today's howtos

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Aug 10, 2025

• Vincent Lammens ☛ Showing a dynamic login banner in Linux

  Since I was reinstalling some servers with Debian Trixie I decided to add a dynamic login banner that shows some basic system information after logging in.

• BSDly ☛ That grumpy BSD guy: Eighteen Years of Greytrapping - Is the Weirdness Finally Paying Off?

  Greytrapping at nxdomain.no, also known as bsdly.net and a few other domain names, has been a long running experiment. I had been running a mail service for my own and my colleagues' benefit for some years already when I converted that setup stepwise from a Debian Linux setup to one involving OpenBSD hosts as the outer line of defense and a mix of FreeBSD, OpenBSD and other hosts in an evironment not unlike what is described in some of the rather basic configurations described early on in the PF tutorial and later The Book of PF.

• idroot

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install Rust on Rocky GNU/Linux 10

    Rust has revolutionized systems programming with its unique approach to memory safety and performance. This modern programming language, originally developed by Mozilla, combines the speed of low-level languages with the safety features that prevent common programming errors.

  • ID Root ☛ Addgroup Command on GNU/Linux with Examples

    Managing user groups effectively is fundamental to GNU/Linux system administration and security. The addgroup command serves as a powerful tool for creating and organizing user groups, enabling administrators to implement robust access control policies across their systems. This comprehensive guide explores every aspect of the addgroup command, from basic usage to advanced enterprise scenarios.

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install Amarok Music Player on openSUSE

    Amarok stands as one of the most powerful and feature-rich music players available for GNU/Linux systems, particularly excelling on KDE desktop environments. This comprehensive music management solution transforms how openSUSE users organize, play, and discover their digital audio collections.

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install Surveillance Giant Google Chrome on Rocky GNU/Linux 10

    Rocky GNU/Linux 10 represents the latest evolution in enterprise-grade GNU/Linux distributions, offering enhanced security, performance, and stability for both desktop and server environments.

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install Proton Mail on Manjaro

    Privacy-conscious users worldwide have embraced Proton Mail as their go-to secure email solution. For Manjaro GNU/Linux users, accessing this encrypted email service requires specific installation methods that differ from mainstream operating systems. This comprehensive guide walks you through multiple installation approaches, ensuring you can enjoy Proton Mail’s robust security features on your Manjaro system.

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install Mesa Drivers on AlmaLinux 10

    Modern GNU/Linux systems require robust graphics drivers to deliver optimal performance for both desktop environments and server applications. Mesa drivers serve as the cornerstone of open-source graphics acceleration on AlmaLinux 10, providing essential support for OpenGL, Vulkan, and various hardware acceleration APIs.

  • ID Root ☛ How To Install GLIBC on Linux Mint 22

    Installing GLIBC (GNU C Library) on Linux Mint 22 requires careful consideration and proper methodology to avoid system instability. This comprehensive guide provides safe installation methods, troubleshooting solutions, and best practices for managing multiple GLIBC versions on your Linux Mint 22 system.

• [Inside LBS Ⅲ] Dividing and Conquering Linux High-Capacity SSD Support with LBS

  Users of filesystems expect buffered I/O support. Linux implements its support of buffered I/O through the page cache. The largest data block size you can support on filesystems has for decades always been limited by the CPU system PAGE_SIZE and so on x86_64 that is 4 KiB. Since system calls will work with files and these are memory mapped in-memory on the page cache, we have supported atomicity of data in the page cache in units of the PAGE_SIZE. Linux buffered I/O support on x86_64 with a max granularity base page size of 4 KiB means that is also the max filesystem data block size supported. Systems such as ARM64 and PowerPC have supported filesystem block sizes larger than 4 KIB for years, however filesystems created on these systems could not be used on x86_64. Linux has historically supported compounded pages together, however the advances for dealing with large allocations for filesystems have changed over the years, first with hugetlbfs, and then transparent huge pages (THP) and these APIs only supported working with huge pages, which are extremely large: 2 MiB and 1 GiB on x86_64 and even larger on ARM64. The only filesystem which ever got support for THP was tmpfs. The Linux page cache has needed an overhaul to support a proper memory management and filesystem API to leverage different granularity compound pages which does not require one to use always use huge pages. Without a solution to this, buffered I/O cannot be supported on IUs larger than 4 KiB with full determinism on alignment.