A Geek Goes Flying

Local DNS setting in PiHole Local DNS I have a CNAME on my main domain that resolves to a DDNS name that’s kept updated from my home network. (Before:  https://freedns.afraid.org/  now whatever the MikroTik supplies, with the FreeDNS name  as a backup - two is one, one is none). It worked fine for years but now it’s not resolving properly from inside the LAN. I’'ll troubleshoot that one day but for now, the expedient fix was just to map that host to the internal IP address on the PiHole (6.3 core version, 6.4 web), since the MikroTik is using that as its DNS source. That was easy. Update:  I also had to go into Advanced mode on the PiHole interface and, under Settings / All Settings (/admin/settings/all), under misc.dnsmasq_lines, add an entry: local=/ myhostname . mydomain .com/ Also had to go into Firefox: Settings → Privacy & Security → DNS over HTTPS → Advanced Settings and turn DNS over HTTP off (for good measure, and to keep the PiHole actually involved as ...

Just a walk through of something that took me 3 minutes longer than it should have 🤔  Uploading a file via a PHP script was throwing an error. The culprit: upload_max_filesize was set to the default 2M in /etc/php.ini. (Tip: Use phpinfo() to determine the Loaded Configuration File, against the possibility there’s more than one on the system.) Once you tweak php.ini, restart the PHP FastCGI Process Manager, if that’s how PHP is running on the system (it is, at least on the Rocky Linux 9.7 box this service was running on): systemctl restart php-fpm.service And, Bob’s your uncle. (When I was a freshman, you just had to restart Apache ... 🤣)

Trying to create a folder on my WebDAV share, using Cyberduck , but couldn’t: The logs: # tail -f /var/log/httpd/ssl_error_log [Mon Feb 02 12:20:36.415327 2026] [dav:error] [pid 50869:tid 50979] [client 192.168.1.1:53060] The locks could not be queried for verification against a possible "If:" header.  [500, #0] [Mon Feb 02 12:20:36.415404 2026] [dav:error] [pid 50869:tid 50979] [client 192.168.1.1:53060] Could not open the lock database.  [500, #400] [Mon Feb 02 12:20:36.415412 2026] [dav:error] [pid 50869:tid 50979] (120002)APR does not understand this error code: [client 192.168.1.1:53060] Could not open database.  [500, #1] [Mon Feb 02 12:20:36.526440 2026] [dav:error] [pid 50868:tid 50966] [client 192.168.1.1:53061] The locks could not be queried for verification against a possible "If:" header.  [500, #0] [Mon Feb 02 12:20:36.526476 2026] [dav:error] [pid 50868:tid 50966] [client 192.168.1.1:53061] Could not open the lock database.  [500, #400] [Mon ...

Xeon Been  flogging an HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen 8 for a while now . But I think its time may be coming to an end. It can’t boot the “optical drive” (slot 5) SATA device directly, need to have a USB stick or Micro SD card installed internally to do that. (Which failed last week. Replacing the old  SanDisk Cruzer Fit   with a  SAMSUNG FIT Plus . Second SanDisk I’ve had fail recently; the other was a  120GB 2.5" SATA SSD . Hrm.) iLO sucks, the iPad app crashes constantly, it doesn’t send mouse activity to Linux, etc. I tried using the Comet remote KVM , but I couldn’t get an any active VGA to HDMI adapters to generate a signal the KVM would recognize. So I did most of this stuff using a wireless Logitech K400 keyboard with trackpad and a tiny Eyoyo monitor . Works, but awkward. Can’t boot a GPT partition scheme (it’s got a BIOS and no UEFI), if you try you’ll get a red screen of death with an inscrutable “invalid op code” error. The most recent LTS version...

 D’oh. I'm an idiot. I’m rebuilding an old Hackintosh into an AI workstation . I pulled the motherboard from the old Corsair case, removed the Core i5 and 16GB RAM (4x4GB Corsair Vengeance sticks), and set everything up in the CoolerMaster case. Everything lined up nicely and, especially with the extra screws I got, it was an easy, straight forward build. I was confident when I hooked up to mains power everything would Just Work™. It didn’t. Pressed the power button and it seemed to be online: The fans were spinning, the NIC lights were dancing, the power LED was on, etc., but the connected monitor stubbornly reported it was not receiving any signal.  Back in the day, computer cases had a cheap speaker installed, looked something like this: Wikipedia photo of an old timey computer speaker But, no more. Starting with what the BIOS was able to tell me seemed like the natural first step, and Amazon enables almost immediate gratification (not as immediate as popping over to the ne...

I have a somewhat involved office setup, that looks something like this: My 2021 MacBook Pro 14" is connected to a: →   Cable Matters USB C Hub DisplayPort 100W, 4K@240Hz (USB C DisplayPort 1.4 Hub), 480Mbps Ethernet, 2X USB , which in turn is connected via a:    →   IVANKY 3ft/1m DisplayPort Cable, DP to DP 3.3ft, 4K@60Hz, 2K@165Hz, 2K@144Hz  DisplayPort cable to a:      →  Unitek DP KVM Switch 1 Monitor 2 Computers USB 3.0 8K@60Hz KVM unit, which uses another:        →  IVANKY 3ft/1m DisplayPort Cable, DP to DP 3.3ft, 4K@60Hz, 2K@165Hz, 2K@144Hz  DisplayPort cable to a:            → Dell UltraSharp U2412M 24-Inch Screen LED-Lit Monitor   The 2012 Mac Mini (OCLP patched and running Sequoia) is connected via a Cable Matters 4K Mini DisplayPort to DisplayPort Cable , to the KVM, and through the KVM to the Dell. It works perfectly. The MacBook Pro keeps blanking the screen, for ~...

Using the OpenVPN Connect app on a MacBook, I wasn’t able to connect to my office VPN. Opening the app revealed an error message: Error calling protect() method on socket OpenVPN Connect error message The fix was easy; from Terminal: % sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.openvpn.client.plist

My not-an-iMac wasn’t going to sleep, despite the power settings being properly configured under the Control Panel. Activity Monitor to the rescue; right-click the column names row in the interface and add “Preventing Sleep” to find the culprit: In this case, Firefox had a tab open with video, and Mail was running some interminable search. Closing the offending tab, and quitting Mail, allowed the machine to nap when it wasn’t being used.