ASP #include file Parent Paths error

Spent almost half a day trying to troubleshoot why some ASP scripts refuse to work when ported over from Windows Server 2003 to Win Server 2008 R2.

Turns out the offending line is this:
<!--#include file="../somefile.inc"-->

After a bit more google-ing, it's obvious that the problem lies in IIS 7.0 and above configuration that set Enable Parent Paths to False by default.

Solution was simple:

Go to IIS Manager, Default Web Site | (feature view) IIS | ASP | Enable Parent Paths = True

Force user logout

Just discovered a convenient way to kill (force logout) users in linux/unix.

pkill -KILL -i user

Solaris slow login script

Recently, I have a consistent complain from a user about very slow SSH logins to Solaris 10.

I've tried various method to debug, looking into all sort of possible network issues. I set LookupClientHostnames to no. I even tried UseDNS no but the SSH that came with Solaris 10 doesn't recognize that command. BEWARE!! UseDNS in your sshd_config file will cause SSH to not be able to start!

At the end, I decided to time my startup script in /etc/profile

It appears that /usr/sbin/quota takes more than 20s to run. So the solution was to either modify /etc/profile and /etc/.login, or to do a touch .hushlogin in the user's home directory.

I opted for the latter.

Ubuntu 9.10 – Here we go!

We've finally decided for good that the raffles hall server will be based on Ubuntu. Actually, Debian will be a good option, but then again, why not ubuntu? Since it's a university residential hostel, and people will be more interested in the "happening" ubuntu, unlike offices which will prefer rock-solid Debian with ultra long term support.

So yay! the new server will be running on Ubuntu 9.10 once it's up! Can't wait for that day to happen!

Will blog about the exciting new features once I start using it!