FreeRADIUS Builds
February 2nd, 2010

Have been helping people out with their FreeRADIUS deployments (usually for hotspots). As a result, I’ve started a little collection of Freeradius packages that I’ve built for Ubuntu. FreeRadius is available from the repositories but what you get sometimes is not the latest and greatest. I’m putting my builds up for download so that someone else doesn’t have to go through the stress of compiling. 

These were compiled using version 2.1.6 of Freeradius.

Hardy amd64

I’m getting really sleepy so I’ll add some more builds tomorrow. Coming soon, instructions on how to build your own packages.

Update: i386 builds for Hardy are also up. i386 builds for Karmic
will follow shortly.

Filed under: Linux, Networking — Tags: , , — Kwame @ 12:57 am
What PHP, JSON, jQuery and James Cameron have in common
January 9th, 2010

Over the holidays, I spend a few days in Accra. While I was there, one of the things at the top of my todo list was to go and watch James Cameron’s Avatar (which I hear is a fantastic movie, by the way). Only place to watch it of course, was the Silverbird Cinema at the Accra Mall. So, being the consummate geek that I am, I checked their Twitter feed for scheduling information. Turns out Avatar would be showing that evening at 9:30pm.  Alright then. Since I would be leaving for Kumasi the next day, that left me just about enough time for me to finish packing, take a nap and have supper first.

Only one tiny hitch; I wasn’t paying attention and misread the time. It was actually showing at 7:30pm. I’m sure you will be able to figure out how the rest of the evening played out. Anyways, fast foward two days later. I’m still grumpy and decided that I would have to do something, even  if it as completely useless. So I threw together a little php script that displays the Silverbird movie lineup in a somewhat more reasonable manner.

Much better

Much better

(more…)

Filed under: Unproductivity, development — Tags: , , , , — Kwame @ 3:02 pm
Does your RADIUS server think “user” = “USER”?
October 20th, 2009

If you happen to manage a hotspot that uses Freeradius with the sql module for authentication, you might want to pay attention. The default queries used by Freeradius sql module are case-insensitive. So if user “kwame” is successfully authenticated, another user “Kwame” can also successfully autheticate. And so can (more…)

Filed under: Linux, Networking — Tags: , , — Kwame @ 12:45 pm
Give your gnome menu a minty taste
September 29th, 2009

I like Ubuntu. I like being able to tweak the bits off my desktop environment. However, I also happen to like the MintMenu, the menu applet that is set up as the default for Linux Mint, a linux distro based on Ubuntu. Of course, this being Linux and all, I just had to install it.

Filed under: Linux, Pimp my PC — Kwame @ 11:15 am
National Service Secretariat, why?
June 19th, 2009

I finally got round to filling my National Service forms online and I just so happened to notice that their website sucked. A lot. What about it sucked? Well…

  • First of all, clicking on the enrollment link causes two windows to pop up. One of the windows contains a form that accepts a PIN number and redirects you to your enrollment form, other is a “Highlights Page”. (more…)
Filed under: Homeless — Kwame @ 6:15 pm
Replacing HP QuickPlay with XBMC(or any other application)
May 9th, 2009

I love my HP dv6915nr. It’s not the fastest or prettiest notebook around but it does most of what I want it to and does it quite well. However, one of the things that I hate is the bundled HP Quickplay software, which like the name suggests allows you to access your media very quickly. Versions 1.x to 2.3 of QuickPlay were based on Linux or Windows XP and had their own partition. As a result, it started up real fast and was battery friendly (kind of).
Version 3.x,which comes with my notebook, is different creature altogether.

HP QuickPlay

HP QuickPlay

(more…)

Filed under: Homeless — Kwame @ 9:12 pm
Taking the plunge: Jaunty
April 22nd, 2009

Around 4am this morning, I finally decided to take the plunge and upgrade my Ubuntu installation to Jaunty.(Yes, I know the release date is tomorrow but I just can’t wait anymore). The simplest way to go about that is to hit Alt-F2 and then run:
update-manager -d
That will add the necessary repositories and perform the upgrade. I’m still downloading packages so check back in a few hours for updates.

Update: About a 2/3rds of the way through downloading packages. I hate Ghana Telecom. With a passion.

Update: Finally done! The upgrade process itself went through without a hitch. However, I had a problem with the driver for my Nvidia card not being detected. That was fixed in a jiffy using this guide. So now, I’m rocking the Jaunty release candidate. The only noticeable difference, for me so far, are the notifications. Anyways, let me play with it a little and see what more I can find.

I can’t wait for the final release so I can full upgrade.

Filed under: Homeless — Kwame @ 4:50 am
The Quest for the Ultimate Desktop
February 24th, 2009

I’m on a quest for a mythical object; an aesthetically pleasing desktop that is not too distracting and lets me keep track of my tasks. This is the result of my search so far.

memory.jpg (more…)

Filed under: Pimp my PC, Web, Windows — Kwame @ 9:08 pm
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