Vicky’s server guides

I always wanted to see mail stats on my server, who receives and sends the most mails, what are the busiest hours, etc.. to better track mail problems, catch spammers and to satisfy my admin’s ego . I found this little script that goes through senmail’s log and produces output. In my case I will send the output to root via email.

Here are the features that I receive from this little script:

SendmailStats reports:

• Time/date of log beginning and end
• Total bytes transferred and total MB transferred
• Total bytes in and total MB in (locally delivered)
• Number of messages sent out
• Number of messages coming in
• Messages per hour graph
• Top 20 remote sending hosts
• Total number of sending hosts and number of their attempted messages
• Top 20 destination hosts
• Total number of destination hosts and number of messages sent to them
• Top 20 local deliveries
• Total number of local accounts that received mail
• Total number of messages delivered locally
• Top 20 senders
• Total number of senders and total number of messages sent Read the rest of this entry »

I have been noticing a very annoying delay when trying to log in via FTP on servers where I use proftpd. Everything works, but when I try to connect, 5 – 10 seconds pass by before I’m prompted for my login credentials. After long hour of searching on the internet I found a solution.

 All you need to do is edit the config file which should be /etc/proftpd/proftpd.conf  and place this line within <global> section:

 IdentLookups Off

 That should remove the delay and your ftp connection will be initialized very quickly.

During the time Ensim evolved it used to call its servrice either ‘webppliance’ or ‘epld’ (newer). So the command you need to run as root via shell to restart Ensim is:

If you use version older than 10.x.x

 # service webppliance restart  

If you use version EnsimX for Linux 10.x and higher

# service epld restart

I hope this helps

This tutorial section deals with mysqldump which is a tool to import and export MySQL databases.

It can be used to back up a database or to move database information from one server to another.

Read the rest of this entry »

I always hated to go to Ensim to find out the current version of it.  Finally I  somewhere found a command that writes this info in shell.

He it is: 

cat /usr/lib/opcenter/VERSION

Many times it happened to me – I forgot Ensim’s admin password for web interface or DC has just set some password and they “forgot” to inform me. I usually struggled via ssh how to change it. Not anymore..

 When you need to reset Ensim password do it by this:

/usr/sbin/passwd_appl_admin <username>

It will prompt for the password only once.

I will show you here how to set correct date and time on your server. All steps need to be done as root (which I assume you know).

To set correct time issue this command

/usr/bin/rdate -s time.nist.gov

It will connect to time server and synchs your time and date. After that command execute

/sbin/hwclock --systohc

which sets ‘permanent’ clock from the system time so that the time will be correct next time you reboot.

You can do this via a NTP daemon but it is too complicated for such an easy task as setting the date and time.