Continue reading »]]> One of my friends signed up for a race in CT, called “Where the Pavement Ends”.

Growing up with Shel Silverstein, one of my favorite poems was “Spaghetti!”

With a little research, a little boredom, and a love for manipulating songs, I came up with the following.

Miles

Miles, Miles, running all over the place,
4 mile trail through Hemlock Hills in open space,
Over Lake Windwing and around Leibowitz Section,
I hope the brisk air doesn’t give me an erection,
Filling my body with good energy I guess,
What’s making the roadway a firery mess!

The race is near ending, I’m totally stoked
My feet will no longer be proded and poked,
I told them “Good Luck”, I said “Get Ready”,
I’m glad the passerbys listened
and didn’t throw spaghetti!

Continue reading »]]> A transcript of former President Bill Clinton’s remarks Wednesday night at the Democratic National Convention, as provided by the Democratic Party:
___
We’re here to nominate a president, and I’ve got one in mind.

I want to nominate a man whose own life has known its fair share of adversity and uncertainty. A man who ran for president to change the course of an already weak economy and then just six weeks before the election, saw it suffer the biggest collapse since the Great Depression. A man who stopped the slide into depression and put us on the long road to recovery, knowing all the while that no matter how many jobs were created and saved, there were still millions more waiting, trying to feed their children and keep their hopes alive.

I want to nominate a man cool on the outside but burning for America on the inside. A man who believes we can build a new American Dream economy driven by innovation and creativity, education and cooperation. A man who had the good sense to marry Michelle Obama.

I want Barack Obama to be the next president of the United States and I proudly nominate him as the standard bearer of the Democratic Party.

In Tampa, we heard a lot of talk about how the president and the Democrats don’t believe in free enterprise and individual initiative, how we want everyone to be dependent on the government, how bad we are for the economy.

The Republican narrative is that all of us who amount to anything are completely self-made. One of our greatest Democratic chairmen, Bob Strauss, used to say that every politician wants you to believe he was born in a log cabin he built himself, but it ain’t so.

We Democrats think the country works better with a strong middle class, real opportunities for poor people to work their way into it and a relentless focus on the future, with business and government working together to promote growth and broadly shared prosperity. We think ‘‘we’re all in this together’’ is a better philosophy than ‘‘you’re on your own.’’

Who’s right? Well, since 1961, the Republicans have held the White House 28 years, the Democrats 24. In those 52 years, our economy produced 66 million private sector jobs. What’s the jobs score? Republicans 24 million, Democrats 42 million.

It turns out that advancing equal opportunity and economic empowerment is both morally right and good economics, because discrimination, poverty and ignorance restrict growth, while investments in education, infrastructure and scientific and technological research increase it, creating more good jobs and new wealth for all of us.

Though I often disagree with Republicans, I never learned to hate them the way the far right that now controls their party seems to hate President Obama and the Democrats. After all, President Eisenhower sent federal troops to my home state to integrate Little Rock Central High and built the interstate highway system. And as governor, I worked with President Reagan on welfare reform and with President George H.W. Bush on national education goals. I am grateful to President George W. Bush for PEPFAR, which is saving the lives of millions of people in poor countries and to both Presidents Bush for the work we’ve done together after the South Asia tsunami, Hurricane Katrina and the Haitian earthquake.

Through my foundation, in America and around the world, I work with Democrats, Republicans and Independents who are focused on solving problems and seizing opportunities, not fighting each other.

When times are tough, constant conflict may be good politics but in the real world, cooperation works better. After all, nobody’s right all the time, and a broken clock is right twice a day. All of us are destined to live our lives between those two extremes. Unfortunately, the faction that now dominates the Republican Party doesn’t see it that way. They think government is the enemy, and compromise is weakness.

One of the main reasons America should re-elect President Obama is that he is still committed to cooperation. He appointed Republican secretaries of defense, the army and transportation. He appointed a vice president who ran against him in 2008, and trusted him to oversee the successful end of the war in Iraq and the implementation of the recovery act. And Joe Biden did a great job with both. He appointed Cabinet members who supported Hillary in the primaries. Heck, he even appointed Hillary. I’m so proud of her and grateful to our entire national security team for all they’ve done to make us safer and stronger and to build a world with more partners and fewer enemies. I’m also grateful to the young men and women who serve our country in the military and to Michelle Obama and Jill Biden for supporting military families when their loved ones are overseas and for helping our veterans, when they come home bearing the wounds of war, or needing help with education, housing, and jobs.

President Obama’s record on national security is a tribute to his strength, and judgment, and to his preference for inclusion and partnership over partisanship.

He also tried to work with congressional Republicans on health care, debt reduction, and jobs, but that didn’t work out so well. Probably because, as the Senate Republican leader, in a remarkable moment of candor, said two years before the election, their No. 1 priority was not to put America back to work, but to put President Obama out of work.

Senator, I hate to break it to you, but we’re going to keep President Obama on the job.

In Tampa, the Republican argument against the president’s re-election was pretty simple: we left him a total mess, he hasn’t cleaned it up fast enough, so fire him and put us back in.

In order to look like an acceptable alternative to President Obama, they couldn’t say much about the ideas they have offered over the last two years. You see they want to go back to the same old policies that got us into trouble in the first place: to cut taxes for high income Americans even more than President Bush did; to get rid of those pesky financial regulations designed to prevent another crash and prohibit future bailouts; to increase defense spending $2 trillion more than the Pentagon has requested without saying what they’ll spend the money on; to make enormous cuts in the rest of the budget, especially programs that help the middle class and poor kids. As another president once said— there they go again.

I like the argument for President Obama’s re-election a lot better. He inherited a deeply damaged economy, put a floor under the crash, began the long hard road to recovery, and laid the foundation for a modern, more well-balanced economy that will produce millions of good new jobs, vibrant new businesses, and lots of new wealth for the innovators.

Are we where we want to be? No. Is the president satisfied? No. Are we better off than we were when he took office, with an economy in free fall, losing 750,000 jobs a month. The answer is yes.

I understand the challenge we face. I know many Americans are still angry and frustrated with the economy. Though employment is growing, banks are beginning to lend and even housing prices are picking up a bit, too many people don’t feel it.

I experienced the same thing in 1994 and early 1995. Our policies were working and the economy was growing but most people didn’t feel it yet. By 1996, the economy was roaring, halfway through the longest peacetime expansion in American history.

President Obama started with a much weaker economy than I did. No president— not me or any of my predecessors could have repaired all the damage in just four years. But conditions are improving and if you’ll renew the President’s contract you will feel it.

I believe that with all my heart.

President Obama’s approach embodies the values, the ideas, and the direction America must take to build a 21st century version of the American Dream in a nation of shared opportunities, shared prosperity and shared responsibilities.

So back to the story. In 2010, as the president’s recovery program kicked in, the job losses stopped and things began to turn around.

The Recovery Act saved and created millions of jobs and cut taxes for 95 percent of the American people. In the last 29 months the economy has produced about 4.5 million private sector jobs. But last year, the Republicans blocked the president’s jobs plan costing the economy more than a million new jobs. So here’s another jobs score: President Obama plus 4.5 million, congressional Republicans zero.

Over that same period, more than more than 500,000 manufacturing jobs have been created under President Obama— the first time manufacturing jobs have increased since the 1990s.

The auto industry restructuring worked. It saved more than a million jobs, not just at GM, Chrysler and their dealerships, but in auto parts manufacturing all over the country. That’s why even auto-makers that weren’t part of the deal supported it. They needed to save the suppliers too. Like I said, we’re all in this together.

Now there are 250,000 more people working in the auto industry than the day the companies were restructured. Gov. Romney opposed the plan to save GM and Chrysler. So here’s another jobs score: Obama 250,000, Romney, zero.

The agreement the administration made with management, labor and environmental groups to double car mileage over the next few years is another good deal: it will cut your gas bill in half, make us more energy independent, cut greenhouse gas emissions, and add another 500,000 good jobs.

President Obama’s ‘‘all of the above’’ energy plan is helping too— the boom in oil and gas production combined with greater energy efficiency has driven oil imports to a near 20 year low and natural gas production to an all-time high. Renewable energy production has also doubled.

We do need more new jobs, lots of them, but there are already more than three million jobs open and unfilled in America today, mostly because the applicants don’t have the required skills. We have to prepare more Americans for the new jobs that are being created in a world fueled by new technology. That’s why investments in our people are more important than ever. The president has supported community colleges and employers in working together to train people for open jobs in their communities. And, after a decade in which exploding college costs have increased the drop-out rate so much that we’ve fallen to 16th in the world in the percentage of our young adults with college degrees, his student loan reform lowers the cost of federal student loans and even more important, gives students the right to repay the loans as a fixed percentage of their incomes for up to 20 years. That means no one will have to drop-out of college for fear they can’t repay their debt, and no one will have to turn down a job, as a teacher, a police officer or a small town doctor because it doesn’t pay enough to make the debt payments. This will change the future for young Americans.

I know we’re better off because President Obama made these decisions.

That brings me to health care.

The Republicans call it Obamacare and say it’s a government takeover of health care that they’ll repeal. Are they right? Let’s look at what’s happened so far. Individuals and businesses have secured more than a billion dollars in refunds from their insurance premiums because the new law requires 80 percent to 85 pecent of your premiums to be spent on health care, not profits or promotion. Other insurance companies have lowered their rates to meet the requirement. More than 3 million young people between 19 and 25 are insured for the first time because their parents can now carry them on family policies. Millions of seniors are receiving preventive care including breast cancer screenings and tests for heart problems. Soon the insurance companies, not the government, will have millions of new customers many of them middle class people with pre-existing conditions. And for the last two years, health care spending has grown under 4 pecent, for the first time in 50 years.

So are we all better off because President Obama fought for it and passed it? You bet we are.

There were two other attacks on the president in Tampa that deserve an answer. Both Gov. Romney and congressman Ryan attacked the president for allegedly robbing Medicare of $716 billion. Here’s what really happened. There were no cuts to benefits. None. What the president did was save money by cutting unwarranted subsidies to providers and insurance companies that weren’t making people any healthier. He used the saving to close the donut hole in the Medicare drug program, and to add eight years to the life of the Medicare Trust Fund. It’s now solvent until 2024. So President Obama and the Democrats didn’t weaken Medicare, they strengthened it.

When congressman Ryan looked into the TV camera and attacked President Obama’s ‘‘biggest coldest power play’’ in raiding Medicare, I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. You see, that $716 billion is exactly the same amount of Medicare savings congressman Ryan had in his own budget.

At least on this one, Gov. Romney’s been consistent. He wants to repeal the savings and give the money back to the insurance companies, re-open the donut hole and force seniors to pay more for drugs, and reduce the life of the Medicare Trust Fund by eight years. So now if he’s elected and does what he promised Medicare will go broke by 2016. If that happens, you won’t have to wait until their voucher program to begins in 2023 to see the end Medicare as we know it.

But it gets worse. They also want to block grant Medicaid and cut it by a third over the coming decade. Of course, that will hurt poor kids, but that’s not all. Almost two-thirds of Medicaid is spent on nursing home care for seniors and on people with disabilities, including kids from middle class families, with special needs like, Down syndrome or autism. I don’t know how those families are going to deal with it. We can’t let it happen

Now let’s look at the Republican charge that President Obama wants to weaken the work requirements in the welfare reform bill I signed that moved millions of people from welfare to work.

Here’s what happened. When some Republican governors asked to try new ways to put people on welfare back to work, the Obama administration said they would only do it if they had a credible plan to increase employment by 20 percent. You hear that? More work. So the claim that President Obama weakened welfare reform’s work requirement is just not true. But they keep running ads on it. As their campaign pollster said ‘‘we’re not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers.’’ Now that is true. I couldn’t have said it better myself— I just hope you remember that every time you see the ad.

Let’s talk about the debt. We have to deal with it or it will deal with us. President Obama has offered a plan with $4 trillion in debt reduction over a decade, with $2 of spending reductions for every $1 of revenue increases, and tight controls on future spending. It’s the kind of balanced approach proposed by the bipartisan Simpson-Bowles commission.

I think the president’s plan is better than the Romney plan, because the Romney plan fails the first test of fiscal responsibility: The numbers don’t add up.

It’s supposed to be a debt reduction plan but it begins with $5 trillion in tax cuts over a 10-year period. That makes the debt hole bigger before they even start to dig out. They say they’ll make it up by eliminating loopholes in the tax code. When you ask ‘‘which loopholes and how much?’’ they say, ‘‘See me after the election on that.’’

People ask me all the time how we delivered four surplus budgets. What new ideas did we bring? I always give a one-word answer: arithmetic. If they stay with a $5 trillion tax cut in a debt reduction plan— the— arithmetic tells us that one of three things will happen:

1) they’ll have to eliminate so many deductions like the ones for home mortgages and charitable giving that middle class families will see their tax bill go up $2,000 year while people making over $3 million a year get will still get a 250,000 dollar tax cut; or

2) they’ll have to cut so much spending that they’ll obliterate the budget for our national parks, for ensuring clean air, clean water, safe food, safe air travel; or they’ll cut way back on Pell Grants, college loans, early childhood education and other programs that help middle class families and poor children, not to mention cutting investments in roads, bridges, science, technology and medical research; or

3) they’ll do what they’ve been doing for thirty plus years now— cut taxes more than they cut spending, explode the debt, and weaken the economy. Remember, Republican economic policies quadrupled the debt before I took office and doubled it after I left. We simply can’t afford to double-down on trickle-down.

President Obama’s plan cuts the debt, honors our values, and brightens the future for our children, our families and our nation.

My fellow Americans, you have to decide what kind of country you want to live in. If you want a you’re on your own, winner take all society you should support the Republican ticket. If you want a country of shared opportunities and shared responsibilities— a ‘‘we’re all in it together’’ society, you should vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden. If you want every American to vote and you think it’s wrong to change voting procedures just to reduce the turnout of younger, poorer, minority and disabled voters, you should support Barack Obama. If you think the president was right to open the doors of American opportunity to young immigrants brought here as children who want to go to college or serve in the military, you should vote for Barack Obama. If you want a future of shared prosperity, where the middle class is growing and poverty is declining, where the American Dream is alive and well, and where the United States remains the leading force for peace and prosperity in a highly competitive world, you should vote for Barack Obama.

I love our country— and I know we’re coming back. For more than 200 years, through every crisis, we’ve always come out stronger than we went in. And we will again as long as we do it together. We champion the cause for which our founders pledged their lives, their fortunes, their sacred honor— to form a more perfect union.

If that’s what you believe, if that’s what you want, we have to re-elect President Barack Obama.

God bless you — God bless America.

Continue reading »]]> Please Donate to the GWB Presidential Library

Dear Fellow Constituent:

“The George W. Bush Presidential Library” is now in the planning stages and accepting donations.

The Library will include:

1. The Hurricane Katrina Room, which is still under construction.
2. The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won’t be able to remember anything.
3. The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don’t even have to show up.
4. The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don’t let you in.
5. The Guantanamo Bay Room, where they don’t let you out.
6. The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find.
7. The National Debt Room, which is huge and has no ceiling.
8. The Tax Cut Room, with entry only to the wealthy.
9. The Economy Room, which is in the toilet.
10. The Iraq War Room. (After you complete your first visit, they make you go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth visit.)
11. The Dick Cheney Room, in the famous undisclosed location, complete with shooting gallery.
12. The Environmental Conservation Room, still empty.
13. The Supreme Court Gift Shop, where you can buy an election.
14. The Airport Men’s Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators.
15. The Decider Room, complete with dart board, magic 8-ball, Ouija board, dice, coins, and straws.

Note: The library will feature an electron microscope to help you locate and view the President’s accomplishments.

The library will also include many famous quotes by George W. Bush:

1. ‘The vast majority of our imports come from outside the country.’
2. ‘If we don’t succeed, we run the risk of failure.’
3. ‘Republicans understand the importance of bondage between a mother and child.’
4. ‘No senior citizen should ever have to choose between prescription drugs and medicine.’
5. ‘I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy – but that could change.’
6. ‘One word sums up probably the responsibility of any Governor, and that one word is ‘to be prepared’.’
7. ‘Verbosity leads to unclear, inarticulate things.’
8. ‘I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future.’
9. ‘The future will be better tomorrow.’
10. ‘We’re going to have the best educated American people in the world..’
11. ‘One of the great things about books is sometimes there are some fantastic pictures.’ (during an education photo-op)
12. ‘Illegitimacy is something we should talk about in terms of not having it.’
13. ‘We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur.’
14. ‘It isn’t pollution that’s harming the environment. It’s the impurities in our air and water that are doing it.’
15. ‘I stand by all the misstatements that I’ve made.’…(George W.Bush to Sam Donaldson)

PLEASE GIVE GENEROUSLY!

Sincerely,

Jack Abramoff, Co-Chair

G.W. Bush Library Board of Directors

Continue reading »]]> This was an email I received and I am checking to see who can spot fake emails!

The answer is, YES. It is a scam. Do not reply. However, if you see anything like this, do not respond because clearly spam and a scam. Even though this seems like common knowledge to a lot of people, there are those who will actually respond to it. However, if they are that unfamiliar with email, they most likely aren’t reading my blog!

If you know what mail headers are, they are listed below.

Continue reading »]]> I recently bought an iPad to help with my commute to and from work each day on the bus. I got the 4g version thinking I would buy the data plan from Verizon so I can access the Internet. However, Verizon would not work with me as an existing Verizon wireless unlimited data plan holder on my Droid Razr. I needed a way to get internet on my iPad without going broke paying for it, based on Verizon’s pricing.

“We offer data packages for the iPad on the pre-paid service. Data packages start at 1GB for $20, 2GB for $30, 5GB for $50, and 10GB for $80.” – Jeremy, Verizon Support

I would most likely be using the 10GB for $80, but I refuse to pay that out of principle. The first rule on running a business is retaining customers. If a customer wants to give you more money, you find a way to work with them and make sure they are happy. They continued to explain that they couldn’t even give me the double data for the same price, that they already do with new Smart Phones. It’s alright, I am using my superior knowledge in technology to obtain a similar end result without paying any more money.

I actually realized this while I was without Internet when I first moved into a new apartment. I connected my Mac Book Pro to my Razr using Bluetooth. I then shared my Internet connection on my Mac. I took that same idea and applied it to my iPad. The result was a 4g connected iPad through a 4g smartphone via Bluetooth.

It isn’t exactly perfect since I am relying on my Razr to have battery and a strong enough signal to stay connected. It doesn’t seem to like playing Netflix or Hulu plus, depending on my connection, but I may need to look into it further.

I was able to bypass Verizon’s mobile hotspot provisioning system by understanding technology. Due to the fact that Verizon wanted to charge me $80 for 10 gb of data, I chose to pay nothing extra and get unlimited data that I am already paying for.

Continue reading »]]> I have worked in IT as a job since 1999 and I have witnessed some of the greatest support tickets. I say greatest, because they were the worst descriptions to the problem and gave no information for us to help them. However, they do give IT departments items to hang up on the walls!

“My computer is broken, can you fix it?” (There was a laptop attached and left in the IT Dept)
Fix what?
“I turned my computer off and when I turn it back on, the error is still there!?!?”
Are you sure you didn’t shut off the monitor?

When submitting a problem or a bug, you need to be as descriptive as possible explaining all of the important details that will result in a faster resolution from support. I am not saying that even mine are as descriptive as they could be, but I try to give as much as I can but in reasonable amount of time. As a customer, the following is an example of a good (not exceptional) bug report.

The following was a bug that I submitted to Hulu and their response.
_____________________________________________
Under “Browse TV”, the bug happens for “TV Shows with Full Episodes”, “All TV Shows” and “Networks”. The bug is on the Wii version since I compared it with the PS3 version and it works as intended.

If you are scrolling through the shows in the list and you go from the last item in the list and continue on (and takes you back) to the first item in the list, the “Title”, “Category” and the current record you are on, do not change. They are stuck on the last item in the list, but the image shows up correctly for each iteration. Now, go back to the end of the list and keep scrolling and the information is correct. Go back to the first item (where it was incorrect) and if you then go into the landing page for that show, and then go back to the list, the information for that show is now correct. However, if you then keep scrolling, the show that was correct is now the show it is stuck on. Finally, if you go back to the last item in the list, the scrolling works correctly.

I hope this helps! If you need more information to help you solve this bug, please let me know.
_____________________________________________

Hi Timothy,

Thanks for letting us know that Wii bug in such great detail. I’m sorry if it troubled your user experience in anyway. I’ve forwarded this to our the appropriate team, and they’ll investigate it ASAP.

It’s emails like this that really help us improve things, so if you happen across anything else, don’t hesitate to let me know. Thanks again for getting in touch with us.

Thanks,
Baris
Hulu Support

Continue reading »]]> Recently, we (my company) took over web hosting for one of our clients. On average, they get 500,000 visits per month and a high profile suite of sites. I setup a Cloud Server Farm for the client. One of their sites, is the biggest of the group and their flagship site. This site was built 2 years ago using Joomla, a Content Management System, by a third-party company. I am not an advocate of Joomla because of the trouble that we have had with it. It is a very resource heavy CMS and for me, the problems outweigh the benefits.

While setting up this site, everything was working great until I started to test the server under high stress using “Siege”. After running the test with 50 requests/second, the server started to buckle and after 15 seconds, Apache became unavailable. I spent about 2 weeks trying to figure out what could cause this problem, but until today, I have been unsuccessful. I will first explain what I tried and how each change I made, either did nothing or caused different problems making them not a viable solution.

My first thought was to optimize Apache to handle more connections at one time. Apache’s HTTP Server website has a Performance Tuning section. After making these changes and restarting Apache, the Stress Test still caused the server to die.

Next, I thought it might have been the mysql server that was the issue. Even though, the mysql server wasn’t getting high load, I decided to fine-tune mysql as well. Since we have a dedicated mysql server, I used the configuration that was located in mysql-huge.cnf. This configuration is designed for servers that are just used for mysql. These changes seemed to help, but it wasn’t even close to what the site should be performing at.

I then thought it might be the amount of RAM on the server. I resized the cloud server to 4G of memory, but there was still no change. I resized it back down to 1G of memory which is what we thought it should be at.

After looking into more server configurations as the problem and getting nowhere, I decided that I would see if Joomla was causing the issues. You should know that this is all being done on a development server. I started by removing the Javascript files that were being included to display the client’s Ads. They have a total of 32 JavaScript calls and takes 10 seconds to just load the Ads. Removing them helped speed up the site, but the high load server failures were still happening and I added their Ads back in.

Now, the server is using Varnish for caching the content. It should be holding onto a static version of the site for 2 minutes (what it defaults to), but it wasn’t keeping the cache. Apache was still getting called every time you load the site. Varnish was still pulling the page through cache, but it was not keeping the cache. I have Varnish running on all of our servers including my personal server farm, however, I couldn’t figure out why this site was not keeping cache.

I tried removing some of the third-party modules that could have been incorrectly programmed and causing serious performance issues. After removing all of the modules on the homepage, the problems still existed. I got to the point where I didn’t think that it was anything to do with the server or how the site was pulling its content through Joomla, but I felt that there was something on the Joomla Core that was the problem.

I spent the next few hours researching what Joomla could be doing that was making the server die. After finding this blog article, I had an idea. His problem wasn’t my problem, but something that he wrote got me thinking. What if, the problem is with the Joomla Cookies. I did a few more Google searches and found that Joomla does not handle cookies very well it uses cookies for everything Joomla does.

*Please read the rest of this before trying the following as this configuration did not work even though it was performing the way I thought it should.

This site is on a dedicated server and no other traffic will be going to it. It is a 64-bit Quad Core Centos Server with 1G of ram. In Varnish, I added the following to the VLC file.

sub vcl_fetch {
   set beresp.ttl = 5m; # Time that the cache should be kept for.
   unset beresp.http.set-cookie; # Unset all cookies on the site
}

I “sieged” the server again at 50 requests/second and sure enough, Varnish was keeping the cache and serving it out of Varnish and not hitting apache at all. I then proceeded to stress the server at 500 requests/second and still the server was holding strong. Finally, I stressed it at 800 requests/second and it was still functioning properly. This is more than what the client would receive for traffic on an average day and I was confident that this had solved the problem….read on!

I then tried to log into Joomla on the front-end and on the administrative side. As it turns out, removing the cookies was a serious problem for the functionality of Joomla and would not let me login. I then removed the change that I made to the VLC, restarted Varnish and tried to login again. This time it worked.

I thought about how I could work around this issue, but nothing was coming to me. I did more research and came across this blog article. It is a little bit hard to read, but once you make the configuration readable, I found this code. *Note that I changed the obj.http.set-cookie to beresp.http.set-cookie to account for the new version of the Varnish 3.0 language.

sub vcl_fetch {
        set beresp.ttl = 5m;
        if( req.request != "POST" ) {
                unset beresp.http.set-cookie;
        }
}

Once I added this code to the VLC and restarted Varnish, not only could I login to Joomla on the front-end and administrative side, but the server was still holding strong at 800 requests/second.

Now, I can only stress the server to the point where I think it will hold its own in a real life scenario, but that doesn’t mean other steps may need to be implemented if the site gets picked up by Digg or Google (Google is what took down this clients server last month). Until that happens, we can’t account for the amount of traffic the site will receive. One additional step you can take is to add a Load Balancer into the mix and allow for the additional traffic and relive some of the stress on the sole server. This however, will be a separate blog entry as this one is already long enough.

In closing, I hope this article helps you to save weeks of performance testing, server changes and headaches.

Continue reading »]]> Time Warner Cable has made me very unhappy because they make money on screwing over the customer. I have had problems with my service over the past two years and they will not admit that it is their fault, even though the technician who came out to look at my service told us there was a problem. It was a problem with their line and it has been that way for two years. When I called to talk to someone about it, they told me there was no record of the problem.

Due to no record of what they fixed, I can’t call the billing department to get a partial refund for the past two years of service. Every time it rains, we lose internet and TV service for the majority of channels. When they setup our service, they told us there wasn’t a good connection to our apartment. Instead of looking into the problem, they said it was wiring in our apartment that was the problem. It turns out that there was a slice of wire missing from a line down the street which was causing the connection problems every time it rained. I would switch to Satellite, but to get “local channels” like NESN, it would cost me an extra $40 a month to go to the next level up.

Does anyone else have problems with Time Warner Cable?

Continue reading »]]> *While writing this post, I realized that Varnish has been updated to 2.1.5 (not in EPEL yet) and this configuration will now break if setup.

If you have not yet setup Varnish or don’t understand the basics of Varnish, please read my post “Setup Pound, Varnish & Apache w/ Multiple IPs & BackEnds”. This article also assumes you understand the basics of a Firewall.

At work, I am setting up a new server environment for a client on our Cloud Servers from Rackspace. We have come up with our first approach to their needs, which is the following. One (1) Firewall Server using Varnish as a reverse proxy for web content to the other servers, Two (2) Production Web Servers running Varnish for Caching, One (1) Production Database Server, One (1) Development Web/Database Server.

Since I am still in the process of setting it up, I may not have it all figured out yet, but the basic concept is this. All DNS records for each site point to the IP Address of the Firewall Server. Next, set varnish to listen on that IP. You have two options for setting up the backend servers.

1. Use rsync to synchronize the two production web servers. Then use Varnish as a load balancer to send equal or weighted amount of traffic to different servers.
2. Use Varnish to proxy specific websites to different backend servers.

I am implementing option 2 into this environment. We have one website (high traffic) that will be on its own server and the client’s other sites will be on the second production server. On the backend server’s varnish configuration, you will change your listening IP to the IP address listed on the backend on the Firewall server. If you have a private IP address associated with each server, I would recommend using it as the IP addresses since those are faster and usually your hosting provider allows unlimited transfer between private IPs.

On the firewall server varnish vcl (Note: these aren’t the real private IP Addresses)

backend mydomain{
  .host = "192.168.1.2";
  .port = "80";
}

backend otherdomain{
  .host = "192.168.1.3";
  .port = "80";
}

sub vcl_recv {
        if (req.http.host ~ "mydomain.com") {
                set req.backend = mydomain;
        }elseif (req.http.host ~ "otherdomain.com") {
               set req.backend = otherdomain;
        }
}

On the backend server’s varnish configuration (/etc/sysconfig/varnish)

DAEMON_OPTS="-a 192.168.1.2:80 \
             -T localhost:6082 \
             -f /etc/varnish/default.vcl \
             -u varnish -g varnish \
             -s file,/var/lib/varnish/varnish_storage.bin,1G"

DAEMON_OPTS="-a 192.168.1.3:80 \
             -T localhost:6082 \
             -f /etc/varnish/default.vcl \
             -u varnish -g varnish \
             -s file,/var/lib/varnish/varnish_storage.bin,1G"

The rest of the configuration would be your standard vcl from Varnish.

There are other solutions to what I am trying to do that might be much easier for the organization as a whole, but we are already using Varnish for caching on the server.

Continue reading »]]> The following is a tutorial in setting up Pound (SSL Wrapper) that is being proxied to Varnish (Cache) which is finally proxied to Apache. This setup also allows for multiple IP Addresses (for SSL Cert) and multiple Varnish Backends.

This article assumes you have working knowledge of Linux and CentOS distribution in particular. This installation is based upon the “yum” paths for all instances. It also assumes you have apache setup already, serving content with multiple IP Addresses and your server’s external IP Address 1 = 2.3.4.5 & IP Address 2 = 6.7.8.9
———————————————————————————————————

Pound SSL Wrapper

Pound is a reverse proxy, load balancer and SSL wrapper that allows you to listen on a secure port (443), decrypts the SSL Certificate and then sends the decrypted data to a local non-ssl port (80) to be served by the Varnish. First, let’s setup the pound configuration.

yum install pound
edit /etc/pound.cfg

ListenHTTP
    Address 2.3.4.5
    Port    80
    Service
        Redirect "https://www.mydomain.com"
    End
End
ListenHTTPS
    Address 2.3.4.5
    Port    443
    Cert    "/var/certs/mydomain.com.pem"
    Service
       BackEnd
                Address 127.0.0.3
                Port 80
       End
    End
End

In this example, ListenHTTP, we want to make sure that the entire site is served securely and redirecting 80 traffic to 443. In ListenHTTPS, we pass it the path to the cert in .pem format. Not only is this required for ListenHTTPS, but it MUST be in .pem format.

To convert a crt to a pem, run the following command (replacing files with your own)
“cat mydomain.com.key mydomain.com.crt (mydomain.com.ca) > mydomain.com.pem”

Varnish Caching

Varnish is a Reverse Proxy (Caching, HTTP Accelerator) that allows for Load Balancing.

yum install varnish
edit /etc/sysconfig/varnish

I used Alternative 2 for the configuration. Set the IP(s) in the -a option. While the IPs are comma separated, make sure there isn’t a space between the IP addreses. It will fail. Pound is listening for the IP Address 2.3.4.5, so we don’t need to have Varnish listen for that IP. We need to have it listen on the port that pound specified as its backend. In this case, 127.0.0.3:80. Since pound is not serving secure content for IP Addresss 6.7.8.9, we can have varnish listen for that IP.

## Alternative 2, Configuration with VCL
DAEMON_OPTS="-a \"6.7.8.9:80,127.0.0.3:80\" \
             -T localhost:6082 \
             -f /etc/varnish/default.vcl \
             -u varnish -g varnish \
             -s file,/var/lib/varnish/varnish_storage.bin,1G"

Next, we need to edit the default vcl file for Varnish which is where all the settings will be added.
/etc/varnish/default.vcl

# For IP Address 6.7.8.9 and the rest of the domains on the server.
backend default {
  .host = "127.0.0.2";
  .port = "80";
}

# For IP Address 2.3.4.5 listening on Pound, proxied to varnish on 127.0.0.3. Setting Apache Backend to 127.0.0.4
backend mydomain{
        .host = "127.0.0.4";
        .port = "80";
}

sub vcl_fetch {
  # Add a unique header containing the cache servers IP address:
  remove obj.http.X-Varnish-IP;
  set    obj.http.X-Varnish-IP = server.ip;
}

sub vcl_recv {
        # choose a backend depending on domain
        if (req.http.host ~ "www.mydomain.com") {
                set req.backend = mydomain;
        }else{
                set req.backend = default;
        }
        # remove and reset the clients IP address
        remove req.http.X-Forwarded-For;
        set req.http.X-Forwarded-For=client.ip;
}

In the sub vcl_recv and sub vcl_fetch, I am doing two things. 1. Setting the backend server depending on which domain it is looking for. 2. Passing along the client’s IP Addresss to reflect in the apache log files.

SSL Conf

edit /etc/httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf
Pound is now listening on port 443, which means you can’t bind the ssl.conf to 443 as well. We need to comment out the listener.

# Listen 443

httpd.conf

/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf
We need to set apache to listen and set the NameVirtualHost on the ports that we specified in /etc/varnish/default.vcl

Listen 127.0.0.2:80
Listen 127.0.0.4:80

NameVirtualHost 127.0.0.2:80
NameVirtualHost 127.0.0.4:80

Vhosts File

/etc/httpd/sites-available/mydomain.com.conf
Finally we need to change the virtualhost IP Address in the vhost.conf to listen to the same ports as above depending on domain.

<virtualhost 127.0.0.2:80>
...
</virtualhost>

or

<virtualhost 127.0.0.4:80>
...
</virtualhost>

If you need the client’s IP Address (I don’t know why you wouldn’t), you need to add the following into the virtualhost above. Replace with your log file paths

        LogFormat "%{X-Forwarded-For}i %l %u %t \"%r\" %>s %b \"%{Referer}i\" \"%{User-Agent}i\"" varnishcombined
        CustomLog /www/mydomain.com/logs/access.log varnishcombined

Now that we have finished the setup, this will require a restart of all services for it to work. If it was setup properly, they should all say “ok”.
/etc/init.d/pound start (restart)
/etc/init.d/varnish start (restart)
/etc/init.d/httpd restart

Monitoring Varnish Stats, Logs and Histogram

Based on install paths, the following should work. From the prompt: varnishstat, varnishlog, varnishhist
Varnishstat and Varnishlog give detailed information on headers being passed and the status of the cache. Varnishhist is a histogram of the traffic coming to your site. The left side is cached content and the right side is server generated content.

Stress Testing New Setup

If you have very little traffic, you might need to use a stress test tool to find out how the server will handle your new setup. Siege is a tool that forces many concurrent connections. If you run this tool before implementing Varnish, it may but more likely will bring down your server. The load average will shoot up very quickly (to 80.00+) until the server can’t handle it and stops responding. After installing Varnish, you can run up to thousands of concurrent connections and the load average won’t go past 10.00 (depending on many factors).

The parameters being passed to siege below, -c350 (350 is the number of concurrent connections, default is 15), -t1M (1M is the total time that siege will run for, 1 minute)

From command prompt, type:

siege -c350 -t1M  www.mydomain.com

* It helps to have multiple shells up and watch “top”, “varnishstat” and “varnishhist”.

Log Files

tail -f /var/log/messages and /var/log/varnish/varnish.log

Continue reading »]]> At work, we have recently started setting up multiple “Cloud Servers” at Rackspace instead of one
massive server like we currently have. I will discuss more about it later once we are fully running on Cloud Servers and have all of the tools setup.

I had a question for Rackspace support regarding their Cloud Setup environment. The point of the chat with Rackspace was to find out where I can change the email address for the contact who receives notifications when new servers are created.

Their solution was to put a filter on Outlook that forwards the emails to the email address I would like, but they don’t have an option for it. If my boss is on vacation and we spin up 4 new servers, we need to wait until he gets back and turns on his computer for us to receive the passwords for the new server. I understand the security reasons for only sending it to the primary email account, but it seems like a silly workaround.

Here is the conversation that I had with Matthew. His name and some information has been omitted. #FAIL

Continue reading »]]> Actually, it has been on a new server for 6 months but since I haven’t blogged in about 1 1/2 years, it isn’t that bad.

I switched from Dreamhost (Shared hosting) which was great for my “own” server, but it was very restricting. I didn’t have root access and I couldn’t expand my sites performance. I moved to Linode.com and it was a great decision. If you have the skills, having full control of your server is awesome, but you need to beware of the following. If you break your server/websites/email (if app) somehow, you need to fix it. No support to call or email. Trust me on that one! Since I moved all my sites to this server, I learned very quickly about aspects of server administration that I wasn’t familiar with.

I have a configuration running CentOS, nginx and php 5.3.2 that includes svn (version control), varnish (caching), siege (stress testing), urchin (Traffic Analytics), nagios (resource monitoring) and more.

I am running all of my domains and a few of my friends websites and it works awesome. I am so excited to learn more server administration as I go so that I can be a more knowledgeable employee at my job. My work recently moved to RackSpace Cloud Servers from RackSpace Managed Hosting. I (+1) currently maintain 8 servers at work and we are adding another 8 servers over the next few months. The more I can learn on my own for selfish reasons (resume), the more I can bring to work and help them as well, which in turn will help me. Over the past 6 months,

I have learned so many exciting linux commands and processes that I feel very comfortable in command line. I know I still have A LOT to learn and ways to improve on already existing knowledge, but I am more confident now than I ever was. I added another set of skills that will greatly help my career. I am now not just a Web Developer, but a Server Admin as well.

Continue reading »]]> I just got an apartment in Portland, ME with my friend Tony. The apartment is awesome and as soon as I move completely into my new place, I will take pictures and post them. Just to give a brief description about the apartment: 1 1/2 baths, washer, dryer, dishwasher, basement, 3 floors, 2 car parking, backyard where we can put my grill and lawn chairs so we can host BBQs.

I will still be paying close attention to Boston sports though. I am living down the street from the Hadlock Field where the Portland Sea Dogs play. Sea Dogs are the Double-A associate of the Boston Red Sox.

Continue reading »]]> The following is an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid term.

The answer by one student was so “profound” that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well :

Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let’s look at the different religions that exist in the world today.

Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle’s Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.

So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, “It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,” and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over. The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct……leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting “Oh my God.”

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

Continue reading »]]> After eight years of the Bush era, Americans who are pro stem cell research can finally have hope that they can hold onto. President Barack Obama signed an executive order today that will reverse the ban on funding stem cell research..I know there are many Americans who disagree with research because it is unethical, but I don’t see it the same way.

In case you were unaware what stem cell research is, I will give a short explanation based on my knowledge of it. I would recommend that those reading this should look up more info about it. Stem Cells are blank cells that can become any type of cell from muscle to nerve cells. There is controversy over the use of embryonic stem cells, but embryonic cells are not the only way to pull stem cells, however they are the most usable. Adult stem cells can come from Umbilical Cords, Placentas and Amniotic Fluid. They can also be pulled from adults including the patient for which it is being used on from their bone marrow, liver, epidermis, retina, skeletal muscle, intestine, brain, dental pulp, even fat from liposuction and others. They can also be available from people who have passed away up to 20 hours after. Some say it is unethical to kill a embryo and I agree, however, how many people who have already been born have to die because we are unwilling to make a couple of sacrifices.

Last year, it is estimated that 750,000 Americans traveled outside of the country to receive medical treatment. I thought America had the best hospitals in the world and I was right, however the lack of stem cell research makes it impossible for Americans to get the care that they deserve. Now that Obama reversed the ban, I hope that more people will see all that stem cell research can accomplish once it is made available. I am not going to sit here and try to be non-objective about this subject. I fully support stem cell research because I have been affected by illnesses of both my parents.

My father was diagnosed with a malignant (cancerous) brain tumor in March 1997. I was only 13 years old at that point. He fought cancer on and off for 11 years. Five brain tumors and colon cancer became too much for him and he passed away on July 6, 2008. The American Cancer Society estimates that in 2008 there was just under 1.5 million new cases and just over 550,000 deaths from cancer. Isn’t that enough of an impact for stem cell research to be an important policy for the country. Over 1/2 million people died from cancer who could have had a chance if we funded stem cell research. Cancer must have touched almost every American at some point in their life.

For me, it isn’t just about cancer. My mother was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 1990 when I was 6 years old and has been living with it since. It has greatly impacted my life and the lives of everyone who knows us. The National MS Society believes that with proper research using stem cells, there is great hope that they will be able to find a cure for MS. I blogged about Accelerated Cure which is a Non-Profit Organization that is dedicated to finding a cure for the disease. In less than a month I will be participating in the MS Walk to help raise money for a cure.

Can this executive order be the beginning of the end for diseases that affect millions of Americans around the country. Besides cancer and MS, stem cell research can make way for other illnesses like spinal cord injuries, brain damage, heart damage, ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease) and many others. Can we finally focus on our futures rid the world of these illnesses? If we can, we will be on our way to be the most respected country in the world for medical treatment.

Continue reading »]]> I will first start off by saying that as a die-hard Red Sox fan, I am going to try and keep this article as close to the facts that I can, but my dislike of Alex Rodriguez is very strong, so I apologize if it comes out mean.

Alex Rodriguez has been looked upon as one of the players who will most definitely go into the baseball hall of fame….until now. No matter what people think about him, he will never be voted into the hall after his admission of steroid use. No matter who the player is, no matter what team they play for, I will lose respect for them. If we come to find out years down the road that Curt Schilling or Jason Varitek used steroids, every bit of respect for them would be lost. What are they teaching the youth around the country about sports? Especially in professional sports, it is important that they remember that they are role models and not just someone playing a game trying to win.

I heard some people call him courageous to admit to it, but that is not courage. Courage is going across the world to fight for your country and possibly die for your country. Courage is the single mother/father who are working their way through life on a pay check by pay check basis and still manage to better themselves by going back to school. Courage is not taking steroids to be a better baseball player and receive a 10-year-$252 million contract and then a 10-year-$275 million contract. If he wanted to be the best baseball player in history, he should have worked at it like everyone else.

A-Rod (A-Roid as people are calling him) went on “60 minutes” and lied to Katie Curic. If no one ever asked him and he chose not to speak up, not AS many people would be as mad/disappointed. If you knowingly went on TV and lied about not taking steroids, that is wrong.

Continue reading »]]> A few weeks ago (before Christmas), I called up Nintendo to ask about how I can clean my Wii since my discs weren’t being read properly. They told me that I could send in my Wii and they would have it back to me in 13-17 days. I sent it to them December 29th and I received it back on January 7th. They replaced the drive and gave me a whole new year warranty on my Wii. Very quick turnaround considering it was right after Christmas.