Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 01/25/2007 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd | macosx ]

Sometimes processes can take time to complete, thus tying up your console session. What if you want to run multiple processes in the background on the same shell session? With the built-in job control, you can. There are three main conditions a job can be in: Running, Stopped/Suspended, or Terminated. To control them, we'll use the fg and bg commands.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 12/05/2006 - [ freebsd ]

Using the ports tree to install applications is one of the most common ways to install softare. However, what if you updated a port to the latest version and it turns out to break things? How do you downgrade to a previous version if your ports tree is up-to-date? This is where the portdowngrade utility comes in handy.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 09/16/2006 - [ macosx ]

By default in Mac OS X, you can only tab through the text fields of any window. Have you ever wanted to use your tab button to cycle through the dialog box options or tab through the check box options on a website? Now you can with this hidden gem.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 08/26/2006 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd | macosx ]

If you are a point-and-click kind of person and have to manage one or more MySQL servers, you may find this web-based utility to be a goldmine.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 08/09/2006 - [ freebsd ]

The FreeBSD ports tree is the most common method of installing software. With the latest 6.x releases of FreeBSD, the old method of keeping your ports tree updated is now considered obsolete. This guide will teach you how to install and maintain your ports tree using the built-in portsnap utility.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 12/10/2005 - [ freebsd ]

The default location for your MySQL database data files may need to be moved to another partition that offers more storage space, or you may want to keep your data organized. These simple steps allows you to move your MySQL data without losing any information.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 10/12/2005 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd ]

Network configuration in FreeBSD can be a bit difficult because there are a few different text files to edit in order for your changes to be permanent. Hopefully this guide will clear some things up.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 07/15/2005 - [ freebsd ]

File servers that run Microsoft Windows will typically have the shared resources locked to some users/groups while other users/groups can have full rights on the same share. How can this be if standard permissions are generic for one user, one group, and everybody? This is accomplished with the use of Access Control Lists (ACLs) and the UNIX environment can also apply these variable permissions to files and directories. Not only can they support the feature, Windows clients that connect to your Samba shares will respect them as well.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 11/04/2007 - [ freebsd ]

I ran FreeBSD 5.2 for a long time with the default SSHd and then decided to upgrade to 5.3-STABLE. I normally use SecureCRT as my SSH client and I like password authentication. After I upgraded to 5.3, I could no longer logon using password authentication and I had to switch to keyboard interactive. This disallowed me from logging in with sftp from remote locations which really bummed me out. Here is the fix I found. This fix only affects people running FreeBSD 5.3 with the default SSHd -- not OpenSSHd.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 12/05/2004 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd | macosx ]

Apache is the most popular web server in use today. But, not everybody that sets up their Apache server takes the necessary steps to secure it properly from intruders. This guide will show you some good security changes to make to your Apache installation.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 07/15/2005 - [ openbsd ]

Maybe you are switching to OpenBSD from Linux or Windows. Or maybe you are familiar with FreeBSD and its ports and packages systems. Either way, you may be wondering how to install applications on this secure OS. Like FreeBSD, most applications can be installed from the Internet. There are two different installation methods to choose from and they both deal with dependancies.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 09/10/2005 - [ freebsd ]

Coming from a Linux or Windows background, many people begin to wonder where to get and how to install applications on FreeBSD. Well, with FreeBSD most applications can be installed from the Internet so you don't have to find the tarballs. There are two different installation methods to choose from and they both do a great job dealing with dependancies.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 11/08/2004 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd | macosx ]

A useful administrative tool is to see what users are logged onto the server. Another tool not only shows who is logged on, but it also shows what programs they are running.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 06/27/2005 - [ freebsd ]

After a fresh install, it is important to harden the security on a server before it hits your network for use. Not only making configuration changes aid in the security of your box, but there are some practical rules to abide by. These are some hardening tips to make your FreeBSD box more secure and will apply to both the 5.x and 4.x branches, but I will assume you are running 5.x. If a 4.x change is different, I will note it. Please do not apply these changes carelessly on a production server. Make sure you test, test, test on a separate box to note the effects of the changes.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 07/15/2005 - [ freebsd ]

Have you ever had a user login to your box and then ask you for help? Or have you ever been curious as to what your users are doing on your system? The watch(8) utility will let you snoop another tty, allowing you to see what your other users are doing and even interact with them. It's a must-have utility for every network administrator.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 10/11/2004 - [ freebsd ]

Any private network should be running some sort of Intrusion Detection System for system adminstrators to watch for any malicious traffic. In this guide you will learn how to set up snort and one of its reporting utilities, snortreport.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 07/15/2005 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd ]

Often times we SSH into our BSD boxes and then have to leave our stations for a little bit. If we don't do anything special with our open terminal, that poses a serious security threat to our boxes. Wouldn't it be nice if we could just lock the open terminal without having to close the connection? Well, we can with a built-in utility called lock(8). There is also the vlock port that I will discuss as well.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 11/10/2004 - [ openbsd ]

OpenBSD has a claim of being the most secure Operating System out-of-the-box. The problem is the installation is not very intuitive. Here I will be guiding you through a standard installation of OpenBSD 3.5 and this guide assumes you have a basic i386 PC to work with and will be using your entire disk for OpenBSD. Nothing fancy or unordinary. For this guide, I used a 3.0 gig harddrive.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 06/05/2005 - [ freebsd ]

When I first set up my mail server, I was faced with a dilemma -- which webmail program should I use? I started out with SquirrelMail, but I soon installed vpopmail and needed a webmail client that could support virtual users. So, my next stop was NuralStorm, but it lacked some features I wanted. I had always heard about Horde's webmail client, but I was always afraid of it because of it's complexity. This guide aims to ease your mind about IMP and help you install it and get it running from a base system and an updated ports tree.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 08/21/2010 - [ freebsd ]

I'm sure many of you have been wondering how people host secure sites using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). This guide will show you how to set up a web server with SSL, PHP, and MySQL support.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 08/23/2010 - [ freebsd ]

Running a FTP server is quite popular for sharing files over the Internet. But, the FTP protocol is not as secure as some may think. By default, each FTP user has a system shell account and when connecting to the FTP server, all usernames and passwords are transmitted in plaintext. That means anybody sniffing your packets can gain access to your FTP accounts. This guide is intended to provide a solution to both problems. Pure-ftpd with puredb allows you to have throttled FTP-only accounts and the ability to use SSL.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 11/01/2003 - [ freebsd ]

Cron is the *nix program that runs scheduled tasks that are read from /etc/crontab. This guide will teach you how to make a scheduled process by using cron.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 11/14/2004 - [ freebsd | openbsd | netbsd | macosx ]

You've downloaded them, you've extracted them, you've liked them. But how do you create them? This guide will show you how to quickly and easily create a compressed archive in the form of *.tar.gz and *.tar.bz2.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 08/21/2010 - [ freebsd ]

FreeBSD doesn't have a very graphical installer like various Linux distributions. This makes installing FreeBSD a bit trickier for beginners. With this guide, you will learn how to get FreeBSD installed with a vanilla install with the mini-ISO.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 10/21/2003 - [ freebsd ]

So, you install stuff from ports and then updates are released. How do you upgrade your software without having to uninstall and reinstall? This guide will show you how to use portupgrade.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 10/21/2003 - [ freebsd ]

In order to password protect a website, or part of a website, we need to create a .htaccess file and a .htpasswd file. These are the files that Apache reads from to see who is allowed in the site. This guide will show you how to setup a website directory with password protection.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 10/21/2003 - [ freebsd ]

Just how do you get your Windows machines to access your FreeBSD server and printers? The trick is with Samba. Here I'm going to show you how to setup Samba so your server will appear in 'My Network Places' and configured for user account access.

Written by Jon LaBass and last updated on 07/25/2006 - [ freebsd ]

This guide will teach you how to set up a basic web server with Apache, PHP support, and MySQL for the database. There are a couple of ways to do this, but this guide will use the easier method with the ports system.