If you are new to Linux servers, you may be a little confused about the terminology used for new software. Sometimes you will hear the word “update”, and other times you will hear the word “upgrade”. The two should not be used interchangeably, as they can have very different and sometimes serious consequences.
First, it is [...]
Social media has permeated throughout the personal, entertainment, and business lives of millions of people, and although it may not directly impact your dedicated server, you can leverage its power for promotion, communication, and even technical management.
Promotion
Whether you are running a web hosting company or using your dedicated server for a single large site, promoting [...]
There are very few reasons why you would ever need to kill another user’s session, aside from just being mean or playing a prank. If a user logs in but, for some reason, does not log off, it is a good idea to kill the session associated with it so that the account is [...]
If you need email for your dedicated server, there are essentially four ways of storing and accessing it. They are not all equal and are very different in the way they handle mail and deliver messages to you.
POP3
With this method, your email client on your computer contacts the mail server, authenticates, and downloads any [...]
Last week we looked a YUM’s update settings and found a way to make it send email notifications when updates are available. You can accomplish the same setup with APT for Debian-based Linux distributions. The benefit of doing this is to have apt-get do nothing but notify you when updates are available, rather [...]
Under normally functioning circumstances, you may never need to manually grant privileges in MySQL. When creating databases in cPanel, phpMyAdmin, or any other web-based interface, you can easily accomplish the same task without accessing the command line. In rare instances, however, those frontends may not work or may not be easily accessible to [...]
When you and your clients need to communicate, there are traditional channels, such as email or even the telephone, but live text, voice, and video conferencing has been restricted to proprietary protocols, software, and services. If you are running a variant of Linux or BSD on your dedicated server, you probably rely heavily on [...]
While some people may want to manually execute every single package update for their dedicated servers, you may be the type of person who expects your server to run well without any tweaking or manual configuration. CentOS and Red Hat Enterprise Linux give you that luxury. If you want, you can let the [...]
On a dedicated server running CentOS, there are two common options for running system updates: manual or automatic. There are, however, less common options, such as scheduling your own auto updates with a cron job or having your system alert you whenever new updates are available.
There are a couple of reasons why you might [...]
One way you can increase your brand’s awareness while also providing failure-proof navigation for your customers is to make custom error documents. Users on your dedicated server may decide to use their own error documents for individual websites, but most will leave the default error documents the system administrator selects. If the sysadmin [...]
If you were born in the late 80s or 90s, you may not even know what a text-only web browser is. It does not mean that you open Firefox and disable images. A true text-only web browser is opened in a Unix or Linux terminal window or console and uses nothing but good [...]
CentOS is one of the most popular Linux distribution for dedicated servers. This is largely because it provides the functionality and stability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux without the licensing and support fees.
OpenVZ is a free and open source virtualization solution that you can use to create virtual private servers (VPS). In OpenVZ’s [...]
When running a dedicated server, you don’t necessarily need to know how to program, but you do need to know what programming languages are available and how to install them. What follows are a list of some of the most important scripting language that you may want to have installed, available, and in a [...]
Traditionally, when an individual or company had their own server, it only made sense to also have their own email system. While web-based services existed, they usually required you to have an email address with yourname@servicename.com rather than yourname@yourdomain.com.
Nowadays, many cloud email service providers offer domain-name capabilities, so that your emails appear to be [...]
Whether you have decided to start your own web hosting company, web design service, cloud-based application service, or any other web offerings, there are certain things you should definitely do to make sure your customers get the most for their money. There are also several pitfalls you should avoid at all costs.
DO tell your [...]
One area on a Linux dedicated server that is particularly vulnerable to attacks is the /tmp directory. It is designed to hold temporary files used by applications, but attackers may use an unprotected /tmp directory to launch scripts or bots. What follows are a few measures you can take to ensure your /tmp [...]
A phpinfo page is a simple PHP script that usually only has one line of code:
<? php phpinfo(); ?>
You can create a phpinfo.php file and place it anywhere on any website on your server to view the current PHP configuration. That single line of code will return a plethora of detailed information about your [...]
A cache is a temporary storage of frequently downloaded or requested data. In most cases, information that is cached is kept in fast media (such as RAM) in order to provide quicker access to it. In other cases, it may simply be stored in a medium closer to the user (such as the [...]
If you have a small website that only your friends visit, you probably have never considered using a Content Delivery Network to host your images or other files. When your site suddenly exploded with popularity, you might have wished you chose to use a CDN sooner. The question is: When is the right [...]
Having an ironclad firewall for your dedicated server is only part of the equation when it comes to security. Certain ports on your server must remain open in order for it to function, and any open port is a potential target for would-be attackers. Port 80, the standard HTTP port used by Apache, [...]
Manchester, UK – Following the age old tradition of January Sales in the United Kingdom, domain name registrar and website hosting company 34SP.com is offering domain names at just 50 percent of the regular retail price for a limited time. As is customary on the High Street during [...]
