Slashdot Mirror

There are over 30 subversion related packages in the install, including updated to db4, apr, httpd and mod_ssl. Moreover, it seems that (at least the last install I tried) these other packages must be updated as a pre-requisite for installing svn.

I want to use svn+ssh. I don't need any of the apache/webdav integration. And having to move to a custom version of apache is going to be a show-stopper for a lot of people.

And does anyone know why vanilla berkely db is not good enough for svn?

svn developers: please release a client/server that can be installed without requiring updates to other packages (unless you need that specific, extra, functionality). Do this and you'll increase the svn adoption rate.

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CVS & SVN Hosting

By having an open proxy anyone can send/receive data via your proxy server (duh). There are implications: e.g. I've seen someone's server bandwidth being used to serve images in a spam (pr0n) email.

If you don't want people hiving off your bandwidth and potentially using your server's bandwidth for puposes you wouldn't normally approve of, then consider controlling your proxy access.

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Use your VPS proxy powers for the powers of good

Why is the poster doing this as a JSR? They are requests for Java specifications. Things that go into the core of the Java platform.

The problem domain for this proposed JSR is primarily in the business world, not the technical one. I can't see any one proposal getting sufficient backing from a wide enough user group. Certainly not enough for everyone to agree on a useful technical implementation of this.

There are better ways to handle this...

I suggest that the poster goes and sets up his own web service to do this (banks and investment firms offer such services already). And work out an open API.

It's good you've found a problem that interests you. But please don't feel you need to go and clutter up my platform of choice to go solving it.

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Java Hosting on Linux VPSs

Each athlete signs an agreement to abide by the Olympic committee's code of conduct. That code includes these clauses:

Under no circumstances, throughout the duration of the Olympic Games, may any athlete, coach, official, press attaché or any other accredited participant be accredited or act as a journalist or in any other media capacity.

will not use or authorize the use of the following items for the purpose of trade, without the prior written consent of the USOC (which consent shall not be unreasonably withheld) (1) photographs, films or videos of myself in the apparel or equipment provided by the USOC for the Games; (2) any Games medals; and (3) photographs, films or videos of myself with any Games medals;

Reading that I would argue that posting on a blog is not acting in the capacity of a journalist. Nor in a 'media capacity'

I would also argue that that posting photos of myself or my medals is not for the 'purpose of trade'.

Then I'd ensure that those photos were taken by friends and family, and not me.

And then the USOC will not 'reasonably withhold' permission for me using those images.

Anyway, it'd be fun to see one of the athletes test this. 'Course, it's not my medal on the line ;)

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Gold Medal Winning Linux VPS Hosting

It's really the future of "shared" webhosting because it balances the power of a full server against the cost of a shared one. Some hosts like JVDS and RimuHosting are already doing this and it's great.

He has 3000 people using the service. It would have taken them some time to sign up. He would have had ample info about the cost of running the service and providing support for it.

I can only deduce that Mr. Winer's personal circumstances have changed dramatically, and that is what is causing the problem.

And I agree with the grandfather post. There should have been warning about the service change. He should have let people know they had a week or a month to move things off the server. There would have been an increase in server load. But it would have been manageable.

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Yep, we host blogs

http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-5227102.html:

In addition to the NX work, Intel this year released prototype wireless network support--albeit nearly a year after full-fledged support was available in Windows.

Don't they mean that Linux had new wireless network support this year? Or was Intel the wireless support contributor for Linux? Either way I think the sentence is in error. Though I'm probably just being pendantic for raising it.

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VPS Hosting

Of course even one hour's root access is enough to enable the user to add their own back doors (e.g. other user accounts). So you'd also need to monitor things like /etc/passwd and shadow file changes carefully. And tools like Chkrootkit can help.

But definitely, ssh public/private key authentication is the way to go.

- Linux VPS Hosting

[quote]when they "feel there is a market need."[/quote]

Um, the market would be me. The time would be now.

Bring it on!

I see that the new dual core opterons are supposed to be pin compatible with existing boards. So that makes it possible to get an AMD server today, and in xx months time pop in a new chip and turn it from a single proc to a dual proc (dual -> quad?) server. Nice. Now if only memory prices would come down some more. So I can enjoy a 16GB quad proc server for under $3K.

Why are we still using passwords for everything? I must sign up for 2 or 3 new websites a week. I've been using the Internet for 32 years now. So that means I've signed up for just over 8388640 passwords.

Would someone please write a browser plugin that will enable public/private key authentication using my ssh agent

ADV: Get your own 'no password required' virtual private server

Not.

MySQL has always been fast. That is probably why most people use it.

MySQL has also been easy to manage (e.g. move database files from one subdirectory to another and the tables have also moved). That kind of simplicity brings tears to the eyes of an Oracle admin. There are a few options you can tune and teak, but by and large it just works out of the box (er, RPMs).

And of course the reason it has been so popular is that it has been so popular. If you get my circular drift. People use it because there is a lot of documentation about it. Perl and PHP pretty much always have the MySQL libraries so it can be used on web sites, etc.

Speacking of those subqueries, what's up with the delay getting 4.1 out from alpha to beta/gamma/production. I want to start using it. And 4.1 has been out in alpha for over a year now. Not to mention new development is already proceeding with the 5.0 release.

- Run the latest and greatest alpha MySQL database on your own VPS

For those who don't like 1000 line changelogs, here are the changes that Marcello specifically mentioned on his -pre and -rc lkml postings:

• NFS client fixes
• Bluetooth fixes
• IDE update (fixes for AMD chipset driver)
• Inclusion of Medley software RAID driver by Thomas Horsten http://www.infowares.com/linux/#medley_intro
• XFS update
• Big SCTP (http://www.sctp.org) merge (to match 2.6 API)
• Network driver updates (including the addition of nVidia Force driver).
• ACPI upstream merge
  

- Run Your own Linux Server on The Latest and Greatest 2.4 or 2.6 Kernel

Instead of VMWare consider User Mode Linux. It is free. And it permits you to run many virtual servers per host server. e.g. you should be able to run 16-30 virtual servers per 3Ghz Intel proc. Just make sure you have enough memory (4GB is handy).

With Copy on Write file systems you can prep up your testing environment. Snapshot it. Run your tests. Then nuke the resulting file systems and start again. Being able to start a test run with the whole file system in the state it was in when you started (without having to roll back individual files and databases) is very convenient.

- UML-based VPS Hosting

Fedora is also used in the User Mode Linux virtual servers here.

The license does not prohibit redistribution. Debian has just decided the license doesn't suit them is all. That's Debian's issue not Sun's.

For the record here are the re-distribution clauses from the 1.4.2_04JDK:

B. License to Distribute Software. Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, including, but not limited to the Java Technology Restrictions of these Supplemental Terms, Sun grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable, limited license without fees to reproduce and distribute the Software, provided that (i) you distribute the Software complete and unmodified (unless otherwise specified in the applicable README file) and only bundled as part of, and for the sole purpose of running, your Programs, (ii) the Programs add significant and primary functionality to the Software, (iii) you do not distribute additional software intended to replace any component(s) of the Software (unless otherwise specified in the applicable README file), (iv) you do not remove or alter any proprietary legends or notices contained in the Software, (v) you only distribute the Software subject to a license agreement that protects Sun's interests consistent with the terms contained in this Agreement, and (vi) you agree to defend and indemnify Sun and its licensors from and against any damages, costs, liabilities, settlement amounts and/or expenses (including attorneys' fees) incurred in connection with any claim, lawsuit or action by any third party that arises or results from the use or distribution of any and all Programs and/or Software.

C. License to Distribute Redistributables. Subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement, including but not limited to the Java Technology Restrictions of these Supplemental Terms, Sun grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable, limited license without fees to reproduce and distribute those files specifically identified as redistributable in the Software "README" file ("Redistributables") provided that: (i) you distribute the Redistributables complete and unmodified (unless otherwise specified in the applicable README file), and only bundled as part of Programs, (ii) you do not distribute additional software intended to supersede any component(s) of the Redistributables (unless otherwise specified in the applicable README file), (iii) you do not remove or alter any proprietary legends or notices contained in or on the Redistributables, (iv) you only distribute the Redistributables pursuant to a license agreement that protects Sun's interests consistent with the terms contained in the Agreement, (v) you agree to defend and indemnify Sun and its licensors from and against any damages, costs, liabilities, settlement amounts and/or expenses (including attorneys' fees) incurred in connection with any claim, lawsuit or action by any third party that arises or results from the use or distribution of any and all Programs and/or Software.

Linux VPS hosting *with* Sun JVMs

Boy did WETA fuck up on this one.

Boy, did they ever. The graphics in the Lotr and Master and commander sucked. The movies were released late. No one won any awards. And the NZ film industry is in tatters.

No wait. I mean the opposite of all that.

Weta knew up front the boxes were only of any use to them for a couple of years. They _budgeted_ on throwing them away after the Lotr trilogy was done. If they can get anything back on them now, more power to them.

Personally, I think its very cool. I'm even seeing if I can get a couple of machines from them to host some of my Lotr-fan customers on. I for one would be keen to run on an ex-Weta server.

- Linux VPS Hosting

I've been using Rimuhosting's Virtual server for a couple of months.

Works really well, I'm running a Gentoo image with Apache, IMAP/POP with a SpamAssasin and Clam-AV running on my Exim mail server.

98% of my spam auto-sorts itself into my spam folder, and If I want I can configure the server to reject mail which looks like spam (either by the SpamAssassin threshold or because the sender is on one of the DNS blacklists) at the point of delivery so the spam never even hits my server.

The Rimuhosting folks are good too. They even took the time (for free) to build me a custom kernel to run Gentoo, even though they don't officially support it (rebuilding the kernel is about the only thing you can't do yourself on their UML VPS). They were also very helpful when I screwed up my network config and couldn't ssh back into the box ;).

Anyway, server runs well and I have around 4GB of disk space for mail/web stuff.

YMMV but if you're prepared to put in the effort of setting up your own server, you'll have all the flexibility you need. It works great for me and was very satisfying to get everything working.

Please don't start up a hosting company.

Many, many students do this at the start of each summer break. They flood the market with $1/month hosting plans offer GB of disk space and bandwidth trying to recoup the $20/month reseller account they're running.

Then when the break is over and they're back at school suddendly they have no way to support those $1/month customers. (Who incidentally want 24/7 support regardless of what they are paying).

On the other hand, web design for companies or web coding would be a great idea. Sink your teeth into an interesting project for 6 weeks and have something to be proud of.

- Linux VPS Hosting

How about JBoss, or Apache Geronimo? User Mode Linux is also important for Linux, like in Java hosting companies.

2.5Gbps from a single server would be pretty fun to see. Maybe get a screen capture of that 200MB unreal tournament demo downloading. But at 320MB/s it would be "d'oh missed it"

But if its just 2.5Gbps distributed to a bunch of servers, then, sorry, I just don't see that as being too impressive.

Most decent data centers will have that kind of bandwidth. If fact for about $x0,000 any joe shmoh can buy themselves a couple of gige cables and a rack of servers from a good bandwidth provider.

You want to know what will impress your customers? Just ask them: "Hey guys, what is it exactly you were looking for?".

Me, being in the Linux Virtual Private Server hosting business, I want to see the following:

• Who are your Internet peers. You are only as good as your peering
• What are you latencies from various corners of the country
• How well do you handle DoS attacks
• How qualified is your network team
• Give me your uptime figures. Will you back that up with a toothy SLA?
• What routing are you using
• What backup equipment and backup power supplies have you got
• ... I could go on

If your customers are looking at 2.5Gbps of bandwidth for an intranet backup solution then they'll probably be impressed by other things.

For Java, you _may_ be able to sneak by with 64MB for a small webapp on Tomcat. You won't be able to run JBoss. Ideally you'd want 96-128MB of memory for Tomcat and 128++ for JBoss.

FWIW we have a VPS-C plan that overallocates the memory on the host server (so it swaps every now and then). Performance is good, but not as good as our main plans where we don't overallocate memory. All that means is that for the $24.95 VPS-C plan you can muck around with Java servers all you like.

It's been a while since I've worked in an environment with so little RAM -- I don't know how/if things will run.

I see that the base plan for several of these includes 64 MB of RAM, but I see that at least RimuHosting states that Java servlets won't run with 64 MB of RAM, and more is recommended if using a MySQL database, I don't see anything yet on Linode's site about practical requirements. Does anyone have any experiences with what's necessary/practical. It seems that on the base plan, doubling the RAM from 64 MB to 128 MB also doubles the entire monthly cost. I'm just interested in using it as a hobbyist, and it wouldn't be high volume.

Oh, and UML servers make perfect backup/failover boxes it you are running an uber dedicated server somewhere else. e.g. see how easy it can be to do automated rsync backups.

Just use keychain. Enter your passphrase once per boot. Then you don't have to worry about someone stealing your key. You do still have to worry about the box with keychain on it getting rooted, and leading them to the backup box, of course.

Thanks for the reference! We also have a Fedora distro available now.

Now, it may be because I've drunk the UML cool-aid, but UML servers are a great way to host. Whether is for a personal blog or a corporate website.

cf. shared hosting you have control over everything (except the kernel which is usually provided by the hosting company). It is common for people to install and reconfigure all their core services. But I've even had customers install a different distro - e.g. moving themselves from RedHat to Gentoo. Seriously.

cf. dedicated servers you usually get a much better deal. For example at $20 you're getting dedicated server functionality. Cheap dedicated servers start at around $80/month from reputable hosters. Compared to the low-end server you'd get for that, our servers are typically dual xeons with RAID and regular backups.

And UML in general is nice, stable, and - of course - Open Source.

So, back to the lead topic, for a business environment UMLs make a lot of sense. At one end they are a step up from shared hosting. They have better file security (i.e. you're not sharing a file system with 2000 other users and hoping that your hoster has secured their server properly). You can run run your own firewall. You can configure multiple domains. You can control what changes are made to your environment and when they are made. And you get better resource sharing with other users on the host server - i.e. your VPS gets an equal share of the server resources.

And at the other end - the dedicated server end - of the business hosting market VPSs still have a place. There are less hardware hassles to deal with. And usually the server is going to be better speced and perform better than a dedicated server for the same dollars.

Oh, and UML servers make perfect backup/failover boxes it you are running an uber dedicated server somewhere else. e.g. see how easy it can be to do automated rsync backups. And if you ever need to experiment with hosting your site on a 2.6 kernel, then UML is the way to go.

And just so that this post doesn't appear too self-serving :), you can see a list of UML hosting providers over on the Jeff Dike's UML site here: http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net/uses.html

Thanks for the reference! We also have a Fedora distro available now.

Now, it may be because I've drunk the UML cool-aid, but UML servers are a great way to host. Whether is for a personal blog or a corporate website.

cf. shared hosting you have control over everything (except the kernel which is usually provided by the hosting company). It is common for people to install and reconfigure all their core services. But I've even had customers install a different distro - e.g. moving themselves from RedHat to Gentoo. Seriously.

cf. dedicated servers you usually get a much better deal. For example at $20 you're getting dedicated server functionality. Cheap dedicated servers start at around $80/month from reputable hosters. Compared to the low-end server you'd get for that, our servers are typically dual xeons with RAID and regular backups.

And UML in general is nice, stable, and - of course - Open Source.

So, back to the lead topic, for a business environment UMLs make a lot of sense. At one end they are a step up from shared hosting. They have better file security (i.e. you're not sharing a file system with 2000 other users and hoping that your hoster has secured their server properly). You can run run your own firewall. You can configure multiple domains. You can control what changes are made to your environment and when they are made. And you get better resource sharing with other users on the host server - i.e. your VPS gets an equal share of the server resources.

And at the other end - the dedicated server end - of the business hosting market VPSs still have a place. There are less hardware hassles to deal with. And usually the server is going to be better speced and perform better than a dedicated server for the same dollars.

Oh, and UML servers make perfect backup/failover boxes it you are running an uber dedicated server somewhere else. e.g. see how easy it can be to do automated rsync backups. And if you ever need to experiment with hosting your site on a 2.6 kernel, then UML is the way to go.

And just so that this post doesn't appear too self-serving :), you can see a list of UML hosting providers over on the Jeff Dike's UML site here: http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net/uses.html

Thanks for the reference! We also have a Fedora distro available now.

Now, it may be because I've drunk the UML cool-aid, but UML servers are a great way to host. Whether is for a personal blog or a corporate website.

cf. shared hosting you have control over everything (except the kernel which is usually provided by the hosting company). It is common for people to install and reconfigure all their core services. But I've even had customers install a different distro - e.g. moving themselves from RedHat to Gentoo. Seriously.

cf. dedicated servers you usually get a much better deal. For example at $20 you're getting dedicated server functionality. Cheap dedicated servers start at around $80/month from reputable hosters. Compared to the low-end server you'd get for that, our servers are typically dual xeons with RAID and regular backups.

And UML in general is nice, stable, and - of course - Open Source.

So, back to the lead topic, for a business environment UMLs make a lot of sense. At one end they are a step up from shared hosting. They have better file security (i.e. you're not sharing a file system with 2000 other users and hoping that your hoster has secured their server properly). You can run run your own firewall. You can configure multiple domains. You can control what changes are made to your environment and when they are made. And you get better resource sharing with other users on the host server - i.e. your VPS gets an equal share of the server resources.

And at the other end - the dedicated server end - of the business hosting market VPSs still have a place. There are less hardware hassles to deal with. And usually the server is going to be better speced and perform better than a dedicated server for the same dollars.

Oh, and UML servers make perfect backup/failover boxes it you are running an uber dedicated server somewhere else. e.g. see how easy it can be to do automated rsync backups. And if you ever need to experiment with hosting your site on a 2.6 kernel, then UML is the way to go.

And just so that this post doesn't appear too self-serving :), you can see a list of UML hosting providers over on the Jeff Dike's UML site here: http://user-mode-linux.sourceforge.net/uses.html

The price is right ($19.95 for 64MB ram, 4GB disk space, 30GB transfer), and they have some nice features that cheap virtual servers often lack, such as the ability to 'power-cycle' your machine from their web control panel, in case you firewall yourself or similar.

They offer RedHat 9, as well as a minimal Debian install, which makes it easy to install just the packages you need. I've found them to be stable (143 days uptime), and the tech support is friendly and helpful.

Wow, this topic really got me thinking. All that time I spend every day deleting spam, driking coffee, having toilet breaks. It all adds up. It's amazing I every get time do any work.

In fact, I've just figured out that if we can shut down slashdot - maybe feature it on a front page article and get it slashdotted - we could scape together enough coin to fulfill George Bush Juniors plan of putting a person on Mars.

Do the math:

800,000 Readers a day
30 Minutes a day to scan the front page and browse at level 5
$30 Per hour wage, these are _mostly_ employed geeks after all
$24,000,000,000 Annual lost time cost, assuming a 40 hour week, 50 weeks of the year.

The above poster is right. People want to run Java servers on their Linux boxes.

But the fact that Debian currently has some issues with installing those automatically shouldn't hold things back. Certainly, Red Hat aren't going out of their way to support Java.

And as far as Ant goes, it's not that hard to install:

FWIW, I run Linux Virtual Private Servers with a bunch of Java hosting tools like Tomcat preinstalled on my distros.

And, at least for me, Red Hat (including Fedora) is still outselling Debian by 5.3 to 1. Maybe it's because I install apt-rpm on the Red Hat boxes to make them just as easy to manage as the Debian ones :)

The above poster is right. People want to run Java servers on their Linux boxes.

But the fact that Debian currently has some issues with installing those automatically shouldn't hold things back. Certainly, Red Hat aren't going out of their way to support Java.

And as far as Ant goes, it's not that hard to install:

FWIW, I run Linux Virtual Private Servers with a bunch of Java hosting tools like Tomcat preinstalled on my distros.

And, at least for me, Red Hat (including Fedora) is still outselling Debian by 5.3 to 1. Maybe it's because I install apt-rpm on the Red Hat boxes to make them just as easy to manage as the Debian ones :)

As you probably know there are a ton of languages that will compile down to Java bytecode and run on any JVM (e.g. jpython).

So why don't you just grab an OpenSource Java compiler and add a --case-insensitive compile switch?

You could then code merrily in whatever case your caps lock key happened to be set in, and it would run on anybody's JVM.

Or just suck it up and get used to case sensitive programming like the rest of 3 million Java developers

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JaVA hOSTing on a lINUX vps

I once had a job counting pallets of butter. It involved (in the middle of summer) being in a warehouse kept at -5 degrees C. And clambering up 20 meter high towers of stacked cartons.

Or there was the 8 years as a youth spent milking cows. And being covered from tip to toe in cow muck for most of the day.

Maybe these early jobs were what triggered my move into computers? Now I have a comfy chair, a nice view, filter coffee on tap, a decent stereo in the office and a desktop with 1600 times more memory than Bill Gates every thought would be necessary.

- RimuHosting - Linux VPS Hosting

Another problem with DLP is that the mirrors reflect only the light shone on them. They have no color. So DLP has 3 different colored filter wheels spinning at a rate (synchronized with the DLP chip mirrors) to create the illusion of color.

This creates the so-called 'rainbow effect'. Which some people see. And which reportedly can invoke headaches.

LCD projectors (or pricier 3 chip DLP systems) thus have some advantages.

LCoS sounds like the perfect blend of price and quality.

But who can wait? I think I'm still going to get my Sanyo PLV-Z2 projector.

VPS Hosting - Free Wide Screen TV with all accounts prepaid 16 years in advance.

This is good news. Tomcat is the reference Servlet implementation. So if it works on Tomcat it _should_ work on other servlet engines. So people that may have held off deploying or even developing Servlet 2.4/JSP 2.0 application may now start down that trail.

Also, let's not forget there are a couple of other great choices out there: Resin with Servlet 2.4 and JSP 2.0 and the alpha Jetty 5.0 the Servlet 2.4.

Linux VPS Based Java Hosting - Now with Tomcat 5 if you want it

Microsoft Drags Feet with Settlement Claims

Now in news just to hand:

Sun rises in the east.

Sheesh

Non-Microsoft-based VPS Hosting

Well the Rugby World Cup escaped us. And that was a big blow to the country's psyche.

But every Kiwi I know derives huge pride in the work Peter Jackson has done. For creating a great triology of movies, for putting our scenery on the big screen, and generally raising the profile of this land of the long white cloud. And he seems to have somehow avoided coming down with tall poppy syndrone.

Jackson: I should've--well, it's too late to fire anyone. The damage has been done.

I'm still laughing...

Cheers, mate.

RimuHosting: Proudly NZ Owned and Operated Linux VPS Hosting

I'm not sure of the Raq attraction anymore. I've never owned one. But from what I read they are cheap, but underpowered.

Nowadays you can get cheap _and_ powerful dedicated servers. Linux to boot.

Control panel wise, if you want to go the Open Source route, slap something like Webmin on them with VirtualMin if you are planning on reselling the space and will have third party users needing a control panel.

Otherwise the most popular web hosting control panels are the likes of Ensim, Plesk and cPanel/WHM

If you're just after affordable dedicated server type functionality (e.g. for compiling software, running custom versions of Apache or MySQL or what have you), then you may be pleasantly surprised with what is available with Linux VPS Hosting (my own service). With the VPS you have no hardware worries. And typically the host servers are very powerful and you'll get better performance than a dedicated server a few times the price.

I pre-install Webmin on our Linux Virtual Private Servers. I think its a great tool.

It is a great help for setting up programs that require a fair bit of configuration. After you're done, you can look at the config changes that Webmin made. Next time around you are a bit more empowered to make the changes via the command-line.

Unlike some control panel software, it doesn't 'take over' your server. It doesn't overwrite RPMS with its own custom versions. It doesn't make config files 'Webmin only'

The help from within Webmin itself is not so great. Often you have to have a very good understanding of the service you're configuring before Webmin will make much sense. There is little contextual help in the program.

I've found The Book of Webmin to be quite useful. Plus I've created a few of my own HOWTOs for common tasks:

• Setting Up DNS: BIND via Webmin
• Setting Up Email: From Sendmail to Outlook
• Host Multiple Domains: Setting Up Virtual Hosts With Webmin
• Securing Your Server: Setting up a Linux Firewall Using IPTables and Webmin

I pre-install Webmin on our Linux Virtual Private Servers. I think its a great tool.

It is a great help for setting up programs that require a fair bit of configuration. After you're done, you can look at the config changes that Webmin made. Next time around you are a bit more empowered to make the changes via the command-line.

Unlike some control panel software, it doesn't 'take over' your server. It doesn't overwrite RPMS with its own custom versions. It doesn't make config files 'Webmin only'

The help from within Webmin itself is not so great. Often you have to have a very good understanding of the service you're configuring before Webmin will make much sense. There is little contextual help in the program.

I've found The Book of Webmin to be quite useful. Plus I've created a few of my own HOWTOs for common tasks:

• Setting Up DNS: BIND via Webmin
• Setting Up Email: From Sendmail to Outlook
• Host Multiple Domains: Setting Up Virtual Hosts With Webmin
• Securing Your Server: Setting up a Linux Firewall Using IPTables and Webmin

I pre-install Webmin on our Linux Virtual Private Servers. I think its a great tool.

It is a great help for setting up programs that require a fair bit of configuration. After you're done, you can look at the config changes that Webmin made. Next time around you are a bit more empowered to make the changes via the command-line.

Unlike some control panel software, it doesn't 'take over' your server. It doesn't overwrite RPMS with its own custom versions. It doesn't make config files 'Webmin only'

The help from within Webmin itself is not so great. Often you have to have a very good understanding of the service you're configuring before Webmin will make much sense. There is little contextual help in the program.

I've found The Book of Webmin to be quite useful. Plus I've created a few of my own HOWTOs for common tasks:

• Setting Up DNS: BIND via Webmin
• Setting Up Email: From Sendmail to Outlook
• Host Multiple Domains: Setting Up Virtual Hosts With Webmin
• Securing Your Server: Setting up a Linux Firewall Using IPTables and Webmin

I pre-install Webmin on our Linux Virtual Private Servers. I think its a great tool.

It is a great help for setting up programs that require a fair bit of configuration. After you're done, you can look at the config changes that Webmin made. Next time around you are a bit more empowered to make the changes via the command-line.

Unlike some control panel software, it doesn't 'take over' your server. It doesn't overwrite RPMS with its own custom versions. It doesn't make config files 'Webmin only'

The help from within Webmin itself is not so great. Often you have to have a very good understanding of the service you're configuring before Webmin will make much sense. There is little contextual help in the program.

I've found The Book of Webmin to be quite useful. Plus I've created a few of my own HOWTOs for common tasks:

• Setting Up DNS: BIND via Webmin
• Setting Up Email: From Sendmail to Outlook
• Host Multiple Domains: Setting Up Virtual Hosts With Webmin
• Securing Your Server: Setting up a Linux Firewall Using IPTables and Webmin

I pre-install Webmin on our Linux Virtual Private Servers. I think its a great tool.

It is a great help for setting up programs that require a fair bit of configuration. After you're done, you can look at the config changes that Webmin made. Next time around you are a bit more empowered to make the changes via the command-line.

Unlike some control panel software, it doesn't 'take over' your server. It doesn't overwrite RPMS with its own custom versions. It doesn't make config files 'Webmin only'

The help from within Webmin itself is not so great. Often you have to have a very good understanding of the service you're configuring before Webmin will make much sense. There is little contextual help in the program.

I've found The Book of Webmin to be quite useful. Plus I've created a few of my own HOWTOs for common tasks:

• Setting Up DNS: BIND via Webmin
• Setting Up Email: From Sendmail to Outlook
• Host Multiple Domains: Setting Up Virtual Hosts With Webmin
• Securing Your Server: Setting up a Linux Firewall Using IPTables and Webmin

I run a Linux Virtual Private Server Hosting company.

I've been considering providing a domain name service. But I think its in people best interests to decouple their domain name from their hosting provider. Why?

You can probably get the domain cheaper from a domain name specialist. GoDaddy and the like.

Places like ZoneEdit offer an unbeatable, easy to use, reliable and free DNS service. Or you can just to it yourself on your VPS. You have root right?

If you need to move hosts then there is no third party (ex host) to get in the way. Even if they are a fair host, you still have issues over controlling the timing of any changes. With your own domain/DNS, you can time your switchover to the within a few minutes.

Finally, if you didn't get the domain name yourself to begin with, and if you are relying on your old webhost for the transfer, then just be persistent with them. If they treat you unfairly, tell the world or find if they are listed on a review site and provide (an accurate and fair, of course) review of what they did.

I run a Linux Virtual Private Server Hosting company.

I've been considering providing a domain name service. But I think its in people best interests to decouple their domain name from their hosting provider. Why?

You can probably get the domain cheaper from a domain name specialist. GoDaddy and the like.

Places like ZoneEdit offer an unbeatable, easy to use, reliable and free DNS service. Or you can just to it yourself on your VPS. You have root right?

If you need to move hosts then there is no third party (ex host) to get in the way. Even if they are a fair host, you still have issues over controlling the timing of any changes. With your own domain/DNS, you can time your switchover to the within a few minutes.

Finally, if you didn't get the domain name yourself to begin with, and if you are relying on your old webhost for the transfer, then just be persistent with them. If they treat you unfairly, tell the world or find if they are listed on a review site and provide (an accurate and fair, of course) review of what they did.

FWIW, if you're building TinyFugue on RH8/9, you'll get a compile error inside the openssl code. Just bung #define OPENSSL_NO_KRB5 1 into src/config.h

-P
MUD Server Hosting Anyone?

My first experience of the 'Internet' was a MUD on a 300 baud modem. It often took an hour or so of trying before I could connect to the local ISP (city council actually). And they eventually banned users in the MUDs since they were too bandwidth intensive. Can you imagine?!? 300 baud!

Anyway I happen to have a Linux Virtual Private Server kicking around with more bandwidth than I know how to use (and root access of course). And am thinking about what better use for it than hosting a MUD server.

Can anyone recommend a good MUD server? And is there such a thing as a pre-populated ready to go world?

I run a Virtual Private Server hosting company. I'd say my most of my time was spent dealing with people.

That includes answering simple questions for potential customers. And every now and then answering 'hard' support questions which might have me googling around trying to find answers.

I spend a bit of time setting up new servers. That used to take hours per server. Now I've got a personal best of 30 minutes (and that included a fully featured kernel recompile).

Since my server setups are pretty standard and the management of them is pretty much scripted, the day to day management of a lot of servers isn't that much of a handful.

Other than the support and hardware side of things, its a bit of everything: Billing; updating the default software installs; working on the website; adding HOWTOs; finding cheaper/faster/better host servers and network connections; reading the wht forums; new customer setups; answering 4AM in the morning pages; ...

I run a Virtual Private Server hosting company. I'd say my most of my time was spent dealing with people.

That includes answering simple questions for potential customers. And every now and then answering 'hard' support questions which might have me googling around trying to find answers.

I spend a bit of time setting up new servers. That used to take hours per server. Now I've got a personal best of 30 minutes (and that included a fully featured kernel recompile).

Since my server setups are pretty standard and the management of them is pretty much scripted, the day to day management of a lot of servers isn't that much of a handful.

Other than the support and hardware side of things, its a bit of everything: Billing; updating the default software installs; working on the website; adding HOWTOs; finding cheaper/faster/better host servers and network connections; reading the wht forums; new customer setups; answering 4AM in the morning pages; ...

This sounds like a great tool. The copied code I'm concerned about, is the code myself and other developers on the same project have copied from one file to another file.

If I can use this tool to find that code and refactor it into subroutines/classes then that would be superb.

And if someone could write a plugin for Eclipse to help automate/assist with the refactoring...

-P
RimuHosting - Linux VPS Hosting

Yep. Really good points. Not to disagree with you, but...

FWIW, virtual servers have the same succeptibility to hardware failure as real servers. Any individual user run the same risk regardless. In a VPS setup its, say, 12 users affected times the risk of one server going down. Or on a user per server setup it is, say, 1 user affected times the risk of 1 of 12 servers going down (which is 12 times higher than the risk of one server going down).

At least with virtualisation it's easier, at least on UML, to move backed up UMLs to a new server and restart them (a 15 minute operation) vs. setting up a new server (takes at least a long lunch hour).

Also, more efficient (i.e. better utilisation of hardware) allows you to use more of it. So rather than going out and setting up 12 servers you can set up 1 server and a couple of mirrors and set up some failover and load balancing services. The kind of thing you can do with real servers, but for less money.

Of course with very high cost server's you've got to be tempted to rely on their reliability and not have spare servers just sitting around. It's a bit easier to swallow having spare machines when you're talking about 'regular' servers.

-P
RimuHosting - VPS Linux Hosting