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General Tech Information, How-To’s, Tips, Tools, and Guides

AUTOMATIC UPDATES FOR UBUNTU 22.04

Setting up automatic updates is critical if you want to maintain a secure environment. Make sure you have automatic backups that occur prior to the updates, so you have a rollback plan.

Here are the commands to set it up.

Open a terminal:
sudo su –
apt install unattended-upgrades
systemctl status unattended-upgrades
apt install update-notifier-common
nano /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades

Now remove the // before each of these lines, and change the values to make them relevant for your system
Unattended-Upgrade::Mail “youremailaddress@yourdomain.com”;
Unattended-Upgrade::MailReport “on-change”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Remove-Unused-Kernel-Packages “true”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Remove-Unused-Kernel-Packages “true”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Remove-Unused-Dependencies “true”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Automatic-Reboot “true”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Automatic-Reboot-WithUsers “true”;
Unattended-Upgrade::Automatic-Reboot-Time “06:00”;
Unattended-Upgrade::OnlyOnACPower “true”;

Save and Exit the file

nano /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/20auto-upgrades

Now replace the contents of the file with the info below:
APT::Periodic::Update-Package-Lists “1”;
APT::Periodic::Unattended-Upgrade “1”;

Save the File and Exit

dpkg-reconfigure -plow unattended-upgrades

Reboot your system instead of running a service restart

That’s it!

INSTALL TOR ON KALI 2024.1

This is a quick guide on how to install tor on the newest version of Kali Linux. By default the version that I am running does not have it.

Open a terminal and Type:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt install tor -y
sudo apt install torbrowser-launcher -y

Now to run Tor you will need to open a second terminal

In the first terminal type:
tor
Press Enter. This will start the service

In the second terminal, type:
torbrowser-launcher
Press Enter

This will open the Browser

Try navigating to my Onion site to test it out:
longleycr37tvhhrxmbs3buk3ze6vtpyouz3gy6uytdqqfvoiqrf3yyd.onion

HOW TO ACCESS TOR SAFELY

This is a quick How-To on installing Tails OS to a USB Drive, so you can use TOR on any computer, Anywhere

To start, on your computer:

Download BalenaEtcher and install it

Visit https://tails.net/ to get your copy of Tails, which was created by the makers of TOR

Download Tails, the latest version

Insert a USB into your Computer

Open BalenaEtcher

Click Flash From File

Select Tails

Select Target

Select your USB Drive

Click Flash!

Once it is done being flashed, you can put it in a computer to use

Boot/Reboot the computer

Select your USB Drive on startup

Tails will begin!

Once you are in Tails, to use TOR, click Activities in the Top Left

Select Tor Browser

Connect the circuit to the tor network.

Once connected to Tor you can test it by visiting my website:

Go to https://jaylongley.com and navigate to the Contact Page

Note that UBlock Origin has found trackers on my website. It finds google analytics and whatnot. This is supposed to happen. You will see why in a minute.

There you will see a tor address. Copy that address

Open a new tab in Tor

Place the Onion address that you received from my contact page, and navigate there

You will see my darkweb page appear

Now note UBlock Origin, has NO trackers here. To use Tor and ensure your safety, only work with pages and sites that do not track you!

Happy Surfing

HOW TO UPDATE FIREFOX TO THE LATEST VERSION

Quick how-to for updating Firefox with screenshots included.

Open Firefox

Click the hamburger icon (shown below) which is in the top right of your computer screen

Click Help (shown below) then select About

If there is an update, it will show here, if the update is installed you will need to restart the browser as shown. And that is it!

INSTALL ESXI 8 ON INTEL NUC 12

Here is how I was able to install ESXi 8 onto my Intel NUC 12 Wall Street Canyon

Press Power Button

Press F2 to get into the BIOS

Navigate to the Power, Performance and Cooling tab

Select External Ambient Temperature

Set to User Defined

Mouse over to Performance and click on it

Set the number of E-Cores to 0

F10 to save and Exit BIOS

Now you can reboot and install ESXi

UPGRADE MAUTIC ON UBUNTU 20.04

Quick how-to on the way I upgraded mautic, since upgrading through the web breaks my installations every time.

Login into your Virtualmin

Backup all of your virtual servers

Download the backups to your pc

Open Putty

SSH to Server

sudo su –

cd to your mautic directory (/home/user/html)

php bin/console mautic:update:find

php bin/console mautic:update:apply

php bin/console mautic:update:apply –finish

Open your mautic installation, refresh the web page, check the bottom right, and you will see the latest version. In my case it is 4.4.8

HOW TO UPDATE PI-HOLE

Quick How-To for updating pihole on Ubuntu

Open a terminal

Type:
sudo apt-get update
Enter in your password

Type
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
Enter in your password

Type
pihole -up
Enter in your password

Pihole updates

That is it!

GODADDY – BACKUP DNS ZONE

Here is how to backup your DNS information in GoDaddy

Login into your account

Navigate to https://dcc.godaddy.com/control/portfolio

Identify the Domain name you want to backup

Click the three dots next to it “…“

Select Edit DNS

On the DNS MANAGEMENT page, next to the ADD button, click the Three Dots “…“

Select Export Zone File

Your DNS will backup to your computer.

Save it to somewhere special, and go on your merry way