Python function args

I rarely use anything beyond named parameters, but this post captures what you need to know.

http://kbyanc.blogspot.com/2007/07/python-aggregating-function-arguments.html

Formatting Output from MySQL prompt

I'm not the biggest fan of MySQL and on the occasions I do use it I always forgot how to get useful results from my queries. To get results paged to less and have them display vertically, you can do this

mysql> \P less
PAGER set to 'less'

mysql> select * from blahblah \G

Restore Mysql Database from the .frm .MYI and .MYD files

OK so you have a mysql database that you have recovered from a backup. However, whereas you would normally have a nice sql dump to deal with, on this occasion you only have the .frm .MYI and .MYD files. Can you rescue that table the client has deleted? Indeed you can!

#> cd [where you databases are kept, possibly /var/lib/mysql ]
#> mkdir [name of database to rescue]
copy the .frm .MYI and .MYD files into it.

make sure the permissions are ok. Something like this
#> chown -R mysql:mysql [dbname]
#> chmod -R 700 [dbname]

Now if you are lucky, you should be able to do this:-
#> mysql -u root databasename -e "SHOW TABLES;";
#> mysqldump -u root databasename tablename

Essential HPing3 and TCPDump

HPing3
# Send 2 syn packets to port 80 on a host
hping3 -c 2 -S -p 80 example.com

# scan a some specfic ports on host
sudo hping3 -S example.com --scan 143,220,993,25,80

TCPDump
# capture packets on -ivenet0 interface, don't resolve addresses or port name (-nn) don't capture ssh traffic
tcpdump -ivenet0 -nn not tcp port 22

# the same as above but don't print minimal information (useful as a quick guide to see whats going over the wire)
tcpdump -ivenet0 -nn -q not tcp port 22

# specify a port and destination
tcpdump -ieth0 tcp port 443 and dst example.com

# capture all payload (-s0) and print it in ASCII format (-v -A)
tcpdump -ivenet0 -s0 -nn -v -A not tcp port 22

# dump all packets and payload to file
tcpdump -s0 -ieth0 port 80 -w localhostdump.pcap

Setting-up Pylons in 5 mins

Really just a recap of http://pylonshq.com/docs/en/0.9.7/gettingstarted/#installing

Here we go

#> wget http://www.pylonshq.com/download/0.9.7/go-pylons.py
#> python2.6 go-pylons.py mydevenv

Everytime we work on a virtual pylons installation run the following script
#> source mydevenv/bin/activate

Create a new project
#> paster create -t pylons helloworld

Create a controller
#> paster controller hello

Fireup the webserver on localhost:5000
#> paster serve --reload development.ini

Building Python from Source

How easy it is to install python from source? Very.

./configure --prefix=/usr/local/python2.6/
make (took 4mins on my x86_64 dc)
make install