One year in the limbo

Seems like yesterday: I used to have a job and needed to go to office every morning. Today I realised that I've been doing nothing for one year. ONE YEAR AT HOME!!!
Well, that's life. I knew since the beginning of this journey that it would not be easy. I moved to Hong Kong in August 2010 and I was lucky enough to find a job with a pretty good rate, but it lasted only 4 years.

A summary of my skills and abilities:
- SAP technical - ABAP development (very experienced);
- SAP functional - CRM / SD / MM;
- Advanced knowledge in following modules: CRM / SD / MM (both functional and technical); FI / CO / WM / QM / CS / PP (technical);
- Experience in GENIL / BOL / BSP / WebUI;
- Experience in performance analysis / improvement;
- Experience in troubleshooting / debugging;
- SAP console / RF transactions (MM/WM);
- SAPScript and Smartforms;
- Data migration using LSMW, BDC, custom programs;
- ALV, BAPI, user-exits, BADIs, etc...

I am willing to relocate. In case of any good job opportunity, please leave me a message.

Thanks a lot!

FreeBSD Jails - VIMAGE - firewall

VIMAGE jails has its own virtual network stack, therefore it is a good idea to enable a firewall (IPFW):

- add the following to /etc/rc.conf inside VIMAGE jail:

# PF Firewall
firewall_enable="YES"
firewall_type="open"


The available firewall types are:

1. open: passes all traffic.
2. client: protects only this machine.
3. simple: protects the whole network.
4. closed: entirely disables IP traffic except for the loopback interface.
5. workstation: protects only this machine using stateful rules.
6. UNKNOWN: disables the loading of firewall rules.
7. filename: full path of the file containing the firewall ruleset.

If firewall_type is set to either client or simple, modify the default rules found in /etc/rc.firewall to fit the configuration of the system.

Note that the filename type is used to load a custom ruleset.

Update: I only got IPFW firewall working in jail after enable it in host as well.


References:
- https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/49561/
- https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/firewalls-ipfw.html

FreeBSD Virtual Machine running jails and VIMAGE: Promiscuous mode

This one I got in the FreeNAS documentation: after setting up the VIMAGE jail in the FreeBSD version 10.1 running on top of VMware ESXi host, I was not able to connect to the internet from the jail. Using the FreeBSD VM host was normal, the internet connection was there. I've tried the below commands:

ping -c 2 google.com
nc -z -w 2 google.com 80

Later on I found this little comment on the FreeNAS documentation:

(...)If you are using VMware, make sure that the vswitch is set to “promiscuous mode”.

That's what I did, and voilá! Problem solved!


References:
- https://doc.freenas.org/9.3/freenas_jails.html
- https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/no-internet-from-within-jail.38688/

FreeBSD: system update with custom kernel

One reminder when updating a FreeBSD system running a custom kernel: when applying the security patches using command

freebsd-update

the custom kernel must be rebuilt and reinstalled, as stated in the handbook:

"(...)Only the GENERIC kernel can be automatically updated by freebsd-update. If a custom kernel is installed, it will have to be rebuilt and reinstalled after freebsd-update finishes installing the updates. However, freebsd-update will detect and update the GENERIC kernel if /boot/GENERIC exists, even if it is not the current running kernel of the system.(...)"

Refer to FreeBSD: Jails (3) - VIMAGE to build and install a custom kernel.


References:
- https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/updating-upgrading-freebsdupdate.html#freebsd-update-custom-kernel-9x
- https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/kernelconfig-building.html

FreeBSD: Jails (3) - VIMAGE

In order to create a jail with its own virtual network stack, with its own network interfaces, addresses, routing table and so on, the kernel must be compiled with the VIMAGE option for this to be available.

Concrete jungle: Hong Kong

Bank of China - Central

One Pacific Place - Admiralty

Shangri-la Hotel - Admiralty

Conrad Hotel - Admiralty

Lippo Centre - Admiralty

Far East Finance Centre - Admiralty

United Centre - Admiralty

International Commerce Centre (ICC), The Harbourside and The Arch - West Kowloon 

China-Hong Kong City - Tsim Sha Tsui

The Gateway Tower 2 - Tsim Sha Tsui

Harbour view from China-Hong Kong City - Tsim Sha Tsui 

Victoria Towers - Tsim Sha Tsui

The One - Tsim Sha Tsui

Jardine House - Central

View of Central from Central Harbour Front Event Space

Bank of China and Cheung Kong Center - Central

HSBC Headquarters Building - Central

HSBC Headquarters and Standard Chartered Building - Central

FreeBSD: Jails (2)

Here is another way to create a jail:

FreeBSD: Jails (1)

Here is the simplest way that I found to create a jail:

FreeBSD: pkg / installing nano

I've already installed additional software from the ports collection, now I'll try to use pkg. From the man page, the pkg is a package management tool. The difference is that you can use the FreeBSD Ports Collection for installing from source, and packages for installing from pre-built binaries.

- Upgrade the pkg
pkg upgrade (answer yes for all questions, if any)

- Installing nano text editor
pkg install nano


References:
- https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/ports.html