A Technical Guy’s Blog

I bought a new Linksys ADSL modem (AM300) to replace the faulty modem came together when I signed up my Streamyx Corporate ADSL package with fixed one fixed IP address.

It was indeed a nightmare. It is definitely not a plug-and-play task. TM’s technician wasn’t turn out too after filing the support ticket. Over the last 24 hours, I called my friends, stranger’s phone number which I found from some don’t-know-what forums, asking their helps. Many articles I found online are not updated and this only add to my confusion and more time to restart my modem with random and unsure settings.

The following are steps which I have confirmed and I really hope that it can help someone out there. I am using Linksys AM300 (yeah again, never listed in the list of Streamyx Supported Modem). Who cares, if you are using Dlink, Aztech or any other ADSL modems - I am sure they work too!

1) Call 1300-88-9515 Streamyx Support (they require some verification like your company address and ROC, etc. I must admit, their call centre are supportive). Request for your username and password. This is crucial, you don’t want to bang on wrong login just in case. My account was registered since year 2005. I am not sure if the new Streamyx Fix IP Package are changed to xxxx@streamyx, but I am sure (confirmed by their call centre) my username is xxxx@tmnet (1001% sure). Also ask for your IP addreses. They will tell you two IP address, with only last digit different. Eg 60.49.166.105 & 60.49.166.106.

2) Unpack your new modem (forget about the bundled quick start CD). Connect your new modem to your PC, instead of the router. For Linksys AM300, enter 192.168.1.1 in your web browser. Use the default login admin/admin to access the web admin. Remember to enable DHCP in your PC, or you will not able to access the web admin.

3) I have circle (in grey) those fields that you need to change. If you are using different modem, please make sure you have chosen PPPOA (Not PPPOE), LLC (not VC), VPI 0 (Must), VCI 35 (Must). Your modem IP is the one with smaller number (in my case, it is 60.49.166.105), and enter Netmask as 255.255.255.252 (if Streamyx gives you 5 fixed IPs, chances you need to modify this).

4) Tricky part now. Make sure you have Operation Mode (or whatever similiar) set as Router (Not Gateway). Also remember to disable NAT. Many online tutorial never explain about this.

If you are not able to access the Web Admin after saving the changes, try disable DHCP in your PC and use 60.49.166.106 (in your case, it would be the IP with bigger number), netmask 255.255.255.252, gateway 60.49.166.105 and DNS (202.188.0.133, 202.188.1.5)

In case you still have any problem, you can call my friend Aiktern (012-7073993). Or you can post your question here, and I will try to see how I can help.

Google Chrome is a browser that combines a minimal design with sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer, and easier.

We use online forms to capture leads, from enquiries to successful sales order. Have you ever wonder what if the delivery mechanism fail and the leads are not delivered to you?

See, submission are sent to you by email. What if the email agent used by your online form is not working as expected? Will you be informed if the email was not sent successfully? As online forms taking care of all the important sales conversion, it is important for you to understand how it works.

Using built-in SMTP

If your website is hosted in a Linux server (you can tell if your website ends with .php, in most case), changes you are using Sendmail as the email agent of your online forms. Sendmail do trigger Error message if a message failed to deliver for some reasons. Anyway, the messages will go to the administrator of the server, not you - most of the time.

Another problem with build-in SMTP server is, when your web hosting and email hosting are in the same server. Your web form will most likely ’smart’ enough to route the submission of online forms to your mailbox. This will cause problem if you have some changes to your Mail Exchange pointing.

Using external SMTP

Just imagine the online form is now your email clients, such as Outlook Express. Everytime, an enquiry waiting to be delivered to you, your online form will connect to a specified SMTP, authorized as usual, and get the message delivered to you. You will have more control in this case, and your email hosting service provider will most likely provide you some status report for the uptime of your email server.

If your web hosting costs you around RM200-300 a year, chances are that it’s a shared basis. Perhaps I’m wrong. Dividing the yearly price to 12 months, I doubt how an average of RM20 monthly web hosting fee is enough to cover the cost of server hardware, bandwidth, co-location and even the unlimited mailbox account offered. That is barely enough for a McD set.

Where goes wrong then?

Forget about the page-long list of feature of those web hosting plan. Look for ‘Monthly data transfer’ and ‘No of website per server’. If you can find them, chances that you are in the right direction. Vaguely still, both offering tricky measurement which sounds to me like finding a virgin in a brothel.

It would be easier to put it this way

1) First offer allows you to stay in a hotel for X amount of days in a month. But didn’t tell you the fact that another 100 people are getting the same offer, and the hotel has just one room! - Monthly data transfer

2) Second offer limits to X amount of people who get the offer, but didn’t mention about the number of days each person will stay in this one-room hotel - No of website per server

What can I do?

Find out number of rooms. In this case, it is the dedicated bandwidth assigned to each website, not server. Remember, shared basis servers host not just your website. It makes huge differences here. A shared 1Mbps for 10 websites may be slower than single website with dedicated 256Kbps bandwidth.

Find out number of days one can stay in your second offer. In this case, check out the ‘Compute Cycles’ offered. It measures how much the processing time your application required in a server. 10,000 compute cycles are roughly equivalent to the monthly capacity of a server with a server with 1.2GHz modern processor. For example, a website with only static pages consumes less compute cycles than a website with shopping cart applications.

Is your website loading slow?

I see big corporate website paying as little as RM20 a month for their online infrastructure including email & web hosting (some with domain as well). I bet this amazing offer answer to the question above.

Sorry to have sound a little harsh in the title. Trust me, if there are only two last DNS servers to use, check out OpenDNS. The nameservers are 208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220. Forget about our local ISPs’ DNS servers. They are geographically near you, but that doesn’t mean they are realiable!

DNS is important. A good one log you into your server without delay, resolving your web address in your web browser quicker! Yet, our local ISPs never seem to take care of this seriously. Your router, computers, servers around you require a pair of reliable DNS servers.

Change your DNS now:

1) In your Router

Enable OpenDNS in your router so every computer benefits. The OpenDNS website is kind enough to list every model of router and guide you through the process. Stop using the famous Streamyx’s DNS servers (202.188.0.133 & 202.188.1.5).

2) In your Computer

If you’re connecting to Internet directly without a router, you can enter OpenDNS’s DNS servers into your computer, instead of using ‘obtain DNS server address automatically’. This also applies to those on Wireless broadband such as Celcom and Maxis 3G, etc.

3) In your Server

For example, if you have Linux installed in your server, include OpenDNS’s DNS servers to /etc/resolv.conf. I’m using TM’s DNS earlier and my dig and host command stop responding when TM’s DNS server decided to go teh tarik…

About OpenDNS

From the way how OpenDNS manage their website, showing the uptime of their globally loacated servers - rest assure this is the last time to change your DNS!

Thanks to ChoonKeng for sharing this useful information with me. He just attended the HostingCon in the US a few weeks ago.

It is report of survey with more than 390 responces on consumer & provider trend and observations & opportunities of web hosting industries.

Web Hosting Talk 2008 Survey Results
Web Hosting Talk 2008 Presentation

Most recent Dell notebook comes with SATA harddrive and Windows Vista preloaded. For those who wish to install Windows XP over Vista, you might run into problems because your XP CD doesn’t come with SATA driver support.

In other words, you will get an error message of disk can not found when booting your XP installation CD. To fix this,

1. Copy ALL content in your Windows XP CD into your computer
2. Go to Dell Support to download SATA Driver for your notebook model (under Windows XP)
3. Follow this guide to Slipstreaming SATA driver into XP bootable CD using nLite
4. nLite create the new image file burn into a bootable new XP CD with SATA support!

Ubuntu is a community developed operating system that is perfect for laptops, desktops and servers. Whether you use it at home, at school or at work Ubuntu contains all the applications you’ll ever need, from word processing and email applications, to web server software and programming tools.

Request a free CD - Request a free Ubuntu, Edubuntu or Kubuntu CD from Canonical. Delivery typically takes 6-10 weeks. You can use each CD as many times as you like - you are free to use it on as many computers as you wish and to pass on to others.

P/s, just received the CD from Ubuntu, sent from UK. Through, due to the mass production, it is wee bit outdated version, but definitely save me a lot of time than downloading and built my own CD.

I always believe running a web hosting business is not easy. You can have a Plesk system to manage your web hosting customers, but you can’t easily filter out those customers who are abusing your web server, running malicious script that loop forever in your server…

Yet, price war makes business owner to believe that monthly web hosting fee should not be any expensive than buying a McD meal. You will be surprised that many online business owners are subscribing to cutting-throat web hosting package, while hoping their online business to grow as second Google.

Share with us your hosting experience

One of my client received an email from someone called Stan Nonin. Apparently, this new phishing works by telling by client that his domain will expire soon next month. Actual fact is, the domain name is actually expiring next year. Stan then made an offer to buy over the domain name.

To verify the actual date of your domain name expiring date, you can use this Free WHOIS tool from DNSStuff.com. Verify now!

If you’re still not sure, leave it as comment here and I will try to verify for you and help!

Do you know how to register for a car plate number? Or getting your first insurance policy without a insurance agent? Well, there are many things that we believe it is way too complicated and we usually leave it to others, and have them get it done for us.

This happens to domain name as well. Usually, this was done by web developers or your web & email hosting service providers. Therefore few things that you need to know for the very least!

1. Domain name ownership. How do you know if a domain name was registered under your name? Registration information of a domain name are freely available to the public through WHOIS. For all .my domain name owner, please use MyNIC’s WHOIS for most updated information. For other domain name such as .com, you can try DNS Stuff’s WHOIS. Enter your domain name and search. From the WHOIS result, make sure you name or company name are in the Administrator / Admin Contact section. You must make sure you can access to the email address listed under the Administrator section too!

2. Cost of registration. Generally speaking, .com cost around RM55 a year, while .com.my cost around RM100 a year. Your agent get commissions from the Registrar and their price to you should not exceed the said figures.

3. What is DNS address? When register any domain name, one need to provide the DNS address to complete the registration. Well, it is okey if you’re not sure what is DNS, and your agents can handle this for you. This does not affect ownership. It is more on resolving or pointing (layman terms) of your domain name to specific IP address.

4. Renewal. Well, a responsible agents should always remind you one month before the domain name expires. If you are those last minutes person, chances you can are safe with those slow registrar such as MyNIC (they allow at least 2 weeks before releasing your domain name to the public). While those strict one, will put you under retention and you may need to pay extra to unlock.

5. What documents do I need? Well, a .com domain name do not need any. Anyway, if you are registering a country-based domain name such as .com.my or .com.sg, you need ROC in most case. Well, the rules are continuously reviewed (to a more loosen process, for sure). Domain name is a lucrative business for all registrar, they want your business :)

If you need some suggestion and hints of choosing a good name for your online business:
It’s never too late to change a bad name
A name for your online business…

One thing I’ve noticed over the months, it seems that keywords relating to ’streamyx’ are relatively popular, especially on network setup, fixed IP, Streamyx DNS, etc. I’ve been using Streamyx when it first launched.

This is definitely not another pay-per-post article, or a replacement of FAQ to Streamyx official website. I wish my little share can help.

Advantage of signing up fixed IP package
Streamyx offers their broadband packages in fixed or dynamic IP package. Fixed one is generally more expensive even with same bandwidth. If you run some file server or VPN and would like to allow outside access, you might need this. One good thing is, my office subscribed to fixed IP package for roughtly more than 5 years and the IP address never changed. If you are looking for how to setup the ADSL Modem for Streamyx Fixed IP Package, check this out.

What is the DNS of Streamyx
Most people search for the DNS of Streamyx. I guess this is because you want to key in into your Router and make resolving faster. Check this out, TM’s primary nameserver (202.188.0.133) and secondary nameserver (202.188.1.5). If you need alternate nameserver of other network provider, or as the third and forth DNS in your router, or for some reason your TM’s DNS servers are down - check this out.

How to check Streamyx Email?
When you sign up with Streamyx, you get an email automatically. Through we don’t suggest you to use it, simply because it is not reliable and has serious Spam problem. If you need a email solution for your business, check this out. If you just need a Free email for your own personal use, sign up one from Gmail. Still, the quickest way to retrieve your Streamyx email is to go to webmail.tm.net.my, enter your username (xxxx@streamyx.com) and password. If you want to setup your email in your email clients, both the incoming and outgoing mail servers are pop.streamyx.com and smtp.streamyx.com respectively. I couldn’t find Lost Password in Streamyx FAQ. If you lost your password, please call Streamyx directly.

I can’t send out my email?
Streamyx is blocking all SMTP server in its network except their own, which is smtp-proxy.tm.net.my. In TM’s press release, it is a measure to fight Spam filter our messages. This has created lot of email problem, check this out.

What can I do when my broadband is down?
Most of the time, you can fix the problem by restarting your router. Ask your neighbour, if the whole area is out of service, chances nothing wrong to your router. You can lodge a report with Streamyx, write down the case number and you can request for a refund/compensation to the downtime. I tried, it works. The rebate some in your next month bill.

How to setup Router?
Nowadays, you get a free Router with build in modem. If you have only one PC and you are fine without wireless, chances that you just need to plug and play and setup should be pretty easy. But, most of the time, this is not the case. Many of you prefer a wireless environment. Remember to buy wireless router with build in modem, so that you don’t have to use the one comes with TM. But, if your router doesn’t come with build in modem, then you will need to connect your router to TM’s modem. In this case, remember to disable the router capability in your TM’s modem, this is crucial to your Streamyx network setup.

ADSL Modem Setup for Streamyx with Fixed IP

A stranger was seated next to a little girl on the airplane when the stranger turned to her and said, ‘Let’s talk. I’ve heard that flights go quicker if you strike up a conversation with your fellow passenger’

The little girl, who had just opened her book, closed it slowly and said to the stranger, ‘What would you like to talk about?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said the stranger. ‘How about nuclear power?’ and he smiles.

‘OK,’ she said. ‘That could be an interesting topic. But let me ask you a question first. A horse, a cow, and a deer all eat the same stuff - grass - Yet a deer excretes little pellets, while a cow turns out a flat patty, and a horse produces clumps of dried grass. Why do you suppose that is?’

The stranger, visibly surprised by the little girl’s intelligence, thinks about it and says, ‘Hmmm, I have no idea.’

To which the little girl replies, ‘Do you really feel qualified to discuss nuclear power when you don’t know shit?’

Google sent their web crawler to index your website. It follows every link found in your page. Therefore, it is important to learn how Google’s crawlers look and inspect your web files. The crawler, runs in a Lynx-like web browser mode, only in Text mode.

This means, they see text, not pictures. They can easily get confuse when you have intensive Javascript running in your website.

In a Dynamic Page where most of the content are extrated from a backend database on the fly, the page would usually load slower. One of the reason, everytime the page loads, it has to connect to the database, retrieve data and display it on the page. Depending on how frequent the data in the database change. If it does not updated often, you can export those data to XML format. The said dynamic page, instead of loading data from database, will call to this XML file and retrieve the data - usually much faster. Basically, each time the page runs, it make sure today’s date is not older than the last modified date of the XML file. If yes, the page will request the database to create new and updated XML file.

Said you have a website and you wish to always total number of people login in a day. Well, total number, in most case, means you will have to go through the whole database and get this amount base on the total number of data found. Well, if this info needs to be shown in every page, it would be excessive load to the server. What you can do is, each time when new data inserted to the said database, update a field by increment the total number directly.

Most of the website can be accessed by adding a www to the front of domain name, and without. For example, you can visit technicalguy.org or www.technicalguy.org to visit the same website.

Technically speaking, website address is used to point to an IP. To direct visitors typing the URL to the correct web server located on different IP. You can view both URL as two different address, pointing to same IP.

In most case, you should define a master one, which I suggest to be the one with www. Then, point the one without to the main one using redirect 301, which is much friendly for search engines.

As when Wordpress getting more and more popular, upgrading more than one WordPress can take up lot of effort and can not be done loosely. Web hosting companies who provide hosted WordPress, particularly find it hard to manage all.

In the other hand, CPanel provides a quick way to manage multiple web hosting account in one server, but also means less technical handson on the backend of your server. I personally prefer running and managing my server without a third party control panel such as CPanel.

We have done an installation of single WordPress to support more than 5,000 Blogs. We use MultiBlog script, modified and it works greatly!

You get more than just signals! Well, this lovely website give you the ideas of who is hosted in he same server as yours. Before subscribing to a web hosting package, check this out. If the server has less website shared, it would be better. Having hundred over website (or even thousand, I came across it before), can be a rish!

Unless it was running on a load-balancing server, without single IP published. This is an exception!

List of Commands

Add New User

/usr/sbin/groupadd <groupname>
/usr/sbin/useradd <username> –g <groupname>
chown <username>.<groupname> /path/to/usernamefolder
chmod 755 /path/to/usernamefolder

Set User Password

passwd <yourusername>
<enter new password>
<enter again new password>

Check RPM Status

rpm –q <rpmname>
Eg. rpm –q imap

Extract a .tar File

tar –zxvf <filename>

Manual on a Specific Command

man <command>
Eg. man sendmail

End a Session

Ctrl + Z

./<command>

[root@kuittho /usr]# ./edquota
Specifies that the command edquota is located inside current folder […]

Configure Virtual Server as Zope Server

Download current version of Python (2.3.5 or later) from http://www.python.org/download/.
wget –P /usr/src/ http://www.python.org/ftp/python/version/Python-version.tgz

Unpack and install current version of Python (2.3.5 or later). Using the instructions in README.txt.
tar –zxvf /usr/src/Python-version.tgz
cd /usr/src/Python-version
./configure
make
make install

Download current version of Zope (2.7.8 or later) from http://www.zope.org/Products.
wget –P /usr/src/ http://www.zope.org/Products/Zope/version/Zope-version-final.tgz

Download current version of Zope (2.7.8 or […]