Steve's questions

Running Amazon Linux 2, installed Apache, PHP, PHP-MySQL, and WordPress. This AMI is using an AWS security group called WebDMZ, say.

Created a MySQL DB in Amazon RDS which also uses AWS security group WebDMZ, I copied db_name, db_user, db_pass, db_hostname to /var/www/html/wp-config.php.

@ www.example.com/wp-admin/install.php I receive:

Error establishing a database connection. Connection timed out

If both Amazon Linux 2 & MySQL are in the same security group, shouldn't they be able to communicate with each other?

Help appreciated.

Edit, I found if I added an Inbound rule to allow MySQL connections from anywhere, the install proceeded, but doubt this is a safe way to go?

On an Amazon EC2 Linux server, I've run:

sudo su -
yum -y update
yum install -y php73

I receive the error No package php73 available.

I've been able to install httpd, php, & php-mysql okay.

Here is my yum repo list:

[root@ip-172-31-1-175 httpd]# yum repolist all
Loaded plugins: extras_suggestions, langpacks, priorities, update-motd
amzn2-core                                                          | 2.4 kB  00:00:00     
amzn2extra-docker                                                   | 1.3 kB  00:00:00     
amzn2extra-php7.3                                                   | 1.8 kB  00:00:00     
(1/2): amzn2extra-php7.3/2/x86_64/updateinfo                        |   69 B  00:00:00     
(2/2): amzn2extra-php7.3/2/x86_64/primary_db                        | 256 kB  00:00:00     
repo id                              repo name                              status
amzn2-core/2/x86_64                  Amazon Linux 2 core repository         enabled: 18,631
amzn2-core-debuginfo/2/x86_64        Amazon Linux 2 core repository - debug disabled
amzn2-core-source/2                  Amazon Linux 2 core repository - sourc disabled
amzn2extra-docker/2/x86_64           Amazon Extras repo for docker          enabled:     19
amzn2extra-docker-debuginfo/2/x86_64 Amazon Extras debuginfo repo for docke disabled
amzn2extra-docker-source/2           Amazon Extras source repo for docker   disabled
amzn2extra-php7.3/2/x86_64           Amazon Extras repo for php7.3          enabled:    305
amzn2extra-php7.3-debuginfo/2/x86_64 Amazon Extras debuginfo repo for php7. disabled
amzn2extra-php7.3-source/2           Amazon Extras source repo for php7.3   disabled
repolist: 18,955

I've created /etc/yum.repos.d/amzn2-updates.repo, but when I run yum install php73, I receive the error:

Loaded plugins: extras_suggestions, langpacks, priorities, update-motd Could not retrieve mirrorlist http://repo.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/2/updates/mirror.list error was 14: HTTP Error 403 - Forbidden

One of the configured repositories failed (Unknown), and yum doesn't have enough cached data to continue. At this point the only safe thing yum can do is fail. There are a few ways to work "fix" this:

 1. Contact the upstream for the repository and get them to fix the problem.

 2. Reconfigure the baseurl/etc. for the repository, to point to a working
    upstream. This is most often useful if you are using a newer
    distribution release than is supported by the repository (and the
    packages for the previous distribution release still work).

 3. Run the command with the repository temporarily disabled
        yum --disablerepo=<repoid> ...

 4. Disable the repository permanently, so yum won't use it by default. Yum
    will then just ignore the repository until you permanently enable it
    again or use --enablerepo for temporary usage:

        yum-config-manager --disable <repoid>
    or
        subscription-manager repos --disable=<repoid>

 5. Configure the failing repository to be skipped, if it is unavailable.
    Note that yum will try to contact the repo. when it runs most commands,
    so will have to try and fail each time (and thus. yum will be be much
    slower). If it is a very temporary problem though, this is often a nice
    compromise:

        yum-config-manager --save --setopt=<repoid>.skip_if_unavailable=true

Cannot find a valid baseurl for repo: amzn-updates/2

This is my /etc/yum.repos.d/amzn2-updates.repo:

[amzn-updates]
name=amzn-updates-Base
mirrorlist=http://repo.$awsregion.$awsdomain/$releasever/updates/mirror.list
mirrorlist_expire=300
metadata_expire=300
priority=10
failovermethod=priority
fastestmirror_enabled=0
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=file:///etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-amazon-ga
enabled=1
retries=3
timeout=5
report_instanceid=yes

[amzn-updates-debuginfo]
name=amzn-updates-debuginfo
mirrorlist=http://repo.$awsregion.$awsdomain/$releasever/updates/debuginfo/mirror.list
mirrorlist_expire=300
metadata_expire=300
priority=10
failovermethod=priority
fastestmirror_enabled=0
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=file:///etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-amazon-ga
enabled=0
retries=3
timeout=5
report_instanceid=yes

[amzn-updates-source]
name=amzn-updates-source
mirrorlist=http://repo.$awsregion.$awsdomain/$releasever/updates/SRPMS/mirror.list
mirrorlist_expire=300
metadata_expire=300
priority=10
failovermethod=priority
fastestmirror_enabled=0
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=file:///etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-amazon-ga
enabled=0
retries=3
timeout=5
report_instanceid=yes

Help appreciated.

Forgive such a naive question but I am a web designer performing some maintenance tasks for a new client.

I'm relatively new to Apache configuration and the Linux command line.

I'd like to install the Google Pagespeed module on a development server.

Server = Debian 64bit with Apache 2.4

I have downloaded the package to my PC, and I understand from this page I eventually need to run the commands:

sudo dpkg -i mod-pagespeed-*.deb
sudo apt-get -f install

but I believe before I do this, I need to upload the package (mod-pagespeed-stable_current_amd64.deb) to the remote host.

My question is: where do I upload it to (over SFTP)? I have root access on SFTP.

I've Googled where to upload apache module to without getting an answer, and the Google Pagespeed documentation probably assumes a better understanding of Apache than I have.

When one of our users logs onto a Windows Server 2008 R2 server with RDC, she receives the following 3 popups:

I can't find any mention of meray.dll, brape.dll or bryntb.dll on the web.

If I load msconfig on her RDC session, I can't see any mention of these in the Startup tab. Would some items be hidden? I loaded msconfig using my admin credentials.

How do we prevent these errors from opening on login?

I used group policy to deploy an Adobe Reader X .msi file, which successfully updated the machines it was targeted to.

The computer group those machines belong to still has a link to the GPO which deployed the .msi.

Is it the .msi file which checks the version of installed software before running a new installation, or is it another Windows or AD service?

Does the msi file remain on the computer after installation?

I ask because I am concerned that if it is the msi file which detects if the software is already installed, and if the msi file is not kept on the computer, does the msi file continue to be copied to the machine each time it restarts?

Is there a tool or method to build an inventory of the version of Adobe Reader installed on computers in a domain?

This would allow specific targeting of Adobe Reader updates to the computers who needed it, say from version 9 to version 10.

• If I deployed an Adobe Reader X MSI to all computers, would the MSI continue to be transferred to each computer every day where the MSI checks the version of Adobe Reader installed?
• Is there a different method GPO software installations use to check the version before transferring the MSI files over the network and installing them?
• Is the MSI file cached on the computer?

In WSUS (3.2.7600.226), I've specified which updates we wish to download onto the WSUS server from Microsoft.

We don't use Microsoft Exchange, so it is not selected in Options > Products & Classifications.

However, this week I noticed more than 1000 new (unapproved) updates appear in All Updates, including updates specific to Microsoft Exchange, Lync, Windows Vista, etc. all of which are not selected as updates we want to download (in Options > Products & Classifications).

I've run Options > Server Cleanup Wizard, yet these updates remain, waiting to be approved.

The WSUS data directory has also increased in size by about 15 GB recently also.

Why has this happened? How do I resolve it, and prevent it from happening again?

Thanks!

We have a Domino mail server protected by Iron Port (v7.1.5 I think). Iron Port reports an average 96%-97% of emails are stopped by reputation filtering, and around 3% of emails are clean messages.

Is this level of spam going to impact on our bandwidth?

Are there other measures to prevent spam hitting Iron Port in the first place? Thanks.

Update1: we receive 28,000 emails a day. 27,000 of these are stopped by content filtering. 900 are clean emails.

Update2: The link speed is 1mbit, with 80gb bandwidth quota.

Update3: The sysadmin says IronPort stops the email being delivered by checking the sender. I guess this means only the header is received, which might be 1K at most, which means 27MB of rejected headers per day, which is 810MB per month, which is 1% of our quota. I think this is tolerable.

Thanks all for your help.

I have recently installed WSUS (v3.2.7600.226) on a Windows 2008 Std server, and configured 4 test PCs to connect to it through group policy. They are detected by WSUS, and the PCs are downloading some updates from the WSUS server, but not all.

The updates which WSUS Console says are missing from the PC have been approved.

If I run wuauclt.exe /detectnow, nothing changes, even after a reboot. If I perform the following, nothing changes:

2. Stop the Automatic Updates service.
3. Rename C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution folder.
4. Restart the Automatic Updates service.
5. Go into Internet Explorer and delete the history, cookies, and temp internet files.
6. Reboot then from a command prompt run wuauclt.exe /detectnow.

I have also set a deadline on a package to be in the past, and then run wuauclt.exe /detectnow on the PC, but checking Windows Update after that shows there are still no updates available.

If I remove the PC from the computer group with the WSUS policy, and run gpupdate /forcenow, the PC is able to see updates are available from Microsoft Internet Updates.

I have tried running this script to force the PC to retreive updates, but that says there are no updates available also.

Update: In the WSUS Console, if I right-click on the update & choose File Information, I see that it exists in the WSUS data directory and is 2.8 MB in file size. If I force an update check on the Win7 PC which WSUS says needs this update, it detects no new updates. The update has been approved for all computer groups, including the one the problem PC is a member of.

Update: The Windows Update log (C:\windows\windowsupdate.log) only displays a couple of errors:

• WARNING: Cached cookie has expired or new PID is available
• WARNING: Failed to evaluate Installed rule, updateId = {189A8F50-0C3A-4FDF-8BC2-BC23A3EB11FB}.101, hr = 80242013
• 0 updates detected

I deleted cookies from Internet Explorer, and I receive similar:

• WARNING: Failed to evaluate Installed rule, updateId = {189A8F50-0C3A-4FDF-8BC2-BC23A3EB11FB}.101, hr = 80242013
• 0 updates detected

Update: The IIS7 logs display only '200 okay'. There are no 404s etc, but the last log entry is from around 8:20am, while I have been checking for updates from the PC client in the afternoon. The time & timezone on the WSUS server is correct, as for the client.

Update: Apaprently 0x80242013 means: WU_E_UH_BADCBSPACKAGEID The update metadata contains an invalid CBS package identifier. There is a MS KB article on this. Checking against the listed possible causes:

• The folder c:\windows\system32\CatRoot2 does not exist
• Only catroot and CatRoot2_2011915163738 exist.
• I've scheduled a disk check to occur on next reboot in case system files are corrupt.
• Windows and the 1st level of subfolders are not hidden.
• I doubt it is a security or permissions issue as other updates install on the problem machine without any problem.
• I have renamed c:\windows\SoftwareDistribution and the same error is generated in c:\windows\windowsupdate.log (WARNING: Failed to evaluate Installed rule, updateId = {189A8F50-0C3A-4FDF-8BC2-BC23A3EB11FB}.101, hr = 80242013)
• I tried using the Microsoft Fixit tool, and rebooted but the same isssue occurs.

I've installed MS WSUS (SP 2 or 3) on a Windows Server 2008 32-bit server.

I've done some basic configuration, and the only computer it lists under All Computers or Unassigned Computers is our domain controller (seperate to the server WSUS is installed on).

Under Update Services > Options > Computers, "Use the Update Services console" is selected to specify how computers are assigned to groups.

The DC's name is the fully qualified host.domain.name, etc, and I can ping a PC using it's own full host name from the WSUS server.

I've clicked Refresh, and no other PCs appear.

The WSUS service is currently sychronising with the remote MS Update server, and I am unable to change how computers are assigned to groups while it is synching. Is the service synchronisation preventing new computers from being added/detected, perhaps to conserve bandwidth/resources?

How else do I have them detected under Unassigned Computers?

Thanks

Our company uses Symantec Enterprise Vault to archive network folders and files, presumably to save on disk space. I can't see any other benefits.

Our company is an architectural firm, and the problem our users face is locating particular images in network folders. Because all the files are archived, Windows Explorer is unable to generate image thumbnails. Each image needs to be individually restored from archive by double-click before it can be viewed. This is a big time-waster for our architects.

Symantec say there is no workaround for this.

Does anyone know of an alternative we could use for archiving images?

Alternatively, some batch utility to create and maintain a thumbs.db file in each folder?

Thanks.

Our company is in the middle of a move between buildings. I've been asked to schedule the majority of our servers to shutdown at midday tomorrow.

They already have a scheduled task for this, which occurred in the past, and occurred once only.

I simply need to update the date and time - they are already running as the local administrator account.

Is there a batch command to alter the date/time for these tasks on multiple servers?

I've added individual 301 redirect entries to .htaccess to redirect my old site's Mambo pages to the new site's Joomla pages, but the old URLs still generate 404 errors. Any ideas why? The format I used was:

Redirect 301 http://www.site.com/old.htm http://www.site.com/new.htm

I added these at the end of the .htaccess file.

I want to run my X-Cart website on my own local Wampserver, to trial if updating the X-Cart server breaks the website or not. The X-Cart version is 4.2.2.

When I run it on localhost, I receive the following error before the main content:

( ! ) Deprecated: Function set_magic_quotes_runtime() is deprecated in C:\wamp\www\hilla\prepare.php on line 52
Call Stack
#   Time    Memory  Function    Location
1   0.0362  380720  {main}( )   ..\home.php:0
2   0.0497  392656  require( 'C:\wamp\www\hilla\auth.php' ) ..\home.php:38
3   0.0713  399144  require( 'C:\wamp\www\hilla\preauth.php' )  ..\auth.php:45
4   0.0899  650648  include_once( 'C:\wamp\www\hilla\init.php' )    ..\preauth.php:51
5   0.0957  878200  require_once( 'C:\wamp\www\hilla\prepare.php' ) ..\init.php:41

Error: Smarty error: [in customer/home.tpl line 18]: syntax error: unrecognized tag 'var' (Smarty_Compiler.class.php, line 590) in C:\wamp\www\hilla\include\lib\smarty\Smarty.class.php on line 1092

The local WampServer has Apache Version: 2.2.17, PHP Version: 5.3.5 .

Does this mean set_magic_quotes_runtime() does not work with PHP v5.3.5 or more?

I'm not familiar with any software deployment tools we have here. It is a Windows domain with a Server 2003 domain controller.

The majority of remote and office PCs have versions of Acrobat Reader older than v10, and I want to remove them, and install v10.

Does MS provide any tools to do this? If not, are there free free deployment tools? We have a copy of the offline installer file on one of our servers.

I've moved my Wordpress from one domain to another, and I want the use .htaccess 301 redirects to redirect posts on the old domain to posts on the new domain.

My webhost suggested I try the following:

 Options +FollowSymlinks
 RewriteEngine On
 RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^(www\.)?steve\.doig\.com\.au/wordpress/$ [NC]
 RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.superlogical.net/$1 [R=301,L]

This works only for the /wordpress folder, but not for any of the category pages or posts.

What is wrong here?

I am trying to submit a post on www.technicalhelp.de, but I receive an error:

Invalid Session. Please resubmit the form.

This happens if I delete temporary internet files and log out and back in, and if I use a different browser, and if I use a proxy browser.

Perhaps someone on this forum can help

I am trying to push a Wyse device image to a USB thumb drive. The image is on a remote server, and the thumb drive is connected to my desktop PC. I am using Wyse Simple Imager to do this.

When I select the following: Product: V90 Image Version: 5.010627.512 Image File: \servername\folder\OLD_Rapport\V90-withusb\9V90.i2d

Almost instantly, without attempting any action, I receive the message:

WyseImager Unable to Create Product Directory. Add Image Failed

I have completely formatted the USB drive with FAT32. It is new out of the fox, and I can create folders in it.

How do I fix this?

I've opened the properties window of a folder to view it's security groups, but the security group names are too long to be fully readable in the security tab.

There is no way to resize the window.

Is there a logical purpose for this, or is it just designed to be a complete pain in the ass.

Happens on Win Server 2003, and Windows 7.

I'm new to server support; spending most of my time in desktop support.

I've been given a request to add read-only access to a list of subfolders on a Windows 2003 Server. Rather than adding the user into the security tab of each folder, is there a wizard or script I could use where I specify: user/folder/permissions, and click OK?

This would save a lot of time.