This article explains the structure of a cipher suite. A cipher suite is a description of a combination of cryptographic algorithms that a system supports, expects or proposes. The description includes a means to create and exchange asymmetric keys, the type of symmetric keys to use, and the hashing algorithm
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Windows Built-In VPN to pfSense
This article demonstrates the settings required on Windows and pfSense to get a Windows Built-In VPN to work between the two. It’s actually pretty easy. This article is more a confirmation of settings than a guide. Make sure you have the firewall rules configured on the pfSense WAN interface. We’re
Read moreBackups Are 1% Of The Solution
The title is a little provocative, but hear me out. My argument is that in most situations, resorting to restoring data from backups means the project or business is already in an untenable position. Suppose Kym from the Accounts department overwrites a document and asks for the file to be
Read moreExpand a LUKS Encrypted Volume
This article demonstrates how to extent a LUKS encrypted volume. We’re using Ubuntu 22.04 and the volume is non-root. Although you could probably do the same on the root volume (partition). This is risky and you should not do this without a backup and understanding the likelihood of failure. This
Read moreSplitting PostgreSQL Read and Write Queries to Different Database Servers with PGPool2
There are times when we need to send read/write queries to one server, and reads to another server (or multiple servers). If we control the application (the client), we can easily do this by coding such that different queries go to different database servers. However, what if we don’t control
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A Single Volume Versus Multi-Volume Disk Layout On Linux
This article discussed the differences between a single volume (/boot + /) and a multi-volume (/boot + / + /var + …). Or to put it another way, one volume with everything on it versus several volumes for different directories. There’s plenty of arguments for both sides. We’re basing our
Read moreDeleting the Bash History
There are times when you want to clear out the Bash history and make a clean start. Or perhaps you want to remove a single or select item/s from the Bash history. Both of these scenarios are accomplished as described below – although we’ll focus on clearing out the entire
Read moreUpgrading the Netgate Firewall to 23.01 Error – Unable to check for updates
I discovered this issue today while upgrading a Netgate 7100 from 22.05 to 23.01. The Reddit page “https://www.reddit.com/r/PFSENSE/comments/mdqyhg/unable_to_check_for_updates_getting_this_error/” discussed this topic too. This is somewhere between a hack and a correction, so make sure to have a backup and a plan for recovery if this all goes bad. The file
Read moreDocker Quick Start (5 minutes to a running web site)
This article demonstrates how to get a web site running using Docker. We’re starting with a Linux server (doesn’t matter which distribution). We’re going to pull down an Docker image from the public repository, modify it’s “index” file, and expose it – making it publicly accessible. I’ve added a little
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Upgrading the Netgate 3100 to Version 23.01-RELEASE
This article shows the process and experience to upgrade the Netgate 3100 to version 23.01. The process started smoothly but I was forced to do a manual power off/on having waited an hour and a half for it to return on its own after the upgrade process was started. OpenVPN
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