Aug 052012
 

What do you run on your website?  Do you have a LAMP stack?  That’s Linux, Apache, MySQL and P{HP,erl,ython} for the uninitiated.  I normally run a LAP/LM app stack duo.  This allows me to separate the MySQL database from the web stack, and use it for other purposes as well.  I include such services as xbmc and MS Access/Libre Office Database as MySQL clients as well.  It makes sense to isolate the MySQL server.

There are also several web servers, or LAP stacks in my home.  I keep one instance for my production site (this page here), and a handful of others for testing and development.  They all share the same LM stack.

Recently I was required to produce a WIMP stack, that’s Windows, IIS, MySQL, and php, for development purposes.  The architecture is almost completely different, but it’s now using my LM stack for database as well.

There are a few things to consider when you’re deciding between a single LAMP stack (or multiple LAMP stacks) and a LAP/LM stack.

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Jul 302012
 

This morning I realized I had no sendmail functionality on my web server.  This isn’t good, since many programs need to be able to, well, send mail.  I had a couple of options.  I could install Postfix or Exim, and take on the task of managing a whole mail system, or I could install a “nullmailer”.  A simple program that forwards mail to an upstream server for further processing.  There are a handful of good nullmailer programs available.  The two I’m most familiar with are sSMTP and Nullmailer.  Here’s a brief overview of the two.

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