What is .htaccess?

By Joe Gardiner Monday, 22nd March 2010

In order for requests to be passed between the static content tier of web servers and the dynamic/application tier, it is important to ensure the .craccess and .htaccess files contain the correct information.

If they do not, your php applications, especially CMS’s, may display some errors, or have features working incorrectly.

How does it work?

Both files offer apache settings overrides at different tiers in the CatN stack. The .craccess file offers configuration overrides at the static content tier, and the .htaccess at the dynamic/application tier.

The .craccess file is offers exactly the same options as the .htaccess file but is specifically configured for the static content tier of the CatN stack.

The .htaccess file was originally used for per directory access configuration in apache web server, but is now used for many more configuration settings, such as cache control, customised error responses, and responses to varying file types.

Finding these files

In order to view these files you must be able to view hidden files and folders in either your FTP client, or using the correct ssh command.

Hidden files in FileZilla

Open up FileZilla, and connect to your vCluster access server. Have a look at this guide if you’re unsure how to do this.

Click the “Server” option from the menu bar and select “Fore showing hidden files”. This will display hidden configuration files in all folders you view through FileZilla.

As you can see in the following picture, the .cracess file and .htaccess files are now displayed in my wordpress install root folder.

Displaying files in SSH

In a secure shell environment using the the -a switch on the ls command displays hidden files with a “.” prefix. For example:

Correct contents

The correct contents of these files are as follows…

.craccess

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !.(gif|jpe?g|png|css|js|ico)$
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://YOUR PRIVATE IP/$1 [P,L]

.htaccess

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]

If these files do no exist in the root of your directory or CMS install, create them in a text editor, save as .craccess or .htaccess and upload to the root folder.

Double check the file names however, as some text editors add their own file extensions, such as .rtf or .txt. Using FileZilla, it is simple to rename a file if this has occurred.

Posted in Advanced Configuration, Guides | No Comments »

We’re developing…

By Joe Gardiner Thursday, 18th March 2010

The CatN blog has been a little quiet recently, but not without good reason.

The website, control panel, and support section that we launched as beta have all been getting a makeover, (or started from scratch in some cases), and are being prepared for our official product launch.

Here’s a quick summary of what we have been working on:

read more…

Posted in Updates, vCluster | No Comments »

Adding your SSH key to your vCluster

By Joe Gardiner Monday, 8th March 2010

SSH (Secure Shell) is a way of controlling your vCluster through a terminal command prompt. This offers great control to the user, but requires you to authenticate your SSH key with the vCluster system.

To allow your computer to connect to your vCluster through a secure shell environment, it is necessary to add your SSH key in the vCluster settings section of the CatN control panel.

We need to copy our SSH key into the text box provided, so lets lookup your SSH key.

The process is different depending on your Operating System. Below is the guide for Mac OSX and Linux shells, browse down for the Windows guide.

Adding your SSH Key – Mac OSX

To generate a new key view this guide.

First we need to open a terminal. In your mac spotlight bar, type in “Terminal”, select the first option, called… Terminal!

In the terminal screen type:

ssh-add

This will add your SSH key to the SSH keyring. Now we’re going to check the key has been added correctly and display it in the terminal so you can copy it into the vCluster page.

Now you need to type:

ssh-add -L

(make sure it is a capitalised letter L). This will display your SSH key. Note: I have deleted some parts of my key for security reasons.

Now select and copy (Apple key + C) the entire key, and open up your vCluster settings page in the CatN control panel.

Click into the SSH key text box and paste your key (Apple key + V).

Now your key is in the box, select “Update Keys” to add your SSH key to the vCluster.

You can now SSH in a terminal to browse your vCluster.

Adding your SSH Key – Windows

In Windows a couple of light weight applications are required, as the windows command prompt does not support ssh natively.

Head to http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/putty/download.html which is the download page for a program called PuTTY. You want the installer that cntains everything apart from PuTTYtel. Note: At the time of writing there is only one installer available for download.

Run the file once it’s finished downloading and install the program.

Look in your start menu and run “PuTTYgen”. This will generate your public and private ssh keys that you can then add to the CatN control panel.

Select the “Generate” option in the actions menu, and follow the instruction to move your mouse over the empty space. These random movements will generate a unique numerical key. Move the mouse until the progress bar is full.

When complete your public key will be displayed. Select the entire key, and copy it onto your clipboard (Ctrl + C).

Naviagte to the CatN Control Panel, and to the settings section of your vCluster. Select “Add New Key” and paste the clipboard into the new empty text box. When complete select, “Update Keys”.

Now we’re going to setup the PuTTY terminal. Bring up the PuTTYgen window again, and enter a password to lock your key in the “Key passphrase” text boxes.

Select “Save public key”, and choose a location on your computer to save this file. You may find it useful to create a PuTTY folder in your My Documents. Now select “Save private key”, and again, choose a location to save this file on your computer.

Now open the folder you save the two keys in, and you should see “sshprivatekey” and “sshpublickey” saved.

Double click the “sshprivatekey” icon (monitor with a hat on!), enter your password, and you can now see the icon running in the system tray.

Right click on this icon and select “New Session”, from the pop up menu.

In the PuTTY configuration window enter the hostname from the Control Panel settings panel, e.g. access1.c1.catn.com, and select “Open”.

Type your username after “Login as:”. Note: this will be the same as your vCluster name.

If successful you will be running the terminal as [username@access1 ~]$

Posted in CatN Control Panel, Guides | 6 Comments »

phpBB

By Joe Gardiner Tuesday, 2nd March 2010

You can What you will need:

All the information from you vCluster Details page and Database Settings page. This includes: access server, public IP, database server, username, database name (the same as your username), and your database password. For quick reference during the phpBB install, you may find it useful to copy these details into a text file.

The newest version of phpBB, available to download from phpbb.com.

A file extractor that is compatible with the .zip format. OSX and Windows handle this format natively.

An FTP program. You can use a program like FileZilla, or if you use Firefox web browser, there is an FTP add on available called Fire FTP. If your not sure which client to use have a look at this article.

A text editor. Notepad or Text Edit will both be fine.

A web browser. We like Firefox.

The official phpBB install guide is available here.

Getting Started

Unzip your downloaded phpBB install to a folder on your desktop. Installing phpBB is relatively simple so we’re going to proceed directly to the upload stage.

Uploading

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To upload phpBB files to the root directory of your vCluster follow the FTP upload guide.

To upload phpBB files to a sub-domain on your vCluster follow the vHosting guide.

Installing phpBB

Now we’re now going to install phpBB using your web browser. Fire it up and navigate to phpbb.username.vc.catn.com. You will be directed to this page:

Click on the “Install” tab to begin the installation process. When you proceed to the next step, after viewing the basic system requirements, you can see a list of the installation requirements, including the databases vCluster supports. phpBB is 100% compatible with our system so you can select “Start Install” to continue.

In the next screen we will enter the database details that we copied from the Database Settings section of the CatN Control Panel.

You can leave the first field, “Database Type” on its default value, “MySQL with MySQLi extenstion”.

In the “Database server hostname or DSN” field enter the name of your database server, for example, xserve1.dc.fubra.net.

Leave the next field, “Database server port” empty, as our database servers operate on standard ports.

In the “Database Name” field, enter the name you copied into the text file. (Note: this will be the same as your username and vCluster name.)

In the “Database Username” field, enter your username. Again, this will be the same as your vCluster name.

In the “Database Password” field, enter the password you copied into a text file. You can change your password in the Database Setting section of the CatN Control Panel.

In the “Prefix for tables in database” field leave the default, “phpbb_”.

Select next step, if you have been successful, the phpbb install will display this message. Select proceed to next step.

In the “Administrator Settings” screen enter your username and password for the admin account, as well as the email address you wish to receive alerts to. Once you have entered this information proceed to the next step.

You will be displayed with another success screen, click to continue. The configuration file will then be written, and if successful you will be notified. Again, click to continue.

The next screen with advanced settings are dependant ont he user and their current resources. Enter your email and SMTP settings if this resource is available to you. If not, leave the default settings. In the “Server URL Settings” section, the only option you should change is the Cookie Secure option, and this, only if you have purchased an SSL certificate for your domain. If not, leave this to the default setting, “disabled”.

Once you have completed this page click “proceed to next step”.

The database tables will then be created. If all the information was entered correctly you will receive this message. Proceed to the next step.

The final stage will give an overview of your complete installation. You can now select the “Login” button to enter your new phpBB dashboard.

Congratulations on your successful install!

Posted in Guides, Installing an App | No Comments »

Multiple domains on your vCluster

By Joe Gardiner Tuesday, 2nd March 2010

Your vCluster can be used to host multiple domains if you subscribe to the Standard package. This guide will show you how…

read more…

Posted in Guides, vHosting | No Comments »