BackupPC is an awesome program for backing up your data in an efficient manner. It provides you with an easy to use web interface and some very complete documentation. Read more about it at the BackupPC SourceForge page.

For some reason, the FreeBSD ports tree still does not contain BackupPC! This guide details the configuration steps to get BackupPC running with an Apache (lighttpd also supported, though) web interface on a FreeBSD host.

Adobe has always denied FreeBSD native flash support, but you can use Linux emulation to get Adobe Flash 10 working on a FreeBSD system with a few simple steps. Although it might have its occasional quirks, Flash works pretty well with anything I have ever thrown at it. It gets better every update!

FreeBSD ships with the internal speaker enabled, which can be very annoying when computing in public! I chose to disable the beep by disabling it at the kernel level with sysctl, instead of doing one-off hacks for each application that uses the system bell.

1. # sysctl hw.syscons.bell=0
2. hw.syscons.bell: 1 -> 0

Now check to see if the beep is still there. If not, do the following to make the change permenant. If the sound is still there, skip to the next heading to see some other methods of disabling the internal speaker.

1. # echo 'hw.syscons.bell=0' >> /etc/sysctl.conf

Unfortunately, spammers of all kinds continuously scan for pages that contain elements in which they, or their bots, can post their spam messages easily. Though the attacks can get sophisticated if they target your exact defense mechanism, you can easily circumvent many of the bots by using a simple captcha.

A captcha is just a method of getting the user to jump through a hoop of some sort to identify

On occasion, I like to get my hands dirty with SQL injection (learning in a controlled environment, of course). If you have ever read about or done SQL injection, you often have to convert text into various other forms to either make the HTTP request happy or avoid one of the server's sanitize methods.

The following are a few that I find useful to have a tool for. Feel free to let me know your ideas on new features and options. I will try to add more as I find the need!

Apache's HTTP Authentication is a fast and easy way to lock down a directory so that it prompts users with a password dialog box to view the files.

This guide assumes that you have Apache2 already up and running.

Most any fresh Linux install, Debian in my specific case, automatically enables a multitude of wonderful high pitched beeps and tones for your listening pleasure. You might have noticed them by hitting a TAB on an invalid auto-complete, when you incorrectly login to GDM, or any of the other seemingly infinite ways to get an ear crunching BEEEEP.

To fix this issue you can go about disabling beeps in individual programs, but I have a better idea! Let's get the job done right and just blacklist the whole internal speaker to get rid of all beeps in all programs. Unless you are listening to motherboard beeps, who really need the internal speaker, anyways?

I use both modules as an example, just note the basic difference is that pcspkr is used in newer kernels. If one command does not work ('Module xxx does not exist' errors, etc), try the other.

Lets try to unload the (possibly) already running module.

1. # rmmod snd_pcsp
2. # rmmod pcspkr

Now we just need to make sure the module does not get loaded on system boot.

1. # echo 'blacklist snd_pcsp' >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
2. # echo 'blacklist pcspkr' >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist
3. # reboot

I just noticed FireFox 3.5 is in my ports tree! I upgraded immediately to check out the JavaScript speeds that everyone was always reporting about... and I see why there were ranting so much! All my AJAX scripts that I am used to using are sped up dramatically. I am very impressed, although I find it weird that I have to load a Kernel module to use my browser. Oh, and Firefox 3.0 is in conflict with Firefox 3.5, so you have to remove Firefox 3.0 before you can even install Firefox 3.5. Also worth mentioning is the fact that Firefox 3.5 uses Firefox 3.0's /usr/local/lib/firefox3 directory don't worry about reinstalling plugins or bookmarks!

Check out how to update your ports tree to get the latest and greatest versions and sources for applications.

1. # pkg_delete firefox-3\*
2. # cd /usr/ports/www/firefox35
3. # make install clean distclean
4. # kldload sem
5. # echo 'sem_load="YES"' >> /boot/loader.conf