Apparently there is a surge in malicious attacks against WordPress and simular platforms (I have seen Joomla sited as well) in the form of a brute force login attempt. I have been working with two hosts this week on a related issue, Rackspace and GoDaddy. The immediate issue we recognized was that WordPress users could not register new [...]
security
Website Security and that Awful Password You Were Just Assigned
So the folks that run your Website or email just sent over your account information and without surprise the password is something awful like 3ewREd97HEkE or even worse s+a%E!rU7*e4p-y. You think to yourself ‘There is no way I am going to remember that… Where do I change it?’. Colleagues, clients and friends of mine are often saying things to me like [...]
Sanity Check: Check Your Website Backups Before You Need Them
Today we set up automated daily backups to an Amazon S3 account for a Drupal site. Coincidently I was also setting up a different testing site and did so by pulling last night’s backup. The reinstatement of the files and database went flawlessly. However upon pulling up the site at a test address it displayed [...]
Does Your Web Host Really have Backups?
Over the last couple weeks we have been working with a few different hosting companies on behalf of our clients and for one reason or another have requested either file or database backups. A few times the backups have been a struggle to get for one of the following reasons: It is not the policy [...]
Keeping Up with CMS Security
Our friends at Andigo Media posted an article earlier this week on CMS security. They were nice enough to include a couple quotes from me as well. Some great points are made regarding the fact that CMS based systems are simply not build and forget about it platforms, but rather require regular attention especially from [...]
How to Manage a Website Part 3
How To Manage a Website Part 3: Programming Languages (Webware) As Web servers answer requests for information and ‘serve’ this information in a usable manner, it takes another component to actually decipher what it is the programmer had intended to happen when it is requested. For example, how does a Website pull the correct title [...]
How to Manage a Website Part 2
How to Manage a Website Part 2: Web and Database Servers Despite the fact we typically refer the computer that runs a Website as a ‘server’, these computers typically have multiple servers or ‘serverware’ installed on them. A typical configuration includes a Web server and a database server. One of the most common configurations to [...]
How to Manage a Website Part 1
Because of what FatLab does, I am often asked what it means to ‘manage a Website’. I wrote a recent article, ‘I Bought a CMS, Why do I Need Web Support?’ that addressed why having a content management system doesn’t necessarily mean someone might not need anyone help you maintain a Website. Because this is [...]
I Bought A CMS, Why Do I Need Web Support?
So when you had your Web site built you no doubt paid extra to have it built on a content management system (CMS) such as Drupal or WordPress. One of the selling points was that you would be able to update the content yourself and would not have to rely on developer to keep the [...]