Posts by George Hills

Apache Denial-of-Service Vulnerability 2 Sep 11

A bug in the Apache webserver has recently been widely publicised. The bug is very simple to trigger remotely and causes almost-instant memory exhaustion (OOM) on the targeted server, which causes any sites hosted there to be unavailable until the server is restarted.

mitre.org has links to more information about this bug.

Ubuntu released new versions of the Apache packages last night, which contain a fix for this bug.

We recommend that customers who are using Apache on their Brightboxes, should upgrade as soon as reasonably convenient. The default Brightbox install uses Apache, so if you are unsure whether or not this affects you then you should upgrade Apache using the instructions below.

The upgrade requires a restart of Apache, which will momentarily interrupt service. In cases where your Brightboxes are behind a load-balancer, the impact of this is minimal.

We believe the upgrade to be low-risk; we have already upgraded a large number of our own servers today without incident, and the only changes relative to the previous package are this security fix.

The necessary commands are

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get -y install apache2.2-common

Ubuntu Lucid beta box offer 15 Apr 10

With the impending launch of Ubuntu “Lucid” (10.04 LTS), we are preparing our new Lucid-based Brightboxes.

We’ll still be offering Hardy-based Brightboxes, of course.

We’re now looking for volunteers beta test Lucid Brightboxes. If you’d like one to test, please email lucidbeta@brightbox.co.uk.

Beta test Brightboxes are free, but Lucid isn’t finished and there are still bugs, so you shouldn’t plan on running your live customer-facing sites on one yet. Once we launch Lucid-based boxes for all, we’ll be switching off the beta boxes.

Space on the test platform is limited, so don’t delay! There are Brightbox-goodies on offer for the best bug reports. We’ll be giving priority to existing Brightbox customers.

Ubuntu Netbook Remix on an Acer Aspire One A110 24 Sep 09

For my weeks on call, Brightbox let me choose an ultra-mobile (netbook) PC. This will allow me to leave the house without having to carry a heavy full-size laptop with me.

I wanted one that worked well with Linux, preferably Ubuntu Netbook Remix, had SSD rather than hard disk, and built-in 3G connectivity.

I’ve picked the Acer Aspire One (AAO) A110. It was available in the UK from Tesco in this spec with 1GB of RAM for GBP 179 – a bargain.

It came with a truly dreadful pre-installed build of Windows XP Home. Very slow and very much not recommended. Ubuntu Netbook Remix is, on the other hand, superb.

I’ve installed the pre-release Ubuntu 9.10 “Karmic”. Here’s what I’ve found that’s specific to the A110. I’ve written up these notes in the hope that they’ll be useful to someone else thinking of running Linux on an AAO. While there is a wealth of information about it out on the Internet, it’s not all collected together in one place.
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