Posts by Paul:
Stupid SSH Tricks: A Better Hosts File
I’ve been noodling with SSH to make my life easier at work. One thing I found out about was how to make host aliases in your SSH config file. (It’s usually located at ~/.ssh/config). And it’s pretty easy to do. Here’s an example:
Host webhost User host_user HostName example.com IdentityFile ~/.ssh/some_id_dsa
The reason this is better than your hosts file (/private/etc/hosts) is because you can do things like scp ~/somefile.txt webhost:~/upload.txt and scp, since it uses ssh, will realize you want to do this: scp -i ~/.ssh/some_id_dsa ~/somefile.txt [email protected]:~/upload.txt
If you do a lot of sshing and scping like I do, you’ll find this extremely convenient. And if you use ssh keys, it makes working on multiple machines as easy as working on a local machine.
Remote diff
I just had a problem to solve: Compare two server config files on two servers to make sure they’re the same. Rather than using scp to copy the file from one machine to another, I used ssh’s ability to run commands remotely to get the contents of the file and piped it into diff. Here’s [...]
Pennsylvanian Moments
In this great endorsement of Obama, Michael Moore says: Pennsylvania, the state that gave birth to this great country, has a chance to set things right. It has not had a moment to shine like this since 1787 when our Constitution was written there. I disagree. I think Pennsylvania has had a couple great moments [...]
Nash McCabe – “I’m 52 and unemployed, but I’d rather talk about lapel pins”
Drexel Dems had a great post about why some woman from Latrobe got to ask Obama a question. According to them, her first appearance on the national stage came from a NY Times article where we learned that, even though she’s 52, unemployed, and living in a small town, she only seems to care about [...]
Replace Perl Path in Movable Type
A while back I had to set up Movable Type on a system where the Perl binary wasn’t in the usual location. So I wrote a quick and dirty shell script that you can run on a directory to replace the perl call (usually /usr/bin/perl) with whatever you want, as long as it’s an executable. [...]
An Open Letter to Representative Monique Davis
In case you hadn’t heard, A Democratic state representative from Illinois, Monique Davis (D – Chicago), has, well, I think she said it best: Rep. Monique Davis (D-Chicago) interrupted atheist activist Rob Sherman during his testimony Wednesday afternoon before the House State Government Administration Committee in Springfield and told him, “What you have to spew [...]
Who’s that guy?
About 18 seconds into the video, just next to Obama’s right shoulder, I think I know that guy! That’s my little brother. He stood in line for six hours to get that seat. Oh, and the speech is good, too. (Screencap after the break.)
Daddyhood
Yes, I know I haven’t updated in a while. Here’s why: That’s my daughter, Ily. (It’s pronounced “eye-lee” goddammit.) Since she’s been born, my life has been really different. Awesome, but different.
“Growing Up in the Universe” – Now Available for Free Online
This is just a quick note to let people know that Richard Dawkins has decided to make every episode of his lecture series “Growing Up in the Universe” available online for free!This lecture series is a great primer on science and the rational explanation of the existence of life, the universe and everything. It’s even [...]