modified
## by the debian update-grub script except for the default options below

## DO NOT UNCOMMENT THEM, Just edit them to your needs

## ## Start Default Options ##
## default kernel options
## default kernel options for automagic boot options
## If you want special options for specific kernels use kopt_x_y_z

Last Update: 2nd November 2008

Connect to your server via ssh and then download the latest kernel version. Best practice is to look first via ftp for the correct file.

Type within your terminal:

ftp update.onlinehome-server.com
User: anonymous
Password: guest
cd local-updates/kernel/deb/
ls
exit

The filename of the latest version is: linux-image-2.6.27.4-20081028a_rootserver.1_amd64.deb
Let’s download this version:

wget ftp://update.onlinehome-server.com/local-updates/kernel/deb/linux-image-2.6.27.4-20081028a_rootserver.1_amd64.deb

Now we have to install the kernel by the following command.

dpkg --install linux-image-2.6.27.4-20081028a_rootserver.1_amd64.deb

Either you check the pointer of vmlinuz to your new kernel in /boot/

ln -sf /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.4-20081028a /boot/vmlinuz

Please replace vmlinuz-2.x.y.z by the release you want to add!

or you change /boot/grub/menu.lst accordingly. For the above mentioned kernel it has to look somehow like this:

serial –unit=0 –speed=57600
terminal –timeout=10 serial console

default=0
timeout=5

title linux with serial console
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.4-20081028a ro root=/dev/md1 console=tty0 console=ttyS0,57600

title linux.old
root (hd0,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz.old ro root=/dev/md1 console=tty0 console=ttyS0,57600

### BEGIN AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST
## lines between the AUTOMAGIC KERNELS LIST markers will be modified
## by the debian update-grub script except for the default options below

## DO NOT UNCOMMENT THEM, Just edit them to your needs

## ## Start Default Options ##
## default kernel options
## default kernel options for automagic boot options
## If you want special options for specific kernels use kopt_x_y_z