Using Gedit for developing HTML pages

To use gedit as a web development IDE the Micah Carrick website has more details (see link below).

The use of gedit plugins is the key here, a file browser pane, code snippets and the ability to ftp to the webserver can all be built into the gedit application.

Links:

• Micah Carrick  - Customizing gedit as a Web Developer's IDE
• Snippets  - sernaferna on Linux Ubuntu (I need to search for this again)

IPv6 and the Residential Gateway

It is presumed that the latest generation of DOCSIS modems and Gateways are IPv6 ready with respect to their IPv6 address ability.

In addition, the vast increase in the number of available IP addresses should make the individual device connected to the Internet identifiable.

• How your individual device can be identified on the Internet 
• Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMPv6) for the Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) Specification
• Cisco DPC3825 DOCSIS 3.0 Gateway 

Capturing The Value Of Social Media Using Google Analytics

Do I really care about what visits I get from Social Media sites?

I guess I might sometime in the future - hey! I may even have a "Social Media Channel" at sometime.

The 3 things are:

• Identify the full value of traffic coming from social sites and measure how they lead to direct conversions or assist in future conversions 
• Understand social activities happening both on and off of your site to help you optimize user engagement and increase social key performance indicators (KPIs)
• Make better, more efficient data-driven decisions in your social media marketing programs

I guess this is relevant to businesses that are relying on Social Media as part of their business plan. I am just an observer but I need to keep abreast of what is going on in this area and if there is someone who needs an insight into it I would be more that willing to enter into a discussion about it.

Restricting the listing of the contents of a directory

• Linux pages on The Technology Muse
• Configuring and running your own private website

An over-ride needs to be made in the configuration files.

DNSExit

DNSExit are another DNS service provider

Links:

• DNS services - an analysis of the various options that you have
• Running a webserver from your domestic Internet connection

DNS Zone Management

As ZoneEdit seems to be down and I was interested in how to assign my domain name so that it could be pointed at a Google Blogger blog, I have been taking another look at the DNS Management offerings of my domain registrar.

It now looks like I don`t need to use a service such as ZoneEdit anyway.  Reading the Google help for using your own domain name for your blog I was confused that ZoneEdit did not have a specific setting for CNAME referrals.

It now looks like I can set my A records to whatever IP address that I like and I can use my registrars nameservers. This is new and was not available when I started to use ZoneEdit.

My nameservers are still set to ZoneEdit`s default servers - at the present time this is OK as I am not currently maintaining tempusfugit.ca as an  independently hosted website.

It also looks like I could set my website (Domain) to point at a Google Blogger blog. I am not doing so at the present time. I now have the option of either resurrecting my own server or using Google.

1st impressions of Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot)

Having re-configured my server and media machines I allowed the webserver backup machine to update to version 11.10

At first glance the new Unity GUI was a bit of a shock.

Take the tour (of the current version of Ubuntu)

Having run Ubuntu and other distributions of Linux for a number of years now, I have fair amount of experience to make a comparison between Ubuntu, Windows and OSX. So far the rhetoric I have seen so far, and I haven't been looking for long, it seems to be the "same old same old". The discussion on whether Linux or OSX are better than Windows is pointless in my opinion.

The main advantage of not using Windows as I see it is that they are both still minority o/s and as such, smaller targets.

My interest in the re-configuration of the Linux box was to setup Samba Shares for use in a media server. This is part of a "proof of concept" for the Raspberry Pi Media server.

Samba Shares

Setting up a Samba share on Ubuntu

This topic is discussed in greater detail on my website, tempusfugit.ca

Links:

• Linux pages on The Technology Muse
• Programming and Systems
• Implementing Samba Shares on a Raspberry Pi computer

Running a website from your basement

This is a topic that I had detailed in great length on my website, much of the material is in the process of being re-posted.

Seeing there was limited feedback that I was getting from it, and that which I did were from those that had not even read what I had posted and were only after picking my brain, I will not repeat it here.

• The legal implications as applied to your ISP
• ZoneEdit and your personal information.
• Using Ubuntu and Apache.
• Step-by-step details on how to do this for free 

• Programming and Systems on The Technology Muse
• Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee 
• Chicken of the VNC
• Advanced configuration of an Ubuntu Webserver
• Rotating Ubuntu Logs
• HTTP Error Handling
• Website Development Cycle
• Why I choose not to monetize my website
• What are the benefit of Google Sitemaps?
• Using Google Webmaster Tools
• Restricting the listing of the contents of a directory

Sir Timothy John "Tim" Berners-Lee

The inventor of the World Wide Web

It is amazing how little and how much has changed over the last 31 years. When Tim Berners-Lee was tinkering with the WWW at CERN in 1991 he configured what could have been the first webserver. 30 years later I have something not too different in the basement of my house.

Nomen Nescio - an anonymous name

I can across the name Nomen Nescio when I was looking at anonymous re-mailers.

It is a generally accepted term used for anonymity (see the WikiP entry for this). What I am surprised about, however, is some of the vitriol that can be found on Google Groups with regard to the Cyber-Bullying of those that appear to be homophobes on a quest to bring down the host of a gay photography website.

Design and administration of a website

In addition to the posts relating to running a webserver from your broadband Internet connection these are my posts related to website administration in general:

• Analyzing  web server logs
• CMS - Content Management Systems (Software)
• The Legal implications for your ISP - w.r.t. running a webserver on your broadband connection.
• The personal information held by ZoneEdit - a DNS service
• The selection of a DNS service
• Remote administration of a webserver using VNC

Analyzing web server logs

Every web server has the ability to log the accesses to it. These Server Logs can be used as a diagnostic tool to determine the source and intent of access.

In most cases the access of a web server is to retrieve a resource such as a webpage. In addition requests can be made to determine weaknesses and vulnerabilities in the configuration of the server. These accesses are those made by hackers.

Cross-correlating Google Analytics with observations from server logs

Used with Google Analytics a more complete picture of what and where a visitor was looking for and where he/she went after finding your website.

In addition to the actual IP address (or host) the search-string that the visitor used to make a search will be recorded in the server log. The search engine and other data is also returned in the server log entry. To locate the IP address you can perform a reverse IP Lookup, Google Analytics does this for you.

The advantage of direct inspection of the web server log is that the access will be recorded even though the visitor had been using a method to suppress their information. The easiest way to stop Google Analytics collecting your information is to disable JavaScript in your browser.

Analysis of pass_creator script

Summer 2011 - I now do this on the webserver directly from the Linux command prompt.

Google Analytics

Using Google Analytics

• Using Google Analytics with Blogger
• Cross-correlating Google Analytics with observations from server logs

Using .htaccess for password control of Internet resources

Assigning passwords to protect directories on the servers used by tempusfugit.ca

    .htaccess and .htpasswrd files in the protected directories

The directories as protected by making the appropriate entry in the .conf file for the VirtualSite in question.

  
Directory "/path_to_directory/restricted_directory"

     AllowOverride All

/Directory

Note that the tag delimiters have been removed from the Directory Tag

The contents of .htaccess:

  AuthName "A Dark and Secret Place"
  AuthType basic

  AuthUserFile /path_to_directory/restricted_directory/.htpasswd
  require valid-user

 

The text specified in AuthName is what is displayed in the login dialog below:

Installing and using Apache on a home-based website

The easiest way to do this is to use Ubuntu - Apache 2 comes pre-installed it is only a matter of configuration.

RSHTML - Really Simple HTML

The majority of my pages on my website was to follow a coding schema that I call RSHTML or "Really Simple HTML". The reasons for this are many-fold.

• It was quick to "cobble" a page together.
• Search Engines will know where to find things.
• There are many web developers out there that are much better at the fancy stuff than me!
• For what I want to achieve I don't need to overcomplicate things.

Apart from a few bits of JavaScript, most notably the code to display the modification date of the page, the code comprises of only a few tags:

• The obvious HTML HEADER TITLE and BODY tags
• <  p > and  < /p > paragraph tags
• <Hx> Heading tags
• <a> and </a> Anchors (HyperLinks)
• and line breaks <br>

Chicken of the VNC

Having used VNC Viewer on Windows and Linux PCs I downloaded Chicken of the VNC when I was test driving a Mac Book Air.

HTTP Error Handling

This is synopsis of the error handling on my webserver.

In fact, "error" is a misnomer here - it should be "response" handling or the "Handling of Server Status Codes"

• 404 - File Not found
• 401 - Authorization Required
• 403 - Forbidden
• 3xx - Moved handling

The 404 response can be customized on the Blogger platform