What we seldom see or hear though is who that person is, how they made it to where they are now and what really drives them to get out of bed every morning and config another router, install another server or lead the armies of engineers and analysts back into war against the ever failing infrastructure. I think it is time to change that. In the next month or so we will be starting our new Audio/Podcast series WhoIS.
I’m going to try to keep this brief as I am not a big WordPress hacker. For the most part WP just works and allows me to get on with what I really want to do which is write and interact. When I first started StaticNAT.com I had all sorts of crazy ideas and to this day I still do. But back then I had not clue how to really setup a blog, I just dove in and hoped for the best. Well it turns out what how I did it is really not all that bad but I had just not configured everything in a way that was optimal. So here is what I did.
On the Initial WordPress install I told the installer to use /staticant.com/WP/ as the directory for all my wordpress install files. That is all well and good but I ended up having to go to www.staticnat.com/wp to get to my blog, and that was not so good. The quick and dirty fix was to use an index.html file that looked just like this:
< !DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">StaticNAT
The problem was that it just ended up pointing back to http://test.staticnat.com and quite honestly thats ugly. As I have been cleaning up the site in preparation for all the cool new things we are adding I decided I needed to make a change even if it was painful. My plan was to backup my WP data and DB then create a new install of WP at /statincat.com/ the root directory for this site. After that was all done I would import all the old data re-install all my plugins re-create the Admin users and move on. But I was a bit concerned about how clean this would be especially from and SEO perspective.
Digging a bit I found out that the way I deployed five years ago was really not wrong and that WP had provisions already to live in a unique director but still present itself without the index.html file. So off I went to find out how to do it. What I found was this support forum post on DreamHosts site. This was convenient since Dreamhost is my web host so I was sure it would work out well.
To sum it all up for you what you have to do is go to Settings –> General –> and change the Site Address (URL) to http://www.staticnat.com. Once you have done that you have to create a .htaccess file and place it in both the /staticnat.com/WP and /staticnat.com/ folders. I did not like all of the things that were in the .htaaccess file that was shown in this forum article so I modified it to look like this;
# protect the htaccess file
order allow,deny
deny from all
# disable the server signature
ServerSignature Off
# limit file uploads to 10mb
LimitRequestBody 10240000
# protect wpconfig.php
order allow,deny
deny from all
#who has access who doesnt
order allow,deny
#deny from 000.000.000.000
allow from all
#custom error docs
ErrorDocument 404 /notfound.php
ErrorDocument 403 /forbidden.php
ErrorDocument 500 /error.php
# disable directory browsing
Options All -Indexes
# set the canonical url
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^staticnat.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.staticnat.com/$1 [R=301,L]
# BEGIN WordPress
# END WordPress
Then you have to copy the index.php files from /staticnat.com/WP to /staticnat.com/. That should be all there is to it. But for me it was not. I ended up having to go into the index.php files and change the following:
/** Loads the WordPress Environment and Template */
require('./wp-blog-header.php');
TO
/** Loads the WordPress Environment and Template */
require('./WP/wp-blog-header.php');
That did it. I have a few custom links that are not working following the change but thats minor and should be resolved pretty quick. Keep in mind if you end up using this any of the references to www.staticnat.com should be replace with your domain name for it to work for you.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup a Login Banner on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco IOS Device.
We have introduced a new blog series called a Few Easy Steps. This series is really what I always intended StaticNAT.com to be from when it started in 2007. I would highly recommend you check out this series and add us to your RSS reader, bookmarks or whatever means you use to remember to check us out from time to time. To date we have published 22 of these articles that allow the reader to walk away and do something right away with that they have just read. Most of these posts have been dealing with very entry level configurations steps around Cisco IOS devices. In the near future we have plans to extend this series not only into configuration of other networking devices but move into server configuration as well. Keep and eye out because there is much more to come.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will set the Speed and Duplex on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco IOS Device.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup Remote SysLog on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco IOS Device.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup NTP on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup DNS Resolution on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco IOS Switch.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will setup
a voice vlan on an interface of a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will configure a Span Port on a Cisco Switch. In General this will work on any Cisco Switch. In this session we will be including the setup and verification commands, following the full config sample we will also provide the commands to remove the Span/Monitoring Port. We are adding these steps because often old Span ports cause havoc with new span sessions and leaving Span sessions running is taxing on switchCPU and Memory and should not be done unless required.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Configure Source Interface
! conf t ! monitor session 1 source interface fastEthernet 0/1 both ! end ! copy running-config startup-config
Configure Destination Interface Interface
! conf t ! monitor session 1 destination interface fastEthernet 0/21 ! end ! copy running-config startup-config
Verify Span Settings
sh monitor session 1
Entire Session:
! conf t ! monitor session 1 source interface fastEthernet 0/1 both ! monitor session 1 destination interface fastEthernet 0/21 ! end ! copy running-config startup-config ! sh monitor session 1
Disable Span Session
! conf t ! no monitor session 1 ! end ! copy running-config startup-config
Find out more about Span Ports on a Cisco Switch here.
or
Check out this Search at NetworkSuperSearch.com.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup SNMP on a Cisco Router.
In General this will work on any Cisco IOS Device.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will be Disabling NAT ALG for DNS on
a Cisco Router.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Disable NAT ALG for DNS
! conf t ! no ip nat service alg tcp dns ! no ip nat service alg udp dns ! end ! copy running-config startup-config
Find out more about NAT ALG for DNS here.
or
Check out this Search at NetworkSuperSearch.com.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will be adding a static route to a Cisco Router.
In General this will work on any Layer3 Cisco IOS device.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Enable Default Route
ip route 0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.0.1 1 permanent
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will naming a VLAN in a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Name VLAN
! conf t ! vlan 20 ! name vlan SessionTest ! end ! copy running-config startup-config
Here at Staticnat.com we have been playing with some new ideas. Among those are all the cool tools that Google offers to webmasters, bloggers and anyone else willing to take the time. One of these options is Google Custom Search and its pretty cool. A few nights ago I introduced a new feature on the site called The Network Super Search. The point of the Network Super Search was to create a curated list of sites that could be searched for expert information outside of the vendors.
But it got me thinking about the old days of search prior to Google. I hated all the garbage I had to deal with and then Google came along with their clean site and massive index. Staticnat is clearly not that type of environment so I hit the domain register and found that www.NetworkSuperSearch.com was available well now its not and starting today I have extended my original idea to its own dedicated site. I do plan on keeping the original Network Super Search here on Staticnat, and I will continue to find great resources other than vendors and curate them here. Once I have done that I will add them to www.NetworkSuperSearch.com so both locations keep growing in value. I have quite a few other ideas for how to make www.NetworkSuperSearch.com better over time and if I can find clean ways to offer multiple types of curated searches on the site I will eventual retire the search on here. Anyway I would love some feedback as to what you think and I would love see it get used. So check it out spread it around wallow in it a bit and hopefully it serves its purpose. I will be posting the curated sites shortly and I would love feedback and recommendations for other great sites to add to the search. So comment, hit me up on twitter @joshobrien77 or stalk me like a few others have lately your call.
One last thing if you don’t quite get what is going on here Check out;
This Google Search for VLANs HERE.
This www.NetworkSuperSearch.com Search for VLANs HERE.
and
This theNetworkSuperSearch Search for VLANs HERE.
What you will find from the top down that is that the search results are more and more specific to the networking industry.
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will Setup Trunk Port on a Cisco Switch.
In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will be setting up an Access Port on a Cisco Switch. In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Setup VLAN 291
! conf t ! vlan 291 ! end !
Setup Access Port
! conf t ! interface fastethernet 0/4 ! switchport mode access ! switchport access vlan 291 ! end ! copy running-config startup-config !
Entire Session:
! conf t ! vlan 291 ! exit ! interface fastethernet 0/4 ! switchport mode access ! switchport access vlan 291 ! end ! copy running-config startup-config !
For a long time StaticNat.com was supposed to be something more more than my scratch pad. I have wanted to be a hub of information for other in the IT community especially focused on the networking side of things. Recently I have been doing quite a bit of reading concerning internet marketing and how to really setup a site for success. If you have been coming here at all lately you will have noticed a new series of posts that we are doing called A Few Easy Steps. Based on the traction we have received so far from that I want to start adding other helpful options to the site as well.
Tonight we would like to introduce another new addition to the site; The Network Super Search. This page is a custom GOOGLE search that we have setup that pulls from what we consider the top sources in the Networking Industry outside of the actual vendors. I plan on curating this search list over time so it retains is usefulness and exposes the top minds in our field. Right now we have a great group of sites listed and will be adding quite a few more in the near future. So go ahead try it out and see what you can find.
To wrap this up expect to see ongoing changes. We will be playing with ads, podcasts, videos and a few other ideas over the next few months to a year. PLEASE comment and let us know what you like and don’t like. What is useful and what is just meh. Follow me on twitter @joshobrien77 and engage with the community. Can’t wait to see where we can take this. Thanks!
In this session of A Few Easy Steps, we will be disabling VTP on a Cisco Switch. In General this will work on any Cisco Switch.
Session Prerequisites:
Session Assumptions:
Our goals of this session are:
Set VTP to Transparent
! conf t ! vtp mode transparent ! exit ! copy running-config startup-config
Set VTP Domain to SwitchName
! conf t ! vtp domain SessionTestSW1 ! exit ! copy running-config startup-config
Entire Session:
! conf t ! vtp mode transparent ! vtp domain SessionTestSW1 ! exit ! copy running-config startup-config
