Top 4 Security Concerns of 2016 and How to Prepare Yourself

Top 4 Security Concerns of 2016 and How to Prepare Yourself

Each year technology is getting smarter, smaller and more ubiquitous.  This technology is empowering a more productive workforce, but it is also empowering hackers with more tools to disrupt and plunder businesses and individuals. So what are these threats and what can you do while at work or home to prevent a breach? Keep reading!
  
1.  Social Engineering and Phishing Attacks Increase.
In an ever increasing arms race between information security professionals and the global network of hackers, hacktivists, and script kiddies the good guys have managed to develop a myriad of technologies to stop them in their tracks.  But there will always be an Achilles heel to this technology that can never be removed entirely from the loop - the human element.  Phishing, phone scams, and other social engineering techniques are proven and reliable ways for criminals to gain a foothold in any company.
 
What can you do about it? 

Slow down - Thinking before you click is always the best option.  Do you really need to click on that hyperlink from an unknown sender? Hover over any hyperlink to make sure it is going to a trusted location.

Double Check the “To” line - Have you double checked who you are replying to in an email?

Question callers - Should you go to a web page that some random person on the phone just instructed you navigate to?  The answer is no.  More often than not, IT staff will reach out to people who have contacted them first.

2.  Smartphones Make A Smart Target For Attackers

According to a 2015 Pew Research study nearly two thirds of Americans now own a smartphone.  From a smartphone you can bank, buy food, get a ride home, or track your fitness. These devices provide a staggering amount of information about you and the world around you, but they can also provide would be attacks with a treasure trove of information if they gain physical or virtual access to your device.  How can you prevent this access?

Harden your phone - The best way to prevent physical access to your phone is with a simple lock screen.  Most phones these days offer many quick and easy ways to lock your device.  Pins, patterns, pictures, and fingerprint scanners are available on many models of phones.
 
There is no such thing as a free app - Many free apps include ads to generate revenue.  These ads may or may not be policed and could take you to a malicious site if you intentionally or accidentally click on them. 

Practice app austerity – Do you really need 40 apps on your phone? Try removing old/unused apps and also be sure to do a bit of research (read negative reviews or google the app) before you install something on your phone.  While the vast majority of app developers are not malicious they may still collect a ton of information about you.  This information could be exposed if they are hacked.

3. Does My Toaster Have A Virus?  The Internet of Things (IoT) Is Almost Here

Did you get a smart TV this Christmas? How about a smart watch or maybe a smart fridge?  These types of devices are all part of the Internet of Things (IoT).  As with any connected device, the more popular the device, the more likely it is to be the target of attacks.  There are very few known vulnerabilities for these kinds of devices, but that doesn’t mean they are invulnerable from attack. 
Keep your device up to date - If you own one of these devices make sure to be vigilant and keep your device software up to date. Be sure to keep an eye out for news about possible vulnerabilities that could compromise your device.

4. Small and Medium businesses will become a bigger target for cyber criminals

A recent PricewaterhouseCoopers report revealed that 74% of SMBs experienced a security issue in the last 12 months, and this number will only increase due to SMBs being perceived as easy targets.  If one of your business’s clients or partners gets compromised their relationship with your company could be leveraged to social engineer your companies employees. 
The most likely avenue of attack would come from phishing emails or fraudulent phone calls coming from compromised email accounts or phone systems.  See item number one on how to prepare for this kind of attack.

Which of these threats concerns you the most?  Please discuss this, and anything else in this article below! 

3D Printed Penguin.

3D Printed Penguin.  That is all. :D

Android Exploration Tools For The Rooted User

Got Root?

Once you have rooted your android device there are lots of cool applications that open up to you.  As a curious IT professional I comb the net looking for good apps for my phone.  I think of them as a digital Swiss army knife.  Not all of these applications require root, but most require it to unlock the full potential of the application.  

Hacker's Keyboard  -

Don't let the name fool you.  There is nothing malicious about this keyboard.  It simply adds more "traditional" keys that are often left out of smartphone keyboards.  Things like the directional pad and toggles to press two buttons at once (CTRL + ALT).  While not as quick as standard keyboards, the extra keys are invaluable while SSH'd into a box.  

SSH Tunnel -

Ever find yourself on a more "restricted" network?  Wish your phone could visit the sites you want while still taking advantage of that sweet sweet bandwidth? Wish you could add a layer of encryption to your network traffic?  Well now you can!  SSH Tunnel connects to a home or remote server running S

ConnectBot

This is a fantastic SSH client (or telnet if that floats your boat) for android.  

Network Discovery and Fing

Want to find out what devices are attached to the network AND what services they are running?  Look no further than these two fantastic apps.  Think of them as NMAP lite.  Another neat feature is that once you have found a service (say SSH) on the network it will launch ConnectBot (or similar) to make the connection.  

Orbot: TOR For Android

Run Silent, Run Deep...web!?  Yup, you guessed it TOR has an official android client!  Once installed it has links to their own secure web browser and the duck duck go search engine.  Very cool stuff.  Tested and it works!

kWs: Android Web Server

Want to host a simple web page from your phone?  Look no further than the kWs web server!  Who needs a computer to update your personal site when you can just log into the server in your pocket!  It allows for 10 connections at once so it isn't going to help you rake in that sweet sweet ad revenue, but just think of all that sweet geek cred you will nab!  Check out my guide here!

Shark and Shark Reader for Root

At first I thought these were very cool, but they are actually of much less limited use than their IRL counterparts. The reason for this is the app is add supported SO...when you harvest those sweet, sweet packets they come cluttered up with lots of "noise" from the adds.  If you can filter that info out great...but it is just kind of a hassel.   

aTorrent & uTorrent - bit torrent clients for Android 

Torrent to your phone!  Tested and works like a charm (both clients).  Just make sure you are aware you will destroy your data plan if you aren't careful.

If you dear reader have any apps that you can't live without share em with me!

As always thanks for reading!!

o7

Why Intel Steams Me! Grrrr!!

So I am an avid gamer, and a Linux user something which, until recently, really hasn't gone hand in hand.  That is quickly changing with the advent of the Steam client for Linux.  More and more games are being ported to the client or are being created especially for it.  Enter me and my primary Linux laptop powered by an Intel 4500 gma chipset.  It plays some simple games just fine (FTL, Dungeons of Dreadmore), but when it comes to graphically intensive games it isn't great, but it should be able to play some older games like Half-Life 2 / other source engine games just fine (like it does in Windows).  Unfortunately this isn't the case.  I use the latest version of Linux Mint, but the standard drivers are terrible for the Intel 4500...so terrible that all of my Valve games are just plain broken.  They either go to black or load upside down.  While there are some work around fixes, but they require using some bleeding edge drivers (xorg edgers ppa for example).  I tried these, but I ended up installing it wrong and had to roll it back.  So I have been finding many other people are running into the same issue.  One such user is found here...http://communities.intel.com/thread/33333 he was running into the same issue as me and when they asked Intel communities if they could start a Linux community to address some of these issues they got this pithy response...

Intel® currently has no intention of opening a Linux subforum.  The Intel linux drivers are developed by the linux community as well.

Basically "We could care less about the new ground swell of Linux based gaming.  If you want it to work fix it yourself."  As a Linux user this much is obvious as it is what Linux is all about...DIY.  But Linux is also about communities, about little pockets of users with similar interests coming together to resolve their specific issues.  When Intel's official response to making a forum community to help Intel GMA chipset users get their game on is PISS OFF, well it pisses me off.

TL;DR - Intel should not ignore the up and coming Linux gaming community.  Instead they should embrace the community and provide just that, a community space for Linux gamers to congregate.

Netflix on Linux!!!

Really not sure how I missed this, but you can now get Netflix on Linux!!

Huge shout out to fellow Iowan Nixie Pixel for posting this very workable workaround over at her linux youtube page.  Also, if you don't know who Nixie Pixel is be sure to check out her YouTube vids and other sites.  Lots of helpful info and news about Linux, Open Source, and gaming to be found!

To install on Ubuntu / Mint (64 or 32 bit)-

Start terminal

$ sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ehoover/compholio

$ sudo apt-get update

$ sudo apt-get install netflix-desktop

------

For Fedora (only 32 bit systems) 

You need wget first:
su -c 'yum -y install wget'

Installing Netflix:
wget -chttp://sourceforge.net/projects/postinstaller/files/data/Netflixplayer.tar.gz

tar -xvzf Netflixplayer.tar.gz

su -c 'sh Netflixplayer.sh'

Running Netflix from cmd line:
sh /usr/bin/Netflix.sh


I did the install on the latest version of Linux Mint and encountered no problems.  The interface seems somewhat wonky at times, but everything works great.  It is really, REALLY unfortunate that Netflix has not developed something like this themselves.  Oh well, Linux community FTW!  Check out Nixie Pixel's video walk through below.

Why Linux?

That is a question many of my non-Linux using friends often ask me.  Why waste your time learning about an OS that takes so much extra effort? I mean if it was that good EVERYONE would use it right???

Linux is specialized tool. It is not a swiss army knife like windows. It is not as easy to use, but limited in scope like the spork that is Mac OSX.  It is more like a tool chest full of specialty tools...think torx head screwdrivers and tricorders. With these tools you can do nearly anything you can imagine!  Let us look at all of the ways Linux just plain does it better.

Linux Is Everywhere

Do you use any of the following? An Android smartphone, a wifi router, DVR, DVD player, or the internet? Of course you do!  Guess what? You use Linux!  Linux can be found in each one of these devices in much the same way DNA can be found in nearly all life on Earth.  It is pervasive yet hidden.  This is the main obstacle to the OS's mainstream desktop use.  It can be tailored to many different applications from the Mars rovers to the computer I am typing this on.  This wide array of options often overwhelms users new to the OS.  Do they use Ubuntu, Arch, Gentoo, Debian, Puppy Linux, Slackware...well you get the picture.

So WHY Linux?? 

For all the reason listed above; that is why!  Got a spare computer, router, tablet, or Martian rover lying around gathering dust?  Put some Linux on it!  Where do I start??  Below you will find some helpful links to get you started on your Linux journey.  I would encourage you to browse my blog, but it is more focused on someone that has already started on their journey.  Here are some links to get you started...

Lifehacker's Guide to Linux - This is a great jumping off point and it brings you to one of the most helpful sites on the internet...not just Linux!

Distro Watch - When you are ready to pick a "flavor" of Linux this is the place to start.  Great info on all variations.

Linux Questions - You WILL have questions, and this site has nearly ALL the answers.  For users of all skill levels by users of all skill types.  Bookmark this site like yesterday.

Ubuntu - Quickly becoming the "Face" of Linux, this site has a wealth of information for users that have decided to use the novice (and expert) friendly flavor of Linux.

I hope this post helps you on your journey.  If you ever have any questions feel free to comment on this blog or send me a shout out on twitter ( @assi9 ).

Thanks for reading!!

Acer Iconia a200: THE REVIEW!!

Well it has been a few months and I have really come to enjoy my Acer Iconia a200 tablet.  The picture quality is fantastic and the performance is great. Graphics intensive games run quickly and look great.  A perfect example of this is the massive new A Bards Tale (which btw way is a great game for all you RPG fans out there).  The game textures look about on par with a high end computer circa 2004.  So I like to get right to the point with my reviews.  So lets get to it.  First lets start off with what is wrong with this tablet.

The Bad

The volume controls are shit.  The rocker button is small and hard to operate.  It feels solid and quality, but just a little too solid.  If it was a wee bit bigger it would be much better.

Power save mode is a blessing and a curse.  When your tablet is idle the WiFi will shut off.  This is a good measure to save battery life and I am all for that, but when downloading very large files it is nice to be able to do so with the screen off.  This "feature" can also be annoying when bringing the tablet out of sleep mode as it will often resume the app you were in and then interrupt said app with a flood of new email alerts and whatnot.

The Good

FULL SIZE USB.  Yea.  That's right I said full size USB.  You can plug all sorts of goodies into this.  USB hub, keyboard/mouse combo, even an external hard drive!  This tablet pushes the boundaries from standard android tablet to decent netbook replacement with the proper case and keyboard mouse combo.

Micro-SD Card Slot.  Use this to expand the 16GB of hard drive space to whatever you darn well please.

Easy root*!  I used THIS method to root the tablet.  Follow the steps to the letter and you will be just fine!  Took me about an hour to get this all set. Many thanks to the great folks over at http://www.acertabletforum.com.  *FYI - After rooting my tablet the newest version of Hulu stopped working.  It seems to be the only application affected by the root process.  I was able to find a version of Hulu (read hacked) that worked, but it doesn't seem to be very high quality.  But hey it works.

Couple final thoughts.  Tablet cases are shit and so are the styluses.  Both are very expensive and in the case of the styluses...garbage.  I did manage to find a decent case for it. The Case Logic iPad/ 10" Tablet case works great as it can hold the tablet in an upright position.  Only one caveat...the little bungee cord in the upper left hand corner will occasionally press the power button and shut off the screen or sometimes even the tablet.  I opt to just unhook it.

See below for links to this tablet and case!  Thanks for stopping by! :D

Acer Iconia a200 First Impressions

Hello world!  It is I your intrepid linux reporter!  Today I am writing you from the exciting world of tablets!  Yesterday I aged another year  (like a fine single malt) and I treated myself with a tablet computer.   After much debating I decided to go with the Acer Iconia  a200 tablet.  It has a 1280 x 800 screen (higher res than the iPad 1 and 2), a full size usb port (and micro usb slot as well), and a 10.1 screen.  And best of all it was on sale!  
So 24 hours with this tablet has left a fantastic first impression on me.  The display is clear and bright, the Logitech k400 keyboard I am typing this on worked with zero user intervention, and it updated itself to Ice Cream Sandwich the second it connected to wifi.  This was fantastic as I didn't have to go through the device setup twice.  So this has been all flowers and butterflies so far.  Where is the manure you say?  Well the sound isn't fantastic, but let's be realistic; I don't see anyone carrying their tablet computers up by their head 80's style.  The wierd little Acer circle menu is rather silly, but it doesn't matter too much as you don't really need to use it if you don't want to.  Other than those minor gripes this is a great 10.1" tablet for the money.  I will revist this little tablet at a later date.  I intend to root it and possibly mod it with Ubuntu (or backtrack linux) and I will let you know how all that goes.  To summarize...
Pros: Great 1280 xt 800 display, easy setup, and a full size usb with keyboard and mouse support.
Cons: Sound sucks and the Acer radial menu is rather redundant. 

I will take "Name that blog" for $1000 Alex!!

Woot!!! Finally scrapped together $3 for a namecheap.com domain.  30 min after purchase my blog has a real name!  I can now say my blog has +2 legit armor.  Thanks for stopping by! :D

Going "Green" with CentOS

Due to my ever shrinking budget I decided to ax my beast xeon debian server. :(  I decided to go for a more "green" (read cheaper) solution for a 24/7 server.  Since I am trying to teach myself some marketable job skills I decided to go with CentOS.  CentOS is basically the free / all open source version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) they just remove the Red Hat branding and whatnot.  Bottom line it will give me a robust, stable, and widely used platform on which to run my apps and to get some good old fashioned hands on XP.   Below is some of the more "unique" challenges I have run into using this OS.

Now to "sexy" this post up!  I give you...the hardware!

Intel D510 all in one board 

2 gigs of gskill ram (soon 4 gigs)

A 40gig Intel SSD for the OS and apps

A 1TB drive for LOL Catz and Demotivational posters.  

And such an elegant system needs a pimp case and power supply. 

Total price for this little gem is $392.95 (or about $450 after shipping/handling).  But the best part is the energy draw.  According to a Tom's Hardware review the D510 should pull about 33-40 watts at full load.  A far cry from the 400+ watts  my old server use to draw at load!  

Hardware is setup and ready to rock....it is CentOS time!

First we must get ourselves an *.iso image of CentOS to use in either a bootable USB stick (instructions on that here) or a bootable CD/DVD.  If windows 7 is your primary os you can burn the iso disk using windows. If you are on XP you will need burner software capable of making an iso disk. I would suggest XP Burner.  Here a mirror for you!   From that link choose which hardware architecture you are on, in my case the x86_64 bit.  Next find the appropriate install.  When I installed it I went with the Live DVD you can find that here. So once your iso of choice has been burned / turned into a bootable USB drive it is time to start the install.  Now I am not big on going through step by step the install process of many Linux distros because frankly a lot of time and effort has gone into making them dead simple.  Like my mom has installed Ubuntu.  If she can do that you can do CentOS.  So assuming you are installing this on the hardware above you may be staring a blue screen and thinking WTF?!?!   If you are on different hardware skip down to the LAMP server setup section.

STOP HAMMER TIME.

Ok at this point, just after the install has finished I hit a wall, I could do nothing....no mouse, no icons just a blue screen taunting me.  I think, maybe I just need to reboot.  NOPE.  Reinstall....NOPE.  Chuck Testa....NOPE.  Nothing worked.  At some point in my obscenity laced tirade I bumped my mouse hard.  Well hello little cursor!  Where have you been hiding!? With the mere power of right click I was able to open up a terminal window and type "gnome-display-settings" and up pops the desktop settings.  Problem found.  It was showing not one but two monitors.  One disabled and the other something obscene like 3072 x 2048. Well I disabled the other monitor and set the current display to the correct resolution and we were in like Flint.  Crisis resolved.  The same procedure (flail the mouse about until it appears on screen and set the correct resolution) had to be repeated for each user, but once that was done it was all good.  On to setting up the LAMP server!

LAMP - Linux Apache MySQL PHP

I make no claim to this section of the setup process. I used the guide below and it helped me greatly, I got all this stuff from here...

http://library.linode.com/lamp-guides/centos-6 by  Sam Kleinman  Please show them love and go to the site if this works for you.  
--------------------------------------------START RIP OFF-----------------------------------------------

This guide provides step-by-step instructions for installing a full-featured LAMP stack on a CentOS 6 system.

In this guide, you will be instructed on setting up Apache, MySQL, and PHP. If you don't feel that you will need MySQL or PHP, please don't feel obligated to install theM.

Set the Hostname

Before you begin installing and configuring the components described in this guide, please make sure you've followed our instructions for setting your hostname. Issue the following commands to make sure it is set properly:

hostname
hostname -f

The first command should show your short hostname, and the second should show your fully qualified domain name (FQDN).

Install and Configure the Apache Web Server

The Apache Web Server is a very popular choice for serving web pages. While many alternatives have appeared in the last few years, Apache remains a powerful option that we recommend for most uses.

To install the current version of the Apache web server (in the 2.x series) use the following command:

yum update
yum install httpd

The configuration for Apache is contained in the httpd.conf file, which is located at: /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf. We advise you to make a backup of this file into your home directory, like so:

cp /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf ~/httpd.conf.backup

By default all files ending in the .conf extension in /etc/httpd/conf.d/ are treated as Apache configuration files, and we recommend placing your non-standard configuration options in files in these directories. Regardless how you choose to organize your configuration files, making regular backups of known working states is highly recommended.

Now we'll configure virtual hosting so that we can host multiple domains (or subdomains) with the server. These websites can be controlled by different users, or by a single user, as you prefer.

Before we get started, we suggest that you combine all configuration on virtual hosting into a single file called vhost.conf located in the /etc/httpd/conf.d/ directory. Open this file in your favorite text editor, and we'll begin by setting up virtual hosting.

Configure Name-based Virtual Hosts

There are different ways to set up Virtual Hosts, however we recommend the method below. By default, Apache listens on all IP addresses available to it.

Now we will create virtual host entries for each site that we need to host with this server. Here are two examples for sites at "example.com" and "example.org".

File excerpt:/etc/httpd/conf.d/vhost.conf

NameVirtualHost *:80

<VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerAdmin webmaster@example.com
     ServerName example.com
     ServerAlias www.example.com
     DocumentRoot /srv/www/example.com/public_html/
     ErrorLog /srv/www/example.com/logs/error.log
     CustomLog /srv/www/example.com/logs/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

<VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerAdmin webmaster@example.org
     ServerName example.org
     ServerAlias www.example.org
     DocumentRoot /srv/www/example.org/public_html/
     ErrorLog /srv/www/example.org/logs/error.log
     CustomLog /srv/www/example.org/logs/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>

Notes regarding this example configuration:

• All of the files for the sites that you host will be located in directories that exist underneath /srv/www You can symbolically link these directories into other locations if you need them to exist in other places.
• ErrorLog and CustomLog entries are suggested for more fine-grained logging, but are not required. If they are defined (as shown above), the logs directories must be created before you restart Apache.

Before you can use the above configuration you'll need to create the specified directories. For the above configuration, you can do this with the following commands:

mkdir -p /srv/www/example.com/public_html
mkdir /srv/www/example.com/logs

mkdir -p /srv/www/example.org/public_html
mkdir /srv/www/example.org/logs

After you've set up your virtual hosts, issue the following command to run Apache for the first time:

/etc/init.d/httpd start

Assuming that you have configured the DNS for your domain to point to your Linode's IP address, Virtual hosting for your domain should now work. Remember that you can create as many virtual hosts with Apache as you need.

If you want to run Apache by default when the system boots, which is a typical setup, execute the following command:

/sbin/chkconfig --levels 235 httpd on

Use the chkconfig command to setup runlevels as needed.

Anytime you change an option in your vhost.conf file, or any other Apache configuration remember to reload the configuration with the following command:

/etc/init.d/httpd reload

Install and Configure MySQL Database Server

MySQL is a relational database management system (RDBMS) and is a popular component in contemporary web development tool-chains. It is used to store data for many popular applications, including Wordpress and Drupal.

Install MySQL

The first step is to install the mysql-server package, which is accomplished by the following command:

yum install mysql-server

In CentOS 6 this provides version 5.1.52 of MySQL. Before you can use MySQL some configuration is required.

If you want to run MySQL by default when the system boots, which is a typical setup, execute the following command:

/sbin/chkconfig --levels 235 mysqld on

Now you can start the mysql daemon (mysqld) with the following command (as root):

/etc/init.d/mysqld start

At this point MySQL should be ready to configure and run. While you shouldn't need to change the configuration file, note that it is located at /etc/my.cnf for future reference.

Configure MySQL and Set Up MySQL databases

After installing MySQL, it's recommended that you run mysql_secure_installation, a program that helps secure MySQL. While running mysql_secure_installation, you will be presented with the opportunity to change the MySQL root password, remove anonymous user accounts, disable root logins outside of localhost, and remove test databases. It is recommended that you answer yes to these options. If you are prompted to reload the privilege tables, select yes. Run the following command to execute the program:

mysql_secure_installation

Next, we'll create a database and grant your users permissions to use databases. First, log in to MySQL:

mysql -u root -p

Enter MySQL's root password, and you'll be presented with a prompt where you can issue SQL statements to interact with the database.

To create a database and grant your users permissions on it, issue the following command. Note, the semi-colons (;) at the end of the lines are crucial for ending the commands. Your command should look like this:

create database lollipop;
grant all on lollipop.* to 'foreman' identified by '5t1ck';

In the example above, lollipop is the name of the database, foreman is the username, and 5t1ck password. Note that database user names and passwords are only used by scripts connecting to the database, and that database user account names need not (and perhaps should not) represent actual user accounts on the system.

With that completed you've successfully configured MySQL and you may now pass these database credentials on to your users. To exit the MySQL database administration utility issue the following command:

quit

With Apache and MySQL installed you are now ready to move on to installing PHP to provide scripting support for your web pages.

Installing and Configuring PHP

PHP makes it possible to produce dynamic and interactive pages using your own scripts and popular web development frameworks. Furthermore, many popular web applications like WordPress are written in PHP. If you want to be able to develop your websites using PHP, you must first install it.

CentOS includes packages for installing PHP from the terminal. Issue the following command:

yum install php php-pear

Once PHP5 is installed we'll need to tune the configuration file located in /etc/php.ini to enable more descriptive errors, logging, and better performance. These modifications provide a good starting point if you're unfamiliar with PHP configuration.

Make sure that the following values are set, and relevant lines are uncommented (comments are lines beginning with a semi-colon (;)):

File excerpt:/etc/php.ini

error_reporting = E_COMPILE_ERROR|E_RECOVERABLE_ERROR|E_ERROR|E_CORE_ERROR
display_errors = Off
log_errors = On
error_log = /var/log/php.log
max_execution_time = 300
memory_limit = 64M
register_globals = Off

If you need support for MySQL in PHP, then you must install the php5-mysql package with the following command:

yum install php-mysql

More Information

You may wish to consult the following resources for additional information on this topic. While these are provided in the hope that they will be useful, please note that we cannot vouch for the accuracy or timeliness of externally hosted materials.

• CentOS Linux Home Page
• Apache HTTP Server Documentation
• MySQL Documentation
• PHP Documentation

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 You should how have a good jumping off point for numerous projects!  Next article I will discuss how to setup the OTRS open source help desk ticketing software on your new server! :D

Let's Get NAPP'y With A NetBSD "LAMP" Server

My good chum Andy has a new post he would like to share.  How to setup a NetBSD version of the perennial LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP).

NetBSD + Apache + PHP + PostgreSQL

My NetBSD version of "LAMP". Or, as I call it, "NAPP" (NetBSD, Apache, PHP, PostgreSQL) This all assumes NetBSD and pkgsrc are set up and configured. Apache To install Apache (2.x in this case), # cd /usr/pkgsrc/www/apache22  # make install clean clean-depends To start Apache at boot, # cp /usr/pkg/share/examples/rc.d/apache /etc/rc.d  # echo 'apache=YES' >> /etc/rc.conf To start Apache, # apachectl start Default httpd.conf location /usr/pkg/etc/httpd Default DocumentRoot /usr/pkg/share/httpd/htdocs PHP To install PHP, # cd /usr/pkgsrc/www/ap-php  # make install clean clean-depends For Apache 1.x, add the following to httpd.conf LoadModule php5_module lib/httpd/mod_php5.so  AddType application/x-httpd-php .php For Apache 2.x, add the following to httpd.conf LoadModule php5_module lib/httpd/mod_php5.so  AddHandler application/x-httpd-php .php Restart Apache if it is running. # apachectl stop  # apachectl start For some reason, I had to do stop/start instead of graceful.  Default location of php.ini /usr/pkg/etc PostgreSQL To install PostgreSQL (9.1 in this case), # cd /usr/pkgsrc/databases/postgresql91  # make install clean clean-depends This may take a while, depending on your system...  To enable PostgreSQL and start at boot, # cp /usr/pkg/share/examples/rc.d/pgsql /etc/rc.d/pgsql  # echo 'pgsql=YES' >> /etc/rc.conf You can now start PostgreSQL, # /etc/rc.d/pgsql start If you try starting PostgreSQL and get a message that "$pgsql is not set properly", it means you didn't edit /etc/rc.conf correctly. PostgreSQL PHP module To install the PostegreSQL module for PHP, # cd /usr/pkgsrc/databases/php-pgsql  # make install clean clean-depends To enable the module, add the following line to php.ini, extension=pgsql.so Then restart Apache. And that's it! Enjoy your new NAPP server.

Be sure to check out this post on his site.....

http://level256.net/tech/napp/

If you have no idea of what NetBSD is and you want to learn more click the link below.

http://www.netbsd.org/docs/guide/en/chap-intro.html

Thanks for reading!

I am not dead! Promise!

Sorry updating of this blog has fallen WAY behind lately.  After the arrival of my first child it has been very hard to find the time needed to devote to this site.  BUT my little girl has grown a bit and I might be able to eek out some more time soon. So stay tuned!

Ubuntu 11.04: Unity Review

Well it took me a few days longer than I though it would to get this review out. But that is ok, because I wanted to do it right and give the Ubuntu / Canonical  team their due.

First things first.  I am not an Ubuntu hater. I enjoy it for what it is and for what it does for the Linux community. To me Ubuntu is the petting zoo for the full menagerie that is the Zoo of Linux distros.  It is easy, accessible, and most of the time... a fun experience.  So does the latest release of Ubuntu (11.04) with it's Unity GUI, maintain this tradition of fun and accessibility? I hate to report dear readers...NO.  Lets break it down.

Unity is a people pleaser. It tries to bring "Unity" to all hardware platforms.  Desktops, laptops, netbooks, and tablets.  With this in mind let us look at what this means from a design standpoint.  First, there is no "Program" menu. No start bar.  A 7-10" tablet would not need such things so they are not there.  Instead there is a launcher bar on the left side of the screen.  From here there, you will find commonly used programs like Libre Office, Firefox, etc.  There is also a file broswer, and the program launcher thing that could best be called the unholy love child of the windows vista / 7 search feature and the android apps page. Lets discuss this feature a little bit.

The launcher button allows you to search for programs that you have installed or find new ones on the internet.  The icons are a good size, but by default there is no quick and easy way to bring up the standard directory listing of programs.  The interface is clunky and not very intuitive.  If I had to work on this desktop all day I think I would soon fill my screen with shortcuts or quickly go insane.  Suggestion to fix the design would be to create a unique icon that would be used on the Unity bar to launch a "start button" style branching menu system and use the current app browser (another smartphone/tablet influence) to search for new programs and/or as a control panel style collection of system related programs/apps/widgets.

Another odd design in the Unity desktop is the addition of external scroll bars. Instead of the scroll bar being inside the border of the window and always visible, the bar auto-hides on the outside of the window. You can still move the page content with the up and down arrow   The idea is very cool for use with a touch screen, but with a mouse it is rather pointless. Overall kinda meh on the idea.  Might take some getting used to but all in all it is more of design idea with touch screens in mind.  Last I checked Ubuntu wasn't trying to take over the handheld market currently occupied by Android, but maybe this is a sign of things to come.

Overall I found the Unity experience to be less than ideal.  The tablet chic aesthetic mixed with the clunky and non-intuitive layout really turned me off from wanting to dig any deeper into this distro.   If they limited this distro to only touchscreen enabled devices I might have given it more of a chance. But it tires too hard to bottle that Android magic and put it on your desktop. It just doesn't work without heavy customization. Now being a Linux user I don't shy away from this idea but I would only expend the extra energy if I needed to.  Like on a tablet.  That doesn't support Android.

TL;DR - Ubuntu 11.04 w/Unity gui... Needs tighter focus and the design needs to be refocused for better usability.  Stick with your old pre-Unity Ubuntu until they fix this clunky excuse for a GUI.

Install A Web Server On Your Android Phone!

The EVO and other cutting edge Android phones are quickly blurring the line between phone and computer. Case in point it is now possible to host a website on your Android powered device! Ok, pick your jaw off the floor, I am going to teach you how!

Step 1: Download the FREE web server app off the Android market. Search for kWs on the Android market and your first hit should be the web server. Download it and lets get started.

Step 2: Put the file containing your website on your phones SD card. The easiest way to do this is to connect your phone via USB, then dump the file on the card. I named mine index.html and it worked straight away.

Step 3: Register with dyndns.com or no-ip.com. In order to view your site from anywhere you are going to need Dynamic DNS. Luckily this service is free (for a non-custom domain name) or you can pay a cheap monthly fee. But seeing as how this is a web server for your phone, the free service should do just fine. I have used both dyndns.com and no-ip.com and they are pretty equal as far as I am concerned. Both allow you to choose from some pre-selected domain names. None of the domain names are really great, but between the two sites you should find one that fits your site. I am not going to go too in depth on the account creation process (both sites offer great info on setup)...basically you create an account, choose your site domain name, then you are done. The web server will take care of the rest.





Step 4: Configuring your web server.
When you first start your kWs app you will see a button at the bottom of the page that says "Start Server" (see left pic). Don't start it just yet. First hit the menu button and select the settings button. Here you will see a list of options (see the right pic). Select where your file is (if you dumped it on the SD card it is ready to go by default). Next select your port (by default it is 8080...and yes this means you need to put :8080 at the end of your site name ie http://my.site.org:8080) we can leave that default right now. There are some more advanced features next, but we are going to skip those and go to the DYDNS setup section. Here you select your provider, for this I am going with no-ip because they provide free web port redirect (so no adding :8080) and the ability to mask your URL when it redirects. So next put in your user name, password, and your website's URL.

Step 5: Start the server. That's it, your done! Now keep in mind there might be a few min lag time between when you make changes on your DYNDNS site and when changes are made to your site. Just a few quick things to mention...max connections to your site is 10...so this isn't meant for much beyond personal use. Hope this works for you as well as it worked for me!


PS: They also have a paid version of this app, but I have not had a chance to try it out yet.

Learn Python - Free Interactive Python Tutorial

Learn Python - Free Interactive Python Tutorial

This is great! A dead simple interface, lots of great information at your finger tips and it even shows the output right away. I have never been good at coding. I mainly just stuck to HTML and stealing / editing other peoples code. I think with more sites like this I will have no reason not to actually try to code some stuff in python. Hope you find this site as cool as I do!

Hax