Author Archives: hedscratchers

About hedscratchers

A UK ex-pat now living in the USA.

Capturing IP tables logs

Posted on August 8, 2019 by hedscratchers

Overview CentOS7’RHEL7 – I needed to log dropped packets form IPtables to a separate file using rsyslog, I like my logs in separate files, and then rotate them. I read several online guides and most worked but ended up with … Continue reading →

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Migrate and upgrade Tenable Security Center from RHEL6/CentOS6 to RHEL7/CentOS7

Posted on January 23, 2019 by hedscratchers

Overview I had Tenable Security Center running on a RHEL6 VM which scans around 1000 hosts several times a week. REHL6 is getting a bit long-in-the-tooth and also there was a need to upgrade to the latest and greatest version of … Continue reading →

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How to prevent audit logs appearing in /var/log/messages – RHEL7

Posted on December 15, 2017 by hedscratchers

Overview For RHEL7. This took more work than I anticipated. My goal was this: Write audit logs to /var/log/audit Forward audit and syslog to central logging server Audit logs to NOT appear in /var/log/messages The items 1 and 2 were … Continue reading →

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Adding a custom unit file RHEL7, for swatch

Posted on October 11, 2017 by hedscratchers

swatch is a Linux tool for watching (it uses ”tail -f”) log files and then demonizes it. I had a need to know when a host needed rebooting after yum-cron had updated the kernel, rather than logging into each host … Continue reading →

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2008 Kia Sedona – A/C stops working.

Posted on August 20, 2015 by hedscratchers

2008 Kia Sedona LX, A/C was working great, we stop, go into a store, come out and now the A/C does not work. Blowers still blow, and there have been no unusual noises from the engine compartment. The 7.5A fuse … Continue reading →

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Adding vmware-tools to Centos5 or RHEL

Posted on January 26, 2015 by hedscratchers

Adding vmware-tools to RHEL6 or greater is easy, assuming you have the EPEL repo enabled all you do is: yum install open-vm-tools.x86_64 That’s it your done. Things are a tad more complicated for lower version of RHEL, for example RHEL5, … Continue reading →

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2001 GE Spacemaster XL1800 over-stove microwave oven repair

Posted on December 31, 2014 by hedscratchers

Microwave went faulty a few days ago, with the following symptoms, play close attention to the symptoms, as this was leading me to think it was a cap going out, and nothing that serious as the oven was still heating. … Continue reading →

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Foscam FI8910W compared to FI8918W

Posted on June 8, 2014 by hedscratchers

I already own several Foscam FI8918Ws, so I have some experience with Foscam, I had it up and running within a few minutes, assigned a static IP using a wired ethernet connection, then set-up the wireless. I use all of my … Continue reading →

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GPS, Garmin 850 touchscreen goes crazy

Posted on November 19, 2013 by hedscratchers

I have a Garmin 850 GPS (with European maps installed) which has served me well for around 4 years, the only issue being that the device that mounts it to the windshield, the rubber suction cup, well, loses suction and … Continue reading →

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Getting Oracle Instant Client, PHP, and oci8 all working

Posted on October 25, 2013 by hedscratchers

I had one hell of a game getting all of this working together, it didn’t help that the server has been CIS hardened, anyway, here is how I got it working, and one word of advice, everything seems very version … Continue reading →

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