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Most frequently asked questions

1. Windows: Accessing Your Server with Remote Desktop

   This article explains how to use Remote Desktop to access your Windows server’s desktop from anywhere in the world.
   
   
   

   Remote Desktop from a Windows Computer

   
   

   
   
   1. Click the Start button.
   
   
   2. Click Run…
   
   
   3. Type “mstsc” and press the Enter key.
   
   
   4. Next to Computer: type in the IP address of your server
   
   
   5. Click Connect.
   
   
   6. If all goes well, you will see the Windows login prompt.
   
   

   
   

   Remote Desktop from a Linux Computer with RDesktop

   
   

   
   
   1. Open a command shell using xterm
   
   
   2. Type ‘rdesktop’ at the command prompt to see if you have rdesktop installed
   
   
   3. If rdesktop is installed, then proceed.  Otherwise, you will need to install the rdesktop package for your flavor of Linux.
   
   
   4. Type ‘rdesktop’ followed by your server’s IP address.  Then press Enter.
      
      
      
      • Example:
        $ rdesktop 72.52.246.40
      
      
      
      
   
   
   5. If all goes well, you will see the Windows login prompt.
   
   

   
   

   Remote Desktop from Mac OS X

   
   

   
   
   1. Using Microsoft Remote Desktop (Mac OS X versions 10.9 and later):
      
      
      
      • Install Microsoft Remote Desktop from the Mac App Store.
      
      
      • Click the New button or use the shortcut Command + N to set up a connection to your server with the following settings:
        

        

        
        
        
        
        • PC name: You can use your server’s IP address or its hostname (if the hostname has an appropriate DNS record and resolves).
        
        
        • User name: To access the admin account, use "root" or “Administrator”.
        
        
        • Password: Enter the Administrator password.
        
        
        • Configure full-screen and multi-monitor settings to your preference.
        
        
        
        
      
      
      • Once you’ve filled in the appropriate settings, close the Edit Remote Desktops window.
      
      
      • Select your connection under My Desktops and press the Start button in the menu to connect (or simply press the return key on your keyboard).
        

        

        
        
      
      
      • If your server uses a self-signed SSL certificate, a message will be displayed as Remote Desktop is negotiating credentials. You can either press Continue to proceed with the connection or, to permanently store the certificate and connect directly in the future, click Show Certificate and then check the box next to Always trust … before clicking Continue to proceed.
      
      
      
      
   
   
   2. Using CoRD (Mac OS X versions 10.5 through 10.8 only):
      
      
      
      • Download and install the CoRD application here.
      
      
      • Open the application and click on the File menu, then New Server
      
      
      • You will be presented with a window where you can specify information about the server you are connecting to.
      
      
      • Enter the server’s hostname or IP address in the Address field.
      
      
      • You can alter the other settings in this window if you wish but all you need to start the connection is the address.
      
      
      • When you are finished making changes, press the enter/return key on your keyboard or simply close the new server window.
      
      
      • Your new server profile will appear in the list to the left side of the application. Double click on it and you will start the connection to your server.
      
      
      
      
   
   
   3. Using the Microsoft RDP Tool (Mac OS X versions prior to 10.7 only):
      
      
      
      • Download and install the Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection Client for Mac here.
      
      
      • When you open the application, you will be prompted for the “Computer:” you would like to connect to. You can enter the server’s hostname or IP address.
      
      
      • After you click Connect the client will ask for your user name and password. If it fails to connect, you can try again inside the remote connection window.
      
      
      
      
   
   

2. What is Reverse DNS?

   Reverse DNS (rDNS) is name resolution that looks up an IP addresses to obtain a domain name, performing the opposite function of the DNS server, which turns domain names into IP addresses.

   
   

   Reverse DNS can be used as a spam filter. Typically, spammers use invalid IP addresses, that is, ones that do not match domain names. A reverse DNS program looks up the IP address of an incoming message and, if no valid domain name is found, the server blocks the message. Although reverse DNS is fairly effective for filtering spam, it also often blocks valid emails.

   
   

   Our administrators configure reverse DNS on all of our email servers. If you administrate your own server, you can contact your IP address's provider to configure reverse DNS.

3. How to disable directory browsing globally on whole WHM/cPanel server

   o disable directory browsing/listing on whole server, follow these simple instructions:

   
   

   1. Log into WHM
   2. Service Configuration –> Apache Configuration
   3. Global Configuration
   4. Scroll down to Directory ‘/’ Options
   5. Un-tick Indexes option (see picture)
   6. Then press Save button below
   7. Finally, rebuild by clicking rebuild apache conf button and that’s it…
   
   

4. Setting up Nameserver DNS Using cPanel/WebHost Manager

   cPanel's WebHost Manager® (WHM) lets you use your own domain name as a nameserver for websites your server hosts. To use your domain name, you have to set up a WHM Account for it first.
   
   
   

   To Set up Nameserver DNS Using cPanel/WHM

   
   

   
   
   1. Log in to WebHost Manager using root for your username and your server's password at https://yourserverip:2087, where yourserverip is your server's IP address.
   
   
   2. Click DNS Functions.
   
   
   3. Click Edit DNS Zone.
   
   
   4. Select the domain name you want to use, and then click Edit.
   
   
   5. For the two rows with the menu displaying NS, edit the right-most columns to ns1.your domain name. and ns2.your domain name., respectively.
      

       Note: You have to enter a "." after your nameserver in this section for the DNS to work properly.

      
      
   
   
   6. In the Add New Entries Below this Line section, do the following in the first row:
      
      
      
      • First field: Type ns1
      
      
      • Second field: Type 14400
      
      
      • Third field: Select A
      
      
      • Fourth field: Enter your server's IP address
      
      
      
      

      Then, in the second row, do the following:

      
      
      
      
      • First field: Type ns2
      
      
      • Second field: Type 14400
      
      
      • Third field: Select A
      
      
      • Fourth field: Enter your server's IP address
      
      
      
      

       Note: Do not enter a "." after your ns1 and ns2 entries in this section.

      
      
   
   
   7. Click Save.
      

       Note: DNS can take 24-48 hours to propagate once these changes have been made.

      
      
   
   

5. Install Webmin on Debian

   If you are using the DEB version of webmin, first download the file from the downloads page, or run the command :wget http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/webadmin/webmin_1.881_all.debthen run the command :dpkg --install webmin_1.881_all.debThe install will be done automatically to /usr/share/webmin, the administration username set toroot and the password to your current root password. You should now be able to login to Webmin at the URL http://localhost:10000/. Or if accessing it remotely, replace localhost with your system's IP address.

   
   

   If Debian complains about missing dependencies, you can install them with the command :apt-get install perl libnet-ssleay-perl openssl libauthen-pam-perl libpam-runtime libio-pty-perl apt-show-versions pythonIf you are installing on Ubuntu and the apt-get command reports that some of the packages cannot be found, edit /etc/apt/sources.list and make sure the lines ending with universe are not commented out.

   
   

   Some Debian-based distributions (Ubuntu in particular) don't allow logins by the root user by default. However, the user created at system installation time can use sudo to switch to root. Webmin will allow any user who has this sudo capability to login with full root privileges.

6. How to Install MySQL on CentOS 7

   MySQL is a popular database management system used for web and server applications. However, MySQL is no longer in CentOS’s repositories and MariaDB has become the default database system offered. MariaDB is considered a drop-in replacement for MySQL and would be sufficient if you just need a database system in general.
   
   
   

   Before You Begin
   

   
   

   
   
   1. 
      

      Ensure that you have followed the Getting Started and Securing Your Server guides, and the Linode’s hostname is set.

      
      

      To check your hostname run:

      
      

      hostname
      
      hostname -f
      
      

      
      

      The first command should show your short hostname, and the second should show your fully qualified domain name (FQDN).

      
      
   
   
   2. 
      

      Update your system:

      
      

      sudo yum update
      
      

      
      
   
   
   3. 
      

      You will need wget to complete this guide. It can be installed as follows:

      
      

      yum install wget
      

      
      
   
   

   
   

   Install MySQL
   

   
   

   MySQL must be installed from the community repository.

   
   

   
   
   1. 
      

      Download and add the repository, then update.

      
      

      wget http://repo.mysql.com/mysql-community-release-el7-5.noarch.rpm
      
      sudo rpm -ivh mysql-community-release-el7-5.noarch.rpm
      
      yum update
      
      

      
      
   
   
   2. 
      

      Install MySQL as usual and start the service. During installation, you will be asked if you want to accept the results from the .rpm file’s GPG verification. If no error or mismatch occurs, enter y.

      
      

      sudo yum install mysql-server
      
      sudo systemctl start mysqld
      
      

      
      
   
   

   
   

   MySQL will bind to localhost (127.0.0.1) by default. 
   
   

   
   

   Harden MySQL Server
   

   
   

   
   
   1. 
      

      Run the mysql_secure_installation script to address several security concerns in a default MySQL installation.

      
      

      sudo mysql_secure_installation
      
      

      
      
   
   

   
   

   You will be given the choice to change the MySQL root password, remove anonymous user accounts, disable root logins outside of localhost, and remove test databases. It is recommended that you answer yes to these options. You can read more about the script in the MySQL Reference Manual.

   
   

   
   
   
   

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