No IE7 for Windows 2000 ?

This news was published last year but I just like featuring here as a reminder for me and for other readers. For those who are still using Windows 2000, there is bad news. The much-awaited IE 7 will not be available for Windows 2000 users. But why? I hear you ask. Microsoft said that:

"the task is too complex due to security features not available in the older operating system. Company officials also noted that Windows 2000 is moving into the "Extended" support phase of Microsoft's product lifecycle as of June 30, 2005."

"It should be no surprise that we do not plan on releasing IE7 for Windows 2000," IE program manager Chris Wilson wrote on the Internet Explorer Web log.

The above phrase clearly stated that Windows 2000 is an old operating system and MS will not support in the future (till 2010). IMHO, I think Windows 2000 is one of the stable OS ever built by MS. It is also used in many mission-critical servers all over the world. I once took classes of MCSE and the instructor use Windows 2000. It is stable and rock-solid especially if use in corporate environment and has a large userbase. But why MS don't want to release IE7 for Windows 2000 users? Why not MS listen to Windows 2000 users? Upgrading to XP involves buying a new OS and many reluctant to do it and especially when they look at many security problem of XP before. You may think that this is one of MS tactic to dominate OS market.

I am one of Windows 2000 users and also a big fan of Firefox. If MS doesn't want to release it for Windows 2000, I have firefox. We as a user, have many better choices. We just need to choose the right tool for what we want to achieve. Thank god we have open source apps that are more reliable with better support for open standard to choose from.

urpmi made easy - Step by step

Ok. to make easier for newbie, a step by step guide is preferable or a series of commands will make their life wonderful :). Here the shortcut for my previous post. You have to be root to run these commands.

urpmi.removemedia -a
urpmi.addmedia --update updates http://ftp.kddlabs.co.jp/Linux/distributions/Mandrake/official/updates/x86_64/2006.0/main_updates/ with media_info/hdlist.cz
urpmi.addmedia main http://ftp.kddlabs.co.jp/Linux/distributions/Mandrake/official/2006.0/x86_64/media/main with media_info/hdlist.cz
urpmi.addmedia contrib http://ftp.kddlabs.co.jp/Linux/distributions/Mandrake/official/2006.0/x86_64/media/contrib with media_info/hdlist.cz

Please notice any error produced. The server may experience busy traffic or it may be down. You should run the particular command once again. This time you have to choose another server. After all commands run successfully, you can install and update packages through internet by issuing :

urpmi name_of_package

That's all there is to it.

Easy installation and updates using urpmi

Mandriva

Mandriva (formerly known as Mandrake) is one of the famous Linux distribution on the planet. I like Mandriva a lot although sometimes it is not as stable as Slackware. Slackware known as one of the most stable distribution and also one of pioneers in Linux distribution world, is not easy for newbies in terms of installation and configuration but it is improving gradually. It still sticks to 2.4 vanilla kernel while other distributions using 2.6 for quite some time. 2.6 is offered as testing kernel only on Slackware. If I have old CPU, I for sure choose Slackware for it. For new machine, I choose Mandriva. If it fails, I revert to Slackware.

Entering 64-bit world

My new machine is a 64-bit. In searching for a 64-bit Linux distribution, I found out that Mandriva is the best (Note: Your mileage may vary). Latest is Mandriva 2006. It supports a variety of platforms including 64-bit. Installation went smoothly and hardwares were autodetected.

What I like the most with Mandriva is the packaging system urpmi and the variety of packages it has. After installation, if you want to install or remove packages, you can do it in console or using package manager in X. It will prompt you to insert the particular CDs if it has the packages on CDs. What if you lost the CDs? Don't panic. You can download the particular packages over the internet or you can tell urpmi to download the packages from a chosen mirrors and install them for you automatically.

urpmi made easy

If you have fast internet connection, you may want to install packages or update packages via internet. What you have to do is go to http://easyurpmi.zarb.org and answer few questions and then copy the commands in the console as root. It will update the media sources. You have to run urpmi.removemedia -a. If all runs well without any errors, you can just issue urpmi name_of_packages to install packages. Please choose the nearest mirror to your location for faster download.

I know Slackware has contributional utilities that can do the same as urpmi but I have never explored them yet. I hope someday. :) If you have experience with them, please give me the link.

Happy 'urpmi'ing :)

*UPDATE : In Slackware, there's equivalent utility called slapt-get. It is similar to apt-get in Debian and yum in Redhat-based distro.

Migrating mails from old server to new server

I have done migrating my users' mails to new server. dbmail saves all mails into database (in my case mysql), backing up and restoring should be trivial.

1. backup (using mysqldump)
~#mysqldump -u user -pPassword dbmail > dbmail.sql

2. restore
~#mysql -u user -pPassword dbmail < dbmail.sql

Voila. It's done!.

I have users' preferences and address books saved in database too. So the method of backing up and restoring to the new server should be the same.

Greylisting with postgrey - a spam fighter

Hi there! A couple of days ago, I have setup postgrey. It eliminated 99.9999% of spams entering my users' mailbox. The implementation of greylisting is done at MTA level (postfix) reducing my mailserver load (especially my spam filter). It is like the front-end spam filter before the spams got filtered by anti-spam if they can pass through. It is designed as a complement to existing defenses against spam, and not as a replacement. So far so good. For time being, I guess no spam ever reach my users' mailbox as I went through a couple of test accounts.

*Note: There's one caveat - Greylisting delays all unknown e-mail, not just spam.

The source came with contributed script for reporting. Check it out to see whether your policy really works.

For those new to this, read below:

Your question : What in the hell is postgrey?
My Answer : Postgrey is a Postfix policy server implementing greylisting

Your question : What in the hell is greylisting?
My answer : (see below - taken from here )

Greylisting is a new method of blocking significant amounts of spam at the mailserver level, but without resorting to heavyweight statistical analysis or other heuristical (and error-prone) approaches. Consequently, implementations are fairly lightweight, and may even decrease network traffic and processor load on your mailserver.

Greylisting relies on the fact that most spam sources do not behave in the same way as normal mail systems. Although it is currently very effective by itself, it will perform best when it is used in conjunction with other forms of spam prevention. For a detailed description of the method, see the Whitepaper.

The term Greylisting is meant to describe a general method of blocking spam based on the behavior of the sending server, rather than the content of the messages. Greylisting does not refer to any particular implementation of these methods. Consequently, there is no single Greylisting product. Instead, there are many products that incorporate some or all of the methods described here.

Your question : How does it work actually?
My answer : (see below - taken from wikipedia)

Typically, a server that utilizes greylisting will record the following three pieces of information (known as a triplet) for each incoming mail message:

• The IP address of the connecting host.
• The envelope sender address.
• The envelope recipient address.

This is checked against the mail server's internal whitelist. If any of this information has never been seen before, the email is greylisted for a set period of time (how much time is dependent on the server configuration), and it is refused with a temporary rejection. The assumption is that since temporary failures are built into the RFC specifications for e-mail delivery, a legitimate server will attempt to connect again later on to deliver the e-mail. Don't forget there's still many mailservers do not conform to the RFC.

Greylisting is effective because many mass e-mail tools utilized by spammers are not set up to handle deferrals (they will never bother to retry a failed delivery), so the spam is never delivered.

More information can be obtained here

Your question : Can I use Greylisting on my personal mail account?

My answer : Because Greylisting methods are designed to work at the mail server level, unless you have control of your own mail server, or your ISP has installed a Greylisting implementation for you, you will not be able to take advantage of Greylisting.

Resources:

1. postgrey home
2. postfix greylisting policy
3. What is greylisting?
   

*UPDATE: I just found a better greylisting solution : sqlgrey.

Firefox 1.5.0.1 released

Get the latest stable and security update of Firefox browser here.


What's new in this release.

* Improved stability.
* Improved support for Mac OS X.
* International Domain Name support for Iceland (.is) is now enabled.
* Fixes for several memory leaks.
* Several security enhancements.

Read the release notes.

My New 1U HP server

This month I got my new server which I want to setup it as my mail server. It is an HP Proliant DL 140 Generation 2. It is a 1U type server. It fits the rack server nicely. This type of machine (I mean the 1U type) surprised me coz I never setup Linux on this *fancy* machine. I just thought that it should be the same as the normal-looking one ,lol. It is except one thing. It has SATA RAID controller. I haven't start installing an OS on it coz I haven't had a clue on how to setup one without CDROM. What? I hear you say. Yes. It has no CDROM. It only has CDROM bay. Damn!. I never checked the spec carefully. I should have known better.

I went to the supplier this afternoon and ordered a DVD-ROM drive. I learned something from this case. I should have checked the spec carefully. Damn!!.