… has too many hobbies.

Topic:

Linux

33 posts
Jan 2009 – Sep 2024

Cloning Raspberry Pi SD cards

Occasionally I need to set up a new Raspberry Pi that's extremely similar to an existing Pi, typically for a monitoring application like collecting UPS statistics. The hard way to do this is to set up the new Pi from scratch and install and configure your application. The …

Making a Docker container depend on a disk being properly mounted

Quick and easy way to a Docker container depend on an external disk being connected and mounted.

Moving fake-hwclock to a separate partition on a read-only Raspberry Pi

My guide to running a Raspberry Pi with a read-only root filesystem has one hacky caveat: it still allows fake-hwclock to write to the filesystem every hour. I don't love this solution, and this post presents a fix.

Monitoring for NAS data corruption on ext4 with cshatag

Two open-source programs, cshatag and runner, make it easy to monitor an ext4 filesystem for data corruption.

Linux: start an mdraid check even though bash's noclobber is set

A quick post for today. When trying to force my NAS's mdraid array to run a check, in a root terminal, I got this error: # echo check > /sys/block/md0/md/sync_action -bash: /sys/block/md0/md/sync_action: cannot overwrite existing file This is because …

Pi Reliability: Reduce writes to your SD card

If you aren't using a read-only filesystem on your Pi, you can still reduce writes to the SD card to increase its lifespan.

Running a Raspberry Pi with a read-only root filesystem

While there are downsides, using a read-only root filesystem will dramatically increase your Pi SD card's lifetime.

Setting net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max on Ubuntu 22.04

On one server I manage, the default net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max value (65536, IIRC) was not sufficient and I wanted to increase it substantially. The first thing I did was add a new file in /etc/sysctl.d: # /etc/sysctl.d/91-cdz-nf_conntrack.conf net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max= …

Pi Reliability over WiFi: 'Temporary failure in name resolution'

Part of the Raspberry Pi Reliability series. One Pi I run here at home sits in an outbuilding with less-than-ideal WiFi signal strength. It runs PiAware [1] and BirdNET-Pi, and I specifically haven't run Ethernet to it to partially mitigate lightning-strike risks, given that it has two exposed …

Reliable WiFi for the Bambu X1C 3D printer

How to set up a Raspberry Pi WiFi access point that the Bambu X1C can stay connected to.

Setting up a secondary Pi-Hole on my home network

I run Pi-Hole as the DNS server for my home network. It provides ad and nuisance blocking for a subset of the systems in the house. Having a single DNS server for your network is very stressful; it’s a single point of failure, so even routine maintenance feels touch-and-go. …

Setting up KVM virtual machines using a bridge network on an Ubuntu host

I recently wanted to set up a VM on my home Ubuntu 22.04 LTS server, with the following goals: 1. the VM uses KVM virtualization, for performance 2. the guest VM is assigned an IP via DHCP by my home network router 3. the guest VM is accessible by …

How to move Docker's data directory from /var/lib

I recently had to move Docker's data directory on my home NAS (from the root filesystem to the storage array). I found some incomplete and inconsistent information on the Web about how to do this, so for future reference here's the process I used to do …

Stop using the Raspberry Pi's SD card for swap

Using your Pi's SD card for swap space will, in time, kill the SD card.

Remote logging for easier Raspberry Pi debugging

When something does go wrong, having collected logs somewhere other than your Raspberry Pi's SD card is very helpful.