Category: Software

Updating your firmware without Windoze

I am running a HP 6000 Pro small form factor PC – no windows (excepted virtualized).  I recently updated my bios, trying to enable VT-x for virtualization.

https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/selfservice/closure/hp-compaq-6000-pro-small-form-factor-pc/4024462

The BIOS softpack from HP downloaded as an file named sp73556.exe – I made sure to download the file for freedos, but epic #FAIL by HP.  You need Windows to unpack that exe before you can get at the freedos files.

Enter wine 🙂 . I launched

# wine sp73556.exe

This launches the installer which unpacks the files as follows under my .wine directory :

glaw@fedora ~/.wine/drive_c/swsetup/SP73556 $ ls -lart
total 2020
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw   14894 Jun 22  2012 logo.bmp
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw 1974206 Oct 22  2015 786G2.cab
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw   13487 Nov  5  2015 license.txt
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw    2122 Nov  6  2015 How to Use.txt
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw    6324 Nov  9  2015 History.txt
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw   21719 Nov 12  2015 Bios Flash.htm
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw    2321 Nov 12  2015 SP73556.cva
-rw-rw-r– 1 glaw glaw    2538 Nov 12  2015 SP73556.txt
drwxrwxr-x 2 glaw glaw    4096 Dec  7 12:28 DOS Flash
drwxrwxr-x 2 glaw glaw    4096 Dec  7 12:28 HPQFlash

From there, it was use a matter of following this other guide :

https://feeding.cloud.geek.nz/posts/creating-freedos-bootable-usb-stick-to/

and copying the files within  “DOS Flash” over to the fs-root directory.

 

Reboot the HP machine with the thumb drive and bam, you’re flashing

 

Open Sourcing my Hackintosh ;)

Running a HP SPP mini tower with Yosemite installed and finally getting tired of finder and iTerm. Don’t get me wrong, I like iTerm, but from my linux background, my fingers just know terminator so much better 🙂

I tried installing terminator via brew but it did not seem very stable – I opened up a 4-up terminator view and after the icon spun for 5 minutes, it crashed.

Fink seems to be much more stable and integrates its programs right into XQuartz where the brew installed version popup’d a separate python window.

1. install fink:  bash script to do it all for ya https://raw.githubusercontent.com/fink/scripts/master/srcinstaller/Install%20Fink.tool

2. fink install terminator

3. fink install nautilus

4. Setup dbus for OSX :

sudo launchctl load -w /sw/share/dbus/launchd/org.finkproject.dbus-session.plist

launchctl load -w /sw/share/dbus/launchd/org.finkproject.dbus-session.plist

 

Screen Shot 2016-03-20 at 8.17.54 PM

Midori Browser – Moving the New Tab button

I am running the Midori browser inside of Cygwin-X at work.  This allows me to browse and download within Cygwin easier, as well as bypass some of the security imposed on the network at work.

One thing I have found that I absolutely hate is the order Midori puts its task buttons in.  The first button on EVERY other browser is Back – Midori uses “New Tab”  – WTF?!  I find myself clicking “New Tab” meaning to go back.  This has got to go!

I found that the easy fix for this is by editing the configuration file.  On Cygwin this file is located in .config/midori/config

Make sure you exit out of Midori, then open the config file in vi.  The line to look for is toolbar-items=.  I moved TabNew from the first entry to the last.  Saved the file and then restarted Midori.

 

Postfix virtual SMTP server IP

Questgion:  Its easy to configure postfix to accept incoming email for multiple domains, but what happens if you have a client who wants their email SENT from a dedicated IP address?

Answer: Postfix 2.7.+ sender_dependent_default_transport_maps



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