Shutting down (e)SATA disks under Linux

NOTE: This post has moved to https://blog.gibson.sh/2010/05/11/shutting-down-esata-disks-under-linux/
The original article is kept here for now, but is not maintained in any way.

I’m using a eSATA external harddrive and want to be able to safely unplug it without shutting down my PC. While just removing the drive after unmounting worked so far, I’m not sure if it’s really safe – I’d really prefer to cleanly disconnect it and spinning it down before pulling the plug.
I googled that and stumbled upon http://www.sakana.fr/blog/2009/05/04/linux-sata-hot-plug-unplug/ which seems to be a clean and safe way to do it, so I just wrote a script to do that.

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Unlock gnome-keyring on Login with SLiM and PAM

NOTE: This post has moved to https://blog.gibson.sh/2010/05/05/unlock-gnome-keyring-on-login-with-slim-and-pam/
The original article is kept here for now, but is not maintained in any way.

My favorite desktop environment is XFCE, because it’s fast, doesn’t need much memory¹ and still is convenient (automounting of CDs and memory sticks, easy unmounting by clicking, a real desktop, etc).
I also use SLiM as a display manager because it is slim and looks much better than xdm.

On my Laptop I also use GNOME’s NetworkManager because I haven’t yet found a better and less bloat alternative for handling wireless networks and VPNs.
NetworkManager is able to store your passwords (WPA-keys etc) in the GNOME Keyring so you don’t need to enter them each time your laptop connects to a wireless network. But you still have to enter the password to unlock the keyring.. unless you let PAM handle that on login.