Apr 23
The Groupwise client for linux comes as an .rpm file, which installs into Suse and RedHat linux just fine, but not Debian. Here’s how to install Groupwise into Debian.
First, install the rpm package installer
apt-get install alien
Next, install the necessary files to run groupwise
apt-get install gcc
apt-get install libstdc++5
Next, install java from ww.java.com following the included directions
Finally, install groupwise
alien -i –scripts novell-groupwise-gwclient.i386.rpm
A Groupwise launcher should be on the desktop now or groupwise can be called directly from /opt/novellgroupwise
Apr 14
With the URLfilter addon installed, an IPcop firewall can be turned into a free content-filtering web gateway perfect for a church, non-profit organization or home office. Access to inappropriate sites whether they be pornagraphic or just not work-related will be denied automatically at the firewall. Both IPcop and URLfilter are free to download and use.
Why IPcop?
IPcop differs from most internet routers and firewalls because it has proxy software built-in. At first glance, a proxy server doesn’t do anything more than a standard router. Both will allow multiple computers inside the network to access websites on the internet, but a proxy servers looks at the actual web address in order to get a web page. For example, a standard router will recognize that a computer is visiting a website out on the internet whereas a proxy server understands that a computer is visiting www.MSN.com/music or www.msn.com/jobs. By looking at the full web address, IPcop can create internet access logs accurate down to the actual web page that was visited. IPcop and other free firewalls are compared in this article.
Another handy trick that IPcop can do is proxy web traffic transparently. Most proxy servers require users to make configuration changes to Internet Explorer or Firefox to use them, but that is not the case with IPcop. Web traffic can be proxied, logged and filtered without any configuration at the workstation and most users will never know that their web traffic is being analyzed. If a network administrator is just interested in keeping a detailed web access log, then IPcop can do that by? default. URL Filter adds the filtering capability.
Why URL filter?
URL filter (Short for Universal Resource Locater Filter) just adds a module to IPcop that helps it make decisions on whether to process a computer request for a web page. It makes decisions two ways. It keeps a list of known unacceptable websites and blocks those and it keeps a list of bad words and blocks anything with one of those bad words in the name. URL filter can be configured to download new lists of bad words and sites automatically.
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Mar 24
Firewall companies have a little secret that they do not want you know: most of their software is based on free open source software. What you pay the firewall companies for is the assembly of the software, an intuitive interface and professional technical support. And what they really want to keep a secret is the fact that several free firewall distributions assemble the software and create an intuitive interface for free also.
Using one of these free firewall systems will give you many great business class features without the hefty business class price tag. These firewalls are a perfect choice for small businesses on a shoestring budget.
Why Upgrade to Open Source?
Increased Bandwidth: Most home routers have enough horsepower for a standard cable or DSL connection, but may slow you down on new ultra-high connections like Verizon’s FIOS or ATT’s Uverse.
Upgraded connections limits: Internet routers have to track all of the connections that all of the computers on its network make to the internet and that number of connections can really add up as more computers are added to the network. Each of these connections have to be stored in the router’s memory and small home routers typically don’t have a ton of memory. Applications like bittorrent that make thousands of connections to other computers on the internet can choke a router and make your internet connection feel slow.
Advanced Quality of Service (QoS): If your teenager is sucking up all of the bandwidth by downloading music and movies all day, finding a router that supports QoS or traffic shaping will help. It allows you classify which internet traffic takes priority and allows you to put all of your web surfing ahead of their downloads. This is especially helpful with applications like bittorrent that suck bandwidth and internet phones that don’t like latency.
Web access logging: Firewalls can track where users go on the internet and keep a log of it without the need to install software on every computer.
Web Content filtering: In addition to logging web traffic, some routers can dynamically block objectionable web traffic based on keywords or a database of known questionable websites. And there is no need to install filtering software on each individual PC.
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Feb 08
Cisco announced the End of Life for the PIX firewall without much fanfare, replacing the line with their new Adaptive Security Appliance line. Astaro Firewalls has jumped in to seize the moment and has offered a 20% discount on their all-in-one Firewall/VPN solution.
Feb 07
I am always having to search for the exact syntax on this command, so I want to document it. This command works on almost any any linux/unix including MacOS X/
find / -name “MyFavoriteFile”
Find is the actual command. The / is the start location. In this case, it means root of the drive, so find will search the entire volume. If you know the files is in a subdirectory, you can specify that. -name specifies to look for a name and then the filename must be in quote. Variables can be used like “*.txt”.
Jan 08
SCP or secure file copy is a great way to copy files through an encrypted tunnel, but it will take up all of the bandwidth available to it, but there is a flag to limit the bandwidth used. Try this:
scp -l 125 /Users/Myaccount/testfile remotehost:
the -l option is measured in bits rather than bytes, so adjust accordingly.
[tags]SCP, MacOSX, Bandwidth, Linux[/tags]