Everything worked well except for two bugs:

1. Ubuntu Unity 2D would crash
2. Viewing directories that contained many PDF files would freeze the desktop

[...] apparmor="DENIED" operation="sendmsg" parent=1 profile="/usr/bin/evince-thumbnailer" [...]
[...] kernel: [  708.816888] nfs: RPC call returned error 13

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I was recently called out to a new client site to stop a Microsoft Outlook 2010 client from crashing every time email was sent or received. It took a while to discover the cause of the problem because the issue was related to a configuration that has not been supported by Microsoft since Exchange Server 5.0 was released in 1997. So, not something I’d expect to find anyone still using.

Don’t Store PST files on a network share

According to Microsoft, among the consequences of using a network share to store pst files are:

When you store .pst files [on a network share], shares may stop responding. This behavior may cause several client-side problems, such as causing Outlook to stop responding or freezing desktops on client computers.

There is some further information and analysis over on the technet blog, including additional problems caused on the server side, from way back in 2007!

Hopefully this information will jog the memory of future troubleshooters or give them another place to look when trying to solve problems with Microsoft Outlook.

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ssh -L 8000:localhost:80 username@remoteserver

In that example, I could now visit http://localhost:8000 in a web browser to access the remote web server over the ssh connection. This is useful for troubleshooting or setting up services before allowing public access.

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Fortunately Florian Boucault picked up the bug report and pointed out that dconf — the system that Unity 2D uses to store its configuration — does not currently work over NFS.

The workaround is to store dconf databases locally by setting XDG_CONFIG_HOME during the user login process, before X gets started. Here is a script that will do the job when placed in /etc/profile.d/

# /etc/profile.d/local-config.sh

# Set XDG_CONFIG_HOME, XDG_CONFIG_CACHE and ICEAUTHORITY to a local path

# Gnome dconf does not currently work over NFS,
# so make sure configs are stored locally.

# Ubuntu Bug: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unity-2d/+bug/817368
# Gnome Bug: https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=595579

# All other programs that honour the location of XDG_CONFIG_HOME
# will also store their configurations here.

# Set CONFIG_BASE_DIR to any local directory where the user
# has write access to create it.

CONFIG_BASE_DIR=/home/configs/${USER}
[ –d ${CONFIG_BASE_DIR} ] || mkdir –p ${CONFIG_BASE_DIR}

export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=$CONFIG_BASE_DIR/config
export XDG_CACHE_HOME=$CONFIG_BASE_DIR/cache

# X11 throws an error on login when .ICEauthority is located on NFS
# Ubuntu Bug: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/761991

export ICEAUTHORITY=$CONFIG_BASE_DIR/.ICEauthority


I also took the opportunity to move .ICEauthority from my home directory because I get an error that it can’t be updated every time I log in.

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Photo From StickBus

A common cause of blacklisting, in my experience, is when client PCs are infected by malware and become part of a botnet. The owners of the botnet then use the infected machines to send out thousands of spam emails and its not long before this is noted and your connection appears on a blacklist, effectively preventing your legitimate email from getting to recipients.

To prevent blacklisting I adopt these best practices:

1. Allow the local mail server to send email and block all other outgoing connections on port 25 at the firewall
2. Configure the mail server to only accept connections from authenticated mail clients.

Now only legitimate users that are logged in to the mail server can send mail, any attempt by an infected machine to contact an external mail server to send email is blocked at the firewall. If PCs then become infected, the firewall logs will alert you to the outgoing connection attempts on port 25 and the infection can be dealt with.

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Photo From kevindooley

For many small retailers, part of the marketing plan is to create a presence on the internet, usually starting with a basic website and occasionally moving toward on-line selling. So, imagine yourself as the owner of a small shop and try a few google searches for information on internet marketing. Plenty of articles that are short on practical advice, any number of internet marketing courses and a sprinkling of grand ideas. Much of this information also assumes a more than passing familiarity with the internet that many shop keepers don’t have, in my experience.

I think that what small, high street retailers need is more zero-based, practical advice on internet marketing. These businesses are hungry to capitalise on the potential of the internet to improve their reach and inform new and existing customers but they lack good information and help. There is still a big opportunity here.

Can you help by pointing to good resources for small retailers on internet marketing and how they can apply it? Links to articles, case-studies or events are much appreciated. If you have any please post them in a comment.

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Photo From whiteforge

In the next breath we are told by the expert how Web 2.0 and social media are driving a revolution in “people-to-people” interaction, closer customer relationships and customisation of products and services to fit the customers needs. Abandon your management and factory-thinking — they tell us — lead your knowledge workers in to the new dawn of the revolution.

If you were alive before 1990, have read any books over the past 20 years and/or don’t rely on the internet as the sum of your knowledge then you may be shaking your head slightly by now. Certainly social media tools are relatively new, but enabled by cheap computers and fast network connections, which are made possible by the factory-thinking of mass-production, engineering and globalisation. Experience has shown that those engineers and production units require a bit of good management, some business processes and, yes, leadership.

So what is new here? Not much. It’s a sales pitch that attempts to reinvent mere tools as a strategy that will revolutionise the way business is done.

Social media is an important tool that is informing marketing and helping businesses, customers and clients to find out what each other are really about.

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Photo From Dazzie D

I’ve been keeping an eye on this story and when I saw that the ExplictWeb Podcast were interviewing WordPress contributing developer Andrew Nacin I asked, via twitter, if they could get his comments on the issue. Sadly there was not enough time to get his response on the show, but he kindly replied to my question on his blog.

Andrew points out that Network Solutions have already owned up to the fact that it was their fault and nothing to do with WordPress, citing the problem was due to a ‘complex combination of factors’. In a later post they explain more fully what the attackers did and I hope we also see the results of security analysts working on the problem as to what mis-configurations or weaknesses were exploited.

For those who run websites, it might be time to think about the quality of your hosting. Shared hosting solutions are cheap but it is hard to balance low-cost with security and performance.

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Windows XP Corrupt Registry Message

This is a true story, the client called me at 7:30pm and needed to be on a train at 8:30am the following morning. In the course of investigating the issue I found that no backup of the laptop or Windows system disks were taken and the hard disk contained many business critical documents and thousands of emails.

I could not fix the problem there and then and had to take it back to my lab to safely backup the data, fix the registry corruption and get the system booting again. The client had to leave without his laptop but we shipped it out the same day to catch up with him at his first stop in China, all adding up to a big bill.

To paraphrase Henry Rollins:

Don’t talk about it, do it! If you didn’t backup, man. You blew it!

If you have been thinking about backing up your computer you really need to do it, now.

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…for me it is about managing expectations and in a more socially connected world we can share our expectations and we can also report when something fails us or doesn’t deliver what it promised. I also think that the fact that these kinds of meetings have evolved out of these connections is something that needs to be maintained and if new opportunities for connections are identified then we need to be clear about what the focus is and what is expected of the people attending.

Photo From Jill Clardy

Over the past few months I have been to two contrasting events, the LikeMinds conference in Exeter and a Devon Social Media Cafe meeting in Plymouth. While I found LikeMinds a useful afternoon, a couple of hours of informal discussion at DSMC was much more enjoyable and absorbing.

It seems clear that whatever type of events we create around social media, they must be open to all, there must be space for participants to talk, share experiences and social media stories.

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