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You are here: Home / Archives for 2009

Archives for 2009

How to make iPhone WP app work with Self Signed SSL Certs

2009/12/10 By staze

This post assumes the user is using a Macintosh running 10.5.x or greater. It will still work with Linux or other Unix OS’s, but you’ll need to do some digging to get the proper commands. This way is all GUI driven.

Assumptions:

  • Have access to a computer running ≥10.5.x
  • Have a self signed certificate your web server is using for SSL
  • Have configured WordPress to require SSL for XMLRPC and Login (using “define(‘FORCE_SSL_ADMIN’, true);”) (Admin over SSL).

Assuming all of this, the process is not too difficult.

The basic gist is that you need to create a Certificate Authority, and then sign your SSL web cert with this CA. Once you’ve done that, you can then take the CA certificate, and email it to your iphone, and install it there.

So basically, you need to create a CSR (Certificate Signing Request) from your SSL cert you’re using on your webserver. If you’re using Mac OS Server 10.4 or greater, you can do this in Server Admin very easily. If you’re not, then you need to do some command line magic.

Something like this here: http://sial.org/howto/openssl/csr/

Once you have that CSR, you then can go into Keychain Access on your mac, and under the “Keychain Access” menu, go to “Certificate Assistant” and say “Create a Certificate Authority…”. Walk through that wizard, and most of the defaults are fine. You’ll want to put in your name, email, etc.

Once that’s done, you can go back into Certificate Assistant, and say “Create a Certificate for Someone Else as a Certificate Authority…”. This basically will sign your certificate. It’s like a self-signed certificate, only you actually have the CA cert to “trust”. Walk through that, though you may have to change the defaults for what the certificate is for.

Once you’ve done that, you’ll need to use this new certificate, as your SSL certificate. You do that by exporting the SSL cert as a .pem, and then replacing your public SSL cert with this one. Restart your web server, and you should have a signed cert. Assuming you trusted your own CA, you also shouldn’t get any warning about it being untrusted.

Now, once that’s done, you can export the public CA cert, as a .crt, and email than to your iphone. Once you get that, you can click it, choose to install the profile, and you’re done. The wordpress app should now work.

Please contact me if none of this makes sense, or if you need additional info. I was going to put up screen shots, but that just delayed me posting this. Which I wanted to get done.

Have a great rest of the week, and weekend!

Filed Under: Sys Admin Tagged With: CA, CSR, Keychain Access, SSL, Wordpress

Flash player and network homes on Mac OS 10.5+

2009/11/20 By staze

So, along the lines of my previous post, today I decided to look into Flash Player performance on 10.5 clients with a 10.5.8 server, using network home directories.

I had noticed a couple days ago that users playing youtube videos got occasional skips and stops in the video. This is on a brand new Intel iMac, with 2gb of ram. It should easily be able to handle a non-full screen, non-HD youtube video. Doing a `fs_usage AppleFileServer | grep <username>` (where <username> is the username of the user logged in) on our AFP server showed a LOT of traffic to ~/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash Player/… First, seems like Adobe hasn’t touched that part of the Flash player code, if it’s still writing to a “Macromedia” folder. Second, why the hell is it caching information in the Preferences folder?! That’s what ~/Library/Caches is for (which I already redirect). But, I know there’s been a lot of complaining in the past about Flash caching data in non-standard places that aren’t affected by clearing the browser cache.

So, given that amount of traffic it was producing, I figured that was probably the cause (what a leap!), so, I open up the NHR scripts I use, and add a redirect for that folder to the local HD, and install those on the client. Guess what? No more Flash Player skips or stops on network home users.

At this point, I’ve copied those changes out to all our clients, and dropped them into our DeployStudio workflow (for machines that we image between now and the next image update). On the plus side, this should result in a sizable decrease in server IO and network traffic in the case of a whole class watching Flash videos.

So, once again, shoddy programming. The only caveat I can think with this would be any install bases that are using Macromedia Dreamweaver (already checked Dreamweaver CS3, and it doesn’t write to that folder), or maybe Macromedia Director. If you’re running those, I’d recommend just redirecting the “Flash Player” folder within the Macromedia folder. But, I’m not positive those other programs write to that folder, it’s just a guess.

So, good luck.

UPDATE: So, a student came up to me today and said Pandora stopped working. Looking into the issue, it looks like the newest full release of Flash doesn’t really like this “hack”. So, after beating my head against the wall for 2 hours with this, I decided “what the hell” and installed the beta of Flash player that adobe just released (which is Intel only, even though it claims to be a Universal Binary in the installer, and the Plugin itself), and what do you know, it fixed the issue. So, my guess at this point is Adobe is just slowly updating Macromedia’s code, and they found/fixed this issue while fixing something else (since they don’t support Network Homes).

Filed Under: Sys Admin Tagged With: 10.5, Adobe, DeployStudio, Flash, Macromedia, Network Home Directories, NHR

Lego Mindstorms NXT Storage

2009/11/16 By staze

So, I purchased a Lego Mindstorms NXT kit back shortly after they were released due to a wonderful “error” on Toys’R’Us’s part that allowed coupon stacking. So, I got the kit for $125, when it had just been released. And while I haven’t played with it nearly as much as I should have at this point, I have really been annoyed with how crappy the box is that it came in (the educational set comes with a case, the retail version comes in a really shoddy box).

So, after hanging new shelves in my office, and seeing that ugly box on the shelf, I decided to finally get around to finding a good storage solution for my NXT set.

First stop was google, and I found people had good luck with Plano cases, and the Stanley cases. Knowing the local hardware store had Stanley stuff on display, I drove over and picked up a Stanley 014725R, which has nice removable trays. The problem is, the NXT brick doesn’t fix in any of them. I could remove one of the large boxes, and shove the NXT in it’s spot, but this seemed hokey, so I returned the case, and started looking elsewhere.

Completed, Closed

On the way home, I stopped by Fred Meyer (a supermarket chain that started here in Oregon, and has since been bought by Kroger). In their hardware department, I found the “standard” non-oem case that people use, the Plano 5231.

I knew things would fit in it because people had put up pictures of what they had managed to sort them into. After getting home, I set about organizing everything into the various slots.

All and all, it probably took about an hour to an hour and a half. And while the Plano case doesn’t have removable trays, it should be okay for a single person doing a build as opposed to a group project. If I ever start really working with the NXT set, I may pick up another one of these for my other Technic legos, as they’re currently in an ancient Lego branded, non-segregated plastic box.

Top OpenThe only issue I can really see is moving back and forth between the top and the bottom of the case to get parts. Ideally, the two halves would come apart easily so one could have them on the table separately and allow for easy retrieval. I can see why Plano doesn’t do this, since the case is really meant for storing random shop related stuff, not really legos. A lot of people purchase the Stanley cases, but have two, one like the one I bought for normal parts. The other that has the deep containers to hold the NXT, cables, etc. This really allows for spreading out and building. And while that would be great for multi-person builds, or in educational settings (apparently the Lego branded cases for education even have holes in the bottom of the trays so you can wash and drain the pieces!), I don’t think it’ll be as big a deal for me. Heck, the main reason I did this, at this point, is to get the ugly torn up box off my shelf.

Bottom OpenIt would be cool if the bottom section had removable trays, but given the price point, and my goals, it’s hardly a deal killer. It would also be nice if the top separated from the bottom easily, in lieu of the separate containers. But, again, for $10, this is so much better than the box. I really wish Lego would have just included a case with the set.

[xrr rating=4.75/5]

Filed Under: Reviews Tagged With: Lego, Mindstorms, NXT, Plano, Stanley

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