mpen's questions

I set up Private Internet Access via these instructions (OpenVPN) a few weeks ago. Everything seemed fine,

 wget http://ipinfo.io/ip -qO -

was reporting an IP from the expected location. Today, however, I discovered I wasn't connected anymore.

I want to prevent this from happening again. How can I ensure that my Ubuntu machine always stays connected to the VPN? If the VPN goes down, I'd rather lose internet access than connect directly through my ISP.

N.B. I'm running Ubuntu server (no GUI) and SSHing in. I don't need remote access (over the internet), but I do want to ensure I can still connect locally if the VPN disconnects.

If possible, please include instructions on how to persist changes after reboot.

I want to map a keyboard key to this command:

wmctrl -a Calculator || gnome-calculator

This works fine when I run it in the terminal, but it doesn't seem to work when I set up a shortcut for this. I'm guessing it doesn't like the ||.

Specifically, it will focus the calculator if it's already open, but it won't open it if it's not already open (which is what the OR condition is supposed to do).

How can I work around this?

This is basically what I'm trying to do:

TEMP_ZIP_NAME="$(tempfile)"
ZIP_NAME="${NOW}-views.tar.7z"
tar c -C /srv/partybus.com views public_html/css 2>> "${CRONLOG}" \
    | 7z a -si "${TEMP_ZIP_NAME}" 2>> "${CRONLOG}" 

But there's 2 problems:

1. 7z keeps adding a .7z extension to my temporary filename which breaks my subsequent commands
2. Even if I use tempfile -s .7z instead, 7z gets upset because the 0-byte tempfile is not a valid archive.

How can I force 7z to just overwrite the temp file as-is?

Specifically, I want to run

lsyncd lsyncd.lua

And

webpack --progress --color -w

Which are both long-running processes. I want to see the output from both, interlaced in my terminal. It doesn't matter if the results are a bit jumbled, I just like to see that they're doing what they're supposed to.

Also, I want it to kill both processes when I press Ctrl+C.

I'm trying

parallel ::: 'lsyncd lsyncd.lua' 'webpack --progress --color -w'

which seems to be working, but I can't see any output even though when I run those commands individually, they output something.

I want to give my friend access to a single folder on my server.

I created a new user for him, created a new group for him, and chgrp -R'd the folder for him so that he would have access.

I just tried SSHing in as him, and he can see everything on my server. He can see all the directories, cat, and download files. The only thing he can't seem to do is modify or create files.

How can I remove access for him from everything except his home folder and this special folder for which he is in the group of?

Here's what I've done, I ran nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config and added this to the bottom:

Match group GROUP
    ChrootDirectory /srv/WEBSITE
    X11Forwarding no
    AllowTcpForwarding no
    ForceCommand internal-sftp

And then ran service ssh restart.

Now I can't log in as my friend using WinSCP.

My web app generates clickable URLs like the following when an error occurs:

subl://open?url=file://%2Fusr%2Flocal%2Fwebenginex%2Fclass%2Fmodels%2Fwxclient.php&line=123

When I click it I get this prompt:

Clicking "Launch Application" does nothing. I want it to open Sublime Text as intended. How can I configure that?

I can run Sublime, for example, in the background by typing

sublime-text &

The & puts it into the background so that I can continue to run commands in my terminal. Alternatively, I can run

sublime-text

Which locks up my terminal. If I then press Ctrl+Z it "suspends" the application which essentially freezes it (it will eventually turn gray). Typing bg moves it into the background and unlocks the terminal.

In any case, if I exit the terminal or type fg and then Ctrl+C, the application will close.

How do I "disconnect" the GUI application from the terminal so that it will not close should I close the terminal or press Ctrl+C? In other words, I would like to use the terminal as a launcher, which is particularly convenient when I want to open a specific file: e.g., sublime-text /path/to/my/file <super-secret-character-that-disconnects-the-app-not-just-puts-it-in-the-bg>.

For example, if I type gimp in my terminal, Gimp will launch, but it will wait for gimp to be closed before returning control to the terminal. If I press CtrlC it will close Gimp. How do I prevent this?

I'm presently using pidgin, but it doesn't adequately notify me when I receive a message. I know I can get it to make noise, and pop up a notification, but I very specifically would like the icon to flash or wiggle (or something) on the sidebar until I check it. Is there a way I can get pidgin to do this/and or is there a different program that does? It needs to support MSN.

(Edit: Can someone create the "messenger" tag please?)

Ubuntu seems to have changed the half-window shortcuts from Ctrl+Alt+NumPad-Numbers to half using the NumPad and Ctrl+Super+Left/Right (which I find absolutely ridiculous). How do I change it back? I can't find it under "Keyboard".

I'm writing a CLI script that asks a series of questions before doing a few things. How can I pass them as arguments so that I don't have to keep entering them every time I want to test my script?

Basically, it should pass 4 items to STDIN, like "text1[ENTER]text2[ENTER]text3[ENTER]text4[ENTER]" automatically.

Yes, I could modify my script to actually read the shell arguments, but I don't want to do it that way, since it's supposed to run more like a wizard.

Looking for something like

SOMEPROGRAM myscript arg1 arg2 arg3 arg4

or

SOMEPROGRAM arg1 arg2 arg3 arg4 | myscript

Or something like that. Is there such a program?

I'm trying to add a command to my applications menu:

But when I select it from the applications menu, it doesn't do anything.

When I run that same command from the shell, however, it runs fine. Why?

(Also, why does pycharm need sudo priviledges?)

On windows I can hold down the Windows key and press Left to make my current window take up the left half of the screen. Is there a similar app for Ubuntu?

I'm running Ubuntu 10.04 i686 in VirtualBox. I get this giant gap on my top toolbar and it's driving me nuts. Any way I can fix it?

Possible Duplicate:
What is the best place to install user apps?

I've downloaded a .tar.gz and ran sudo sh install.sh. It's asking me where to install the program to. I don't want it cluttering up my home directory, and I want it to be available in the applications menu. Where should I put it? /usr/bin? /usr/local/bin? Or are those only for single binaries? This program wants to create a folder.