Holiday VPS woes

On Sunday morning, December 23, one of the worst nightmares of a web host came true. A VPS server suffered a hardware failure. The hardware was repaired quickly enough, but restoration of the VPS server was another matter.  The nightmares of the web host begat the nightmare of a webmaster. All four of the worldspaceflight sites went down. As restoration by the web host proceeded, worldspaceflight.com and sphider.worldspaceflight.com were functioning again Monday afternoon. Blog.worldspaceflight.com and forum.worldspaceflight.com were not so fortunate. There really wasn’t much that could be done until the VPS server restore was completed. For the uninitiated, restoring a VPS server is nowhere as simple of just copying a bunch of files back. IF ONLY! That restore was FINALLY completed Friday evening. Then it was discovered that the blog and forum were STILL not working. It turns out that for the blog (this site), there was a simple permissions problems which was quickly fixed. Three down, one to go. The forum is being stubborn. First, the entire cache directory (with needed driver files) was devoid of content. I THINK that is fixed, but now there may be ANOTHER permissions problem. We are working to resolve that. No guarantee there won’t be something else next, but hope springs eternal. The forum WILL be back.

Yeah, it has been fun, but PLEASE, let’s not EVER do this again!

Securing your Sphider

You may have read before that I have suggested securing the Sphider admin directory with password protection. After all, you don’t want to take a chance of someone else gaining access and changing all of your settings… or worse!

But Sphider has a number of other directories within it. What about those? Well, MOST of them can also be password protected. The rule is, if files in the directory only need to be accessed by PHP, it can be password protected. If any file in a directory needs to be accessed by a web browser, it shouldn’t be password protected. For example, the templates directory should not be password protected. It contains css files, which the browser needs to display search forms and results properly. Js_suggest should not be password protected, It contains javascript which the browser needs to access. The tmp directory (not the one in admin) should not be password protected as the browser needs to be able to read and write there. Other than that, go ahead and add password protection.

Oh! One more thing. Add SSL. That is something that at one time was expensive and primarily used by sites like businesses with checkout pages and such. Today, SSL in some cases can be free. DreamHost offers “Let’s Encrypt SSL” for free. Then there are self-signed certificates, also free (but not as trustworthy). The advantage of SSL is that when you do need to enter user name/password to one of your password protected directories, it can’t be intercepted.

Typo in Sphider 2.2 install script

A typo has been discovered in ‘install.php’ for Sphider 2.2.0 (classic). This will affect those who have 1) already downloaded ‘sphider-2.2.0.zip’, and 2) are trying to do a clean install. Any downloads after right now already have the file corrected.

This does not warrant a new release, but simply instructions on how to fix the problem if you have it.

Line 23 currently has:

error_reporting(E_ALL0../settings”;

Change this to:

error_reporting(0);
$settings_dir = “../settings”;

This does NOT affect the PDO edition.

Sphider 2.2.0 released

Sphider 2.2.0 was released today in both the Classic and PDO editions.

There are currently no plans to release this update in PostgreSQL or SQLite editions. Those remain at 2.1.0. There seems to be little demand for these.

Sphider 2.2.0 has the search interface redesigned to be more mobile friendly. The code was rewritten to be more responsive to CSS instruction, made to detect the use of mobile browsers, and present a mobile friendly version of the standard template.

A minor security problem was also addressed, as well as the ability of the administrator to easily switch between the tabbed search (traditional, RSS, and image) and just the basic traditional text search.

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There are plans for the next release (February 2019 ???) to expand this ability so that the administrator can pick and choose which search interfaces to present. If they want both traditional and image, but not RSS, they will be able to do so.

Also, the templates will be reworked so mobile browsers can experience friendly versions of ALL the templates.

World Space Flight website pages

The World Space Flight pages are anything BUT mobile friendly! That is a sad fact.

The good news is that that will be changing. The changes will be gradual, a few MAJOR changes coming first, followed by more general changes. The first big change which will be rolled out will involve the menus on the left side of practically every page.

As it is, you have to enlarge the area just to read it, much less actually click on something. America in Space already has the beginning of that change on MOST of the pages.

Once the menus have been adapted, then there will follow changes in the content layout. Be patient. Things will be getting better.

The customer service rep…

Sometime back, I was talking on the phone to a customer service representative about some product or another. He needed to snail mail me some information.

Now the conversation went something like this (names changed but not the concept):
Customer Rep: Can I get your name, please.
Me: James Piper.
Rep: Diaper?
Me: No, PIPER!
Rep: Diaper?
Me: NO! PIPER! P as in Paul, i-p-e-r!
Rep: OH! Okay. Thank you.

A few days later I got the information in the mail. It was addressed to Paul Iper.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sphider 2.2 is in the works

The subject(s) has come up recently about the use of html tables, css, and mobile browsers.

Looking at the Sphider search pages, there is room for improvement. So work has begun to alter the code to do away with html tables and expand the use of css. The result is that the appearance of the search page layouts using css is nearly identical to look using html tables.

The kick is, it makes it easier to customize the look from template to template. Even a new template has come about. Named “mobile”, it is much easier to see/use on a mobile device. The search page will also detect the use of a mobile and force the mobile template even when it is not the template set in the configuration and seen by anyone NOT on a mobile.

The changes have already been made and will now undergo a period of testing. Most likely, Sphider classic will see the new version first, with PDO a short time later. If this will also carry over to the PostgreSQL and SQLite variation has not yet been decided.

Core functionality will have no change. This new release will be for benefit of the user’s clients, the people who actually use the search feature.

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To get an idea how the mobile template will work, first visit
https://www.worldspaceflight.com/sphider/search.php
with a desktop or laptop. Then visit the same link with a mobile device.

Feedback appreciated.

NASA announces date maiden flight of Crew Dragon

NASA recently announced that an unmanned test of the SpaceX Crew Dragon to the ISS will take place on 7 January 2019. The Boeing Starliner will have a similar test sometime in March.

If all goes well, The first manned flight of Crew Dragon will be sometime in June with the Starliner doing so in August.

But there are no guarantees. Both vessels do have issues. With the Crew Dragon, there are parachute issues and, more importantly, concerns about the high pressure helium tank. Remember the tank failure on 1 September 2016 that took out the Falcon 9 and the entire launch pad?

Personally, I am concerned about SpaceX’s procedure in which the crew is boarded BEFORE the Falcon 9 is fueled. The crew has to sit atop the rocket while fueling takes place. I know SpaceX fuels at the last minute because they use super-cooled propellants for added power. But I have to ask, is a little extra efficiency more desirable than a reduced risk to human life? For purely cargo or satellite launches, go for it. But when lives are at stake?

I like what SpaceX has accomplished. They are definitely daring. But then again, there is a fine line between between being daring and being cocky. Cocky can get you killed.

 

Sphider 2.1 released

It was found that all variations of Sphider 2.0.* had a flaw in the search capability. While earlier versions allowed wild card searches (*), or not contained searches (-), this ability was inadvertently blocked in 2.0! It seems the work to improve security and block undesirable searches went too far!

This is resolved in all variations of 2.1 – Classic, PDO, PostgreSQL, and SQLite.

A family tradition

It is Thanksgiving Day here in the United States. Many families have traditions for Thanksgiving. My family when I was growing up was no different. This is the story of one of those traditions.

It began about 1955 or 1956 when we got our first television set. It was on the first Thanksgiving after getting the television that my father discovered the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. He would turn on the television, set the channel for the parade… and leave the room to do other things, never to return. But God help the soul who, in his absence, attempted to change to another channel! That was strictly forbidden! So every Thanksgiving, we would turn on the television, tune in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, … and leave the room to find other things to do. Nobody had any real interest in watching the thing… but it just HAD to be on.

After I had left home and had my own family, the tradition died, at least in my house. If we went to visit the folks on Thanksgiving, the parade was on… with nobody watching. My father didn’t miss a Thanksgiving Day parade (which he never watched) a single time until he died in the early 1980’s.