Transition Technology: Ticket Query

#645: APC Tuning on Parrot and Penguin

chris — Tue, 10 Dec 2013 10:52:31 GMT

As part of the upgrade from Squeeze to Wheezy, see ticket:535, Munin graphs for APC were added:

There is also more APC info here:

The documentation for the variables which can be set in /etc/php5/mods-available/apc.ini can be found here:

http://php.net/manual/en/apc.configuration.php

This monitoring is generating quite a high volume of warnings about fragmentation and purges and this ticket has been created to try to sort this issue out.

#676: Alternative to Skype for TTech Meetings

chris — Tue, 14 Jan 2014 13:33:51 GMT

Jim has pointed out that:

Skype costs us 15-30 minutes of grinding pain every time we do this!

So what are the alternatives and what are our requirements?

#814: Higher that usual loads on PuffinServer since early September

chris — Wed, 03 Dec 2014 17:12:35 GMT

The following load graph from PuffinServer shows that the load increased substantially in early September 2014, does anyone know why?

When I found I went to Drupal 7.33 and all I got was a slow site I thought that perhaps a Drupal 7 site on the server could be the cause but 7.33 came out on 7th November 2014.

Anyone have any ideas?

#655: Add social media icons with counters to blogs listings views

ed — Thu, 12 Dec 2013 13:03:11 GMT

Investigate with Rob how to add Social media icons with counters into the /blogs listings views and individual node views.

I suggest starting with just Rob's blogs (/rob-hopkins), separate context for 'Transition Culture section' and then roll it out over other blogs and maybe news content type once the /rob-hopkins has been trialled

Sam to talk with Rob

Also cc-ing Ben as design - theme guy

#881: Site on ParrotServer with a memory leak?

chris — Fri, 23 Oct 2015 11:19:04 GMT

It appears a site, or application, on ParrotServer might have a memory leak.

#898: Fwd: Access to Drupal

ade — Tue, 26 Jan 2016 17:35:05 GMT

Hi Chris,
The web team at the development agency are requesting access to the
webserver so that they can look at the sites make up.
(Please see below)
Would you please set up an account so that they can get root read access?
I guess this would be done via FTP, but your thoughts greatly appreciated.
best regards
Ade
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ainslie Beattie <ainsliebeattie@transitionnetwork.org>
Date: 26 January 2016 at 17:25
Subject: Fwd: Access to Drupal
To: Sam Rossiter <samrossiter@transitionnetwork.org>, Ade Stuart <
adestuart@transitionnetwork.org>, Yvonne Struthers <yvonne@thisisyoke.com>
Hey both, can you please action this urgently so that Yoke can have access.
Cheers
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Yvonne Struthers" <yvonne@thisisyoke.com>
Date: 26 Jan 2016 10:58
Subject: Access to Drupal
To: <ainsliebeattie@transitionnetwork.org>
Cc:
Hi Ainslie,
Just a quick email as I'm out seeing a client today,but just to say,it
looks like you have only given us access to the database. What we need
please is admin access to the Drupal site and to the code base so that we
can get a sense of how it's all set up.
Thanks in advance!
Yvonne
Sent from my iPhone
--
Ade Stuart
Web Manager - Transition network
07595 331877
The Transition Network is a registered charity
address: 43 Fore St, Totnes, Devon, TQ9 5HN, UK
website: www.transitionnetwork.org
TN company no: 6135675 TN charity no: 1128675

#541: Documentation of the WordPress sites

chris — Wed, 01 May 2013 20:25:57 GMT

These pages have been created for the documentation of the wiki:WordPress sites running on wiki:PenguinServer:

So far they only have a listing on the plugins for each site.

Ideally they would document all the plugins, the theme and the steps that need to be taken to upgrade each site and also any other things that need documenting.

Laura is this something you might be able to help with? I'm happy doing some work on it but you know your way around these sites far better than anyone else.

#590: Drupal performance improvements

jim — Fri, 06 Sep 2013 10:27:27 GMT

This ticket is to track the work and changes done within the Drupal sphere in relation to performance enhancements done since #585.

More information is needed and will come when ticket:586 New Relic Monitoring for BOA is completed.

I also note that many of these cleanup operations will also help make the move to D7 smoother and better.

Summary of actions and status

TODO

O) Stop making so many URL aliases for non-relevant pages, clean up url_alias table -- 1/4-1/2 hour, medium reward, only risk is that some already broken links might break... Per chat with Ed, only these will be removed (plus releated tweaks to Pathauto settings):

3,579 entries where src = node/%/feed
1,856 entries where src = user/%/contact
= 5,435 or ~11% of entries in url_alias

L) Review slow query log, explain queries, tweak as necessary/flag poorly behaving modules. 2-4 hours, high reward, low risk... Keep looking at the slow query log and adjust Drupal or find patches as necessary. ALSO related Reduce your server's resource usage by moving MySQL temporary directory to tmpfs... Have opened ticket for this: #591 for Chris.

Done

A) Remove spam taxonomy entries ~~1/2 hour, Low risk, low reward -- See item 8 below. A simple delete from taxo term table where length > 50 is worth doing IMHO, and nothing I saw that would be clobbered is not spam.~~

B) Try a Taxonomy Cleanup: 3 hours, Medium risk, medium reward -- style module to try to merge terms with the same names and clean up the link tables back to nodes. Further, we can remove any taxonomies or relations to certain CTs that don't really add value.

D) Review Views caching ~~1 hour, low risk, high reward -- Utilise Views Content Cache this was done a while back but I think -- done (task 12) in comment 21.~~

F) Force blocks caches to cached appropriately (and be rendered/included only as needed) 1-2 hours, medium reward, low risk -- BOA packages the Block Cache Alter, which makes sure Drupal only renders blocks when needed. Potential small but nice boost quickly in whole site. -- per comment 22, block caching is disabled by other modules so this will have to go on hold for now.

H) Remove CustomError? module all together 1/2 hour, low risk, low reward -- We should take out the PHP code from the 403 section of CustomError? and put it into a simple page entry. See comment 6 below as this has happened for 404s (which need no PHP). We can then remove the CustomError? module all together, saving lots of sessions. I would go ahead and do this but since the 403 page has various displays depending on user type, I wanted to raise it here as it *may* have side effects. Or not...

I) Re-enable block caching. 2-6 hours, high risk, high reward -- Per comment 24, a module (probably Content Access) is stopping Drupal caching blocks, which for some of them means a fair amount of pointless overhead. We need to somehow get around this and get blocks cached if possible. R&D mainly, perhaps with some hacking/patching - but I'd stop short of doing this if so.

K) Add & enable Views Lite Pager on big views. ~~1 hour, low risk, low reward -- Using this module stops a heavy count query on views with pagers -- recommended for large sites.~~

M) Take control of Cron, and maximise time pages are cached for. .25h, high reward, low risk -- Cron is wiping the page cache, so we need to install https://drupal.org/project/elysia_cron so we can clear the page less often, and run other things when we want and the site is quieter. Now need per minute resolution set to get the best, see comment 33 and 34 for more...

N) Replace Admin Menu 1.x with 3.x -- will happen when #590 occurs, marking complete here -- ~~5 mins, high reward, low risk -- done when #582 happens, could be the cause of some load spikes as it occasionally goes made and does 2000-5000 queries~~~~

#596: Captions issue

benj — Mon, 16 Sep 2013 16:58:04 GMT

basically captions are appearing on body inline images and featured images on STG but not PROD and I can't see where the difference is...

The following code addition to the bottom of template.php should be (but isn't) adding the caption class to images such as the one at the top of this page:

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/ed-mitchell/2013-06/test-blog-test-caption-and-featured-image

Any reason you can think of why not? Or do you know of another easy way of adding the class caption to featured image fields? (I guess the module https://drupal.org/project/semantic_cck - but maybe overkill...)

Adds caption css class to featured images */

function transition2_imagecache_formatter_featured_image_default($element) {

Inside a view $element may contain NULL data. In that case, just return. if (empty($element#item fid?)) {

return ;

}

Extract the preset name from the formatter name. $presetname = substr($element#formatter, 0, strrpos($element#formatter, '_')); $style = 'linked'; $style = 'default';

$item = $element#item; $itemdata?alt? = isset($itemdata?alt?) ? $itemdata?alt? : ; $itemdata?title? = isset($itemdata?title?) ? $itemdata?title? : NULL;

$class = "imagecache imagecache-$presetname imagecache-$style imagecache-{$element#formatter} caption"; return theme('imagecache', $presetname, $itemfilepath?, $itemdata?alt?, $itemdata?title?, array('class' => $class));

}

#636: Changes to Space.transitionnetwork.org homepage to facilitate user registration

ed — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 17:30:19 GMT

Space currently does not give users who aren't already registered a way in. Anon users can see some of the spaces but when they try to apply for membership, they hit a login page, which they can't complete as they are not registered.

RTFM for OA as to OA best practice - this is billable time. Then leave notes about it in wiki for later developers.

The homepage needs editing to sort this out. Here are some first changes:

2.1. Remove the 'Need the pros' pane (RHS) 2.2 Remove the 'Just getting started' pane (LHS) 2.3 Add a 'Request membership' pane which is basically a user registration form. Make registration 'approval only' for now, approval to be by a site admin (webproject@…)

The /spaces listings view shows the spaces that are publicly viewable, and there is a 'request group membership' button for each of them.

Can you make this into a registration form as well?

#737: SPF / Emails rejected from the website contact form

sam — Thu, 05 Jun 2014 15:46:13 GMT

We had a user report that they could not send a message via our contact form:

"Yesterday I sent a message to you via the contact form on the website. But obviously something went wrong: for I got a failure notice saying my message could not be delivered. Therefore I'm sending it directly via email (see below) hoping that you're receiving my message this way."

<info@…>: host mx1.spamfiltering.com[72.249.150.158] said:

550 81.95.XX.XX is not allowed to send mail from gmx.de. Please see http://www.openspf.net/Why?scope=mfrom;identity=userXX@gmx.de;ip=81.95.XX.XX (in reply to end of DATA command)

(User details edited as this is publicly archived)

I'm not sure I quite understand what's going on here. Chris indicated in email that this would affect other users whose email provider has set this kind of SPF record.

Can we make an educated guess as to what proportion of email providers set this kind of SPF?

How many messages do we never get to see? Is it a problem? Or a small enough number of users that we just don't worry about it?

Thanks

Sam

#772: new TIs not appearing on staging until caches flushed

annesley — Tue, 05 Aug 2014 09:26:32 GMT

i added a new Mulling transition initiative on staging in Afghanistan and it did not appear on the map... i flushed caches and then it started appearing on the main initiatives map. is this intended? is it a known?

#582: TN.org platform and sites

jim — Mon, 02 Sep 2013 09:30:02 GMT

The TN.org platform and Drupal site updates are to be tracked in this ticket.

Current PROD platform build = P009 Current STG platform build = S010

Updates pending:

SECURITY UPDATE - NO RISK: Pressflow core 6.30 is due, but the security holes fixed do not affect us, low priority. Platforms: present in S010, but not in P009.

#587: Puffin MySQL Tuning

chris — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 12:54:47 GMT

This ticket is to track the tuning we do to MySQL on PuffinServer.

See also previous comments on this issue:

#638: Question about notifications option for content creators

ed — Thu, 28 Nov 2013 12:32:57 GMT

Content creators (news, Rob's blog, social reporters) struggle with the notifications. the problem is that they forget to click the option to 'do not send notifications for this update' and then notifications are sent out. It is easy for us to think this is easy for them, but when you are bashing stuff out in a hurry, it's easy to forget this fiddly bit.

CAN WE set drupal to NOT send notifications out as standard for some of the content types?

And change it so that the content creators (news, Rob's blog, social reporters) choose to SEND notifications out instead (of NOT sending them) ?

#662: Subscriptions' links in text emails breaking

ed — Tue, 17 Dec 2013 15:37:13 GMT

for January - to get Sam and Jim talking - in January

The subs sent out to subscribers: are fine in html but the text version is broken and unsatisfactory. I know we've been through this and it's a known bug etc. etc. but I'm wondering if we can switch all subs to html, or if there are any patches to this problem?

Adding as Jim's ticket with Sam cc-ed

#701: Emails & Telephone calls

paul — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 09:38:24 GMT

#711: Emails & Telephone calls

paul — Tue, 01 Apr 2014 13:47:56 GMT

#727: Change background on block from orange to white

sam — Fri, 16 May 2014 10:02:17 GMT

Hi Ben

Rob wants a list of the themes presented in a block.

I did the block: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/admin/build/block/configure/block/97

But it appears with an orange background. The block is visible towards the bottom of the page (for logged in admins) here: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/rob-hopkins

If I put the block on other pages it appears with a white background.

I tried to hack it with some inline CSS but failed.

Could you take a look?

Thanks

Sam

#758: * Advisory ID: DRUPAL-SA-CORE-2014-003

paul — Wed, 16 Jul 2014 21:55:29 GMT

View online: https://www.drupal.org/SA-CORE-2014-003

Advisory ID: DRUPAL-SA-CORE-2014-003
Project: Drupal core [1]
Version: 6.x, 7.x
Date: 2014-July-16
Security risk: Critical [2]
Exploitable from: Remote
Vulnerability: Multiple vulnerabilities

Multiple vulnerabilities were fixed in the supported Drupal core versions 6 and 7.

.... Denial of service with malicious HTTP Host header (Base system - Drupal 6 and 7 - Critical)

Drupal core's multisite feature dynamically determines which configuration file to use based on the HTTP Host header.

The HTTP Host header validation does not sufficiently check maliciously-crafted header values, thereby exposing a denial of service vulnerability.

.... Access bypass (File module - Drupal 7 - Critical)

The File module included in Drupal 7 core allows attaching files to pieces of content. The module doesn't sufficiently check permission to view the attached file when attaching a file that was previously uploaded. This could allow attackers to gain access to private files.

This vulnerability is mitigated by the fact that the attacker must have permission to create or edit content with a file field.

Note: The Drupal 6 FileField? [3] module is affected by a similar issue (see SA-CONTRIB-2014-071 - FileField? - Access bypass [4]) and requires an update to the current security release of Drupal 6 core in order for the fix released there to work correctly. However, Drupal 6 core itself is not directly affected.

.... Cross-site scripting (Form API option groups - Drupal 6 and 7 - Moderately critical)

A cross-site scripting vulnerability was found due to Drupal's form API failing to sanitize option group labels in select elements. This vulnerability affects Drupal 6 core directly, and likely affects Drupal 7 forms provided by contributed or custom modules.

This vulnerability is mitigated by the fact that it requires the "administer taxonomy" permission to exploit in Drupal 6 core, and there is no known exploit within Drupal 7 core itself.

.... Cross-site scripting (Ajax system - Drupal 7 - Moderately critical)

A reflected cross-site scripting vulnerability was found in certain forms containing a combination of an Ajax-enabled textfield (for example, an autocomplete field) and a file field.

This vulnerability is mitigated by the fact that an attacker can only trigger the attack in a limited set of circumstances, usually requiring custom or contributed modules.

/A CVE identifier [5] will be requested, and added upon issuance, in

accordance with Drupal Security Team processes./

Drupal core 6.x versions prior to 6.32.
Drupal core 7.x versions prior to 7.29.

Install the latest version:

If you use Drupal 6.x, upgrade to Drupal core 6.32. [6]
If you use Drupal 7.x, upgrade to Drupal core 7.29. [7]

Also see the Drupal core [8] project page.

The denial of service vulnerability using malicious HTTP Host headers was

reported by Régis Leroy [9].

The access bypass vulnerability in the File module was reported by Ivan

Ch [10].

The cross-site scripting vulnerability with Form API option groups was

reported by Károly Négyesi [11].

The cross-site scripting vulnerability in the Ajax system was reported by

mani22test [12].

The denial of service vulnerability using malicious HTTP Host headers was

fixed by Régis Leroy [13], and by Klaus Purer [14] of the Drupal Security Team.

The access bypass vulnerability in the File module was fixed by Nate Haug

[15] and Ivan Ch [16], and by Drupal Security Team members David Rothstein [17], Heine Deelstra [18] and David Snopek [19].

The cross-site scripting vulnerability with Form API option groups was

fixed by Greg Knaddison [20] of the Drupal Security Team.

The cross-site scripting vulnerability in the Ajax system was fixed by

Neil Drumm [21] of the Drupal Security Team.

The Drupal Security Team [22]

The Drupal security team can be reached at security at drupal.org or via the contact form at http://drupal.org/contact [23].

Learn more about the Drupal Security team and their policies [24], writing secure code for Drupal [25], and securing your site [26].

Follow the Drupal Security Team on Twitter at https://twitter.com/drupalsecurity [27]

_ Security-news mailing list Security-news@… Unsubscribe at https://lists.drupal.org/mailman/listinfo/security-news

#546: Trac documentation

chris — Wed, 08 May 2013 18:47:09 GMT

Better documentation of things like how to set billing times etc

#597: Default owner for tickets

chris — Tue, 17 Sep 2013 08:04:58 GMT

Ben reported that the default owner for tickets is laura and that this should be changed.

#618: Migrate Penguin and Parrot to the ZFS fileserver

chris — Fri, 15 Nov 2013 09:37:36 GMT

Since wiki:PuffinServer has been running from the ZFS fileserver, see ticket:593, it has been performing better -- we should also migrate wiki:PenguinServer and wiki:ParrotServer to the ZFS server prior to upgrading them to Debian Wheezy on ticket:535.

#487: robots.txt files for development sites

chris — Tue, 29 Jan 2013 13:24:35 GMT

All the sites other than www.transitionnetwork.org on wiki:PuffinServer should have a robots.txt file to exclude them from being crawled and indexed to prevent the development versions of sites being included in search results.

#499: MySQL backup dump error on puffin

chris — Tue, 26 Feb 2013 01:26:53 GMT

Warnings from /etc/backup.d/20.mysql :

Warning: mysqldump: Got error: 1142: "SELECT,LOCK TABL command denied to user 'root'@'localhost' for table 'cond_instances'" when using LOCK TABLES
Warning: Failed to dump mysql databases performance_schema

#538: intransitionmovie.com checks and updates

chris — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 20:02:03 GMT

The http://www.intransitionmovie.com/ site has been migrated to wiki:ParrotServer, the DNS might not have yet updated for everybody.

Laura -- could you check that the site is working OK if you get a chance, especially the ecommerce elements?

There are some outstanding updates, WordPress is version 3.3.2 need updating to 3.5.1 and there are 12 plugins with updates available:

18 installed plugins:
 UA affiliates
 UA affiliates-woocommerce-light
 UA akismet
  A backupwordpress
 UI bad-behavior
 UA bwp-minify
  A contact-form-7
 UA event-o-matic
  A transposh-translation-filter-for-wordpress
 UA usernoise
  A woocommerce
 UA woocommerce-export-csv
  A woocommerce-currency-converter
 UA woocommerce-dynamic-pricing
  A woocommerce-delivery-notes
 UA woocommerce-shipping-table-rate
 UA wp-customer-reviews
 UI wp-super-cache
Legend: A = Active, I = Inactive, U = Update Available

I'm happy to do all these updates but I wouldn't know what exactly to check to see that the updates don't break anything -- would Laura be able to help with a quick check that updates haven't broken anything?

#542: Parrot RAM

chris — Wed, 01 May 2013 20:35:50 GMT

I'm concerned that wiki:ParrotServer might not be able to cope with load spikes due to it only having 1GB of RAM, these are the Munin graphs we need to key an eye on:

If the server runs out of RAM it will basically stop responding.

#543: Puffin Load Spike

chris — Fri, 03 May 2013 20:48:16 GMT

Puffin just had a massive load spike up to 65 and then it calmed down and it's up in the 70's again:

uptime
 21:46:43 up 91 days,  3:01,  4 users,  load average: 73.45, 30.76, 28.09

I'm trying to find the cause, it's making the TN site unresponsive.

#577: Transition Streets Wordpress Migration

chris — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 21:28:25 GMT

This is a ticket to document the migration of the Transition Totnes http://www.transitionstreets.org.uk/ wiki:WordPress site to wiki:ParrotServer.

#581: Remove 'add to newsletter' option for site editors/admins

ed — Mon, 26 Aug 2013 13:24:17 GMT

Please remove the option for site editors/admins to 'add this to the newsletter' (which would send it to the newsletter nodequeue). Please also for now make the newsletter nodequeue non-active.

It's been confusing for staff members, and was for the simmplemail service really, so we're going to trial using a google doc for staff to add their stories to the newsletter instead.

#586: New Relic Monitoring for BOA

chris — Thu, 05 Sep 2013 08:35:17 GMT

This is a ticket to document the consideration, and possible installation, of https://newrelic.com/ on the PuffinServer

#588: RSS feed caching

chris — Fri, 06 Sep 2013 09:43:57 GMT

At the meeting on 5th September ticket:585 one thing we discussed was that:

The biggest single source of bandwidth by URL is Rob's RSS feed, 34.5GB of data, 150k hits. This represents half the total site data transfer, the RSS files is 0.4MB but will hopefully be mostly served gzipped at 0.1MB.

This ticket is to follow up on that -- are the RSS feeds served directly by Nginx?

#604: Times for admin tasks

ed — Thu, 03 Oct 2013 13:10:00 GMT

I am timing some of the admin tasks and keeping a log here for reference. Front of the site is great, backend is still like hauling ghosts through jelly for me.

58 seconds: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/admin/user/user/create

#605: Can we make the subscriptions management admin view re-order-able?

ed — Thu, 03 Oct 2013 13:35:17 GMT

I use this view when I need to find subscriptions for users who are receiving email alerts to old accounts: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/admin/messaging/subscriptions

I am finding that if a user changes their email address in their user account, it does not update that email address in the subscriptions settings, so they continue to receive alerts to their old address. So I go to this view, dig out the incorrect sub, and kill it.

Which is a PITA.

Can we make it possible to make the 'users' column clickable so I could re-order it alphabetically? That would be really cool.

#607: Getting three copies of stats reports

ed — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 08:27:59 GMT

I'm getting three copies of the stats reports (weekly) that I've set up here: https://stats.transitionnetwork.org/index.php?module=PDFReports&action=index&idSite=1&period=day&date=today

Please investigate

#608: User profile pictures are too big

ed — Mon, 14 Oct 2013 08:37:38 GMT

The user profile pictures on the user profile nodes are too big.

e.g. https://transitionnetwork.org/people/tina-clarke

Please investigate and restrain them into a suitable maximum size

NB: Ed is keeping a number of small UI-ish tickets back for Ben to do in a lump when we've built up enough so don't do anything yet.

#610: Aegir database intensive (migrate, clone, restore) tasks hang for larger sites

jim — Tue, 15 Oct 2013 10:18:59 GMT

Large sites (TN.org and variants) will simply not complete their migrate, clone or restore tasks in Aegir.

However, smaller sites are fine, and all tasks work for them.

The process largely completes -- codebase installs, database is cloned, symlinks for sites aliases and files created... BUT the process never completes in Aegir, so the final steps of switching a site's served location never occurs.

Useful links/comments in this issue:

#613: Parrot mysql console errors

chris — Mon, 04 Nov 2013 09:48:35 GMT

I connected to the wiki:ParrotServer wiki:XenShell to check the bandwidth usage and there was the following output, we should try to track down the cause of this:

parrot login: [41569.058444] hrtimer: interrupt took 59422559 ns
[442920.164115] INFO: task mysqld:3522 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
[442920.164133] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
[442920.164142] mysqld        D ffff880003755c40     0  3522    711 0x00000000
[442920.164153]  ffff8800bfa68e20 0000000000000282 ffff8800565fb9e8 ffff8800565fb9e4
[442920.164165]  00000000000157c8 0000000000000000 000000000000f9e0 ffff8800565fbfd8
[442920.164175]  00000000000157c0 00000000000157c0 ffff88000180c6a0 ffff88000180c998
[442920.164185] Call Trace:
[442920.164200]  [<ffffffff8110fb96>] ? sync_buffer+0x0/0x40
[442920.164211]  [<ffffffff8130de82>] ? io_schedule+0x73/0xb7
[442920.164219]  [<ffffffff8110fbd1>] ? sync_buffer+0x3b/0x40
[442920.164228]  [<ffffffff8130f142>] ? _spin_unlock_irqrestore+0xd/0xe
[442920.164237]  [<ffffffff8130e292>] ? __wait_on_bit_lock+0x3f/0x84
[442920.164246]  [<ffffffff8110fb96>] ? sync_buffer+0x0/0x40
[442920.164253]  [<ffffffff8130e342>] ? out_of_line_wait_on_bit_lock+0x6b/0x77
[442920.164262]  [<ffffffff81066360>] ? wake_bit_function+0x0/0x23
[442920.164271]  [<ffffffff8110ffc3>] ? sync_dirty_buffer+0x29/0x93
[442920.164286]  [<ffffffffa001be04>] ? journal_dirty_data+0xd1/0x1b0 [jbd]
[442920.164301]  [<ffffffffa0032f4c>] ? ext3_journal_dirty_data+0xf/0x34 [ext3]
[442920.164312]  [<ffffffffa00313f5>] ? walk_page_buffers+0x65/0x8b [ext3]
[442920.164322]  [<ffffffffa0032f71>] ? journal_dirty_data_fn+0x0/0x13 [ext3]
[442920.164333]  [<ffffffffa0034a93>] ? ext3_ordered_write_end+0x73/0x10f [ext3]
[442920.164343]  [<ffffffff810b648a>] ? generic_file_buffered_write+0x18d/0x278
[442920.164352]  [<ffffffff810b6926>] ? __generic_file_aio_write+0x25f/0x293
[442920.164361]  [<ffffffff810b69b3>] ? generic_file_aio_write+0x59/0x9f
[442920.164369]  [<ffffffff810f0316>] ? do_sync_write+0xce/0x113
[442920.164377]  [<ffffffff81066332>] ? autoremove_wake_function+0x0/0x2e
[442920.164385]  [<ffffffff8130f6fa>] ? error_exit+0x2a/0x60
[442920.164394]  [<ffffffff8101251d>] ? retint_restore_args+0x5/0x6
[442920.164403]  [<ffffffff8102de30>] ? pvclock_clocksource_read+0x3a/0x8b
[442920.164411]  [<ffffffff810f0c68>] ? vfs_write+0xa9/0x102
[442920.164419]  [<ffffffff810f0d7d>] ? sys_write+0x45/0x6e
[442920.164427]  [<ffffffff81011b42>] ? system_call_fastpath+0x16/0x1b
[442920.164435] INFO: task mysqld:21061 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
[442920.164441] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
[442920.164448] mysqld        D ffff8800018b0e20     0 21061    711 0x00000000
[442920.164457]  ffff8800018b0e20 0000000000000282 ffffffff8100c426 ffffffff8100e233
[442920.164469]  ffff880003755d10 0000000000000002 000000000000f9e0 ffff8800bdde3fd8
[442920.164480]  00000000000157c0 00000000000157c0 ffff8800bd9462e0 ffff8800bd9465d8
[442920.164492] Call Trace:
[442920.164498]  [<ffffffff8100c426>] ? pfn_to_mfn+0xe/0x22
[442920.164506]  [<ffffffff8100e233>] ? arbitrary_virt_to_machine+0x28/0x73
[442920.164515]  [<ffffffff8110fb96>] ? sync_buffer+0x0/0x40
[442920.164523]  [<ffffffff8106ce4a>] ? timekeeping_get_ns+0xe/0x2e
[442920.164531]  [<ffffffff8110fb96>] ? sync_buffer+0x0/0x40
[442920.164538]  [<ffffffff8130de82>] ? io_schedule+0x73/0xb7
[442920.164545]  [<ffffffff8110fbd1>] ? sync_buffer+0x3b/0x40
[442920.164554]  [<ffffffff8130f142>] ? _spin_unlock_irqrestore+0xd/0xe
[442920.164561]  [<ffffffff8130e292>] ? __wait_on_bit_lock+0x3f/0x84
[442920.164569]  [<ffffffff8110fb96>] ? sync_buffer+0x0/0x40
[442920.164576]  [<ffffffff8130e342>] ? out_of_line_wait_on_bit_lock+0x6b/0x77
[442920.164584]  [<ffffffff81066360>] ? wake_bit_function+0x0/0x23
[442920.164592]  [<ffffffff8110ffc3>] ? sync_dirty_buffer+0x29/0x93
[442920.164600]  [<ffffffffa001be04>] ? journal_dirty_data+0xd1/0x1b0 [jbd]
[442920.164611]  [<ffffffffa0032f4c>] ? ext3_journal_dirty_data+0xf/0x34 [ext3]
[442920.164622]  [<ffffffffa00313f5>] ? walk_page_buffers+0x65/0x8b [ext3]
[442920.164632]  [<ffffffffa0032f71>] ? journal_dirty_data_fn+0x0/0x13 [ext3]
[442920.164643]  [<ffffffffa0034a93>] ? ext3_ordered_write_end+0x73/0x10f [ext3]
[442920.164652]  [<ffffffff810b648a>] ? generic_file_buffered_write+0x18d/0x278
[442920.164661]  [<ffffffff810b6926>] ? __generic_file_aio_write+0x25f/0x293
[442920.164670]  [<ffffffff810b69b3>] ? generic_file_aio_write+0x59/0x9f
[442920.164677]  [<ffffffff810f0316>] ? do_sync_write+0xce/0x113
[442920.164685]  [<ffffffff81066332>] ? autoremove_wake_function+0x0/0x2e
[442920.164693]  [<ffffffff810f0c68>] ? vfs_write+0xa9/0x102
[442920.164700]  [<ffffffff810f0d18>] ? sys_pwrite64+0x57/0x77
[442920.164706]  [<ffffffff81011b42>] ? system_call_fastpath+0x16/0x1b

#623: Question about revisions

ed — Mon, 18 Nov 2013 17:21:46 GMT

do we keep any revisions of content? we had this conversation years ago, it came up in a recent social reporters webinar, I can't see any evidence of revisions activity...

#627: Users: deleting their own accounts

ed — Wed, 20 Nov 2013 16:08:43 GMT

Can users delete their own accounts? I've looked at user settings and can't find any clues? Can you point me to a user account setting which would enable them to delete their own accounts (and their profiles by proxy)?

#642: Trac "databasee is locked" errors in /var/log/messages

chris — Sat, 07 Dec 2013 13:46:43 GMT

I have just noticed these errors in /var/log/messages on wiki:PenguinServer:

Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor TimingEstimationAndBillingPage: OperattionalError: database is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor AdminModule: OperationalError: databasse is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor SearchModule: OperationalError: databaase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor QueryModule: OperationalError: databasse is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor ReportModule: OperationalError: databaase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor RoadmapModule: OperationalError: databbase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor TicketModule: OperationalError: databaase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor TimelineModule: OperationalError: dataabase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor BrowserModule: OperationalError: databbase is locked
Dec  1 23:09:00 penguin <11>Trac[chrome] ERROR: Error with navigation contributor WikiModule: OperationalError: databaseeis locked

There are lots more of these, including some from this morning.

Trac still seems to be working OK so I don't know how significant they are.

#663: De-commission the PSE

ed — Wed, 18 Dec 2013 17:44:43 GMT

We are wrapping up the PSE to simplify our web traffic, codebase and support requirements before we move to TNv3.

Ed has informed all the PSE alpha triallists twice and asked them to remove their widgets. About half have. Others say they will. So we can remove the service any time from now on.

Ed has UNpublished the following pages:

/pse/create
/pse/about
/pse/faq

Jim - time to de-commission the service in a suitable way. Wrap this puppy up and turn it off. Please outline what you are going to do on this ticket and then do it.

Ed suggests this is work for January 2014.

Sam, Chris, fyi and any other changes needed?

#668: Wagn transition_mod

chris — Sat, 11 Jan 2014 08:52:25 GMT

Email from Ethan via Tom:

I was doing some work on wagn mods today and I realized that I'd created a mod (as in "modification" or "module", whichever you like) for the transition site that probably never survived the move to the new server.

Looking at https://patterns.transitionresearchnetwork.org/Building_Resilience confirmed this for me. The confidence shows up as the words "2 stars" rather than actual star images. That's one thing the mod does. The other has to do with reducing visual redundancy (recurring names) in pattern summaries.

I've attached the mod file here. Unless you've gotten creative with your configuration, you should be able to stick this file in local/mods and restart the server and have that fixed. Let me know if any of this doesn't make sense.

#670: Roll back performance customisations and use stock BOA settings where possible

jim — Sat, 11 Jan 2014 20:51:30 GMT

Issue Given so much has changed since the initial issues on the server, I now strongly recommend reverting all settings changes that do not add features back to stock BOA settings after the next BOA release.

These would include all MySQL, PHP, FPM, Redis and other settings that have been for performance reasons, or to combat the situation where there was hardware/IO issues with the underlying server. I'm most interested in FPM and MySQL settings.

The next version of BOA will include some improvements we need (see 629: Upgrades to BOA which should handle load on our server with a lot of CPU cores. With this in place we'll be able to revert more easily to stock settings.

Rationale I'm not talking about rolling back changes that provide us with features or mission-critical capabilities, just the changes to the subsystems I list above for performance reasons.

It's my belief that these enhancements no longer match the needs of the server since the changes to filesystem and underlying hardware fixes have been completed. They also represent an ongoing risk around updates, future planning -- plus it's possible they might mean Puffin's web services need more memory than it otherwise would, costing TN more than it should need to spend on hardware.

Proposed solution

Await the next version of BOA, and setup the enhanced load settings per the documentation.
Revert all other changes to conf files for MySQL, PHP, FPM, Redis that do not add a feature or are not mission-critical.
Review /root/.barracuda.cnf and turn off any overrides and customisations we don't now need as a result of 2).
Run the BOA BOND.sh script to do the tuning of the server appropriate to the memory requirements. This will tune for the current levels on first pass.
Review Munin and site performance. If we need to make any tweaks then we can do a minimal set as required -- keeping an eye on memory usage.
Once a few days have gone by I would hope that the overall memory use will be lower, OR with more cached data. At this point we can either re-run the barracuda installer with the _RESERVED_RAM set to 1-4 Gb, or simply reduce the memory available to Puffin.
Repeat from 4, using BOND.sh to optimise for the new memory footprint.

Clearly, it's possible no memory savings can be made, or just 1Gb or so is sensible. Either way, rolling back the changes made for a system that has changed immensely is worth attempting to compare current (tweaked) performance to the stock system. Since current settings are all documented and can be backed up, we should be able to test this with no risk and the ability to roll back as needed.

Next steps

Chris and Ed to give their thoughts.
Ed to green-light before we proceed in too much detail or take any action.
Chris and Jim to establish the changes and outcomes.
Chris, Jim and whoever to do the new optimisation process.

#673: Install mosh - the mobile shell

chris — Mon, 13 Jan 2014 11:27:40 GMT

The mobile shell enables terminal connections to stay up when using really bad connections, for example on a train, see:

http://mosh.mit.edu/

#680: Mixed content: HTTP content on HTTPS version of site

chris — Mon, 20 Jan 2014 12:28:18 GMT

The front page of the site contains the following elements using HTTP when accessing the site using HTTPS:

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-image-fid">
                <span class="field-content"><img src="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/slideshow_660/images/slides/capture1.jpg" alt="" title="" width="700" height="306" class="imagecache imagecache-slideshow_660 imagecache-default imagecache-slideshow_660_default"/></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-destination-link-url">
                <span class="field-content"><a href="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/about" 0="a:0:{}" class="learn">Learn more about Transition Network »</a></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-image-fid">
                <span class="field-content"><img src="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/slideshow_660/images/slides/clay.jpg" alt="" title="" width="700" height="306" class="imagecache imagecache-slideshow_660 imagecache-default imagecache-slideshow_660_default"/></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-destination-link-url">
                <span class="field-content"><a href="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/rob-hopkins/2014-01/can-earth-building-scale-mainstream-1-clayworks-and-clay-plasters" 0="a:0:{}" class="learn">Read more here »</a></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-image-fid">
                <span class="field-content"><img src="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/slideshow_660/images/slides/frack3.jpg" alt="" title="" width="700" height="306" class="imagecache imagecache-slideshow_660 imagecache-default imagecache-slideshow_660_default"/></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-destination-link-url">
                <span class="field-content"><a href="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/rob-hopkins/2014-01/6-reasons-why-theres-no-community-fracking" 0="a:0:{}" class="learn">Read more here »</a></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-slide-image-fid">
                <span class="field-content"><img src="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/slideshow_660/images/slides/pc1.jpg" alt="" title="" width="700" height="306" class="imagecache imagecache-slideshow_660 imagecache-default imagecache-slideshow_660_default"/></span>
  </div>

  <div class="views-field-field-featured-image-fid">
                <span class="field-content"><a href="/news/2013-12-17/november-and-december-round-what-s-happening-out-world-transition" class="imagecache imagecache-featured_image_thumb imagecache-linked imagecache-featured_image_thumb_linked"><img src="http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/featured_image_thumb/chilesml.jpg" alt="Chile Transition Training" title="Chile Transition Training" width="150" height="101" class="imagecache imagecache-featured_image_thumb"/></a></span>
  </div>

Would it be possible to embed content from the site using URLS like /sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/featured_image_thumb/chilesml.jpg rather than http://www.transitionnetwork.org/sites/www.transitionnetwork.org/files/imagecache/featured_image_thumb/chilesml.jpg ?

Changing these links would result in the mixed content warnings in browsers going away.

By default Firefox doesn't block HTTP content over HTTPS connections, however you can enable this by entering about:config in the URL bar are searching for mixed_content and then changing security.mixed_content.block_display_content to true if you want to see how the site looks when only secure content is loaded.

I have checked that the site does set the secure flag on the authentication cookie, so the mixed content shouldn't result in the authentication cookie being sent with unencrypted requests.

Further information:

https://blog.mozilla.org/tanvi/2013/04/10/mixed-content-blocking-enabled-in-firefox-23

#682: Create Trac & Wiki account for Paul

sam — Wed, 22 Jan 2014 12:39:18 GMT

Hi it looks like i@… will be joining us to pick up some of Jim's role as he moves on.

Chris could you create a trac & Wiki account for him please?

His email is; i@…

Thanks

Sam

#683: Create Aegir account for Paul

sam — Wed, 22 Jan 2014 12:42:48 GMT

Hi Jim

It looks like i@… will be joining us to pick up some of your work.

Could you create an Aegir account for him please?

I was also wondering about the Transition Network Github repo, do we need to do anything to hand that over?

Thanks

Sam

#696: Disk space error on parrot for TTT site

chris — Mon, 03 Mar 2014 10:51:46 GMT

Email from Laura:

Message appearing at top of ttt website when I just took a look-

Warning: session_start():
open(/home/ttt/tmp/sess_mnme76d2k5s6vopk5u1it126p5, O_RDWR) failed: No
space left on device (28) in
/home/ttt/sites/default/wp-content/plugins/tt-resource-database/participants-database.php
on line 2534

and something in the sidebar -

Warning: call_user_func_array() expects parameter 1 to be a valid
callback, array must have exactly two members in
/home/ttt/sites/default/wp-includes/plugin.php on line 199

#709: Reconomy sites appears to be sending out spam

chris — Fri, 28 Mar 2014 18:48:53 GMT

This failed email has just been returned:

From: Mail Delivery System <Mailer-Daemon@parrot.webarch.net>
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2014 18:14:32 +0000
To: recon@parrot.webarch.net
Subject: Mail delivery failed: returning message to sender
This message was created automatically by mail delivery software.
A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its
recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:
  fionaward@transitionnetwork.org
    SMTP error from remote mail server after end of data:
    host mx1.spamfiltering.com [72.249.150.158]: 550 An address in this message (at sleepingteensex . com) is listed on
+sbl-multi.rbl.spamrl.com. Please organise removal and retry.
------ This is a copy of the message, including all the headers. ------
Return-path: <recon@parrot.webarch.net>
Received: from recon (uid=1006)
        by parrot.webarch.net with local (Exim 4.80)
        (envelope-from <recon@parrot.webarch.net>)
        id 1WTbIM-0001Sz-6R
        for fionaward@transitionnetwork.org; Fri, 28 Mar 2014 18:14:22 +0000
To: fionaward@transitionnetwork.org
Subject: roulette89
X-PHP-Originating-Script: 1006:class-phpmailer.php
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2014 18:14:22 +0000
From: casino10 <fmzsb@www.reconomy.org>
Message-ID: <28cbb75557094e41d2f5e7e070dcd660@www.reconomy.org>
X-Priority: 3
X-Mailer: PHPMailer 5.2.4 (http://code.google.com/a/apache-extras.org/p/phpmailer/)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
From: casino10 <fmzsb@www.reconomy.org>
Subject: roulette89
Message Body:
интернет казино игровые автоматы рулетка зарубежный <a href= http://pobedim11.sleepingteensex.com/item280.html >можно ли играть в
+игровые автоматы в интернете на деньги</a> игровые автоматы через интернет 3g еще <a href= http://pobedim11.sleepingteensex.com >Новый
+Игровой Автомат</a> казино интернет казань.
--
This mail is sent via contact form on REconomy http://www.reconomyproject.org

#710: Incorrect email address for Sam on Transition Culture

chris — Tue, 01 Apr 2014 12:01:47 GMT

I'm seeing quite a few emails like this:

From: Mail Delivery System <Mailer-Daemon@parrot.webarch.net>
Date: Tue, 01 Apr 2014 08:04:28 +0100
To: tc@parrot.webarch.net
Subject: Mail delivery failed: returning message to sender
This message was created automatically by mail delivery software.
A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its
recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:
  samrossiter@transitionentwork.org
    Unrouteable address
------ This is a copy of the message, including all the headers. ------
Return-path: <tc@parrot.webarch.net>
Received: from tc (uid=1011)
        by parrot.webarch.net with local (Exim 4.80)
        (envelope-from <tc@parrot.webarch.net>)
        id 1WUskG-0005Rv-Sa
        for samrossiter@transitionentwork.org; Tue, 01 Apr 2014 08:04:28 +0100
To: samrossiter@transitionentwork.org
Subject: [Wordfence Alert] Problems found on Transition Culture
X-PHP-Originating-Script: 1011:class-phpmailer.php
Date: Tue, 1 Apr 2014 07:04:28 +0000
From: WordPress <wordpress@transitionculture.org>
Message-ID: <11e64e1b3cdb24f69d0069ecdc224524@transitionculture.org>
X-Priority: 3
X-Mailer: PHPMailer 5.2.4 (http://code.google.com/a/apache-extras.org/p/phpmailer/)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Wordfence found the following new issues on "Transition Culture".
NOTE: Upgrading to the paid version of Wordfence gives you two factor authentication (sign-in via cellphone)
and country blocking which are both effective methods to block attacks.
You can also schedule when your scans occur with Wordfence Premium.
Click here to sign-up for the Premium version of Wordfence now.
https://www.wordfence.com/wordfence-signup/
Alert generated at Tuesday 1st of April 2014 at 08:04:28 AM
Critical Problems:
* The Plugin "Spam Destroyer" needs an upgrade.

#713: Ticket clearing

chris — Wed, 02 Apr 2014 09:30:31 GMT

There are 33 Open Maintenance Tickets this ticket is to record the time taken to close as many of them as possible.

#744: Add CSS Injector module to the D6 mix

annesley — Thu, 19 Jun 2014 10:50:03 GMT

CSS Injector module allows admin dynamic adding of CSS in to a live production server without code updates. this is to respond quickly to client needs whilst implementing the requests in the correct place in the themes on the next promotion from dev.

#762: cannot log in to Puffin

annesley — Sat, 19 Jul 2014 08:46:53 GMT

hi, i think i've locked myself out of puffin again. i successfully logged in and navigated to ~ and /. but it wouldn't let me access /data/disk/tn/static/transition-network-d6-s012 it asked for more authentication and then stopped responding.

thanks, a

#776: Piwik 2.0.5

chris — Sat, 16 Aug 2014 07:55:49 GMT

New version of Piwik, not a security update so no urgent need to upgrade unless there is some new required feature:

http://piwik.org/changelog/piwik-2-5-0/

#781: MediaWiki Security and Maintenance Releases: 1.22.10 and 1.23.3

chris — Thu, 28 Aug 2014 06:42:16 GMT

Announcement email:

https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/mediawiki-announce/2014-August/000159.html

Bugfixes only, not a security update so no urgent update required.

#786: GitHub Transition: Annesley needs permission to create repositories

annesley — Mon, 15 Sep 2014 07:17:03 GMT

is Paul the owner of Transition GitHub??

#810: Piwik 2.9.1

chris — Thu, 20 Nov 2014 14:58:20 GMT

From the changelog:

Piwik 2.9.1 is a new minor release of Piwik. In this release we have fixed a few minor issues reported in 2.9.0.

#813: MediaWiki 1.23.7

chris — Thu, 27 Nov 2014 14:38:47 GMT

The announcement email:

I would like to announce the release of MediaWiki 1.23.7, 1.22.14 and 1.19.22. This is a regular security and maintenance release. Download links are given at the end of this email.

Security fixes

(bugs 66776, 71478) SECURITY: User PleaseStand reported a way to inject code into API clients that used format=php to process pages that underwent flash policy mangling. This was fixed along with improving how the mangling was done for format=json, and allowing sites to disable the mangling using $wgMangleFlashPolicy. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T68776 https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T73478
(bug 70901) SECURITY: User Jackmcbarn reported that the ability to update the content model for a page could allow an unprivileged attacker to edit another user's common.js under certain circumstances. The user right "editcontentmodel" was added, and is needed to change a revision's content model. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T72901
(bug 71111) SECURITY: User PleaseStand reported that on wikis that allow raw HTML, it is not safe to preview wikitext coming from an untrusted source such as a cross-site request. Thus add an edit token to the form, and when raw HTML is allowed, ensure the token is provided before showing the preview. This check is not performed on wikis that both allow raw HTML and anonymous editing, since there are easier ways to exploit that scenario. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T73111
(bug 72222) SECURITY: Do not show log action when the entry is revdeleted with DELETED_ACTION. NOTICE: this may be reverted in a future release pending a public RFC about the desired functionality. This issue was reported by user Bawolff. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T74222
Bugfixes

(bug 71621) Make allowing site-wide styles on restricted special pages a config option. https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T73621
(bug 42723) Added updated version history from 1.19.2 to 1.22.13 https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T44723
$wgMangleFlashPolicy was added to make MediaWiki's mangling of anything that might be a flash policy directive configurable.
Full release notes for 1.23.7: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Release_notes/1.23

#823: Pwiki 2014 annual report

chris — Wed, 07 Jan 2015 12:19:55 GMT

Ed would like a some PDF reports of Transition Network site usage for 2014 from Piwik.

#840: Piwik 2.12.1

chris — Tue, 31 Mar 2015 16:31:12 GMT

From the changelog:

Piwik 2.12.1 is a new minor release of Piwik, a follow up to 2.12.0 major release.

In this release we have focused on fixing a regression in the Visitor Log as well as other smaller fixes.

11 tickets have been closed by 5 contributors!

#850: Piwik 2.13.1

chris — Fri, 08 May 2015 10:25:43 GMT

The changelog:

Piwik 2.13.1, a new minor release of Piwik, has been released!

What’s new?

We are releasing 2.13.1 shortly after 2.13.0 to address a few small bugs that were reported by the community. This release also includes a Tracking API performance improvements as well as other minor improvements listed below.

#858: Piwik 2.13.1

chris — Fri, 05 Jun 2015 19:14:15 GMT

From the changelog:

Piwik 2.13.1, a new minor release of Piwik, has been released!

What’s new?

We are releasing 2.13.1 shortly after 2.13.0 to address a few small bugs that were reported by the community. This release also includes a Tracking API performance improvements as well as other minor improvements listed below.

13 tickets have been closed by 6 contributors!

#866: Piwik 2.14.1

chris — Fri, 17 Jul 2015 08:41:34 GMT

The changelog:

What’s new in Piwik 2.14.1?

In this release we have focused on fixing a few regressions reported in the last major release Piwik 2.14.0, as well as 27 other small improvements. As always we – the Piwik team – are very interested to hear your feedback!

27 tickets have been closed by 6 contributors.

#869: Piwik 2.14.3

chris — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 12:00:58 GMT

The Piwik Changelog 2.14.3 contains:

Piwik 2.14.3 is a new minor release of Piwik.

What’s new?

This release addresses a regression introduced in 2.14.2 that prevents users from installing Piwik in some cases.

11 tickets have been closed by 5 contributors!

#207: Logwatch Issues

chris — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 14:19:50 GMT

This is a ticket to track items that show up in the logwatch emails to root and often just take a few mins of reading time and response.

Any issues that look like they might take longer than a few mins should have their own tickets opened.

#208: Dblog Issues

chris — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 14:53:29 GMT

"The dblog module monitors your website, capturing system events in a log to be reviewed by an authorized individual at a later time. The dblog log is simply a list of recorded events containing usage data, performance data, errors, warnings and operational information. It is vital to check the dblog report on a regular basis as it is often the only way to tell what is going on."

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/admin/reports/dblog

This is a ticket to be used to flag up issues that are not going to take up enough time that they justify their own ticket -- if an issue is raised in a comment on this ticket that does look like it's going to take some significant time then best start a new ticket for it.

#218: Debian upgrades and updates

chris — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 13:34:16 GMT

This is a ticket to track debian upgrades to the wiki:PuffinServer, wiki:PenguinServer and wiki:ParrotServer the time they take.

See:

These updates are generally done using the wiki:AptitudeUpdateScript and this records all the changes in the /root/Changelog and then the contents of the Changelog are pasted into the ticket to document the upgrade.

This ticket was was originally used for the ~~wiki:DevelopmentServer~~ and the ~~wiki:NewLiveServer~~.

#371: Piwik Hosting

chris — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 21:34:51 GMT

Another option to consider for Piwik would be be to use a instance on another server, and there happens to be one here that could be used:

https://stats.webarch.net/

Could this be considered?

#382: Measurement and tracking requirements for TN and PSE

ed — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 04:57:12 GMT

to list the measurement and tracking requirements for TN and PSE so that we can assess piwik vs google and decide which way to go.

#470: Penguin install and configuration

chris — Sat, 15 Dec 2012 16:05:16 GMT

penguin.webarch.net is a new 2GB RAM virtual server which will replace NewLiveServer and DevelopmentServer for running all non-Drupal sites and is due to go live in early 2013. Drupal sites from the old servers will be migrated to PuffinServer.

This ticket has been created for tracking time and tasks done during the install.

See https://tech.transitionnetwork.org/trac/wiki/PenguinServer and also the corresponding PuffinServer.

#483: Nginx 502 Bad Gateway Errors with BOA

chris — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 11:23:45 GMT

The Barracuda Octopus Aegir server on puffin.webarch.net is getting generating a lot of Nginx 502 Bad Gateway errors, see ticket:466#comment:31 and ticket:466#comment:38

The Nginx logs contain 58 502 errors:

cd /var/log/nginx
grep " 502 " * | wc -l
58

I expect the cause of these is Nginx asking PHP-FPM for a page and not getting one, an answer might be to either speed up PHP-FPM response time or adjust the Nginx settings so that it waits longs for a response from PHP-FPM.

There are several threads about this on http://groups.drupal.org/ but none of them have any useful suggestions (eg 1 2 3 4).

#494: Email account for TRAC

ed — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 10:16:37 GMT

Set up: 'trac@…' Password: going to Chris separately Secure SSL/TLS Settings Username: trac@… Password: Use the email account’s password. Incoming Server: mail.xssl.net IMAP: Port 993 POP3: Port 995 Outgoing Server: mail.xssl.net SMTP: Port 465 Authentication is required for IMAP, POP3, and SMTP.

#495: Replace Google Analytics with Piwki

ed — Thu, 21 Feb 2013 10:20:25 GMT

Unless we see any issue, turn GA off on 01/03/13. Use Piwik instead.

#502: patterns sub-domain for transitionresearchnetwork.org, was: Setting up specific pointer for URL

ed — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 07:10:03 GMT

Can we set this URL:
www.transitionresearchnetwork.org/research-guidelines
to point to this location:
https://cldstr.com/docs/configure-dns
While this URL:
www.transitionresearchnetwork.org/
Still points to the current location.
~~~~
Ed Mitchell: Transition Network Web manager
web: http://transitionnetwork.org
project blog: http://transitionnetwork.org/blogs/ed-mitchell
mobile: +44 (0)7807 141 828
office hours: Mon, Tues, Wed, Thurs
company no. 6135675  charity no. 1128675
Subscribe to Transition news: http://tinyurl.com/transitionregister
~~~~

#528: patterns.transitionresearchnetwork.org DNS update

chris — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 09:58:13 GMT

Request from Ethan:

We've moved the site back to the production server. Would you be willing to set the CNAME for patterns.transitionresearchnetwork.org to patterns.transitionresearchnetwork.org.230.cldstr.com?

See also previous tickets ticket:482 and ticket:502

#529: New Barracuda BOA-2.0.7 Edition available

chris — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 08:57:09 GMT

There is new BOA-2.0.7 Edition of Barracuda and Octopus available.

Please review the changelog and upgrade as soon as possible to receive all security updates and new features.

Changelog: http://bit.ly/newboa

#530: New Barracuda BOA-2.0.8 Edition available

chris — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 07:44:51 GMT

If I had known this was about to come out I would have waited before doing the BOA-2.0.7 upgrade last night on ticket:529

There is new BOA-2.0.8 Edition of Barracuda and Octopus available.

Please review the changelog and upgrade as soon as possible to receive all security updates and new features.

Changelog: http://bit.ly/newboa

Is mostly to fix a problem for people using Percona, https://drupal.org/node/1962690 and as we are using MariaDB this isn't an issue for us.

Other updates in this version:

Allow to use [a-z0-9] subdomains and not only [www] for IDN domain names.
Change the interval between platforms builds from 5 to 3 seconds.
Forced 1s Speed Booster TTL for vhosts behind local proxy is deprecated.
Move old firewall logs to backups to avoid crazy load after upgrade.
Nginx: Better exceptions handling in the Abuse Guard for js/shs modules.
PHP: CLI is at 5.3 since BOA-2.0.4, so symlink old 5.2 binary path to 5.3
Update _LENNY_TO_SQUEEZE major upgrade procedure.
Update contrib with login_security-7.x-1.2
Use static downloads for all distros in stable edition.

I'll do this update tonight unless there are any objections, hopefully it should be quite quick.

#536: Upgrade Mediawiki to 1.19.6

chris — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 20:35:32 GMT

A new version of Mediawiki is due out tomorrow:

This is a notice that on Tuesday, April 30th between 20:00-21:00 UTC (1-2pm PDT) Wikimedia Foundation will release security updates for current and supported branches of the MediaWiki software. Downloads and patches will be available at that time, with the git repositories updated later that afternoon.

http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/mediawiki-announce/2013-April/000128.html

The upgrade should simply be a matter of following the steps taken last time, see ticket:532#comment:2

#539: REconomy site migration and updates

chris — Wed, 01 May 2013 10:01:00 GMT

This ticket is to keep track of the tasks undertaken and the time spent on the migration of the http://www.reconomy.org/ site to wiki:ParrotServer.

#544: CSF / LDF false positive blocks on Puffin

chris — Sat, 04 May 2013 11:02:53 GMT

Ticket to keep track of CSF /LDF issues on Puffin, see wiki:PuffinServer#CSFLDF

#550: Transition Town Totnes migration

chris — Sun, 19 May 2013 14:59:44 GMT

It has been agreed to migrate Transition Town Totnes, http://transitiontowntotnes.org/ to wiki:ParrotServer and this ticket has been created to record this process and the time spent on it and the documentation of the migration.

There is also an issue regarding what, if anything, to do with the old Drupal site at http://archive.transitiontowntotnes.org/

#551: Mediawiki 1.19.7 upgrade

chris — Tue, 21 May 2013 08:25:51 GMT

From MediaWiki-announce:

This is a notice that on Tuesday, May 21st between 20:00-21:00 UTC (1-2pm PDT) Wikimedia Foundation will release security updates for current and supported branches of the MediaWiki software. Downloads and patches will be available at that time, with the git repositories updated later that afternoon. Although MediaWiki does not have the vulnerable feature enabled by default, most wiki using common advanced features will want to patch for this issue.

#552: Puffin Downtime 23rd May 2013

chris — Thu, 23 May 2013 20:54:15 GMT

There was a massive load spike on wiki:PuffinServer this afternoon, the load average peaked at over 60 and at exactly the same time there was also one on the virtual server serving http://webarch.net/.

Pingdom reported:

www.transitionnetwork.org down since 23/05/2013 12:11:57
www.transitionnetwork.org is UP again at 23/05/2013 12:19:57, after 8m of downtime
www.transitionnetwork.org is down since 23/05/2013 12:26:57
www.transitionnetwork.org is UP again at 23/05/2013 12:58:57, after 32m of downtime

When I did managed to get back into the server php-fpm and nginx were not running and it took several attempt to get them to start up.

Attached is the munin graps of the load from today, munin didn't record the start of the spike but it did start recording it as it came down.

This ticket has been created to report the issue and also to record anything that might be found in the logs to explain what happened.

#554: Site slow down and MySQL load increase

chris — Tue, 28 May 2013 18:11:51 GMT

Since the upgrade to MariaDB 5.5.31, done on ticket:218#comment:93 (and fixed on ticket:548#comment:32) there appears to have been been a noticeable slowdown in the time for pages to be generated, measuring with http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/ the front page alone takes around 5 seconds to generate.

There is a clear increase in the amount of MySQL/MariaDB activity measured by Munin, see the attached graphs, the upgrade was done around midday on 24th May 2013. There has also been a increase in traffic according to the firewall graphs. The memory usage of redis has also dropped right down and the database memory usage has significantly increased.

It's not totally clear if the cause of this change in behaviour of the site is related to the MySQL/MariaDB upgrade or if there was a coincidental change in the traffic to the site at the same time. There is no noticeable change in the visitors recorded in the Piwik stats.

According to pingdom the front page of the site is now "slower than 77% of all tested websites" with a total load time of around 6 seconds, almost all of this is down to the wait of around 5 seconds for the index.php file. This can also be tested from parrot with Apache bench, sometimes cached pages are served up and these appear in an instance, if the front page is generated it takes around 5 seconds, see wiki:LoadTimes#a2013-05-28

#555: Load spikes causing the TN site to be stopped for 15 min at a time

chris — Wed, 29 May 2013 09:53:52 GMT

The BOA /var/xdrago/second.sh script is run every minute via the root crontab and if it detects a certain load level it changes the nginx config to a "high load" config which results in bots being served 503 errors when they spider the site, see ticket:563. When the load goes higher and hits another threshold the second.sh script kills the webserver applications, nginx and php-fpm, and waits till the load has dropped before starting them up again. This was happening once or twice a day following the increase in traffic around the launch of The Power of Just Doing Stuff. This has been addressed by multiplying the thresholds by 5 in second.sh.

Original Description

This morning at 10:19:24 I received the following alert from puffin:

Subject: lfd on puffin.webarch.net: High 5 minute load average alert - 6.59
Time:                    Wed May 29 10:17:02 2013 +0100
1 Min Load Avg:          23.39
5 Min Load Avg:          6.59
15 Min Load Avg:         2.57
Running/Total Processes: 44/326

At 10:21:57 I got an alert regarding ssh:

Service: SSH
Host: puffin
Address: puffin.webarch.net
State: CRITICAL
Date/Time: Wed May 29 10:21:57 BST 2013
Additional Info:
CRITICAL - Socket timeout after 10 seconds

Then at 10:26:47 ssh appeared to have recovered:

Service: SSH
Host: puffin
Address: puffin.webarch.net
State: OK
Date/Time: Wed May 29 10:26:47 BST 2013
Additional Info:
SSH OK - OpenSSH_5.5p1 Debian-6+squeeze3 (protocol 2.0)

But then pingdom reported at 10:29:07:

www.transitionnetwork.org is down since 29/05/2013  10:24:57.

There was then a report regarding Nginx at 10:32:07:

Notification Type: PROBLEM
Service: HTTP
Host: puffin
Address: puffin.webarch.net
State: CRITICAL
Date/Time: Wed May 29 10:32:07 BST 2013
Additional Info:
Connection refused

So at 10:33:47 I ssh'd in and found that php53-fpm and nginx were not running and it took several attempts to get them running again.

The up email from pingdom reported:

www.transitionnetwork.org is UP again at 29/05/2013  10:36:57, after 12m of downtime.

I can't find anything in the logs to indicate what caused the load spike and php-fpm and nginx to stopp running.

#556: Upgrade Piwik to version 1.12

chris — Thu, 30 May 2013 21:40:48 GMT

A new version of Piwik came out today with some interesting looking features:

#560: Install drupal-based project management system onto our servers

ed — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 17:00:28 GMT

Please can you install a suitable project management drupal-based tool onto the suitable server? I am thinking of Open Atrium. It's for staff and partners to use for management stuff (ie not a ticketing system or mediawiki).

Open Atrium?

Can you let me know how long it would take to install to a point where I can manage it and get a pilot project up and running?

#562: Users being subscribed to widgets newsletter on registratoin

ed — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 15:11:22 GMT

Ed added new users to system via user-->add user. They are being automatically subscribed to the widget owners newsletter. Please investigate and stop this.

#563: 503 Errors

chris — Wed, 19 Jun 2013 10:59:54 GMT

Original Description

The site is generating a lot of 503 errors, 83 since 6:30am today and there were around 750 yesterday.

#565: Blogs breadcrumbs incorrect on listings views

ed — Tue, 25 Jun 2013 13:21:56 GMT

Blogs breadcrumbs are wrong at main all blogs view and one author's full list view: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/blog https://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/ed-mitchell

Jim can you sort this in under 15 minutes (which is what you have left)

#566: Profile photo does not work

ed — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 14:17:35 GMT

Using this user account: https://www.transitionnetwork.org/users/patricia-benson https://www.transitionnetwork.org/people/patricia-benson

I can't get the photo to sit correctly. I have already deleted her first user account as the first photo she put in was sideways - the system presented that the right size, but sideways. Then I couldn't get the system to forget the original photo so had to delete the account and start again. Now I've tried adding bigger, smaller pictures and they all come out far too big - the system is enlarging them up to wider than the space alloted.

Very odd. Too tired and busy to do this now - will revisit in July after holiday.

#568: TC blog: can't not send notifications

ed — Mon, 08 Jul 2013 10:20:16 GMT

I can't see how to do a node edit and *not* send a notification - here seen on the Transition Culture blog:

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/node/32863/edit

please advise - there's been some kerfuffle about the TC blog move so swift resolution much appreciated

#569: 403s served to editors, admin very slow

ed — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 07:52:32 GMT

Rob is getting 403s when trying to submit his work. Report from 07:12am this morning (Tuesday)

Ed tried to add a blog post at node add:

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/node/add/blog It took nearly 15 seconds to get this published https://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/ed-mitchell/2013-07/eds-test-blog-item-check-403

Running admin functions takes ages.This request took well over 30 seconds:

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/admin/content/node/overview

Please advise?

#570: Notifications: not sending complete URL

ed — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:19:57 GMT

Notification for blog post does not include full URL.

URL in notification is:

http://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/rob-hopkins/2013-07/transition-th...

URL should be: http://www.transitionnetwork.org/blogs/rob-hopkins/2013-07/transition-thursdays-three-down-three-go

#571: Force HTTP for anonymous, HTTPS for logged in users

jim — Tue, 16 Jul 2013 11:59:54 GMT

To further reduce load and leverage the caching I've changed the Session 443 settings to force anon users to HTTP and logged in to HTTPS. The benefit of allowing a handful of users to choose is tiny compared the downsides of outages, 503s and higher load.

The "User state" setting on the config page is now " Redirect authenticated users to HTTPS and redirect anonymous users to HTTP (with the exception of login/registration pages).", was "Redirect authenticated users to HTTPS and redirect anonymous users on login/registration pages to HTTPS. Anonymous users visiting other pages may use HTTP or HTTPS."

I've also set user and site-wide contact forms, plus the mailchimp subs page force secure-only per the "Additional pages to make secure" setting.

We can see if this makes a difference, and this ticket is to track comments and see if it results in any improvement in performance/stability.

#572: Design changes for homepage and TC section

ed — Wed, 17 Jul 2013 14:17:25 GMT

Design changes for TN homepage and TC section done by Ben to be part of maintenance budget.

list here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0An7ZaZdq6UfJdDhxS0JxbXZLYnhLRkN4X3h5aVV3R1E#gid=0

#573: MariaDB 5.5.32 is available for Puffin

chris — Thu, 18 Jul 2013 19:11:24 GMT

I could either update this via aptitude and it would be quick and have little down time or I could update it via BOA and it'll take 3 or 4 times as long and involved extra downtime.

Jim -- which way would you like it done?

The MariaDB project is pleased to announce the immediate availability of MariaDB 5.5.32.

This is a bug-fix release. See the Release Notes and Changelog for details.

MariaDB 5.5.32 Stable (GA)

Release Notes: https://kb.askmonty.org/en/mariadb-5532-release-notes
Changelog: https://kb.askmonty.org/en/mariadb-5532-changelog
http://lists.askmonty.org/pipermail/announce/2013-July/000048.html

#574: EFF: How HTTPS Everywhere affects transitionnetwork.org

chris — Thu, 25 Jul 2013 08:09:31 GMT

The following email was sent via the whois contact details for the transitionnetwork.org domain name, see also ticket:571 -- the changes made on ticket:571 has broken the site for anon Firefox users with the EFF HTTPS Everywhere browser extension installed.

Hi,

You're receiving this note because transitionnetwork.org is part of our HTTPS Everywhere browser extension, and an upcoming change to the way Firefox handles HTTPS pages may cause your site to display or function incorrectly. We want to make sure that the nearly 3 million HTTPS Everywhere users have the best possible experience while browsing, so we're asking you to please take a minute and test how your site behaves in Firefox 23. You can find out more about our software at

https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere

To see the rules affecting your site, you can visit the HTTPS Everywhere Atlas at

https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere/atlas/domains/transitionnetwork.org.html

The Atlas shows both rules in the development and stable versions of our extension. Rules in the stable version are used by millions of users, while development rules are used by tens of thousands of users. Development rules are now being tested but will be migrated to the stable version in the future.

An upcoming change (described below) in how the Firefox browser renders HTTPS content makes it especially important that you check that your site is prepared for HTTPS access. We urge you review the rules affecting your site and also to test it using HTTPS Everywhere with the upcoming version of Firefox.

*NEW FIREFOX CONTENT SECURITY POLICY*: In the upcoming Firefox 23 browser release, due out the week of August 6, Firefox will stop loading certain "active" content such as scripts and stylesheets from insecure http:// URLs if they've been included from a secure https:// site. If the HTTPS Everywhere rules send users to the secure version of your site but the secure version includes some content loaded over an insecure connetion, the rendering of your site may become broken for Firefox users with HTTPS Everywhere installed after they upgrade to Firefox 23. You can check this by downloading a preview release of Firefox 23, installing HTTPS Everywhere, and visiting your site. We urge all web site operators to protect their users by making sure that all site content is always loaded over a secure connection. A preview version of Firefox 23 is available now at https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/beta/ and the HTTPS Everywhere extension is at https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere

HTTPS Everywhere rules instruct browsers to access certain specified resources securely -- over HTTPS -- even if the user typed or followed a non-HTTPS link or even if the resources were included in a page via a non-HTTPS URL. For example, it might automatically rewrite

http://www.transitionnetwork.org/

to

https://www.transitionnetwork.org/

or make some similar change.

The goal of this rewriting is to protect as much as possible of every web site against sniffing and tampering by ensuring that as many site resources as possible are loaded over a secure HTTPS connection.

When web sites are accessed insecurely, users are vulnerable to attacks by other users on their networks. HTTPS Everywhere aims to activate sites' existing HTTPS protection more consistently to make sure users are as well-protected from these attacks as possible -- including attacks like sidejacking and SSL stripping.

http://www.firesheep.org/ http://www.thoughtcrime.org/sslstrip

As a result, we think there's an emerging consensus to make all web sites secure, not just financial sites and login pages. Providing a secure connection helps protect users' login credentials, but also helps protect their privacy and security even when accessing public resources, for example by preventing network operators from injecting malware downloads.

The goal of HTTPS Everywhere is to make the web more secure and help users express their preference to use the secure version of every site automatically, even on sites where this is not the default. We don't want to break sites or harm users' experience. So, we encourage webmasters to test the effect of HTTPS Everywhere on their sites and fix any problems that result -- ideally, by making sure that all resources that make up a site are available over HTTPS, using a current, valid certificate. Although we only include rules that we've been told and believe work properly, we can't always anticipate whether a rule adversely affects a site, especially if the site's URL structure, use of CDNs, or level of HTTPS support changes over time.

We are always happy to receive bug reports, updates, and fixes to HTTPS Everywhere rules. We will also make rules inactive by default if a site operator asks us to. Although we are working for a web where all sites are secure, we are not trying to use this software to force sites to use HTTPS against their operators' wishes. You can send any corrections, updates, or requests to https-everywhere-rules@… (which is a public and publicly-archived mailing list), or by replying to this e-mail address.

Thanks for your attention!

Seth Schoen, Senior Staff Technologist, Electronic Frontier Foundation for the HTTPS Everywhere development team

#575: User system is blocking everyone - needs fixing urgently

ed — Wed, 31 Jul 2013 14:39:11 GMT

Everyone who registers for the last two weeks is being blocked - check user list and see screengrab. Needs fixing promptly.

#578: Comments subscriptions: enable user alerts if a user has made a comment

ed — Mon, 12 Aug 2013 13:33:58 GMT

Can we set the email alerts to auto-subscribe users to comments threads that they have made comments on? ie I make a comment to blog post x, then I get email alerts of the new comments made to blog post x.