Jeremy’s blog

Winter Preparation – Check your backups

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:34:49 -0700

If spring is a time for cleaning fall is a good time to check your backup strategy and ensure that your existing backups are working. In the winter there are more chances for power outages, flooding and other types of natural disasters.

Locally in Seattle there are worries that damage to the Howard Hanson Dam caused last January may cause flooding of the Green River Valley. The valley, home to thousands of businesses and residents, has been readying for the possibility that this thin, lazy stream might swell into that area’s worst flood in nearly half a century.

If you are currently performing backups of your important files take some time to check the following:

You are backing up the correct files.
Your backups are running with no errors according to an automated schedule.
Perform a test restore to make sure that the backups are indeed working.

If you aren’t currently performing backups it’s time to start. The threat of the worst flood in nearly half a century should get you motivated. If it doesn’t then consider the most common cause of data loss are human error and hardware failures. Remember the last time you forgot to save a file or accidentally deleted one. How about when you or someone you know had a hardware problem and lost years of documents, and pictures. This was possibly caused by or happened shortly after a power outage.

The first step of a successful backup plan is determining what needs to be backed up. The most common place to start is your documents folder, and where you store your pictures, and music. Also spend some time thinking about files that may be on other computers or are stored on the internet. One common example would be email.

Once you have identified what files need to be backed up it’s very important to remember. You should never have only one copy of any important files. The second important part of a successful backup plan is there should be an automated process that creates a second copy of these files. Manually creating a second copy periodically is better than nothing. However there are many solutions that will create daily backups of your files while your computer is idle.

One solution I’ve been using for over a year and highly recommend is Crashplan. I reviewed it about a year ago and it’s still my favorite solution. They continue to make improvements every quarter and now it’s free. Another solution I use for smaller files is Dropbox. It isn’t a backup program but does create another copy of your files.

Over the next week I plan on talking about a few different solutions primarily for home users and small businesses.

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CrashPlan Review – A flexible multi-platform backup solution

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 01:26:07 -0800

crashplan.gif

CrashPlan is a multi-platform backup solution written by Code 42 software. The software has been available for approximately a year but I just discovered it recently. It seems like I’m always searching for a backup solution that will meet my requirements. In the past I’ve always had to compromise or use multiple different solutions. My basic requirements are:

Software that is easy to use and reliable
Software that is compatible with Windows and Macintosh computers
Offsite backups are preferred, however local backups to a central server is acceptable. Since I have multiple home computers, including laptops, I’d prefer not to rely on external hard drives.

As a home user I have two different types of files I’d like to backup. Smaller text based documents and much larger multimedia files. In the past I’ve used several remote backup solutions, for example Mozy, to backup the smaller files. I used a synchronization product, foldershare, to automatically create multiple copies of the larger multimedia files to other computers I owned.

CrashPlan offers several unique features that allow it to meet all my requirements. It’s one of the few backup solutions that support Windows, Mac, and Linux. It also supports backing up to other computers you own, your friends’ computers, or to CrashPlan’s servers.

Off-site backups help protect from local disasters. Some examples of local disasters would be flooding, fire, a power surge, or more severe like an earth quake. For home users off-site backups can be expensive and are very slow.

Remote backup services are becoming more inexpensive and are now available for under $10 a month. However even with broadband the time it takes to backup, and perform restores, is still a major issue. Backing up 20 gigs of data to a remote backup solution could take weeks and restoring this data could take several days.

CrashPlan has a solution to both of these issues by allowing you to backup to other computers you own or friends’ computers. It allows you to perform the initial backup locally to another computer in hours instead of weeks. Then you can create another copy of your data to a second remote location. You could also take your computer, or the backup on an external device, to the remote location for the initial backup or to do a large restore if necessary. Since you are backing up to another computer you own or a friends’ computer the most likely it there will be no additional cost for storage.

Backups are compressed and encrypted before they are sent to the remote computer and are stored in an encrypted format. So if you are backing up to a friends’ computer or CrashPlan’s servers they won’t be able to read your data. Previously when I was using a synchronization program for large files I could only use computers I owned. This is because the data was readable on the remote computer.

CrashPlan offers two versions of their software, a free basic version and a Crashplan+. The major difference is the basic version only performs daily backups and saves the most recent copy. The pro version performs backups more frequently, every 15 minutes by default, and stores multiple versions of the files. The basic version is free and CrashPlan+ is $60. You only have to license the computers you are backing up. It’s free to run the client that is only used as a backup destination. You can also backup to CrashPlan’s servers for approximately $5 per month.

My new backup solution is to backup my home machines to a local file server. I have access to remote server which holds a second copy of the data. This ensures I have a local source to perform quick backups and restores. Plus just in case I have a second remote off-site backup.

Updated 10/2009:

I’ve been using CrashPlan on windows and mac computers for well over a year now. The program has been easy to use and has worked with no problems. They have been providing updates improving the product and adding new features quarterly. If you need a backup solution I’d recommend testing CrashPlan. It’s easy to use, reliable, and flexible enough to meet most users, and their friends, needs. They also have a similar solution available for business users.

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Movable Type 4 - CAPTCHA Provider

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 21:55:21 -0700

After installing Movable Type on the comment settings page I get the error:

No CAPTCHA provider available No CAPTCHA provider is available in this system. Please check to see if Image::Magick is installed, and CaptchaSourceImageBase directive points to captcha-source directory under mt-static/images.

On the system information page verify it shows your server has Image::Magick installed. If it is installed then you need to modify your mt-config.cgi file. The value of this configuration directive should be set to the absolute path on the filesystem to the images/catcha-source directory in mt-static.

Example

CaptchaSourceImageBase /path/to/mt/mt-static/images/captcha-source

Movable Type Docs

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Mount Rainier from Seattle

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 20:10:55 -0700

Mount Rainier from Seattle

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Zimbra Backend Review

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 19:59:33 -0700

There have been several reviews of the Zimbra Collaboration Suite. However the focus most of these reviews has been on the browser-based Ajax interface. I agree the Zimbra has one of the best, if not the best, browser-based email client. However what makes Zimbra such a great solution is the product as a whole. The focus in this review is the server side of Zimbra.

Zimbra is available for several distributions of Linux® and Mac OS® X. Its architecture includes open-source integrations using industry standard protocols. The third-party software listed below is bundled with Zimbra software and installed as part of the installation process. These components have been tested and configured to work with the software.

Apache Tomcat, the web application server that Zimbra software runs in.
Postfix, an open source message transfer agent (MTA) that routes mail messages to the appropriate Zimbra server.
OpenLDAP software, an open source implementation of the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) that provides user authentication.
MySQL database software.
Lucene, an open-source full featured text index and search engine.
Verity, a third-party source that converts certain attachment file types to HTML.
Anti-virus and anti-spam open source components including:
ClamAV, an anti-virus scanner that protects against malicious files.
SpamAssassin and DSPAM, mail filters that attempt to identify spam.
Amavisd-new, this interfaces between the MTA and one or more content checkers.
James/Sieve filtering, used to create filters for email.

Using open source software allows Zimbra to concentrate on improving existing software instead of rewriting software that has already been written. It also allows administrators to use their existing knowledge to configure and troubleshoot Zimbra.

The Zimbra Collaboration Suite is designed to be installed on a dedicated server with no other applications. The installer includes all the necessary components and will install tested versions of the software listed above.

The installer on Linux is command line based and can be run by administrators with little or no command line experience. The default options presented in the installer will meet most administrators’ needs. In less then 15 minutes a single installer will install and configure all the software it needs to run. An administrator will be required to setup DNS correctly for their domain.

The ZCS server key features:

High availability through clustering, native backup tools, and application level journaling / clustering
Native hierarchical storage management allows for cost effective multiple GB mail boxes
Live online move, backup and recovery of individual or a group of mailboxes without a service disruption
Integrated company-wide anti-spam and anti-virus out of the box
Easy integration with Microsoft Active Directory and other LDAP directories for authentication and Global Address Lists
Ease of integration via complete set of SOAP / REST web service APIs and support for Standards (POP, IMAP, iCal, iSync)
Multi-domain support
Domain-level administration
Domain-level branding

Once ZCS is installed almost all administration takes place in the browser-based Zimbra Admin UI. The Zimbra Admin UI is just as easy to use as the Ajax web client and equally powerful. Administrators can quickly:

Create and edit new accounts
Manage accounts settings and permissions
Create and edit distribution lists
Manage email queues
View and manage systems status

Full Admin Scripting Tools are also available for large scale / batch operations.

Over the last six months since installing Zimbra I have enjoyed having a mail server with an excellent web-based client. This is important since I use several different computers at multiple locations. I can also use the web-based client from any computer with internet access. Zimbra has also allowed me to have access to all my contacts and calendars from the web-based client. My previous IMAP solution did not support contacts and calendars from within the same system.

The Zimbra Collaboration Suite currently has an open source edition plus standard and professional network editions. The open source edition is a free download and the network editions start at $25 per user. A comparison of the different editions can be seen on the Zimbra site. If you don’t want to maintain your own email server then there are several hosting providers that will manage the server for you. This will also be a cost effective solution if you have less then 20 users. There is a list of hosting providers on the Zimbra site.

For personal use and small businesses Zimbra Collaboration Suite will allow users to enjoy the most common features in Microsoft Exchange without the cost or administrative overhead of Exchange. If you are a business with less then 100 users then I would strongly look into using ZCS as your solution. Zimbra can and is also being used in enterprise environments.

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Greylisting to prevent Spam

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 19:56:38 -0700

Greylisting is a method of blocking significant amounts of spam at the mail server level. It blocks spam based on the behavior of the sending server, rather than the content of the messages.

What happens is that each time a given mailbox receives an email from an unknown contact (ip), that mail is rejected with a “try again later” message. This, in the short run, means that all mail gets delayed at least until the sender tries again - but this is where spam loses out! Most spam is not sent out using RFC compliant MTAs; the spamming software will not try again later. This process is transparent to the user sending and receiving the message.

This is a very lightweight process. Especially compared to other common spam prevention techniques which read the content of the message or check blacklists. The only disadvantage is this technique will delay email being delivered from unknown contacts.

Most implementations of greylisting only delay a message for a few minutes. They also keep a database with previous email so this delay is only seen the first time a message is received.

In my experience greylisting prevented almost all spam from being delivered to my mailbox.

A list of software that can be used to implement greylisting can be found at:
greylisting.org

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Online backup solutions: a review

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Mon, 13 Aug 2007 07:41:35 -0700

The increased availability of fast broadband have made online backup services a viable option for many PC users. Ars looks at four online backup services to determine if they’re compelling enough to ditch your local backup solutions.

Faster, safer Internet with OpenDNS

nobody@vox.com(Jeremy) — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 16:19:45 -0700

Launched in July 2006, OpenDNS adds a few free services on top of the traditional DNS to block phishing Web sites and auto-correct common misspelled URLs. And thanks to some clever traffic routing and load-balancing technology, OpenDNS can also deliver Web pages faster.

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