Mariana Eneva wrote: > Hi all, > > > > I just got on the newbie list. I have three questions that I hope someone > can answer: > > > > (1) I need to grant a remote access to someone, so that he can install > and set up certain software on my Linux laptop. I have Ubuntu Linux. I know > this is not generally advisable, but it has to be done in this case, because > he is not in San Diego and there are too m any setups fro me to be able to > do myself. How can I set up my laptop so that he can get access?
The answer depends on how your computer is connected to the internet. Are you going though a "residential gateway" (aka router/firewall). I see you have a roadrunner (time-warner) email address. So you could be connected directly to the cable modem, but I bet you have some dlink or linksys or netgear or some other gateway box between the cable modem and your private internal network (including your laptop). Would that be a good guess? If so, you would need to: - 1a. run a server on your laptop that allows remote connection -- a server of some sort: possibilities are ssh, vnc and vino (a variation of vnc). Choice of these depends on whether the work can be done from the command line (use ssh) or needs a gui (use vnc or [my preference] vino). - 1b. allow access to your computer by setting up a forwarding rule for the firewall in your gateway. The way to do that depends on the gateway hardware, but they usually have a web-based administration interface to do those things. - 1c. decide on a couple of security details before you do it. > > (2) In (1) above, I am worried that some of their scripts will not work, > because of the need for "sudo" to precede some commands. For example, I need > sudo even with "mkdir", etc. Also, each directory I create needs then "sudo > chmod 777 .", as otherwise I cannot copy files to it. There must be some way > to set up this so, that sudo and chmod are not needed. Does anyone know how > to do it? Yes there are ways to remove the protections, but it is hard not to ask if you are sure of what you are doing. This person you are willing to allow access for the purpose of installing and configuring something -- he is someone who you trust [very!] highly), and who has expertise to do the necessary work without risk of damage? If yes and yes, then I would expect him to have the answers you ask. If he only has limited expertise, and you still want to let him do the work, could you just confirm that before we finish with the final details. I'm truly sorry for being squeamish (an possible insulting you -- not intended!), but I wouldn't want to invite something that I had reservations about. > > (3) I went to the Installfest yesterday - I already had Ubuntu, but I > needed help with repartitioning that Gus graciously provided. In the > process, he discovered that I was running the old kernel 2.6.15-51-386 and > helped me get 2.6.15-51-686. However, if I now start with 686 I get > scrambled text and weird colors. So, I reverted to starting with 386. This > worked as before, but when I left the screen for a while, I returned to find > the same scrambled text as with 686. This is the first time I am getting > this problem and I do not know what it means. Can anyone help me to fix > that? Scrambled text and weird colors are hard to deal with over email. Maybe Gus will know more about it and jump in with some suggestions, if he's around. If not, maybe it would be best to stick with the kernel that works. But to make some progress on that question, it would probably be useful to find the relevant chunk of a log file that might help diagnose the situation. You have to look into /var/log/Xorg.0.log to see if you can find the block of messages written at the time you booted the .686 kernel. I'm not sure how to be sure about this except by date (or retry, and then look immediately after, to narrow down the guesswork). If it's impossible to find/extract the right part, say so, and someone will probably suggest how to post the whole file for examination. This email list doesn't accept attachments -- so really big chunk of stuff have to be uploaded to somewhere else. > > Thank you in advance and I apologize for these ignorant questions. No, they seem like intelligent questions to me. Keep asking. Post the details of your connection, your gateway model, whether ssh (command line) access might be sufficient, and perhaps some details of the operation to be performed in case you think that might help assess the access requirements. Regards, ..jim -- [email protected] http://www.kernel-panic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/kplug-newbie
