Well, a 404 is not the way!

The 301 redirect is easy.  Edit your htaccess file on your linux server in the root directory of your site, or create one if you do not currently have one.

My old page was index.php and I wanted it as index.html, I have my index.html uploaded to my site.

The simple contents below is all that you need:

redirect 301 /index.php http://www.m3server.com/

The above line will redirect  your index.php requests to your main web site url, in this example.

Perhaps you had a page that you want to change its name to.  Rename the file to the name you wish to use, add the redirect, presto – your traffic saved and served without a nasty 404.  Example is below:

redirect 301 /fishin.html http://www.m3server.com/fishing.html

That is a fictitious link, but you get the idea.

If you make a mistake and your web site appears broken, first step should always be to rename your .htaccess file to off.htaccess, see if that resolved your trouble.  If it does, then you just need to isolate the bug in your .htaccess file.

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Remember, each pop3 email account has to be unique to the server, just like there is only one you, there is only one unique email account. So, let’s get started with the most basic setup.

Our example domain, (this is fake and non operational, just substitute your real domain for the example):
aaa_cars.com

Let’s say you want to setup sales@aaa_cars.com. Well, sales is not a unique user name as is probably already taken or in use by another one of your domains. How can I use sales then?

First, we setup a pop3 account so you can send/receive email. Our test account name is going to be:

john.doe

Login to your server admin control panel. Under the navigation panel on the left hand side (Control Center), click on the small navigation box to the left of email. The drop down list appears.

Click on “Add Mailbox”

Enter a unique name, like our example, john.doe, select the domain from the drop down box, and assign the password, confirm it, and click continue. Verify your settings to confirm, then click confirm.

Now you have a working email account that you can check and send email from.

You can access it quickly via the webmail interface, example url:

http://aaa_cars.com/webmail/

So, thats great, but what about sales@aaa_cars.com? Now, you need to create an email box alias, we call them email routes. They are a standalone email address that just simply routes email to a local email box.

Back to the Control Center at your server admin control panel, click on:
Add Alias

Enter the address on the box to the left:
sales@aaa_cars.com

On the box to the right, enter just the pop3 account name you want the email to route to, not a full address, just the name, in our example, we are using:

john.doe

click continue to access the values.

Now, people can email you at sales@aaa_cars.com and it will arrive in your email box, john.doe waiting on you to download them.

You are probably wondering how to show the recipients that you email, that the email comes from sales and not your user name, john.doe? This is where the magic comes in.

Login with john.doe via your webmail interface.

Look at the top navigation bar, locate and click on “preferences”.

Now that your alias (email route) and pop3 account are setup, you are free to make changes here based on your alias configuration.

Locate the top section and click on the edit nav link by the From address.

The left box is the user’s name, in our example case, it will be:
Sales

The right box is for the real email address we previously setup, in this example we will type in:
sales@aaa_cars.com

Click the add/modify button to save your addition, and then click the back button.

Next, under the From is the Reply to option. Type in:
sales@aaa_cars.com

Scroll to the bottom and hit save.

Now, the system will send email from SALES and will appear to the recipient as it came from sales@aaa_cars.com. When the recipient clicks on reply, it will be sent back to sales@aaa_cars.com. In which, the email route you setup, will deliver the email to john.doe.

Presto, you can now use the common name, sales, and have it route to your mailbox.

Sounds complicated, a long post, but it is rather basic and once you do it one or two times, it will be easy. I assure you.

You can route many email addresses from one or more domains to the john.doe mailbox, because as we have learned in the previous blog, a mailbox is just a holding place for our incoming email.

Travis

- M3Server.com

There are two parts to an email server, one that sends email to other servers, and one that enables your client to receive email from your local mailbox server. This is often the most confusing part to understand.

A mail client, either web based, or application based, uses both parts of the mail server to send and receive email.

Let’s start with sending of email. The sending of email is done via the outgoing mail server, most commonly known as the SMTP server. This is often provided by the ISP that your internet connection is connected to. The security method here is relay by IP address, so there isn’t any authentication method such as a login and password.

When you are using a 3rd party SMTP server, the most common security method for access is, SMTP AUTH. This is done by selecting the option for your mail client’s outgoing mail server, “My server requires authentication” and entering a user name and password – often the same as the pop3 client’s login information.

Once the message is sent, it is routed to the destination email address’s mail server. This mail server will route it to a mailbox as instructed in the email configuration files. the mailbox, accessed via a pop3 user name and password is unique to the local server.

The pop3 server, mostly referred to as the incoming mail server, is accessed with a pop3 login account name and password. This allows access to the mailbox file. The mailbox file contains a list of all email messages in the box. If two users shared the same mailbox user name and password, the could see each other’s email. This is coming when multiple people work under the same account, say – info@buildingcompany.com.

If you want to separate email for a different group, example, roof.info@buildingcompany.com, this address will require it’s own email account to keep the email separate from the info mailbox.

The key item to remember is this, pop3 mailbox account can be used by many domains, it is simply a mailbox that can have one or many email addresses.

-M3Server.com

So, you want to change the password to your ftp/ssh login account on your linux server? No problem!

First, download putty for your windows based operating system and save it into a convenient directory. Copy and paste the following url into a new window:

http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/

1) Launch the program putty.exe (or any other terminal program that supports ssh).

2) Enter your server name in the host name field, the same as you would enter for your ftp host. Example: server.simplecom.net or simply, domain.com

3) The server will ask you to login using your current login and password.

4) once logged in, you can simply execute the following command and press enter:

passwd

(pressing enter after the command passwd, will enable the server to prompt you. Following the prompts, pressing enter after each one.)

That is it! once you logout, your new password will be required for your next login.

Travis

-M3Server.com
World Class Hosting – since 1996!

order allow,deny
deny from 123.45.1.7
deny from 123.45.2.
allow from all

Add this to your .htaccess file, or create one if you do not have one with your favorite text editor, upload the file to the server into the directory you wish to protect.

This will allow any ip to access your site, except those listed. You can add as many as you wish. Note the 2nd example, 123.45.2. – this will block the full class C, from 123.45.2.1 to 123.45.2.254

Again, test it to ensure this is the effect you want. At any time, you can remove the .htaccess file, or rename it to, example, off.htaccess and it will disable any rules you have specified.

Travis

WARNING: Errors made in your htaccess file could cause your site to fail. You can restore operation of your web site by removing or renaming the htaccess file.

The file .htaccess (there is a dot in front of htaccess). This dot prevents the file from being viewed via a web browser.

Some htaccess files can be very advanced, this is just basic information to protect your images.

You can reference this tutorial for more information:

http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/howto/htaccess.html

So, let’s get started!

open your favorite text editor, notepad for you windows users, and nano or vi for you Linux users.

Place the following into your page (taking note to replace m3server.com with our own domain name, you can also allow other domains to link your images, as I did here, with m3xs.com).

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^$
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?://(.*\.)?blamcast.net [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?://(.*\.)?m3server.com [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http(s)?://(.*\.)?m3xs.com [NC]
RewriteRule \.(jpeg|jpg|gif|png)$ – [F]

Save the file, name it .htaccess and upload it to your site’s root directory. (domain.com/.htaccess)
If you have other image extensions than the above noted, you can add those here as well.

Now, test it, make sure it works like you need it to.

- M3Server.com
World Class Hosting Since 1996!

Add this to your .htaccess file, or create one if you do not have one already (upload this to your site’s root directory).

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule (.*) https://my.m3server.com/

Now, when someone clicks or types in your URL, they will be taken to your secure URL.

Just replace my.m3server.com in the example above with your site’s domain name, and please test to ensure this is the action you are trying to achieve.

Travis

*Open iPhone and select the settings app
*You will then scroll down until you find the selection labeled “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”
*When you choose Mail, Contacts, Calendars you will see different headings and changeable options for that heading
*The first heading will be labeled “Accounts”
*Here you can edit your existing mail accounts or add a new one
*Select the option “Add Account…”
*This will take you to the Add Account… page where you can choose from the most popular email service providers, such as G-Mail or Yahoo, or you can choose the “other” option to create your own
*Once you have selected the “other” option you will arrive at the Other page where the first heading is labeled “Mail”
*Under the Mail heading is an option to Add Mail Account that you will select
*You will then arrive at the New Account page where you will enter your account information (Name, Address, Password, and Description)
*For “Name” you will use your actual first and last name
*For “Address” you will use your mailing address, the example provided is “example@me.com”
*You will select your own password
*The default for the description will be your mailing address, you can change it if you’d like
*You will then choose the save option at the top right of your screen
*After saving your information you will be asked for more New Account information regarding incoming and outgoing mail servers

SELECT POP AT THE TOP OF THE MENU BEFORE PROCEEDING

*Scroll down to the incoming mail server and enter your server host name:

example: domain.com
incorrect example: pop3.domain.com

*Scroll down to the outgoing mail server and enter your server host name:

example: domain.com
incorrect example: smtp.domain.com

*Then select “Save” which is again located at the top right of your screen
*Please wait while the iPhone verifys your information
*If a box appears that says “Cannot Connect Using SSL” you need to select yes to make sure you’re not using SSL (Your mail account will not work using SSL)
*It is possible that the iPhone will say Cannot Connect Using SSL a second time. Be sure to select yes again
*After you select not to use SSL your phone will verify the account information and automatically save it, returning you to the “Mail, Contacts, Calendars” screen
*To access your new mail account you will go to the mail app where you will have to select your new account if you already have existing ones
*Once you’ve selected the account you want you can check your new mail with the inbox option or use the box at the bottom right of your screen to send a new message
*You can also use the arrow at the bottom left of your screen to manually check for new mail

Bret
M3Server.com

All of a sudden my browser, reliable Firefox, became very slow. At first I thought the site I was on was slow. Then, I assumed it was windows 7, lol. Then, I blamed my high speed Internet connection. Nope.

In fact, it turns out, checking the taskmanager process list, Firefox had consumed 300 MBs of ram, yea, that would slow it down!

Rebooted, problem remained.

What to do? I refuse to use IE8, my personal opinion. I in turn, downloaded Google’s Chrome.

Boy, was I amazed. Not only did chrome import all of my links, favs, and passwords from firefox… SPEED!

So, before you blame your server, or your favorite web site, test another browser. I was surprised.

Updated:
Keep google chrome fast by making these changes in your google chrome options:

1. click on options, the wrench icon on the top right
2. click on the tap “Under the Hood”
3. Uncheck all options!

Clear the cache, close the browser, open it back up, and it will be fast as new.  Clear your cache from time to time (I don’t clear my passwords, as that is a royal pain).

- Travis

Name: ns1.simplecom.net
Address: 69.64.94.15

Name: ns2.simplecom.net
Address: 216.177.153.3

M3Server.com