• sshmnt installation and useage for backups

    So you want to use sshfs to do a backup? We have had a couple of customers unsure what to do when the sshfs command is not found. Its not too hard to do. Debian based VPS can just run apt-get install sshfs Centos doesnt come with it by default and you need to install…


  • Unsure who is sending spam? Try this

    Anyone who has hosted peoples websites before, has had  either a blog hacked, or some guy thinking he is going to send mass mailouts using PHP or similar happen. Its extremely hard to trackdown and deal with, and yet it can get your server listed at spam service denying legitimate email from getting through. This…


  • Problems with HDDs, so Rimuhosting.com gets a hardware upgrade

    Procrastination is a horrible thing. A few weeks back Carl here setup a brand new Nehalem server for us to pop the RimuHosting website onto. RimuHosting had been running on one of our lowest speced Core 2 servers for couple of years now. And it had been doing pretty well. But hey, why not upgrade?…


  • Does your VPS have MD5 enabled for passwords?

    We recently discovered that the way we install a VPS differs slightly from the usual CD install. This is not something we do specifically but something that can be improved on in the set-ups of CentOS5.3. When you install from a CD it automatically enables MD5 encryption in passwords (which should be the norm), however…


  • One Java init script to rule them all

    Need an init script for a Java service? Like tomcat, liferay, or jboss? Regular Linux init scripts often don’t work so well. e.g. Java apps typically want to be run by a particular user (e.g. tomcat or liferay). e.g. They may require a ‘special’ shutdown mechanism (e.g. with Tomcat sending a signal to a particular…


  • Has your VPS been hacked?

    If you use any pre-packaged software, it always pays to sign up to their mailing list or security advisory list. This means if any exploits or updates happen, you are on the ball and up to date. Today we had an email from a customer whos front page had been replaced. I noticed it was…


  • Rimuhosting does Software Freedom Day

    Well I’m sure most geeks out there have heard of Software Freedom Day, it was the same day as Talk like a Pirate day!  I’m glad however that most people forgot ‘Talk Like a Pirate’ day however, since a good portion of the NZ Rimuhosting staff were helping out at the local SFD. John, Paul,…


  • Is your VPS slow to login at all? Applications not running so fast?

    Often we will get customers emailing in saying that things are just running ‘slow’. Often when we login the first thing we notice is after the password has gone through it just hangs for a fair while before login. This is usually a sign that its trying to do a reverse DNS lookup and failing.…


  • Safe rm prevents accidents! try it!

    I found this the today http://www.safe-rm.org.nz/ , and having had the odd accident im most definitely going to be installing this on my own server! What is safe-rm? Safe-rm is a safety tool intended to prevent the accidental deletion of important files by replacing /bin/rm with a wrapper, which checks the given arguments against a…


  • New website release coming up

    Heya guys Well this is a special release just for you guys who watch the blog. It seems the dev guys have been hard at work and put together a couple of new websites designs! We are just tweaking it a little but thought we would give you a nice sneak preview of both of…