Installation

To install sysstat on a RedHat based variant using yum:

yum -y install sysstat

To install on a Debian based variant using apt:

apt-get install sysstat

If you are using a Ubuntu-based distro, you should be able to find sysstat in the software manager.

After the installation, you will need to edit the configuration file to run the daemon.

In the terminal:

gksu gedit /etc/default/sysstat

and set the “sadc” variable to true by changing the line to ENABLED="true".

Save and close the file. Finally, start the daemon:

/etc/init.d/sysstat start

Common usage of Sysstat

The sysstat suite is obviously a collection of very extensive and detailed application. Here are some basic ways to use the tools in order to gain a feel for its troubleshooting guidance.

Check CPU usage

To check CPU usage stats for the current day (by default sar tracks the data every 10 minutes):

sar -u

To display real-time CPU usage for a given amount of time, you can specify the intervals in seconds followed by how many entries you want to report. For example: the following will report total CPU usage every 2 seconds for a total of 10 times:

sar -u 2 10

Most PCs have multiple cores nowadays. To view the activity of each specific core use the “-P ALL” flag. The following shows a real-time snapshot of the 4 cores in my PC (same intervals and output parameters apply, below is 1 second 1 time):

sar -P ALL 1 1

Want to see how much memory is currently being used? Use sar -r as follows to show real-time memory usage every 2 seconds for 10 times:

sar -r 2 10

Display device report

To display a device report showing transfers per second (tps) and data read and write stats, showing data in real-time every 2 seconds, for 10 reports, type:

iostat -d 2 10

Note:

• tps = transfers per second
• Blk_read/s = amount of data read in blocks per second
• Blk_wrtn/s = amount of data written in blocks per second
• Blk_read = total blocks read
• Blk_wrtn = total blocks written

For extended I/O stats:

iostat -x 2 5

Get information regarding running process

Use pidstat to report information regarding running process. The -d flag will list all processes on the machine:

pidstat -d

To see real-time results of running processes, you can use the following, where like the above examples, the first number is the second interval and the second number is how many times to report:

pidstat - d 2 5

Another useful command is to use pidstat with the -r flag to analyze memory usage with particular processes:

pidstat -r 2 5

Conclusion

Sysstat is a very powerful monitoring tool for Linux and it is particularly useful in a server environment where there is no GUI available. The above mentioned only touch the surface of what sysstat is capable. If you have used sysstat in your PC/server, feel free to share with us the various ways you use it to monitor your system performance.

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1. Knowing your kernel
2. Finding hidden processes
3. Listing running modules
4. Checking disk usage
5. Locating binaries and configuration files

1. Knowing your kernel

The kernel is the core of your Linux system. It is frequently updated, and knowing its version may be important for compatibility reasons. Certain programs may require a certain version in order to work properly. It may also be important for some peripherals and modules. As an example, my Ubuntu is based on the official kernel 3.0.0. So far, the latest version is 3.2.5.

To know exactly what kernel you are using, its version, and your computer architecture, use the command:

uname -mrs

With this example, we can clearly see that I am using the official kernel, version 3.0.0. The i686 stands for my computer architecture. Here it means that I am using a 32-bit computer. On the other hand, x86_64 would have indicated a 64-bit architecture.

2. Finding hidden processes

To know what processes are currently running on your machine, most people would recommend the command “top“. Joshua wrote a very good article about it last year at Linux Running Too Slow? Here’s How to Find the Cause. Personally, I find this command very useful, and as Joshua explains, it can even be used to monitor the RAM usage.

However, I am sometimes too lazy to search in the list provided by “top“, and if I already know the name of the program running, I recommend the combination:

ps aux | grep [name of the program]

This will have the effect of listing all the current processes, even the smallest ones that will not be picked up immediately by “top“, and then filtering them according to your keywords.

This method will instantly give you the name of the user responsible for this process, the PID number, the CPU usage percentage, the memory usage, the name of the process, etc.

As a side note, if you don’t know how to kill a running process:

kill [PID number]

OR

killall [name of the process]

3. Listing running modules

Modules appeared in version 2.0 of the Linux kernel. They are very useful, and you can consider them as drivers that you can load and remove from the memory. As an example, if you are using a laptop, you probably have a WiFi card. The corresponding modules for that card are probably loaded automatically at start up. If you want to save some battery, you may want to stop the card when you are not using the Internet. Removing the corresponding driver from the memory will then give you a little bit more memory (and you will also be sure that your card is disabled).

But first you need to know which modules are currently running. The command for that is

lsmod

This command is simply the combination of “ls” for listing files in a directory and “mod ” for module (I know, what a surprise).

As a complement to your knowledge, you can add modules with the command

modprobe [name of the module]

and remove them via

rmmod [name of the module]

These two commands have to be launched by a super-user.

4. Checking disk usage

Keeping an eye on your system’s volumes can save you a lot of trouble. You may want to be sure that there is always enough room in /root, and remember to periodically clean your /tmp. For that purpose, there are two great commands:

lsblk

and

df -h

lsblk displays a tree representation of the partitions of your computer. It also gives you some useful information about the size of these partitions, their type, and their mountpoint.

However, even if lsblk is more visual, I still prefer to use df -h. The latter gives you more information about the remaining space, the size of the partitions, and the percentage of memory in use.

You may have noticed that the command df alone will give you the size in bytes, which might be very hard to interpret. The option -h stands for human readable and gives you the amount of data in gigabytes, megabytes, or whatever is the easiest for a human to understand.

5. Locating binaries and configuration files

One of the first things that confused me when I left Windows a few years ago was that the file system was completely different on Linux. There is no such thing as Program Files, or a single directory for all the configuration files. But it may be very useful to know where these binaries are. For that purpose, the command:

whereis

is among the best. Similarly to

whoami

which gives you the name of the current user, or

whatis

which explains a command quickly, whereis can locate binaries, manual entries, and various configuration files. Its syntax is also very simple:

whereis [name]

In the example above, I asked where Firefox was, and the command returned the location for its binary and various directories, as well as the manual page.

But one of the greatest strengths of whereis is its ability to locate standalone configuration files. Here is another example, where I was searching for rc configuration files:

Such options can become very useful, especially if you are not using Ubuntu but another distribution like Archlinux which requires a serious amount of time to edit these files.

Conclusion

With these commands in your pocket, you will be able to see a little more of what is going on in your system. If you still prefer to have a GUI for that, I would still recommend things like Baobab for the files and Gnome System Monitor in general.

Are you using other commands? Other GUIs? Let us know in the comments.

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Standard Notifications

By default KDE’s notifications pop up from the “Notifications” widget, which is found in the panel next to the system tray. Whenever a system or application event occurs, the notification will briefly appear in a Plasma popup over this area. Once the popup disappears, you can click the icon at any time to see past notifications.

Notification Widget Settings

The notification widget has a few settings that can change the way it displays notifications for you. To reach the settings, right click on the widget icon and click “Notification Settings”. The first section labeled “Pop Up Notices” allows you to select some basic notification categories: “Application notifications” and “File transfers and other jobs”. The last setting labeled “Automatically hide” determines if notifications disappear after a short time.

Notification Configuration

More extensive KDE notifications are available in System Settings in the “Application and System Notifications” section. The first pane called “Manage Notifications” allows you to configure system and application notifications.

“Event source” refers to the system or application that will send the notification. The “State” column tells you which types of notifications are enabled for a particular event. KDE gives you five options for this:

1. Play a sound – Choose any supported audio file you want.
2. Show a message in a popup – the standard method
3. Log to a file – useful if you want to keep track of how often an event occurs
4. Mark taskbar entry – The taskbar will change colors to alert you of the event
5. Run command – With this you can enable more advanced responses to notifications. When a certain event finishes, it can spawn a program that starts another.

As an example, suppose you want to change the way KTorrent notifies you when a torrent has finished downloading to automatically start your video player. By default, it will only show a popup and possibly play a sound if the KDE sound system is enabled. To change this, do the following:

1. Click the dropdown menu next to “event source” and choose KTorrent
2. Choose the last event in the list “Torrent has finished downloading”
3. Check the “Run command” box
4. Type in the command /usr/bin/dragon (or whichever video player you use).

To change the way KDE plays system sounds, click the next tab labeled “Player Settings”. This allows you to adjust the volume, use an external player (such as “play” or “mplayer”), or disable audio output completely.

Other Notifications

One of the more annoying features that I have always disabled in KDE is the bouncing “busy cursor”. If you share my disdain for it, you can disable it by clicking the “Launch Feedback” button and choosing “No Busy Cursor” from the dropdown menu. In order to still get some type of notification when a program is launched or demands attention, leave “enable taskbar notification” enabled. The “startup indication timeout” option determines how long the notification stays in the taskbar even after a program fails to start.

KDE’s notification system can make use of the accessibility system bell to provide better notification for people who are not easily alerted by the standard notifications. Click the “System Bell” button and check “use system bell instead of system notification” to enable this feature.

Ultimate Flexibility

KDE now has the ability to interpret GTK notifications, resulting in better integration of KDE and non-KDE apps. The KDE nofitication system can be as active or as passive as you want. You can even detach a notification popup and move it to a different location. It provides the ultimate flexibility for all types of users.

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But Dropbox’s biggest strength is also its weakness. While the simple concept of synchronizing everything inside one Dropbox folder is the factor that keeps it above its competitors, this simplicity also means that it’s (almost) impossible to synchronize everything else outside that folder.

Meet Symlink

If you are a Mac user who doesn’t like the idea of moving everything to Dropbox folder for the sake of synchronizing the content, there’s another way to achieve that. Basically, what we do is utilizing “symbolic link” (symlink) to create a reference to a folder and then place the symlink inside Dropbox folder. Anything that happens to the folder will be mirrored by the symlink and vice versa. So, symlink is a perfect solution to the problem of synchronizing outside folder to Dropbox.

You could create symlink via command line in Terminal, but common computer users are “allergic” to command line. So here are two free and simple tools that you can use to create symlink without having to touch any command line.

1. SymbolicLinker

SymbolicLinker is a tiny contextual menu plugin (for Puma through Leopard users) and software service (for Snow Leopard & later users) that, once installed, allows any user to create symbolic links to files inside the Finder. SymbolicLinker does this by adding a contextual menu item to the Finder that generates symbolic links to the selected files.

To use SymbolicLinker, download the compressed installer file. There are two important files there: SymbolicLinker.service for Snow Leopard (and later) users, and SymbolicLinker.plugin for Leopard (and previous version of Mac OS X) users. There’s also the installation instructions that will give you all the details.

The usage is also simple. Create a symlink of a folder (either by right clicking or by using Service), then place the symlink inside your Dropbox folder.

2. MacDropAny

MacDropAny is a tool built specifically to create symlink for Dropbox. The first time you open the application, it will ask you to choose which folder that you want to sync via Dropbox.

Then the next step is choosing where in the Dropbox folder do you want to put the symlink. This option gives you the ability to organize those symlinks into a specific folder inside Dropbox. You could name the folder “External links” or something else according to your preferences.

The last step is to assign name to the Symlink. To avoid confusion, it’s advisable to name the symlink similar to the original folder.

MacDropAny will offer you to open the newly made symlink.

Testing Time

Then it’s time to test the result. I dragged a text file into the symlink inside Dropbox folder.

The text file appears on the original folder that I placed in the Desktop. Then I made changes into the text and saved. I checked the synchronized text on another computer, and it was updated. So the conclusion: the system works fine.

Words of warning though, it’s not advisable to sync folders with too many items inside – something like the Applications and Pictures folders – since Dropbox tends to behave erroneously when it tries to sync too many files. Read more about this in the Known Issues page.

This two tools are the simplest solution that I could find to synchronized folders outside Dropbox. If you have other alternatives, please share them using the comment below.

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You can be sure that eventually you are going to suffer from one of the following issues:

• An electrical failure
• A virus infection
• A fault in your operating system
• A faulty driver

Any of these can change a system file or setting, which could make your system’s behaviour unstable. For this reason, we need to create backup and repair tools. Backup tools create copies of your system while repair utilities try to fix your system.

Since you won’t be backing up every minutes of the time, there might be some changes that are not captured by the last backup, thus it is always important to first attempt to repair the computer. Only when it fails, then you proceed to restore your backup (and lose some of the unsaved changes).

We won’t go into the detail of backing up your system since Tanmay has covered how to create a backup system image in Windows 7 in great detail. What we will do is to go through the steps you need to do to create a system repair disc that you can use to repair your system.

Creating A System Repair Disc

Note: The System Repair utility is included in the Windows 7 installer DVD. This tutorial is useful for those who don’t own the installer DVD (the OS is pre-installed in your system) and want to create a separate system repair CD.

Before you proceed, insert a blank CD/DVD into your CDROM in order for the system to create a system repair disk.

Go to the Start menu and type “repair” (without the quotes) in the search field. Select “Create a System Repair Disk”

You will see the following image. Select Create Disc.

Windows 7 will start to prepare the necessary files.

And proceed to create the disc.

Windows will show you a window asking you to label the disc. Press Close.

How To Use A System Repair CD

To use the system repair CD, you have to boot your system from it. You will have to make sure that your BIOS is configured to boot from the CD.

To start your BIOS, use the F2 key or Insert or Del (some motherboards might come with different BIOS hotkey). Once you are in the BIOS menu select the Boot Tab:

These screenshots are from an old BIOS but you should see something similar. Select CD/DVD Drives as first boot device:

Then the CD will start, select Windows Setup and press Enter.

Windows will ask for your keyboard language, press Next when you are done.

In the next step, it will search for Windows Installations:

Windows 7 will then show the findings:

Finally you will find a list of tools:

• Startup Repair: This is the first thing to do if your computer won’t start up. Windows 7 will do several check and fixes that can solve the problems. This is done automatically without your interaction.
• System Restore: If you have installed some new hardware or an application and your computer is not capable of start you can revert your system to a previous state.
• System Image Recovery If you have done a system image you can revert those files.
• Windows Memory Diagnostic. This will restart your computer and look for memory problems. More common than you think.
• Command Prompt: Designed for people that want to do advanced recovery. This will let you do a check of your disk for example, the famous Windows XP command chkdsk.

What other ways do you use to repair your system?

Related Posts:

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• How to Monitor Your Linux Performance With Sysstat
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In short, Mz 7 Optimizer is a very sophisticated tweaking application for Windows. It is also the most complete system optimization suite around to help you improve the performance of your Windows PC.

On the first run, it will prompt you to backup your registry. It is best that you follow the instruction and backup your registry (you never know when your computer going to break).

The software is divided into 5 main sections and each section contains numerous tweak options.

1. Performance Tweaks

The performance tweak is where you tweak the settings of the hardware to get better performance. Things that you can tweak include the CPU, Hard Disk and Memory

2. Windows Tweaks

The next section is the tweaking of the operating system itself. To improve the responsiveness of the OS, this is where you want to spend the most time tweaking. Things that you can tweak include the core system tweaks, startup and shutdown tweaks.

3. Internet Tweaks

Since you are spending most of the time on the Web, it makes sense to be able to tweak the internet connection. You can do the network tweak and Internet Explorer and Firefox tweaks. No Google Chrome or any other browsers tweak for the time being.

4. Customization Tweaks

The customization tweak is divided between the taskbar, aero effects and the context menu. The taskbar tweaks allow you to change the size of the taskbar icon and also the time for the jumplist to appear. The Aero tweaks give you the option to enable/disable each Aero effects. Lastly, the context menu tweaks allow you to add custom command to your context menu. You might also be interested to know about 4 other tools to edit the context menu.

5. Security Tweaks

This is also one important part that you don’t want to miss. The security tweaks covers area including the networking and the system security. It also provides a shortcut to the UAC control panel.

Automatic Optimization

For those who don’t like to meddle with the various optimization options, you can use the “Automatic Optimization” feature to quickly optimize your system.

This will give you a quick and easy way to optimize your system.

Conclusion

Mz 7 Optimizer is a powerful system optimization tool. Casual users might find some of the options an overkill, but regular and expert users will come to appreciate the usefulness of this application.

Download Mz 7 Optimizer

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You can click the Analyze button to scan your registry for duplicate and issues. It also checks your Internet activity for redundant files and traces of your privacy records. Once it has finished scanning, you can then click the “Fix and Clean” button to clean it up.

Miscellaneous Tools

The Miscellaneous Tools section contains some of the most useful tools that you will ever need to tweak your system for best performance and efficiency.

Auto Shutdown – Allows you to set a timer to log off/shutdown/hibernate your computer.

CD Autorun – Have you ever hated the autorun popup whenever you insert a CD? Well, you can now disable the autorun feature. Other than that, you can also change the default CD and DVD player.

Process Manager – Allows you to view the running processes and kill those that are not in use. You can also set priority for each task.

TweakNow Shortcut – With TweakNow Shortcut, you can create a custom shortcut for a CPU intensive application. When you activate this shortcut, it will prioritize the application startup and free up extra RAM for the application. This is useful in the situation when you are already running several applications and you need to open another CPU-intensive application.

RAM Optimizer – An useful tool that will free up RAM whenever they are not in use.

Virtual Desktop – Enable up to 4 virtual desktop for your Windows desktop

System Information

Here is where you can find out plenty of information for your system, from the motherboard, hard disk, CPU, network, video to the version of Windows that you are using.

Windows Cleaner

There are several things that you can clean up in this area. You can clean your Hard Drive, clean up the startup items, clean up the registry, defragment the registry, uninstall an application or even analyze your hard disk for the folder that take up the most space.

Windows Secret

The title doesn’t really tell you what this tool does. Well, it allows you to configure the options for some of the popular and frequently accessed applications. There is a whole big bunch of things that you can tweak, from the windows login screen to the default search engine in Internet Explorer, and even setting your own logo for OEM manufacturer.

Conclusion

As I mentioned from the start, this is easily the most comprehensive tweak application that I have ever come across. Unless you like hacking into the registry all the time, this tool is going to be very useful to you.

Download TweakNow PowerPack

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In Windows 7, there is this feature that allows you to clone your system to an image file so you can restore from it in the event some disasters happened. In this article, we are going to show you how to clone your system drive in Windows 7 and restore your system from that.

Cloning your system

1. In the Start menu search box, type “backup and restore” and press “Enter”. It will open the Backup and Restore window in control panel. Now Click on “Create a system image” from left side of the window.

2. Once the “Create a System image” window appears, choose “On a hard disk” option and locate the drive where you want to save the backup. You can also choose DVDs option, but be forewarned that it will require more than one DVD to complete the backup. Using an external hard disk would be a better choice.

3. After confirming the backup location, you can click on the “Next” button to proceed in the next step. Here is where you choose the drive to backup. The system drive (C:) is checked by default. For other drives, simply check the box beside them to include them in your backup.

4. In this step, you have to confirm whether you have selected the right location of backup and the correct drives which you want to backup. Click the “Start backup” button once you have checked everything is correct.

5. The backup process will take some time to finish. You can go for your coffee break for now.

After the backup is completed, you can now remove your external hard drive and keep the backup image file in a safe place.

Restoring from the backup image

To restore your PC from the backup image, you can either boot it up from the startup screen (if your OS cannot be booted up anymore) or restore from the control panel (when you just want to revert back to an older setting).

Restore from Control Panel

1. Type “backup and restore” in the Start menu search box to open Backup and Restore window.

2. Click on “Recover system settings or your computer”.

3. Click on “Advanced recovery methods”.

4. Choose the option “Use a system image you created earlier to recover your computer”.

5. Now you’ll get a option to back up the files like documents, pictures, music, located in the current system drive. You can skip this process by clicking the “Skip” button.

6. Hit the “Restart” button. When your computer starts again, just choose the location of the backup image file and proceed.

Restore from startup screen

1. Restart you computer, hold down the F8 key when booting to enter the advanced boot option menu.

2. Select your preferred keyboard layout. Click Next to proceed.

3. Put a user name and password, click OK.

4. Choose “System Image Recovery” from the System Recovery option menu and follow the instructions.

That’s all to create a backup system image and restore your system from it. Do let us know if you use any other ways to backup/restore your PC.

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For those users who use a desktop operating system and expect a graphical experience, opening a terminal window is not a normal thing to do. That does not mean they are incapable of learning it. They are just more comfortable with a visual interface.

There are many control panel tools and settings dialogs in KDE that make it easier for graphical-minded users to get things done. Here are five stand-alone applications that will help you stay informed about your computer’s status and health.

1. KInfoCenter

It is just what it says. It provides users with information about their systems. There are categories for graphics cards, PCI devices, memory, CPU, and many others. If you are ever unsure about what devices you have or what system settings you currently have, KInfoCenter is a good place to start.

2. KDiskFree

This is a very useful tool for those of us who manage to fill up our hard drives rather quickly. You can monitor disk usage on both fixed drives and currently connected removable ones.

3.  KDE Partition Manager

Need to format a drive, resize a partition, or create a swap partition? KDE Partition Manager can do it all. It depends on the trusted disk “Parted” libraries, so users can know they are getting reliable results

4. KSystemLog

Linux documents every major occurrence on your system. You just have to know where to look for that documentation. For convenience, KSystemLog will collect that information for you and display it in a window, all with the click of a button.  KSystemLog monitors your log files, updating them periodically. It currently supports system log, kernel log, authentication log, daemons’ logs, CUPS (printer) log, X.org log, and others.

5. Ksysguard

KDE 4 includes a handy little task manager that you can access by pressing Control+Escape or by clicking the button on Krunner. For those of us who used KDE 3, however, we need something a little more robust. Ksysguard monitors processes, provides stats, and includes graphs, updated in real time. Processes and programs can be monitored, filtered, and killed, when necessary. As with previous versions, users can add new tabs, placing customized sensors on each tab. Sensors include CPU cores, uptime, partition usage, log files, memory, and much more.

There are many others tools that can make your Linux experience easier. If you have a favorite, feel free to post it in the comments. For me, after having worked as a Linux system admin for many years, I still occasionally love to open up Konsole and hack away the command line.

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