For help, advice and discussion about stuff not related to aviation. Play nice: no religion, no politics and no axe grinding please.
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By Colonel Panic
#1816275
Ugh, sorry to do this ... but why does Linux have to be so unintuitive!

Question: I want to nuke the NUC's SSD and then re-install Ubuntu from the USB stick's iso file so that I can start afresh (as I mucked up installing Docker & Portainer etc etc etc).

But if I follow the initial instructions of a) Updating the BIOS via F7 (done again) and then b) putting the Ubuntu iso USB stick in and booting via F10, it does not give me the option to boot from the USB Drive (or even to "re-install Ubuntu").

What might be the best route to sort this self made mess out? :oops: :oops: :oops:

TIA
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By skydriller
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1816279
Colonel Panic wrote:why does Linux have to be so unintuitive!


Ok, yup...with you on that...

Colonel Panic wrote: I want to nuke the NUC's SSD and then re-install Ubuntu from the USB stick's iso file so that I can start afresh (as I mucked up installing Docker & Portainer etc etc etc). But if I follow the initial instructions of a) Updating the BIOS via F7 (done again) and then b) putting the Ubuntu iso USB stick in and booting via F10, it does not give me the option to boot from the USB Drive (or even to "re-install Ubuntu").


....lost you at the first acronym... :lol: :lol:
But Im sure you know what you are talking about :thumleft:

I love this thread. :mrgreen:
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By stevelup
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1816286
None of that is a Linux problem if you can't even get the boot loader up, it's going to be an issue in your BIOS.

There are various settings which could be causing an issue.

Get into the BIOS using F2 - you'll see a boot order section. It has two tabs, UEFI and Legacy. Make sure the tick boxes are selected on both.

Save and exit, then try F10 again.

If it's still not listed, there's a problem with your stick or the image on it.

If you didn't already, do the image again using unetbootin as I suggested, or, if you have access to a PC, Rufus is the best tool.
By Colonel Panic
#1816499
Thanks; took me a while to get Legacy ungreyed out, but in the end managed it. I am now 98% sure I have re-installed a fresh install of Ubuntu on the SSD, but have evidently broken the BIOS as it always starts with this splash screen. I am unable to get past this to Ubuntu itself, but I can do the "hold button for 3 seconds" & then in to the BIOS pages.

I have tried downgrading the BIOS from FN0047 to FN0046, but that didn't cure it. Neither does re-applying FN0047.

I am able to interact with the BIOS fine, but TBH can't remember what settings I changed to cause the issue. Hopefully I haven't bricked the machine (somehow doubt it) before Boxing Day is out, but this grub> stuff is well above my pay grade! :pale:

Image
User avatar
By stevelup
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1816510
You are genuinely the only person I have ever known who can make an Ubuntu installer not work.

Why don't you reset all your BIOS settings to factory defaults - that works fine on a NUC anyway and will undo anything you might have done to break it.

That is the GRUB boot loader which is installed by Ubuntu onto your drive - it's nothing to do with your BIOS. I don't think the Ubuntu installation was successful if you're seeing that.

Here's what I'd do.

1) Make a new USB stick using unetbootin
2) Reset your BIOS to out of box settings
3) Put the stick in, turn the machine on, hit F10 until you see the boot menu
4) Choose UEFI: USB

Accept -all- the default settings on Ubuntu. Don't fiddle with anything. Make sure you choose the ' use whole disk ' setting.
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By Colonel Panic
#1816529
Clutching at biodegradable straws, in my defence I did get Ubuntu to run on the NUC, but it all started to go wrong when I mucked up the installation of Docker - hence my assertion that Linux wasn't hugely intuitive. vis having to type all of this in Terminal just to load "an app" which would be no more than 2 or 3 GUI clicks on a Mac!

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install \ apt-transport-https \ ca-certificates \ curl \
gnupg-agent \
software-properties-common

curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo apt-key add -
sudo apt-key fingerprint 0EBFCD88

sudo add-apt-repository \ "deb [arch=amd64]
https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu \ $(lsb_release -cs) \
stable"

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io


Anyhow, some good progress has been made thanks to your posts; BIOS reset & a fresh install of Ubuntu done; interestingly unetbootin didn't play nicely with Big Sur & even though I did a Terminal workaround which did at least get it to run, I couldn't get it to "see" the USB Drive. So I went back to Etcher and that did work.

Onwards & Upwards! :D
By Colonel Panic
#1816958
Two questions re: remote access. Ubuntu, Docker, Portainer & Home Assistant all now installed on the NUC. Before configuring HA I want to sort out comms etc, but can't get ssh to work.

1. ssh
On the NUC, I did
sudo apt-get install openssh-server and
sudo systemctl status sshd and
sudo ufw allow ssh and
sudo ufw status,
and everything points to the ssh server & the firewall are working. I then changed the port from 22 to 2222, but I have NOT done anything about passwords or keys (not sure how to do that).

But when I type ssh jjb@bartholomew.co.uk<nuc's_lan_ip>:2222 or ssh -p 2222 jjb@bartholomew.co.uk<nuc's_lan_ip> nothing happens. Have I omitted a step somewhere?

2. VNC
Is VNC "app agnostic"? Meaning if I have eg. TigerVNC Server on one device, can I interact with it via RealVNC Viewer on another? Or do both ends need to be the same?

TIA
User avatar
By stevelup
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1816962
1) how did you change the port on the SSH server? What exactly did you do? You didn't need to do that anyway - I would have left it as it was and dealt with the port translation on the firewall.

2) what's the username on the Ubuntu box? When you installed it, you would have specified one. Isn't it just jjb?

You would then be able to reach it with:-

ssh -p 2222 jjb@ip.of.ubuntu.box
... if you did successfully change the port

or

ssh jjb@ip.of.ubuntu.box
... if you didn't
By Colonel Panic
#1816997
stevelup wrote:1) how did you change the port on the SSH server? What exactly did you do? You didn't need to do that anyway - I would have left it as it was and dealt with the port translation on the firewall.

The cheat sheet I followed suggested moving it away from port 22 "for security". To change from 22 to 2222 I edited & re-saved /etc/ssh/sshd_config using sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config , but I have just gone back in and re-hashed / commented out the reference to 2222 & re-booted the NUC ... and ssh jjb@<nuc's_IP> now works from my iMac. So it would appear that I dug the hole myself #notuncommon.

Should I ignore the "security" aspect of this for now, and rely on the USG's firewall (which I haven't yet touched?
User avatar
By stevelup
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1816998
Yep.

The idea that 2222 or 2022 or similar improves security is amusing to say the least. I'd say those two port numbers would be the very next ones to be probed after 22.

The reason it didn't work by the way is that you changed the port of the SSH server to a non-standard one, but didn't update the firewall.

So the firewall had 22 open not 2222. If you had wanted to do this, you would have needed to do sudo ufw allow 2222 instead.

Really, if you're opening SSH to the world, you're better off using a shared key and disabling interactive authentication which can be your next project ;)

It's not difficult and is basically bulletproof.
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By stevelup
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1817000
Re: VNC - it's more or less interoperable.

There are extensions on the encoding mechanisms, but these are negotiated and will fall back to the lowest common denominator.

RDP will often perform better - might be worth trying both.
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