Finding a live chat solution – and picking cSupport
How I found out
In my company HelpSoft we run various websites either selling products, offering free stuff and we also own a web portal where women can find new friends.
For all of these we wanted a live chat solution. Simplicity, functionality and pricing were three factors in this process. You see Zopim everywhere, so we looked at that. We did try to sign up for a beta, unfortunately they don’t seem to like new customers because the required activation e-mail never arrived.
Sometimes in these cases, the forgotten password button is a help, but that failed too. No e-mail arrived. And ironically, their live chat support were not online. I’m not a man who enjoys waiting a lot, if I want something I want it now, not tomorrow or whenever they feel like responding to a support ticket. So they were trashed and the whole idea of Zopim was out.
I visited one of my favorite web sites, alternativeTo and did a search for Zopim. Some very irrelevant products showed up and so did cSupport.
I had fallen in love with IM integration I read about on Zopim. cSupport did that too, limited to XMPP, but I can live with that since that’s my favorite IM protocol anyway. And a 14-day trial with no credit card required, I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?
Getting started
It was simple, really. I clicked the “Start trial” button and inserted a name, an e-mail address and a username. I picked the “Premium” plan, it seemed to fit our needs fine.
Updated set of must-have apps for your Mac
Back in 2009 I wrote a post about the apps you must have for your Mac. Time changes, new apps are born and I discover new stuff. So this is my new updated list of the Must-Have apps I will recommend you to get if you do not already have them.
1Password
This software is simply awesome! 1Password makes it possible for you to store all your passwords securely and gives you the ability to easily use those logins from your browser. Furthermore you can store credit card information in it, and it will be able to fill that out for you too.
Adium
I still think that Adium is the best instant messating app for your Mac. It supports most IM protocols, and that’s about what there i to day.
BetterZip
For unpacking a wide range of archives, BetterZip really gets the job done easily.
Camtasia
If you make instruction video or any other kind of screencast, Camtasia is without doubt the best application for recording these sessions I have used. Not only is it very easy to start recording, it also offers to record your mic and/or the system audio. Also, editing your work afterwards is very easy.
CoRD
While I think that Windows is a useless OS, CoRD is the best app for remote controlling those computers/servers running Windows via RDP.
Divvy
Being and old GNU/Linux desktop user, there were some things I have missed on OS X in regard to managing application windows. Divvy really makes this task easier. It gives you the ability to arrange your windows very easily and with a click on a keyboard shortcut.
Hands Off!
Control which applications has access to the internet and to write files on your disk. If you’re a security paranoid like me, you will love this.
iStat Menus
Keep an eye on your CPU, Disk, memory and network usage at all times right in your menu bar. Highly customizable and has a nice simple design.
LimeChat
The IRC client to rule them all. The themes are created using standard CSS. It also gives you a small preview window which shows you everything going on in all channels you are joined in. Great if you’re curious.
Keynote
PowerPoint.. seriously..met… the boss! Nuff’ said.
NaviCat (for MySQL)
If you manage MySQL databases and you’d like something a little nicer than phpMyAdmin and you’d like something to use for building and testing queries easily, this is the tool you want.
Transmit
Connect to FTP/SFTP/DAV/S3 either in Transmit or mount them as a drive. This just works beautifully and is extremely easy to use. Panic really did a great job here!
SFTP only chroot users with OpenSSH in Debian
From OpenSSH version 4.9 and up it is now possible to create chrooted SFTP-only users with OpenSSH without the need for any add-ons.
In my example i want all users within the “sftp” group to hit /srv/sftponly. This can be done on userlevel or on group level. I will be using groups.
At first, use your favorite editor to ecit /etc/ssh/sshd_config and find the line starting with “Subsystem sftp” (usually at the bottom) – change it so it looks like this:
Subsystem sftp internal-sftp
Next, we need to add the rule to match users. Add this to your sshd_config at the bottom:
Match Group sftp
PasswordAuthentication yes
ChrootDirectory /srv/sftponly
AllowTCPForwarding no
X11Forwarding no
ForceCommand internal-sftp
Now add the sftp group:
groupadd sftp
Add our first user:
useradd -d /srv/sftponly -g sftp -s /bin/false <username>
passwd <username>
Now, restart openssh:
/etc/init.d/ssh restart
And you should be all set. Use your favorite SFTP editor to test. Also try logging on via SSH to make sure that the user does not have access to do that.
Troubleshooting
Along your way some problems might occur. I will try to address the most common ones here. At first what you want to do is enable debugging in openssh so you can see in the logs what happens. Edit /etc/ssh/sshd_server – find “LogLevel” and change the setting to “DEBUG” – and restart ssh. The problems below are shown either in these logs or in the output of the “sftp” command from the client. When using the sftp client be sure to add the “-v” flag for verbose output.
Problem: fatal: bad ownership or modes for chroot directory component “/”
Fix: chmod 755 /
Problem: fatal: bad ownership or modes for chroot directory “/srv/sftponly”
Fix: Folders in the path along the way must be owned by root:root and must not be writable by anyone but root. This is because the directory we are going to use will be the root of the new users. In my example the fix would be: chown root:root /srv ; chown root:root /srv/sftponly ; chmod 755 /srv ; chmod 755 /srv/sftponly”
Problem: Everything seems to be OK.. The users just don’t get access.
Fix: Make sure that you don’t have any whitespaces in your sshd_config after the configuration lines. In my case this caused a real pain.
Hit me a comment if you experience anything strange.
Setting UMASK for SFTP users
Add this line to /etc/pam.d/sshd:
session optional pam_umask.so umask=0002
This particular line will make new files/folders user and group writable.
Do you make backup? – If you do, is your backup strategy safe?
I think server backups here.
As a server administrator, there are a lot of concerns and one of the bigger ones is security. I know a whole lot of server administrators, and when I did a Q&A to know about their backups I was astonished to find out that more than 30% of them did not even take backup. I got a lot of responses and there are many ways of handling your backup, but a lot of them are very very wrong and will not do you any good in case of an emergency.
Do you even back up?
If you do not back up your data, what will you do in case of a hardware failure? Sure, you might be running a RAID, but a RAID is no guarantee, a RAID can break and then you will loose the game.
If you do not take backup, what will you do in the event of a fire breaking loose and destroying everything where ever your server is placed? Is your data valuable to you?
How do you back up?
Making backup is good. But how do you save your backup on the remote host? A few common ways of making backup is via FTP/SFTP/rsync. So, now you’re safe, right? If a fire breaks out, water disaster, disks die and so on, you will have your backup. And that’s good.
If your backup is automated, then your client somehow authorized to the backup server. In most of the above mentioned cased that authentication gives you full access to the backup data! Why is that bad? It is because an attacker that has success gaining access to your server, will be able to emulate the authentication of the automated backup and therefore be able to delete both production data AND backup data.
How much is your backup worth now?
Howto: APC UPS and Debian
So, I have a couple of NAS boxes and a laptop as server running at home. It’s all good until thunder appears. There are multiple risks with this. If the lightning strikes it can cause large surges of electricity that will destroy your equipment, if a power loss occurs it can cause the two RAID5 setups to die and it will cause major data loss.
A couple of days ago I bought a UPS and set it up and now I figured I should also set it up. So I did some reading and this is my result served to make it easier for you.
In this guide, this setup is used:
- Computer with GNU/Linux Debian Lenny
- APC Back-UPS 800
The software I use is apcupsd which is in the Debian repository. Start by installing it:
apt-get update && apt-get install -y apcupsd
The next thing is to configure it. I did a whole lot of reading the manual for apcupsd to make sure I did things right. When your UPS is set up, hook the USB cable into your server.
Go to /etc/apcupsd and edit the file apcupsd.conf
My UPS and most of the newer UPS’es form APC uses USB to interface with the server, and that makes it easier for us to talk to it. These are the parameters I have set:
UPSCABLE usb
Define that we use a USB connection to the UPS.
UPSTYPE usb
DEVICE
ONBATTERYDELAY 5
BATTERYLEVEL 10
MINUTES 10
ISCONFIGURED=yes
/etc/init.d/apcupsd start
# apcaccessAPC : 001,044,1076DATE : Thu Nov 25 10:20:32 CET 2010HOSTNAME : natalieRELEASE : 3.14.4VERSION : 3.14.4 (18 May 2008) debianUPSNAME : natalieCABLE : USB CableMODEL : Back-UPS BR 800UPSMODE : Stand AloneSTARTTIME: Wed Nov 24 20:30:05 CET 2010STATUS : ONLINELINEV : 230.0 VoltsLOADPCT : 13.0 Percent Load CapacityBCHARGE : 100.0 PercentTIMELEFT : 53.0 Minutes
Wed Nov 24 20:22:50 CET 2010 Power failure.Wed Nov 24 20:22:56 CET 2010 Running on UPS batteries.Wed Nov 24 20:23:57 CET 2010 Reached run time limit on batteries.Wed Nov 24 20:23:57 CET 2010 Initiating system shutdown!Wed Nov 24 20:23:57 CET 2010 User logins prohibitedWed Nov 24 20:24:16 CET 2010 apcupsd exiting, signal 15Wed Nov 24 20:24:16 CET 2010 apcupsd shutdown succeeded
Make NAS’es shutdown too!
This is what I did:
2) mkdir /etc/apcupsd/keys
4) chmod 600 /etc/apcupsd/keys/id_rsa
ssh -i /etc/apcupsd/keys/id_rsa -l <username_for_nas> <ip_for_nas> ‘ps’
ssh -i /etc/apcupsd/keys/id_rsa -l admin <ip> ‘/sbin/poweroff’
echo “UPS ${2} initiated Shutdown Sequence” | ${WALL}echo “Will now shutdown NAS systems before killing server” | ${WALL}/usr/bin/ssh -l admin -i /etc/apcupsd/keys/id_rsa <NAS1_IP> ‘/sbin/poweroff’
/usr/bin/ssh -l admin -i /etc/apcupsd/keys/id_rsa <NAS2_IP> ‘/sbin/poweroff’${SHUTDOWN} -h now “UPS ${2} initiated shutdown”
42 reasons why the iPad is better than netbooks.
Now, in the following I take into note that the iPad is not meant as a replacement to your laptop computer. It is meant as an additional device, something extra you have. Because you like nice things.
Also, the “it’s expensive” and “you need to buy” argument is used a lot of times – I see that argument as invalid. It’s not a question about money, it’s a question about whether the device is great or not.
Actually, all of this is nonsense, as the iPad should not be considered a replacement for a computer, as mentioned. The iPad is an extra device you get, something more, when you’re out and you DO NOT have the need for a computer, but would like to watch some movies, listen to music, read books, show your friends pictures.
Also, being on a flight the iPad is EXCELLENT for movies, reading and you can sit with it in a relaxed position like a piece of paper or a book.
As a response to: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2358590,00.asp
1 ) If you want an iPad you must know that you want quality and that you want to pay for the fact that the product is extremely well created and beautiful. If you are poor and you use the argument that the iPad is expensive, that only tells that you are too poor to own it.
2) Beginning in november, Apple will launch iOS 4.2 for the iPad making it able to multitask.
3 ) Flash is annoying and it concumes a huge amount of CPU and memory. Also it introduces security issues.
4 ) With a photo kit an iPad does have USB. (Remember the poor argument when beginning to argument that this is pricey)
5 ) For the purpose of what you need an iPad for, you have absolutely no use for higher resolutions. Also, it scales down websites wonderfully.
6 ) If you want a bigger screen the device will be bigger and the smart size of the iPad starts to disappear.
7 ) You can get on-the-go charging kits for the iPad. (Don’t even think about it, poor guy)
8 ) Personally I have never, ever used the webcam for anything but fun and it is not something I would need in the device I use for movies and reading books.
9 ) You can buy a keyboard. The iPad is nice and compact without it with a wonderfully working on screen keyboard. (Again… )
10 ) The photo kit mentioned above you can use the USB interface from your camera or read the most commonly used card, SD. (…)
11 ) iPads have the potential of flash, taking over the world, doing your mom AND making coffee all at the same time.
12 ) The screen on a netbook is usually made from plastic that extremely easy gets scratched and ugly when exposed or just even touched. The iPad is covered with glass and made for touching. The glass on an iPad is very hard to scratch.
13 ) On a device the type of an iPad you do not need a faster processor.
14 ) On a device like an iPad you don’t need more than 64 GB space. Also, where did the “you can buy this and that but it’s too expensive” argument go here?
15 ) True story. A new version of the iPad with better specs will come when times require it. (No! you’re too poor! Remember that even Microsoft stated in their own advertisment that macs are for cool people)
16 ) On a device like the iPad you don’t need a full blown OS. In fact that’s one of the major FEATURES of it, not having the full OS. iOS is great for touch.
17 ) With an iPad you can get the apps you need through iTunes.
18 ) Square-ish? That argument is lame. I won’t even comment further on it. The iPad can rotate, period.
19 ) Wireless-N is indeed fast enough for HD video. The iPad is not a replacement for a computer, it’s an additional device.
20 ) Aaand.. the iPad can’t? My iPad plays 720p HD without any problems. You would NEVER need 1080p on such a small screen! Not even if it was 13 inches.
21 ) The battery argument again? It was in 7.
22 ) But! None of them even comes close to how beautiful the iPad is.
23 ) … Who wants to do that?
24 ) Again.. enough about the money! Apple stuff is for cool people who knows that good things cost good money – and those who can afford to be awesome. Don’t make money an issue, cheap ass.
25 ) Again the money issue. The connector, get it!
26 ) More advanced? It’s just flat and boring as hell. It’s very entertaining playing games on the iPad because you interact with it. You can even play scrabble and use it as your board and have your letters on the iPhone.
27 ) The iPad has built in 3G and you can readch your Plex/Nine at home with it to watch TV and stuff. You won’t need legacy ports on a iPad kind of device.
28 ) You certainly can on the iPad too. I just bought a data card from another carrier and put it in, BAM, internet on the iPad. This argument is directly wrong.
29 ) Get Apple Care.
30 ) You can do that from iPad too.
31 ) Yes you can, through apps.
32 ) Argument based on basically thin air.
33 ) What are you a hundred? Rent it online with iTunes.
34 ) As can you for iPad.Navigon, TomTom, CoPilot. iPad runs all iPhone apps.
35 ) The iPad gives you access to internet within 1 second. Also the iPad is an EMBEDDED DEVICE, not a computer.
36 ) Get a netbook for your child, I don’t have kids, I don’t give a crap about kid friendly.Besides, with the awesome games and the fun way to interact with them the kids will be entertained for hours with the iPad.
37 ) Again, go online and stream from Plex (and eyeTV). (But mommy, data is expensive, I’m poor.. waaaaaaah.. )
38 ) Say hi to Opera
39 ) True. Java is slow anyway so why use it? Like flash it consumes a lot of system resources.
40 ) iOS 4.2 in november. it’s okay to use upcoming and “possible” and “potential” in these arguments, as used earlier with the netbooks.
41 ) If you don’t have a computer already, an iPad is not a device you would use. It’s not a god damn replacement, it an addition.
42 ) Use files and streaming instead of physical optical media.
Setting up OpenVPN server
Please read through the entire tutorial BEFORE doing anything. If you do not read through this you might end up with some unanswered questions on how to do something, that is actually described further down. Thanks.
Test setup: XEN based VPS. 256 slice from Slicehost running Debian Lenny 64-bit
Let’s get started!
The first thin you want to do is install OpenVPN:
apt-get update && apt-get install -y openvpn
If everything above goes as it should, OpenVPN is now installed and we will continue to configuring it.
The following 4 commands will go to the configuration directory, copy easy-rsa (which we will use), copy a sample of the configuration file and unpack the sample.
cd /etc/openvpn
cp /usr/share/doc/openvpn/examples/easy-rsa/2.0/* .
cp /usr/share/doc/openvpn/examples/sample-config-files/server.conf.gz .
gunzip server.conf.gz
Now that these files are in place it’s time to start creating keys and configuration. For this we will use the easy-rsa package supplied by OpenVPN. This package makes the creation and signing of keys much easier.
Next thing we are going to do is set the variables for easy-rsa to use. These must be set every time you want to use easy-rsa if you have been logged out!
. ./vars
source ./vars
Make sure that our directory for keys exists, has the correct settings and such. Note! If you have any keys at this point, they will be removed!
./clean-all
Set up your Certificate Authority
./build-ca
We need a certificate and a key for the server itself, let’s build those. The second argument is the name of the server. If you choose to change this from server (there’s not really a reason to do so), then remember to change this as well in the config changes we make later on.
During the build-key-server process you will be asked for various information, you can choose to change this if you want, but for the setup to work it is not necessary. Just make sure that Common Name is server
./build-key-server server
We need to build the Diffie-Hellman parameters.
./build-dh
We are basically done with building the server now, but at this point no users will be able to log on and use the VPN. We use the build-key command (remember that vars MUST be set for this to work, if you want to create users at a later time). I will create a user called “fbh” for myself.
Again, I will be asked for some information and again I can choose whether to enter this or not.
./build-key fbh
Next thing we need to do is edit the server configuration file to know where these keys are located, use your favorite editor and open the server.conf file and find the part that holds paths to keys. Change it as following. (Note! If you change the servername from “server” above, this is where you need to change the keyname)
ca /etc/openvpn/keys/ca.crt
cert /etc/openvpn/keys/server.crt
key /etc/openvpn/keys/server.key# And a little further down
dh /etc/openvpn/keys/dh1024.pem
For now, leave all other parameters at the default.
You are now done with a basic OpenVPN server. If the LAN you are connected to uses the range 10.8.0.0/24 currently, you should edit the server.conf file and find the line that says “server 10.8.0.0 255.255.255.0″ and change it to something else, otherwise you will encounter a conflict!
Tunnel internet access through the VPN as well
With the above setup you will be connected via VPN to the network of the VPN server, however you will not be browsing the internet through the VPN server. As you might think, this configuration is not done in the client. You will need some changes to the OpenVPN server for this to work, as the server pushes configuration to the client.
Again, edit /etc/openvpn/server.conf and add the following line to it:
push “redirect-gateway def1″
Now it will set the client’s default gateway to go through the OpenVPN server upon connect – however, it will not work yet and there are multiple things to this.
At first, you might currently be using your ISP’s DNS servers, and they will probably not allow you to do recursive lookups when not connected through their network. So you need to push a set of open DNS server as well, or set up your own on the server (this tutorial does not cover that). In this tutorial we will use Level 3 Communications DNS, as they have a set of free, public DNS servers that responds quickly. Add these lines to your configuration:
push “dhcp-option DNS 4.2.2.1″
push “dhcp-option DNS 4.2.2.2″
push “dhcp-option DNS 4.2.2.3″
We’re getting closer now, but it might STILL not work. Also, you must have NAT between eth0 and tun0 enabled in iptables. You will need to know the name of your public interface to do this. In most cases it’s eth0. To enable it run these commands:
/sbin/iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE
/sbin/iptables -A FORWARD -i eth0 -o tun0 -m state –state RELATED,ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT
/sbin/iptables -A FORWARD -i tun0 -o eth0 -j ACCEPT
If you want these to be run whenever the server reboots, to make sure this works, add the 3 lines to /etc/rc.local before the “exit 0″ line. This script is being run every time a multiuser level is started up on the server.
Almost there! The last thin you need is to enable forwarding, do this with:
echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
And done! Restart OpenVPN and make sure that it starts up
/etc/init.d/openvpn restart
Your VPN server is now able to tunnel connections and you are able to connect to the internet through it.
When I have the time, I will be publishing a tutorial on setting up clients as well.