Category Archives: RootBSD

vBSDcon 2015 Recap

Date published: October 5th, 2015
Posted in Announcements, Events, FreeBSD, RootBSD | No Comments »

Wow – Verisign gets HUGE props from RootBSD for vBSDcon 2015

Marketers: want a clinic in how to roll out the red carpet and run a technical event like a Rolex? Go to the next one.

BSD hackers: if you missed it, you missed a 5-star event – but don’t worry too much – they rocked the cameras and all the talks are on YouTube

Instead of a long written blog, we’re going to let our pics, tweets and retweets do the talking.

Look carefully – you might find a special hosting offer in here 🙂

 


Silicon Valley Data Center Pre-Launch Promotion

MaheshaBSD by Juraj Sipos – A RootBSD hosted project

Date published: March 16th, 2012
Posted in FreeBSD, RootBSD | No Comments »

Juraj Sipos
http://www.freebsd.nfo.sk/maheshaeng.htm

 

Introduction of MaheshaBSD-2.0 – What’s New On The Lake Manasarovar?

 

MaheshaBSD-2.0, a FreeBSD Live CD (modular/education/presentation/rescue toolkit) based on FreeBSD 9.0, is introduced in this article. The Live CD was released in February 2012. The article will summarize the news in the new version of this distribution (for example, a possibility to use 4 keyboard layouts also with Devanagari, the author’s Xmodmap solution, and many other things). The name MaheshaBSD is derived from Mahesha, one of the names of Lord Shiva. The name was chosen because Lord Shiva is armed with the same weapon as FreeBSD – the trident (trishula in Sanskrit).

 

Brief introduction of the project

 

The full article about MaheshaBSD-2.0 was first published in the 2012 March issue of the BSD Magazine. You can see more details and pictures at the reference link.

 

To quickly recap what MaheshaBSD is, how it works and what it offers, the following points will put you into the correct light:

 

MaheshaBSD is a modular (and rescue/education/presentation) toolkit. MaheshaBSD’s purpose is to bring some useful system/recovery utilities to people, but on the BSD platform – like TestDisk (which will recover lost partitions), PhotoRec (which will undelete files; it can also undelete files on USB memory sticks), Clamav (antivirus software), immediate NTFS R/W access (with ntfs-3g), chntpw (for resetting the Windows XP/W2K passwords, a very practical utility), FTP server (which immediately works without need to configure anything), MPlayer (to watch films; DivX and many other codecs are supported), and many other things – for example, MaheshaBSD can be used for presentations (you can bring it anywhere with you and show thousands of pictures to people, or present videos while giving a lecture, or watch videos with friends), or easily let your documents speak their contents for you with the MaheshaBSD’s built-in speak (espeak) functionality (a very useful thing for blind people).

 

Linux emulation is activated. You may run Skype or any Linux software under condition that you also have the necessary libraries. For that reason, the static versions of Linux binaries are recommended.

 

The MaheshaBSD’s modularity feature, too, is very useful – you may place a tweaked mfsroot.gz file into the MaheshaBSD’s /boot directory. This means that you can prepare router/ftp server/www server and so on that will suit your particular needs.

 

MaheshaBSD is not for everyday use. It is a recovery toolkit that can be also used for presentations, etc., and it serves this purpose only for a couple of hours. Its FTP server (vsftpd) is your door to log into any computer running MaheshaBSD (a broken notebook, for example) and save (copy) your data. You may also delete defective software on your Windows NTFS partition (to mount it in the NTFS R/W mode, use ntfs-3g – it works immediately).

 

MaheshaBSD will help you be anonymous on the Internet (with tor and polipo [a proxy server]).

 

You may choose national keyboard layouts in the IceWM’s menu (German, Russian, Czech, Slovak); dead keys work too.

 

You may write documents in the Seamonkey’s Composer component (HTML editor). Click on the “Write documents” icon in IceWM. You can also download dictionaries and spellcheck your texts.

 

Sample use cases

 

1) Your notebook falls down on the floor and the screen gets broken. You are not a techie and you do not know how to get your hard disk out of your computer. With the built-in MaheshaBSD’s FTP server (vsftpd) you may log in to your computer via SSH and get to your files.

 

2) You may run the Clamav antivirus software from within the MaheshaBSD’s environment.

 

3) You may recover lost files/partitions (TestDisk, PhotoRec).

 

4) You are a Windows user and you need to reset your Windows password.

 

5) Many other possibilites…

 

Security

 

If you want to complain that running Skype in the MaheshaBSD’s /tmp directory is not a wise idea, I emphasize again that MaheshaBSD should be used only for a couple of hours (and under condition that all your hard disks and cellular phones fail, so there is really no need to complain about security) and mostly as a recovery toolkit. The above points, as you see, already express the essence of the MaheshaBSD’s objectives and there is really no need to worry about security. Nevertheless, if you want to complain, run Skype in your Linux /etc directory and not in the MaheshaBSD’s guest account (which is always available for you:).

 

What’s new in MaheshaBSD-2.0?

 

MaheshaBSD-2.0 is based on FreeBSD 9.0-RELEASE (i386), and it was released on February 7, 2012.

 

MaheshaBSD-2.0 is now Skype ready – that is, you do not need anything to install to use Skype (some Linux libraries were missing in MaheshaBSD-1.0). This Live CD contains instructions on how to put MaheshaBSD on a USB memory stick and you may carry it with you also with the Skype Linux static binaries.

 

Youtube videos now run without need to install Adobe Flash Plugin from the Internet (but without native Adobe Flash).

 

X Window may now be started with the startxaut (start X automatically) script, which will generate the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file (with the command Xorg -configure) and the X Window GUI environment will start automatically without any manual configuration.

 

MaheshaBSD-2.0 has a new logo (Manasa Devi). Manasa Devi, the Naga Goddess of the underground (Patala), is the daughter of Lord Shiva.

 

MaheshaBSD-2.0 has a special Xmodmap map with Devanagari and IAST support; it is in the More Progs IceWM’s menu. You may use 4 keyboard layouts with it (to switch between them, use CAPSLOCK).

 

Conclusion

 

The pull behind the MaheshaBSD project is to support and spread words about FreeBSD. Its Hindu touch is geared toward the same purpose, because there are still many people who have never heard of FreeBSD. If they search for some Hindu keywords, they may possibly find it and try it and convince their neighbors that FreeBSD is not only for the techies. In the future, MaheshaBSD will always keep its original contours, because a possibility to type wise ideas in Sanskrit or IAST transliteration of Sanskrit will make many people look out of their (Linux) Window(s).

 

Reference Links

 

Project home page (with download): http://www.freebsd.nfo.sk/maheshaeng.htm

RootBSD Hosting: http://www.rootbsd.net

BSDMag (with download): http://bsdmag.org/magazine/1795-nessus-exploitation-tools-and-payloads

 

Unscheduled Network Event: August 1, 2011

Date published: August 2nd, 2011
Posted in Announcements, RootBSD | No Comments »

Much of the internet connectivity in and to the Continental United States including our two datacenters was degraded by an outage within the Level3 Communications backbone that began at approximately 17:22 1 August 2011 UTC.  The impact of this event was felt not only on the Level3 backbone but also on other carriers as providers shifted large amounts of traffic that would have normally transited the Level3 network onto alternate network paths, causing increased latency, congestion and packet loss.

Many providers who utilize Level3 Communications for transport services, both telephone and IP,  were also impacted as these transport services utilize the same converged backbone as the Level3 transit product.

The Level3 Communications master case number is 40976066.

The Level3 Communications official statements regarding the unscheduled network event are:

8/1/11 7:12:56 PM GMT The IP NOC reports that the network equipment self
restored, resolving the routing issue and restoring services at
approximately 17:55 GMT. The IP NOC states that they will continue to
work with Level 3 OPS Engineers and the equipment vendor to isolate the
root cause of the service interruption. The Level 3 TSC has confirmed
that all customer services have been restored and the IP NOC will
continue to monitor for stability.

8/1/11 6:29:26 PM GMT The IP NOC reports that a routing issue failure
between Dallas, TX and Los Angeles, CA is impacting IP services in
multiple markets. The IP NOC has engaged the equipment vendor, as well
as Level 3 OPS Engineers and continues to investigate to isolate the
issue at this time.

If you have anymore questions about this outage, please contact our support team at [email protected].

Spam Filtering – “SpamStick”

Date published: June 16th, 2010
Posted in Announcements, RootBSD | No Comments »

What is SpamStick?

SpamStick is RootBSD’s new spam filtering service for domains.  It is a hosted filter service that will filter all the e-mail addresses for your domain.  It does not require any installation or changes to your existing mail setup for your domain.  There is a control panel which allows you to easily administer the settings.  SpamStick is ideal for SMBs with their own mail server.  The only change that will need to be made is your DNS MX records.  Once that is changed and we have confirmed your account is setup, you’re ready to start utilizing the service.

Benefits

Our SpamStick filter recognizes on average 99.98% of all spam correctly.  It protects your users and e-mail accounts from e-mail based virus attacks or phishing attempts.  All questionable messages are put in a quarantine in case a message is incorrectly identified as spam.  This allows you to login to the web-based control panel and review any messages that may have been quarantined.  You may also activate a daily or weekly PDF report which summarizes the results of messages sent to quarantine and the ability to release any valid messages with a single click.

How do I get started?

1.  Send an email to [email protected] telling us the domain you want filtered.

2.  Switch the domain MX records to poin to our  SpamStick servers (we can help with this).

3.  Enjoy!

First 30 days free to any customer who wishes to give SpamStick a test drive.  Simply submit a support ticket with your domain and tell us you wish to add it to SpamStick.  After 30 days, billing will start at $10 per month per domain.  If you don’t wish to keep the service for any reason, no problem, you won’t owe a dime for it.

Screenshots