My original post on installing a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) server with WordPress seems to have helped at least a few people.

I have since come up with a few more random, but I think helpful, tidbits since writing that post. I will list them here.

Basic Commands

‘ls -alR’ for a recursive look at all owners and groups, etc.

Transferring your Blog to WordPress.org

If you are importing your blog from somewhere else and the upload doesn’t seem to be working (e.g., when you click the “Import” button you see no screen changes and/or you the browser is just “spinning”):

• create uploads directory in wp-content
• you may have to set wp-content to chmod 777 permissions for import
  - first try 755 on uploads. If it doesn’t work, then
  - then try 777 on uploads. If it doesn’t work, then
  - then try 777 on wp-content
• revert everything back to 755, or what you had it before

If you are moving from wordpress.com to wordpress.org and you need your blogroll, you need to export this separately (it is not included as part of the normal export from wordpress.com). You go to http://your-wordpressDOTcom-domain.com/wp-links-opml.php and save the XML you see and then import via the blogroll/import capability (or you can just enter the link to the opml I mentioned before right in the blogroll import). Note the export only seems to work in Firefox and IE. Safari gave me a blank page.

SSL

If you want SSL for Apache – sudo a2enmod SSL (see article)

If you want SSL for your WordPress administration areas, enable SSL for wp-admin (See documentation)

For SSL resolution — if you are only using SSL on one site and you have other sites, see this forum post.

Final Setup Steps for WordPress

Make sure www-data has write access to the following — Do a ‘chmod -R g+w’ on wp-content/themes,wp-content/uploads

For final permissions:

• find public -type d | xargs chmod 0755
• find public -type f | xargs chmod 0644 (files)
• find public -type d | xargs chown username:www-data
• find public -type f | xargs chown username:www-data

Ding! Obviously spam or a scam, without even opening the message. How do I know? Well, first the sender’s name has no capitalization. What kind of professional uses a name without capitalizing the first letter of their first and last name? Secondly, the subject screams out programmatic email with the brackets being used as a key to insert website names.

So, what other giveaways are there? I decided to open the message:

So here is what I see

1. Message was dated 6:46 PM and I got it 2 hours later. Not sure that means much.
2. Email address has about 10 digits after the name ellie. So, there is obviously a program generating email addresses. I mean, come on, at least have lisarey123456789@gmail.com
3. The greeting addresses me as “Website Owner”. Another indication of automation and spamming is not addressing you by your real name.
4. An address, but no company name or link to company website. They even say “Our company is on the first page when you search on Google for our primary search term ‘SEO Company’”. REALLY? But you won’t tell me what the name of your company is, huh? (btw, here is the search result for “SEO Company” on Google.
5. They say “Simply reply with opt out if not interested to hear from us”. Not very good English, if you ask me.
6. I also did a search on Google and found other people seeing these types of emails.

So I wonder what would happen if I replied?? Not sure I am going to try to find out

I think I have worked out most of the kinks.

But there is one thing that I am still trying to ensure is working probably. So, if you read this, could you please leave a comment (any comment will do – although I would prefer something “clean” ). And if you leave a comment and you see it has not posted, please email me by clicking on the link above my picture at this blog.

I make no money with this blog; so I am not trying to increase any click through traffic or anything. This is purely a technical review.

Much appreciated.

Financial Software

I have grown a bit tired of Microsoft Money on my Windows machine. Plus they have stopped making the program, at least for 2009. I am looking for Mac financial software that:

1. Allows for online download of transactions from institutions
2. Keeps track of both bank and investments accounts
3. A great nice to have would be the generation of invoices for business

I might just have to wait for Quicken Financial Life to come out.

Blogging Software

Windows Live Writer (on which I am writing this post) is the best blog writing software available. Bar none. Find me one on the Mac that at least can be in the same discussion, please.

Anti-Virus

I am just interested in seeing if there is a good anti-virus program for the Mac. I probably wouldn’t use it permanently, but I would like to see if such a program would be able to find anything on my Mac.

… and I am still looking for a good online backup service too.

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So, for $71.99, I get an automatic discount on domain names and some cash parking and auction stuff that I have yet to use and am not sure if I will.

So let’s just say, for simplicity, that I am paying $71.99 for 31% off of .COM domain names. I am sorry, but I just don’t buy that many domain names — and I can always use coupon codes when I do buy a domain name.

Don’t get me wrong, Go Daddy is a fine domain name registrar that I exclusively use, but I think something like Amazon Prime for free 2-day shipping is a better deal.

I love this new theme. Good work, deniart. I think I will stick with it for a while (assuming it remains stable of course). Let me know what you think of it.

Anyway, I have learned a lot during this process. And, I am going to create an updated post to the one that proved to be relatively popular that talked about installing LAMP and WordPress on Slicehost. There are a few things to add to that step-by-step guide, and believe me, I know that first hand.

I have finally re-established my relationship with Slicehost (oh, you didn’t know I left. Well, it had nothing do with them; it was a personal decision on my part to leave temporarily). And now that I feel that this time I will be sticking with Slicehost more permanently, it is time to do some housekeeping.

One item on the agenda is to move this blog from wordpress.com to Slicehost.

There may be some intermittent downtime, but hopefully I can get this all up and running by the end of this week.

As I understand it — joelmarcey.com will remain, but be stale (with this as the last post). That is, of course, unless I delete the old blog.

joelmarcey.com will be transferred to the new host where you will see all of my previous posts, including this one, and all new posts.

We’ll see how it goes!

See you on the flip-side.

It has been a long time since my last post. What to say about why that is – well, mainly I was taking care of some personal work and also finishing up a consulting gig.

It has been a successful first “out of a corporation” year for me. I have made some money and made some great contacts.

So where do I stand right now?

I am in a state of flux. I am between consulting/contracting opportunities and I have not made much headway on any micro-ISV product (mainly because of the consulting work, but also for some other reasons).

I have some decisions to make.

Here are my current options:

• Flesh out 1 or more of 5 possible product ideas, if for anything to get me back in the programming “spirit”
• Do some side, primarily non-programming work that has been offered to me, more for the experience and satisfaction than any monetary reason.
• Work on some technical articles or books that I have been floating around. as possibilities I have some possible leads for publications, but some other things have to fall into place, which I am working on.
• Look for some more consulting work – I may have a possibility in January, but I am not sure I can 100% count on that.
• Go back to school to earn my Masters in Computer Science or MBA or, at the very least, take some courses to get the brain juices flowing
• Look for a full-time job

Now, the options above are not necessarily exclusive, but I do need to prioritize and make a decision. And make a decision is exactly what I am going to do now…..

……well, after I watch my Buffalo Bills hopefully beat the Browns tonight!

Go Bills!

UPDATE: The Bills lose on another “wide right” field goal. Bills fans know those are the two most dreaded words a Bills fan can hear

[Disclaimer: I am not responsible for any mishaps that may occur by following these steps or advice because you follow them out of your own free will.] — I figure I better put that up-front.

Someone wrote me an email today asking me how to get a LAMP server up and running on a Slicehost VPS (…in Slicehost land, your VPS is called a “slice”).

During the time when I was setting up my slice, I made a little personal document on how to set up a LAMP server with WordPress (I used Ubuntu Hardy as my base Linux installation).

While this is by no means anything official or 100% complete, I figure when I need to set up a LAMP server again, it will serve as a great starting point for me.

Like I insinuated in my disclaimer, I cannot guarantee the accuracy  or the 100% “foolproof”-ness of these steps. I am by no means an expert at this stuff, but, hey, they worked for me.

Below are the contents of that document in its raw form. Feel free to ask any questions, although I cannot guarantee I will know the answer. Feel free to correct any mistakes in comments, although I cannot guarantee I will fix them.

Ubuntu Linux (Server): Setup @ Slicehost

Basic Commands and Instructions

• sudo aptitude install <package1> [package2]
• sudo aptitude purge|remove <package>
• whereis <program> (to find out where something is located)
• root shell: sudo –s (get out of the root shell by ctrl+d)
• ps aux (to find out processes running) (ps aux | grep <process name> to narrow — e.g., ps aux | grep httpd)
• apache2ctl configtest (to make sure your Apache configurations are ok)
• Apache logs are at /var/log/apache2 (Must be in a sudo shell — see above)
• sites-enabled is a symlink; make vhost changes to sites in /etc/apache2/sites-available
• Don’t worry about .htaccess and httpd.conf files. Use vhost config files instead.

Server

1. Get bare bones install
2. Log on as root via ssh ( ssh root @ <ip address> )
3. Use provided password and immediately change it via passwd.
4. Change time zone
   • sudo ln –sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/US/Pacific /etc/localtime (replace US/Pacific with what your timezone is)
5. Follow these instructions for security http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/25/ubuntu-hardy-setup-page-1
6. Backup the private (and public if you want, but especially private) key from your local machine! (preferably in a couple different places)
7. Continue with these security instructions http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/25/ubuntu-hardy-setup-page-2 (add \u@\ before \h\ to add user name in front of hostname in PS1)
8. A good package to install would be unzip for downloads (only tar is available at this point): sudo aptitude install unzip (http://codeghar.wordpress.com/2007/12/08/zip-files-in-ubuntu-cli/ )

Setup Domain via DNS Manager

1. Log into the slice manager: https://manage.slicehost.com/
2. To configure the DNS records for your domain, go here: http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/10/24/creating-dns-records
   • Make sure you have set the nameservers properly on your registrar (e.g. ns1.slicehost.net)

Setup Domain Email via DNS Manager

1. I use Google Apps for email. The next steps are specific to that. If you don’t use Google Apps, just make sure you set the MX records properly in the Slicehost DNS manager, otherwise you may be without email if you have completed the “Setup Domain via DNS Manager” step.
2. If you haven’t done so already, set up Google Apps for your domain (www.google.com/a)
   • For verification, you can use the HTML method since you can control your website
3. Set up the MX records like described here: http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/10/25/creating-mx-records-for-google-apps

Apache/PHP

1. Start here: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/25/ubuntu-hardy-installing-apache-and-php5 (making sure you use your own server name and user names)
2. Read http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/28/ubuntu-hardy-apache-config-layout to understand enabling/disabling sites and modules
3. Follow these instructions: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/28/ubuntu-hardy-apache-configuration-1, and at least change the Timeout and KeepAliveTimeout to something much lower.
4. Follow these instructions: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/28/ubuntu-hardy-apache-configuration-2
5. Read these articles about virtual hosts before setting things up: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/5/28/how-to-serve-multiple-domains, http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/9/17/introduction-to-virtual-hosts
6. Read this article to understand how you are going to layout your directory structure for the domains you are going to host: http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/9/13/multiple-hosts-layout
7. Secure virtual host permissions and create skeleton virtual host directory: http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/9/18/apache-virtual-hosts-permissions
   • For all new domains, just follow the following command:
     • cp –a /home/<user>/public_html/skeleton /home/<user>/public_html/<new domain>
8. Create your first virtual host: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/29/ubuntu-hardy-apache-virtual-hosts-1 (remember to change domain1.com, domain2.com to your own domains in the examples AND ‘demo’ to your username) (note: search and replace in nano is “ctrl-\”)
   • Remember that if they navigate to the IP Address, they will most likely get the “It Works!” message for the default Apache site. You can change this.
   • Change DirectoryIndex to “index.php index.html” if you are going to be using WordPress
9. Change and add settings in your domain virtual hosts file: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/4/29/ubuntu-hardy-apache-virtual-hosts-2
   • Make sure you set some directory options – one I would for sure do is turn off directory browsing

MySQL

1. Follow the instructions here: http://articles.slicehost.com/2007/11/23/ubuntu-gutsy-mysql-and-ror. Only do the MySQL part and make sure you do not put the Ruby option in the install string (unless you want Ruby of course)
   • This is also a good blog to read as well to help: http://www.jonathanmoeller.com/screed/?p=175
2. Follow post setup instructions here: http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/default-privileges.html to secure your initial mySQL accounts
3. After I am done, I like to clear the mySQL console history. Exit mySQL and at the command prompt do ‘rm ~/.mysql_history’
4. Setup DNSUtils (for dig especially): sudo aptitude install dnsutils 

Set Up Sending Mail From Slice

1. You need to change “exim” settings on server to send email from WordPress
2. For Google Apps, see this thread: http://wiki.debian.org/GmailAndExim4. Follow the instructions all the way down to Run # chown. I didn’t have to do this.
   • Also, accept all defaults for questions after the DNS-queries minimal question. There are more than the thread instructions let on.
3. See this thread for more general info: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=196112 (don’t need sendmail after all, exim is already installed so try that first, see page 2 of thread for meat)
4. Now for multiple email addresses (when you have more than one blog, for example, each representing a different domain), you will need to follow some different steps. This might be a good place to start: http://www.debuntu.org/2006/05/17/52-how-to-exim4-virtual-host-on-debian-etch.

WordPress

1. Load mod_rewrite for Apache
   • Sudo a2enmod rewrite
   • Sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload
2. Follow instructions here: http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress (especially Detailed instructions)
   • DB Name: wordpress (or whatever)
   • DB UserName for wordpress: wordpress (or whatever)
   • Append table names if (1) you want more security (2) going to have more than one WordPress blog using the same database
3. Probably don’t want to put on google and technorati until you are done with the blog design
4. Make sure to change admin password after first log in
5. Change the “admin” user in MySQL to something else:
   • Mysql> use wordpress;
   • Mysql> UPDATE <wpTableName>users SET user_login=’admin’, user_login=’<new admin name>’;
6. NOTE: Many instructions say to add things to “.htaccess” or “httpd.conf”. Since you have root access, don’t worry about these files. Make your configuration changes to the vhost file (or maybe, sometimes, the master apache2.conf file).
7. Add Rewrite Log to vhost file
   • RewriteLog /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/log/rewrite.log
   • RewriteLogLevel 1 (anything higher than 3 could slow down Apache hard core) (set to 0 to disable)http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/mod/mod_rewrite.html
8. Turn off directory in “public” browsing in the vhost
   • <Directory /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/public>
     • Options –Indexes
   • </Directory>
9. Put wp-config.php database and key info into another file and put that new file in /home/<user> (outside the public_html). Then put an include to hat file in wp-config.php. This is for security (http://danemorgan.com/blog/wordpress/wordpress-security-secure-your-wordpress-wp-config-info )
10. Log into the WordPress admin panel (http://<domain>/wp-admin/) and go to Settings/Permalinks. Set the permalinks to something like “Day and name” and click on Save Changes
    • Then, assuming you don’t have an .htaccess file, go to the bottom of the page and copy the code in the text area and paste in your vhost file (within the <Directory></Directory> for the top level directory (usually /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/public)
11. Do some security around the wp-content, wp-includes and wp-admin directories.
    • Only allow access to images and javascript to wp-includes and wp-content
      • <Directory /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/public/wp-includes>
        • Options –Indexes
        • AllowOverride None
        • Order Allow, Deny
        • Deny from all
        • <Files ~ “.(css|jpg|jpeg|png|gif|js)$”>
          • Allow from all
        • </Files>
      • </Directory>
      • ….and do the same for wp-content
    • Either restrict access to wp-admin by adding a password layer or by IP address
      • <Directory /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/public/wp-admin>
        • Options –Indexes
        • AllowOverride None
      • Then follow instructions like at: http://htpasswd.wordpress.com/ for password or at #1 at this link for IP address: http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/three-tips-to-protect-your-wordpress-installation/
    • You might also want to do the same as you did for wp-asmin for wp-login.php at the file level since going to http://<domain>/wp-admin redirects there (see: http://www.reaper-x.com/2007/09/01/hardening-wordpress-with-mod-rewrite-and-htaccess/
      • <Files /home/<user>/public_html/<domain>/public/wp-login.php>
        • …..
      • </Files>
12. Install login plug-in @ http://www.bad-neighborhood.com/login-lockdown.html. Copy the download link and use ‘wget’ to get it from the command line (instead of FTP)
13. Activate the akismet plugin in the admin panel.
    • You need a WordPress.com account so you can get an API key. This key is found in Settings/Your Profile
14. Install WP-Super-Cache plug-in

DIDN’T INSTALL

phpMyAdmin

This is a MySQL front-end that is more user friendly than the default mySQL client

1. sudo aptitude install phpMyAdmin
   • IMPORTANT: Make sure you press the space bar when selecting the web server you are using
2. Go to /etc/apache2/conf.d/ and edit phpmyadmin.conf
   • Change Alias from phpMyAdmin to something more obscure for security purposes
3. Change the /etc/phpmyadmin/config.inc.php file to support https: http://forums.vpslink.com/security/2282-do-you-use-phpmyadmin-2.html#post11246
4. Then go to https://domain.com/obscureToPhpMyAdmin

I am signing up with a web host because I plan to first host some blogs. Then, down the line, I plan to host some other web sites.

I knew I was either going to go with Shared Hosting or VPS Hosting — I don’t need dedicated yet. Shared Hosting would have been easiest for me because I could get blogging software up and running very quickly, it would have been cheap, and I wouldn’t need to know much Linux (or Windows) if I went that route. VPS Hosting is more expensive and requires command line knowledge of Linux (oooohhhh, command line), but you are guaranteed a set of memory, CPU and resources (albeit not as much as some of the shared hosts *claim* to give you). Plus, you are in control of everything from the OS perspective — you get root access.

I decided to go with a VPS solution (to tell you how close this decision was — this morning when I woke up, I was *sure* I was going with shared hosting). At the very worst, I learn a little bit of Linux and understand how to run my own LAMP server (LAMP = Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP). At the very best, I am able to successfully host everything and anything I ever need to host, all under my control. In the end it will cost me $10 a month more than shared hosting would have. But that is OK. I am excited about the process.

So, the host I decided to go with after much deliberation is Slicehost. I had two VPS providers in mind, and I chose Slicehost because of what I considered its great website, excellent tutorials, community support options (chat being one of them), and the recommendations from many at the Business of Software forum. The last one was the tipping point.

So I am excited to try this out. I have already signed up for a new account and got the LAMP server up and running. Their tutorials helped out a lot here. It is important to note that this is an unmanaged hosting environment, which means, other than hardware failures, I am responsible for everything. There are no traditional support mechanisms other than the community.

In case you are interested, I signed up for the smallest package of $20/mo which gives me 256 MB of deddicated RAM, 10 GB disk space and 100 GB bandwidth/mo. You can upgrade/downgrade at anytime and I have 30 days to try this out to get some of my money back (You have to pay for at least 3 months of service initially – this was the only “downside” I saw about this)

My first major project is to move this particular blog over to the new host. I figure that should inundate me in the whole hosting process, real quick. That will be the topic of a future post.

I had 5 web hosts in mind; if you are interested in the other 4 that were on my short list, let me know.

That’s all for now.