Updating the cert on a Synapse Matrix standalone server

As usual, logging this so I don’t lose track of it later: https://www.linode.com/community/questions/18963/certbot-error-problem-binding-to-port-80 And the original content in case it goes missing: This is a common CertBot error when using the Standalone plugin (–standalone flag) during the certificate renewal/creation process. In this case, CertBot will attempt to use port 80 to create a temporary web server. You have […]

Monitoring Temp and Fan Speed in a Quanta LB4M switch

I’m starting to replace the fans in my LB4M to try to quiet it down. During this process I wanted to keep an eye on my temp and the associated fan speeds to make sure I wasn’t running into a problem with cooling. Here’s my Telegraf code with the applicable OIDs. [[inputs.snmp]] agents = [ […]

MFA in Office 365, not talkin’ bout Azure

Microsoft is frustratingly vague about support for basic MFA in all Office 365 offerings. They have these lists of feature support across different packages, which go into great detail and yet don’t include basic MFA. Maybe this post will get up in the rankings so others don’t have to spin their wheels looking for an […]

OpenVAS on the Raspberry Pi 4 works really well!

I’ve been trying to set up OpenVAS on a tiny PC like the RPi lately. Based on this post: https://dayne.broderson.org/2018/05/24/RPi_Vulnerability_Scanner.html I wasn’t expecting much success. And that’s what I found. It wasn’t really usable. I saw the TinkerBoard and the extra performance and RPi compatibility and thought that might be a good thing to try. […]

OpenVAS for simple vulnerability scanning

I’ve been looking for a simple security vulnerability scanning tool for a while now. OpenVAS looked promising in the past, but I always had trouble getting it to work. I decided to work through it this weekend and figure out what I was doing wrong. In a nutshell, here it is: GSM Community Edition and […]

Grafana and Chromecasting to a TV

I’ve wanted to use simple Chromecast dongles for pumping a Grafana dashboard to a TV for a while now.  The challenge has been how to effectively manage the casting source.  Chromecasts can’t manage any of their own content, they can only be a casting target.  I don’t want a mobile device sitting in the rack […]

Ubiquiti USG site to site VPN with a single controller

Quick note about how to make this work. If you want to have two Unifi Security Gateways connect to a single controller at one location, you need to open up a couple of ports. Specifically, 8080 and 8443 need to be open to the controller. I strongly suggest you make sure you have a fixed […]

Poor trunk labeling

Just a reference for anyone trying to create a trunk between Dell and Ubiquiti switches. In my case, I wanted to create a trunk between a Dell N2048P and a Ubiquiti Edge Switch, with a native VLAN in use across the trunk. They both seem to have the notion of Access, General, and Trunk modes. […]

Raspberry Pi Zero W headless setup

There seems to be conflicting info out there for how to accomplish this.  Compounded with the Zero’s different micro ports, it’s easier if you can set it up as a headless device.  Unfortunately, I found that if you try to do this locally, with a monitor and keyboard, the order of operations causes the ssh […]

My Grafana dashboard

With all of this tutorial publishing I’ve been doing for Grafana, I have neglected to post what mine currently looks like.  So, here it is.  This is the 1080P version.  I also built an iPad version that has a lot of the same info but compressed for the smaller screen.