Recent Posts
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Enabling Duo Unix on Ubuntu With a PAM Profile & pam-auth-update
Enabling Duo Unix on Ubuntu involves integrating the
pam_duomodule into your system’s Pluggable Authentication Modules (PAM) stack. This can be done by manually editing the files in/etc/pam.d/, but Ubuntu provides a safer way to do this in the form ofpam-auth-updateand its associated PAM config framework. -
Finding the Serial Number of a Windows PC With PowerShell
It’s now possible to locate your PC’s serial number in the Settings app, but nothing beats a simple command-line query.
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Non-Destructively Disabling Netplan on Ubuntu
Netplan has been part of Ubuntu for almost a decade now, and it’s actually pretty good at its job, which is to provide a unified, human-readable interface for configuring either systemd-networkd (on Ubuntu Server) or NetworkManager (on Ubuntu Desktop). Let’s be honest, manually configuring systemd-networkd isn’t for the faint of heart, especially for more complex scenarios like bonding.
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Starting Again
It’s been a little under two years now since I took this site offline and embarked on one of my longest breaks from publishing since I started blogging back in 2012.
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How to Fix "No Pattern File Found" in Stata’s dm0082 Package
If you’re using the dm0082 package in Stata, you may encounter the following error when using commands such as
stnd_compname:No pattern file found in ~/ado/plus/p/ -
Troubleshooting SELinux Issues
SELinux has a well-earned reputation for being hard to use. It’s infamous for causing strange, illogical faults that can’t be fixed via normal troubleshooting routines, and, as a consequence, many guides and blog posts recommend disabling it outright. However, SELinux is a great way to secure and harden Linux systems, and with a few simple steps it’s possible to fix most common problems you might encounter while using it.
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Bitdefender Antivirus Breaks RDP (Remote Desktop) on Windows
Update: This may have been fixed by now, but back in 2021, the free edition of Bitdefender Antivirus was interfering with Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) connections on Windows. The remainder of this post has been preserved for posterity.
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Automatically Updating Stata on Linux With Cron
On Windows and macOS, Stata can be configured to check for updates automatically with the
set update_querycommand. However, this feature isn’t present on the Linux version of Stata. Also, it doesn’t actually update Stata – it just enables update notifications. Stata will still need to be manually updated by someone with the permission to do so. -
Microsoft Gets in on the Browser Hijacking Game
Update: Microsoft has reversed their decision to automatically install the Microsoft Search in Bing extension. The extension will still be made available but will not be automatically deployed with Office 365 ProPlus. The original post continues below.
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Disabling the Dynamic MOTD in Ubuntu or Debian
Ubuntu has been using
update-motdas a MOTD (Message of the Day) generator for several years. Some of the default messages – such as the number of available security patches – can be helpful, but not everyone likes being greeted by a barrage of text every time they log in to their server. In this article, we’ll explore how to adjust, disable, or replace the dynamic MOTD in Ubuntu. -
Dell TPM 1.2 to 2.0 Upgrade Instructions
If you have a Dell PC manufactured between 2015 and 2018 that originally shipped with TPM firmware version 1.2, you may be able to upgrade it to TPM firmware version 2.0. Several Dell models are capable of switching between TPM firmware versions 1.2 and 2.0 provided the necessary conditions are met.
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The Berkeley Research Scan
Note: This post has been updated since publication to include more information about UC Berkeley’s Internet scanning projects.
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Blocking WordPress Brute-Force Attacks With Nginx
There are a few different ways that crackers will try to get into your WordPress installation, and one of them is by using a plain old brute-force attack. This kind of attack requires nothing more than a freely available exploit toolkit and is not difficult to detect when reviewing server logs. In the first section of this post, I’m going to give an example of what a brute force attack looks like, and then to make things more interesting I’ll discuss some techniques used to mitigate them using Nginx.
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The w00tw00t Scan
Note: This post has been updated since publication to use reserved IP addresses for documentation purposes and to include more information about the
w00tw00tscan. -
How to Install Hidden Regional Themes in Windows 7
Windows 7 bases its default theme offerings off of which location you select during setup. Though there are multiple regional themes, only one of them is installed by default when you choose your location during setup. If you would like to install the other themes, here’s how.
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How to Use fixmbr in the Windows XP Recovery Console
The Windows XP Recovery Console is either an installable start-up option for a computer running Windows XP or a bootable program included with the Windows XP install disc. This tutorial details how to load the Recovery Console from the original Windows XP install disc.