Debian – FoolControl – Phear the penguin

anon-hotspot: On demand Debian Linux (Tor) Hotspot setup tool

September 18, 2016

Today it’s not easy to anonymize internet traffic and protect our online privacy. From advertisers to various other parties, everyone seems to be interested in what we’re doing online, and it’s our traffic that allows them to track our behaviour and interests.

To make our internet traffic anonymous we could turn to various VPN/Proxy solutions, but in the end need you still need to have ultimately trust that your traffic on other side of the tunnel won’t end up in wrong hands.

That’s why if I want anonymity I’ll always turn to Tor (anonymity network).

Turn Raspberry Pi 3/or any other Debian Linux based device into a (Tor) WiFi Hotspot

You need two things:

Clone anon-hotspot git repo
Raspberry PI 3 or any other Debian Linux based device with ethernet port and wifi card

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Kernel agnostic, DisplayLink Debian GNU/Linux driver installer (Debian/Ubuntu/Elementary)

November 29, 2015

I use DisplayLink at work for multi display setup/Ethernet/etc, all by connecting to a single USB port. Although it’s a nifty little device, its software support isn’t that great.

Only Linux driver they have is for Ubuntu. Which is only optimized to work with 14.04, and latest kernel they support is 3.19!

Their installer script can be modified to work with Debian and Systemd, but even so if you’re using any Linux kernel version other then >=3.14 && <=3.19 you’re not going to have a good time.

displaylink-debian (github)

That’s why I decided to take things in my own hands, and created displaylink-debian.

Tool which allows you to seamlessly install and uninstall DisplayLink drivers on Debian/Ubuntu based Linux distributions.

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Juniper/Pulse Secure VPN on Linux (2015 edition)

September 21, 2015

Prelude

Some time ago, Juniper Networks sold their beloved Junos Pulse SSL VPN, and thus new company called Pulse Secure was created. Which resulted in Pulse Secure client, which is used to establish secure authentication to the (VPN) tunnel.

Since Juniper never supported Linux, it comes as no surprise that successor company client supports every other platform except Linux.

Setting Juniper VPN/Secure Pulse on Linux is pain. Basically, it comes down to using Java applet in web browser or using 3rd party hacks and scripts. Something I refused to accept.

Getting it to work in a web browser

Although, it can be bit confusing on 64 bit architecture, getting VPN access via web browser is simple. You just need to install right packages:

sudo apt-get install icedtea-7-plugin openjdk-7-jre:i386 libstdc++6:i386 lib32z1 lib32ncurses5 libxext6:i386 libxrender1:i386 libxtst6:i386 libxi6:i386

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Debian PPA Utility

September 4, 2014

Debian remains to be my favorite distribution, however there’s one thing that’s missing, that thing is called PPA.

There were numerous discussions on this topic inside of Debian, but AFAIK without any visible movement. Thus, I decided to publish a utility I’ve been using for some time now.

PPA’s

Since its introduction, PPA’s are exclusively connected to Ubuntu and its derivatives (Mint, Elementary, etc …). But over time, a number of interesting projects appeared whose whole development is happening inside of PPA’s. To name few, I’m talking about TLP, Geary, Oracle Java Installer, Elementary OS and etc … Some of these projects are in WNPP without much happening for a long time, i.e: TLP

One option was to repackage these packages and then have them uploaded to Debian, or just go rogue and install them directly from its PPA’s. Title of this post might hint which path I took.

In theory, adding Ubuntu packages on your Debian system is a bad idea, and adding its PPA’s is probably even worse. But, I’ve been using couple (TLP, Geary, couple of custom icon sets) of these PPA’s on my personal/work boxes, and to be honest, never had a single problem. Also, setting Pinning priority to low for the PPA you added is never a bad idea.

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android-sdk-installer for Linux (Debian/Ubuntu)

July 19, 2012

This post is also available on/was written for OMG! Ubuntu

I’m fan of automation, as well as simplicity and as much as I tend to complicate my own life I generally enjoy making life easier for others. I’m of a belief that if you’re a Android developer who’s new to Linux and is using it as his development platform, you’ll have pretty hard time installing and setting up all the necessary tools.

Some people use Linux to make their life easier, not because they like to fiddle with Linux internals, for some time now I’m looking how Android SDK, Eclipse ADT plugin, hardware drivers as well as MTP support are installed as almost completely different components. And in order to install/configure some of these components you will need to role up your sleeves and dive into Terminal, something that almost every new or even experienced user will try to avoid.

That’s why I started thinking of ways how to make this process as simply as possible, and fast as possible. The solution I came up is called “android-sdk-installer“. Not very original name, I know, but this is a utility oriented to Linux (currently Debian and Ubuntu) which aims to automatically install and configures Android SDK, Eclipse ADT Plugin, adds hardware support for devices and enable full MTP support.

I did this project as part of my University Capstone project “Implementation of Android SDK into Debian Linux” where I explained everything down to the smallest detail as well as included the very first version of installer’s code. My intentions with this projects are to make current script fully working, after which I’m planning to package it into a Debian package as I’m the owner of Android SDK Debian ITP. Among many plans for the future one of the most important ones is to add a GUI as right now it’s represented in text mode.

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Category: Debian