Posts

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SSL renewals fixed

Certbot was struggling to auto-renew my domain SSL cert due to changes in OpenSSL 3 support for legacy protocols. Something is clearly wrong with my my openssl config but fearful of breaking the whole set up I only want to address the Certbot renewal failures.

ChatGPT gave some fixes, but the only one that actually worked was setting the CSH variable setenv CRYPTOGRAPHY_OPENSSL_NO_LEGACY 1 which stops certbot trying to use the legacy protocols that are no longer there allowed CERTBOT renew to skip thru the steps happily and now the server is ok until February by which time I truly hope to have retired the current server.

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Busy with updates – FreeBSD 14.3

Finally found some time and upgraded both servers to 14.3 and trying to establish a stable baseline of installed apps like Apache, MySql, PHP, Perl, and Samba so I can easily port the remaining services over to the “new” server and retire the older one before it expires.

Setting up a new Wifi SSID for the older devices meant the Washing Machine, and cycle computer now connect easily and the Cameras appear to be more stable.

iOS 26 dropped last month but with no real massive technical changes, but now waiting for a new iPhone 17 to see Apple Intelligence live and in action as current iPad and iPhone are too old to benefit.

Its been quite a successful month with just the iKettle left to fix, but this seems to be an issue with the App or backend server as I can see its connected to the Wifi fine and can ping it fine, and I don’t seem to be the only one with issues with the smarter.io kettle range.

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Slow progress

Been far to busy with the house in general to work on any IT projects and what work has been done has been mainly to fix or address pressing issues rather than any development. Wifi has been a issue with all the new devices and connections dropping out, so have purchased another Wifi Extender to cover the top of the house.

The Tapo cameras have also been a bit flakey holding the WiFi signal consistently but re-establish the connection all by themselves so more of an annoyance than a pressing concern. But once everyone goes back to work, Uni, and less guests dropping in so I can then reset the Wifi and start over again.

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New Home

No posts of activity in July as busy moving house and the server was in boxes. I have now built my new Home Office and set the server up in the corner while I decide how best to kit out and layout the office.

Looks like FreeBSD have been busy and there are new updates to install and a new SSL cert to apply asap before the server is safe on the web, so that is what I am currently doing.

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Perl updated to 5.40

so that means another forced updated of everything built with PERL. Not sure why /usr/ports/UPDATING keeps pointing us back to 2023 when they could just post the postmaster commands to update from the last default version to new default version… heyho.

portmaster -o lang/perl5.40 lang/perl5.36

portmaster -f `pkg shlib -qR libperl.so.5.36`

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Moving On

Less than a month until I move home. So expect some disruption to the site and even more erratic postings. Probably a new broadband provider, probably a new physical server as I will need to rationalise the number of physical boxes that will get moved. Four laptops have finally been retired as can’t handle Windows 11. Kept a couple back as Linux/FreeBSD test-beds, but otherwise it’s a good time for clear out for things I won’t use again.

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Cyber Security Certifications

Often get asked which Cyber Security courses are worth doing. Well there is an absolute plethora of different courses available to suit relevant backgrounds. A colleague found this and it look pretty useful

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Alexa+ – Alexa on Steriods with AI

Echo Dot

Amazon are adding new powers existing Alexas over the coming weeks and months.
More details here

Question is how much privacy will be sacrificed for the enhanced functionality. Scant detail on the original product launch blog.

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Domain Name Mismatch – Your site is insecure

I don’t know if Apple, and Google upped the ante, or I had not noticed before, or the SSL tools on the server had not kept updated, but I started getting warnings that my site was not secure. Letsencrypt has done a pretty good job for the last 5 years so I was confused as to why suddenly now , the browsers no longer liked up. Even harder now that MS Edge do not let you easily view the full cert.

A quick test at SSLlabs confirmed that the SSL for farcorfe.org.uk was all ok, but the sub-domain of www.farcorfe.org,uk was the actual issue. The SSL cert had not been validated for the www redirect.

Some quick Googling found this page – https://stackoverflow.com/questions/41097696/letsencrypt-certificate-for-www-and-non-www-domain with the required Certbot commands to add the www to the cert and a restart of Apache got the issue fixed.

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New (old) Hardware coming along

Inherited a second hand PC that was too good in terms of size and much quieter than current server, so currently in the process of installing another copy of FreeBSD ready to migrate content across.

Hardest task so far is getting to the original drive bay to remove the existing HDD so I can properly mount the new SSD in its place, rather than just floating in the case.

Expect to see Farcorfe up and down over the new few weeks as I continue its migration.