Author: Bill

Modifying sntp to use pool.ntp.org

While I was looking at my Fedora installation I noticed that they used something called pool.ntp.org to find available time servers. This looks pretty cool! Figuring out which time server to use has always been a bit funky. I ended up setting my SBS2K3 server to use us.pool.ntp.org which should be a pool of available time servers in the US. I was tempted to use a server list like “0.us.pool.ntp.org 1.us.pool.ntp.org 2.us.pool.ntp.org”. This server list is what they used in Fedora. I finally decided to make sure that the simplest solution worked.

Fedora Core 4 Installation Notes

Fedora Core 4 Installation Notes

Here is a nice set of instructions for customizing Fedora 4. I found this page by searching for Azureus and fedora. I used the instructions to update the Java JRE and install Azureus and the BitTorrent GUI. I had to modify the iptables instructions since I used a different port and my ISA2004 firewall was denying port 6868. Azureus uses 6868 to look for program updates. Startup was taking a real long time since it was waiting for the program update check to complete or timeout.

RE: The Best Platform For Small Business Server 2003

Microsoft’s Small Business Server 2003 allows even small organizations to implement servers that provide big organization benefits. We discuss tips and ideas for balancing power, price and priorities.

[Via Tom’s Hardware Guide: Articles]

A nice SBS article that highlights the impact dual core technology on low cost server solutions. I have been really interested in dual core systems since I know that dual cpu systems work well with SBS. I run an old dual 700 MHz CPU server with SBS Premium. I originally ran the system with a single CPU since I am pretty price sensitive on a home server. When I bought a second CPU off of Ebay I was impressed with the performance improvement. The second CPU reduced the processing queue since the applications like Exchange and SQL Server are designed for multi-processors. My best guess is that a dual CPU/core system will degrade nicely under heavier loads. The Pentium D processor is particularly attractive at this price point since dual Xeon processors are more than twice as expensive. This extends the low cost servers to a slightly larger sized user base with adequate response time.

Needing to use Exmerge to move mailboxes and mail from one server to another?

Needing to use Exmerge to move mailboxes and mail from one server to another?

I started out investigating Best Practices for VSS. I moved the Shadow copies over to my backup disk drive. During my investigation I noticed that Ntbackup does not use the VSS writer provided with Exchange. Hmm… Since I was learning more about Exchange backup then I intended to, I decided to investigate/run Exmerge. The Diva’s instructions were a little better for me than Petri. I have always liked “brick level” backups but I have never had the need on my home server. Backup Exec is the preferred solution but Exmerge will do for those on a budget.

Reading the box helps you find security problems

Recently I was working at our local Habitat office and I noticed that our PCs could not see each other. After some research I discovered that they were using some unusual IP addresses(i.e. not private ips like 192.168.x.x or 10.x.x.x). Technically the PCs were on different subnets. I asked the guy who should know and he said that there was a router/firewall on the network but he didn’t know how to get to it. I tracked the cables back to the switch and found the switch connected directly to the DSL modem. There wasn’t any router/firewall! The box the switch came in was on the shelf. I was not surprised to find that it did not have a firewall. Well, that explained a lot of things! Both the guy who told me about the network and I thought the network box was a simple router with a firewall. Today I am donating and installing a new Linksys multifunction router. As treasurer for the affiliate I am not happy finding the network exposed like this but I know that will end today.

Vladville – IMF 2 in Exchange 2003 SP2

Vladville – IMF 2 in Exchange 2003 SP2

While Exchange 2003 SP2 installs IMF by default, it does not automatically enable it.

I hadn’t seen too many complaints so while my disk space on C drive was under control I decided to upgrade to Exchange 2003 SP2. The only problems I had were:

  1. I needed to uninstall IMF V1 before install would proceed.
  2. Install asked me for permission to overwrite newer, common MSSearch files.

After I rebooted I looked for changes in Exchange. I did not see any. I was curious about IMF and Sender ID so I searched for info and found this article on how to configure IMF 2. I have both IMF 2 and sender ID enabled. I have not been able to find any sender ID status flags in the Outlook. I kind of hoped that Outlook would display that info.

Screwing up Sharepoint and finally fixing it

While I was trying to deal with low disk space on my server’s C drive I decided to delete some old programs and webparts. I removed an old Leadit RSS webpart and a little while later I found that my default sharepoint site was broken. The error message complained about needing the Leadit RSS assembly. It took me quite awhile for me to figure out where I needed to delete the reference to the old assembly. It was located in the default.asp which is available via FrontPage 2003. I tried commenting out the line in the html code but it did not work for me until I deleted the statements.

Low disk space alert on C drive

I have been battling a low disk space alert on the C drive on my SBS server for the last couple of days. The problem is that my disk space on the C drive should not be changing. Most of my databases and user files are on a different partition. I eventually found the culprit, sbsmonitoring. For some unknown reason the sqlagent for sbsmonitoring was set to manual and was not running. I guess that sbsmonitoring has an SQL maintenance plan that cleans up and optimizes the database every day. After a couple of days the sbsmonitoring database and log files are much smaller.

Ubuntu – Ubuntu 5.10 Released

Ubuntu – Ubuntu 5.10 Released

The Ubuntu team is proud to announce Ubuntu 5.10. This is the official Ubuntu 5.10 release, and includes installation CDs, live CDs, and combination DVDs for three architectures.

I downloaded the latest x86 version this week for kicks. I liked the previous version but I seem to remember having trouble booting the live version on one of my PCs. This version did not have a problem with my PCs. It did seem to run slowly on the AMD3000 PC but I suspect the AMD version would be much faster. The menus are almost identical to my version of Fedora FC4.

To mount my existing Fedora LVM I used the following commands:

sudo mkdir /media/hdb
sudo lvdisplay
sudo mount /dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00 /media/hdb

To mount my existing NTFS partition I used the following commands:

sudo mkdir /media/windows
sudo mount /dev/hda1 /media/windows/ -t ntfs -o nls=utf8,umask=0222

RE: I swear ..if any SBSer downloads this during lunchtime…

Yes the Exchange 2003 sp2 just RTMs as reported live by HappyFunBoy.

Download details: Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 :

And … if I hear of any SBSer downloading this during their lunch hour and installing it……… where’s my 2×4?

Remember Exchange updates are ONE WAYS…that means you have yourself a good backup.

Yes, this means we can now store 75 gigs of junk mail, but READ and understand first and TEST THIS SUCKER. Yes, it’s supported on SBS but yo, folks… this isn’t a rush to see who can install it the fastest and blow up their production machines.

Make a backup of that Exchange first please, okay?

Homework first….

You Had Me At EHLO… : More details on Standard DB limit size increase in Exchange 2003 SP2:
http://blogs.technet.com/exchange/archive/2005/09/14/410821.aspx

You Had Me At EHLO… : Storage limit changing in Exchange 2003 SP2 Standard:
http://blogs.technet.com/exchange/archive/2005/06/06/405933.aspx

[Via E-Bitz – SBS MVP the Official Blog of the SBS “Diva”]

Enough said! I can wait for other people to take the plunge.

Easy Time & Billing with SharePoint, Outlook, & Excel (and VSTO too!)

Easy Time & Billing with SharePoint, Outlook, & Excel (and VSTO too!)

I thought this would be an easy project for me but I could not create an Outlook Addin project! It kept telling me I needed to install Outlook 2003 SP1 or newer despite the fact that I had Outlook 2003 SP2 installed. I reinstalled VSTO and Outlook without success. I guess this is why they call it beta.

Booting Linux

Since I was in an updating mood I went ahead and updated my Fedora 4 distribution. When I rebooted I went into W2K and copied the linux.bin file from the floppy over. When I rebooted and selected Linux it hung up going into GRUB. So I recreated my boot floppy using the Fedora rescue cd and the following commands:

grub-install /dev/fd0
mkdir /mnt/floppy
mount -t msdos /dev/fd0 /mnt/floppy
dd if=/dev/hdb1 of=/mnt/floppy/linux.bin bs=512 count=1

I copied the linux.bin over to my c drive under w2K and modified the boot.ini file. Now when I boot I get a MS boot menu with a linux option.

WSUS and MBSA

I think it was last week when I made the changes to the WSUS configuration so that the clients would use SSL. Everything kind of worked but I was not happy. Today I finally got everything to work as expected. The first annoyance was to enable “Display mixed content” for Intranet sites so that I would stop seeing the popup everytime I went into WSUSAdmin using https. The next configuration change was more subtle. I could not go into WSUSAdmin with a fully qualified domain name when I cranked up the browser on my server. I would get a 502 error complaining about https traffic should be on 443. I think this same problem kept MBSA from downloading the latest updates file since it was probably using port 8531, too. The problem was probably related to my IE proxy setup. I had set this manually when I installed the server. Since then I had successfully verified that my automatic configuration with wpad.dat was working. So I set the IE LAN Setting to automatically detect the settings. I can now go into WSUSAdmin. MBSA works correctly, too! At least for me I found that if I can go into WSUSAdmin via https on port 8531 I have the WSUS client set up correctly. I still need to work on distributing the certificate to new clients.

I had been monitoring WSUS ever since Office 2K3 SP2 was released. I was looking for it to appear as a package needing approval. I did find it today but it had been disapproved. I wonder how that happened? Hmm!

This whole episode started off this morning when I noticed that my PC had rebooted. I forgot that I had set it up to automatically install critical updates at 3 AM. I did confirm that I configured WSUS to automatically approve critical updates.

Office 2K3 SP2 problems

I was investigating why WSUS did not show this service pack as being needed yesterday. I cannot say I got very far with this before I finally gave up. So I downloaded the “client” version from Microsoft. I was thinking that I would eventually update my client software on my server with this version so I might as well get it now. It did not work! It said that it could not be applied. Huh? So I went over to Officeupate and tried to update with it. The donwload worked but the installation failed! So I downloaded the “full” version from Microsoft. It worked! I have seen some posts on a variety of Office 2K3 SP2 installation problems.

GPG/PGP Basics

GPG/PGP Basics

Okay, I knew less than I thought about GPG! The above link was helpful. GPGee may need to be configured. I did not get the comment info in the verify command initially so I configured GPGee. After I got the info, I cleared out the configuration parameters as a test. It was still ok. Here are some of the GPG commands I needed to refresh my memory on:

  1. gpg –refresh-keys –keyserver pgp.mit.edu
  2. gpg –import kurt.asc
  3. gpg –edit-key kurt@somebody.org
  4. The search pages for keyservers did not find my public key until I put the 0x at the front of uid. When in doubt use the email address!
  5. I actually was not able to verify my exported public key with the –verify command. I got an error about unexpected data. Huh?

Despite my obvious stumbles with GPG, GPGee works as advertised and it should make working with GPG signatures practically painless.

RE: GnuPG Explorer Extension (GPGee) version 1.2.1 released

Version 1.2.1 of GPGee has now been released and is available at…

[Via GnuPG.org]

This is the first time I have seen GPGee. It is an Explorer extension that makes using GnuPG much easier to use. Just right-click and pick GPGee-Verify/Decrypt to check the signature for the file. This is slick! Since I had not used GnuPG since I re-installed my OS, I had to install GnuPG and restore my keyrings. Since I used the default locations for GnuPG and my keyrings, GPGee did not have any problem finding them. It is nice when you do not have to configure a utility. This utility makes it considerably less painful to GnuPG in a windows environment.

RE: How To: Asterisk Answering Machine

While using Asterisk to answer your calls is admittedly overkill, it’s a great way to get acquainted with this powerful open source VoIP application. Matt Kaatman takes you step-by-step through the process.

[Via Tom’s Hardware Guide: Articles]

I have to admit that I am interested in Asterisk despite it potentially becoming quite a distraction. This article gets closer to the problems I am interested in. Here are some features I would like implemented.

  1. I would like my phone to not wring when telemarketers call. This would generally mean that the phones without caller id or come in with “toll free” or “out of area” would get a voice prompt rather than a ring.
  2. I would like to add to known numbers to a telemarketers list.
  3. I would like my distinctive ring number for my fax to not ring, too. It should be forwarded directly to an extension or fax server.

I have a low need for VOIP at this time but it might be nice to have a VOIP number for business phone calls. Although I like Matt’s minimalist approach in this article, I think I would still prefer to run Asterisk At Home since it is bundled with the OS.