Forcing a cpanel reinstall

Written by Jason Kendall Wednesday, 20 October 2010 15:46

There comes a time in everyone's security life you need to rebuild a cpanel server.. i'm talking about the OS, whm/cpanel and it's modules.. not websites. I wanted to document the process I use to rebuild it:

1. Force an CentOS/Redhat Reinstall by:
   1. Create an empty directory: mkdir /tempreinstall
   2. CD into the new empty directory: cd /tempreinstall
   3. Force a Yum update: yum reinstall *
   4. delete the temp empty directory
2. Force cpanel to update with:
   

   /scripts/upcp --force

3. Force the webmail systems to update with:
   

   Roundcube:

   /usr/local/cpanel/bin/update-roundcube –-force

   Horde:

   /usr/local/cpanel/bin/update-horde –-force

   Squirrelmail

   /usr/local/cpanel/bin/update-squirrelmail –-force

4. Reinstall MySQL:
   

   /scripts/mysqlup --force

Your mileage may very, and you may run into issues on the OS reinstall.. so backup first.

Rick Rolled the Bots!

Written by Jason Kendall Tuesday, 10 August 2010 11:52

I do twitter, i post links to twitter. I wanted more details into my links I post into twitter, so I setup my own link shortener - shurls.ca. I notice, I get anywhere between 10 and 30 clicks to my links with in about 5 seconds after I post my tweet.. Light Bulb.. Breakage, Carnage Follows.

Yes, that is how I think. Sad, I know.

Anyway.. I start asking, what happens if I send a link, in a tweet, that just 301 redirects to it self? Yeah, evil.. So I send out this tweet:

I want to see what happens to bots when you put a self referring link in twitter - so don't click this: http://www.shurl.ca/roll - http://twitter.com/coolacid/status/20803314903

And the gory details followed.

With in about 30 seconds, I had about 300 hits, in under a minute, I decided to turn off the redirect, and redirect to something else before I got into trouble with my host :)

Final count: From 11:29:22 to 11:32:11 I had over a thousand hits.

Top 5 Bad IPs that just kept following:

538 - 64.74.98.14 - LinkedIn Corporation - LinkedInBot/1.0
109 - 68.40.195.13 - Comcast Cable Communications - PycURL/7.19.4
101 - 38.113.234.181 - PSINet - Voyager/1.0 - Possibly http://www.kosmix.com/
100 - 38.113.234.180 - PSINet - Voyager/1.0 - Possibly http://www.kosmix.com/
88 -  87.230.55.42 - Hosteurope GmbH - Blank -- Possibly http://popurls.com/

I'm sure more will be looked at at this topic..

Wikid Authentication Soft Token Client on Ubuntu

Written by Jason Kendall Thursday, 05 August 2010 20:24

This is a running document on trying to get the Wikid authentication client running on my Ubuntu system.

1. Download the client from http://www.wikidsystems.com/downloads/token-clients specifically Software token For Mac/Linux
2. First we need to install some dependencies, run: sudo apt-get install ibus
3. From a shell launch the installer with: java -jar {downloaded file}
4. Follow the on screen instructions
5. in the shell goto the installation directory and create a symbolic link from old .jar name to new: ln -s wikidtoken.jar jWiKID.jar
6. Test using the test site: http://www.wikidsystems.com/downloads/simple_reg_form/

*Note: Additional dependences my be required, as my Ubuntu already has a lot of extra applications (Including it's Kubuntu)

Warhammer Online - On linux

Written by Jason Kendall Monday, 03 May 2010 21:19

I'm going to try and document any issues I have while attempting to get warhammer online installed under linux with wine.

My first problem came because I was trying to install on /media/stuff - this is a different partition since my / (z:) drive was nearly full. Since wine doesn't update free space, and z: was almost full, I had to create a symbolic linl to the other directory.

Second problem came when attempting to choose a folder within now s: (/media/stuff) - I could only get the "The install folder is not valid" error message - in order to work around this error, just remove all the extra stuff after your path and make it warrhammer. I have a feeling it's either the spaces ' ' or the dash "-" that was causing the problem. In my case the final path was s:\games\warhammer - this then allowed me to click the install button.

I was then able to launch the game file - it downloaded some patches and restarted the game. After the game restart it asked for the user/password of the registered user and started downloading more files.

One item of note - the check boxes and other text on the patcher screen is not textured. I'm not sure why and can cause a number of flickering issues while the screen updates.

Primus Canada Termination Fee's?!

Written by Jason Kendall Friday, 29 January 2010 17:51

So - Last month I sat down with all my bills, and my computer to find a way to chop as much fat out of the bills as I can. I mean, everyone *should* be doing this at least one a year. In this case, Primus still have their unlimited North America Plans listed for 24.95 - They also charge a network access fee of about $4.00 or so. Thus, Primus comes out to about $30/month.

Bell, At this time provides a unlimited North America deal now for $22.95/month in a bell bundle. I have a home phone and satellite (I DO NOT WANT INTERNET FROM BELL). So I get that price, there is no *extra* access fee above the one I already pay for my land line.

I called bell to set this up, and a few days later It was complete. Little to my knowledge, Primus charges 1 month cancellation fee. I find this odd, since I'm not in a contract or anything. Alas, I'll call Primus and get this straitened out.

A few things:
1. I liked Primus, they were good to me before bell had their plan
2. I liked the air-miles, but really, 10 Air miles is nor worth $7/month
3. I would happily go back to Primus once they have a comparable plan
4. Both the Customer Rep and the supervisor were pleasant to talk too.. for the most part.

I begin the call with the CSR - After explaining my issues, there was no way he would even consider assisting with this problem. I'm not one to escalate my issue - I prefer not too, but I just don't feel this cancellation charge is just. So I ask for the supervisor. After talking with the supervisor she suggested that if I remain with Primus, we could wave the fee. I was a happy camper. I could stay with a company I prefer, keep getting my air miles, and save the money. Wait. Would I save the money? I flatly told out the supervisor that I would be happy to change back, however they would need to match the price bell was providing. She said she would look to find a plan.

After a few minutes on hold, she came back with a plan for $19.95/month + their monthly fee (What is with these fee's anyway?!) However, it gave unlimited calling to the US, and LD to Canada was X cents per minute. Wait, What!? This isn't the same plan. No where near it.

I calmly explain that this was unsatisfactory, and since this is tainting my relationship with Primus there is no way I would return to being a Primus customer, and will no longer recommend their services to others. At this point the supervisor would not entertain any other options. I thanked her for her time and hung up.

So thats my story. I'm still unsatisfied with the result, but alas, I will probably not be a Primus customer, and for obvious reasons, I will never recommend them to anyone.