LEMP Stack Articles and Tutorials
Linux, Nginx, MariaDB/MySQL, PHP/Perl/PythonNginx proxy and load-balancing functionality intro
Nginx is one of the most viable (and visible) open-source HTTP servers competing against Apache today. Due to its asynchronous, event-based nature, Nginx is highly scalable and can far outperform Apache under very heavy loads. As a result, it is one of the best...
Giving away Google Domains invites
Giveaway Complete Updated 11/8/2014 The entry period ended last night and three winners were chosen at random this morning. Congratulations to Ehh, Mayank, and Geoffrey, the Google Domains invitation winners. Your invitations were sent earlier today to the email...
LEMP stack installation scripts for Ubuntu 14.04
This weekend I overhauled my quick-lemp scripts for automating part of the server setup and LEMP stack installation process. The basic functionality is the same: standard new server setup is performed and a fully functioning LEMP stack is installed along with a sample...
Obtain and install a free SSL certificate on Nginx
Until the past year I never really bothered to put my projects behind SSL. It always seemed like more of a hassle than it was worth, and I didn't like the idea of paying $50+ for a properly-signed SSL certificate when none of my projects were commercial or...
Poodlebleed exploits SSL 3.0
Despite being 15 years old, and theoretically replaced by TLS, SSL 3.0 is still in widespread use. As luck would have it, yesterday Google researchers revealed a vulnerability in 3.0 which allows for the decryption of secure connections. Poodlebleed is a vulnerability...
Quick introduction to DNS
IP Addresses and Domains In computer networks, every single machine is identified by a numerical label called an IP address like 203.0.113.1 (IPv4) or 2001:0db8:0f61:a1ff:0000:0000:0000:0080 (IPv6). As IP addresses are hard to remember, the Domain Name System has been...
Nginx and uWSGI configuration for Flask app deployment
For someone new to application or server deployment (or any field, really), the vast assortment of commands, arguments, variables, and parameters can be overwhelming. That's why I encourage friends and coworkers to break those daunting projects into smaller, more...
Initial steps on a new Ubuntu 14.04 server
Ubuntu 14.04 If you just logged in to a fresh installation of Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty Tahr), there are a few steps you'll want to take immediately to help secure your new server. The IP blocks used by the various VPS providers are constantly being scanned, and brute...
A LAMP stack with Nginx is a LEMP stack
LEMP stack not LNMP stack For years I've referred to a stack consisting of Linux, Nginx, MySQL/MariaDB, and PHP/Python/Perl as a LEMP stack. While using LEMP might seem odd at first, it actually makes a lot of sense given that Nginx is pronounced "engine x."...
Update Bash on Linux and Mac machines to protect against ShellShock vulnerability
If you have any Linux or Mac machines, you'll want to update Bash due to a vulnerability announced by RedHat called ShellShock. This vulnerability allows an attacker to inject their own code into Bash using environment variable assignment. You can check if your...