Geek Rewind

Backing up WordPress Databases

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how backup WordPress databases.

One simple task every webmaster should learn is backing up MySQL databases. When you’re managing a website or IT system, you should always have a backup plan.

A plan that will get you restored if something goes wrong with the systems you’re managing.

When it comes to WordPress and MySQL databases, that same strategy should apply.

This brief tutorial is going to show you how to easily backup your WordPress MySQL databases using cPanel as well as from Linux command terminal.

Configure HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) with Apache

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to configure HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) with Apache on Ubuntu Linux.

If you’re using HTTPS or going to be using it on your websites, then HSTS is something you might want to configure as well.

HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) is a security policy that help protect against downgrade attacks and cookies hijacking. When configured, your web server enforces strict HTTPS connection for web browsers and never via the insecure HTTP protocol.

To enhance connections to your Apache web server make sure that HSTS is also enabled to help protect against man-in-the-middle attack.

Since newer web browsers are all HSTS enabled, this should work across most systems. When a web browser contacts a HSTS enabled server, the browser by default looks for a special HTTP header related to HSTS.

Generate Certificate Signing Request (CSR) for Apache2

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to create a certificate signing request for Apache2 on Linux systems?

Certificate signing request is the first step you take in acquiring trusted SSL/TLS certificates for your domain. If you need to protect the information being transferred between your web server and client’s browsers, you must install SSL/TLS certificates.

Before you can generate SSL certificates, you must first generate or create a CSR request and provide that to the certificate provider. The provider will then use the request to generate a certificate for your server.

The CSR request contains information that will be used to create the certificate. These include, the organization name, common name (domain), locality, country and more.

It also contains the public key that is used to generate a certificate. A private key is also created during the time of the CSR creation.

Uninstalling Windows 10 Apps

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to uninstall Windows 10 apps and programs.

There are two types of apps that are installed on Windows 10 systems: Desktop apps and Windows apps. The Windows apps are those that are installed like in traditional versions of Windows and the desktop are are those installed from the Windows store.

When you uninstall Windows apps, they get uninstalled from the entire system. Desktop apps get removed for the all users on the system, although they may still be installed in the core systems.

When you install traditional applications like Adobe Reader and others, those are considered Windows apps.

This brief tutorial shows you how to uninstall apps on Windows systems.

Change Windows 10 Apps Installation Location

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to change Windows 10 default apps installation location.

By default all Windows applications are installed on the Local Disk C: (This PC) drive. This has been the default location since from the beginning of the modern Windows OS.

Advanced users may choose to install new applications at a different location, but that process isn’t automatic. You must manually select the location to install a program during the program installation.

With the introduction of Windows 10, now you can configure your systems to always install new programs and applications at a location specified by default.

This post is going to show you how to do that with Windows 10.

Now a days, some PCs are sold with two hard drives. One hard drive might be SSD with smaller storage size the the other a regular SATA drive but much bigger in storage size.

Disable Windows 10 Recent Files & Frequent Folders List

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to protect user privacy by disabling Windows 10 recent files in Quick access.

Windows 10 introduced some new features that many might find embarrassing especially when someone is able to view your recent activities which you wanted to keep private.

With Windows 10, File Explorer (previously known as Windows Explorer) opens to the frequent folders and Quick access files pane by default. Every file or folder recently opened or accessed are displayed in this pane.

For privacy reasons, some folks fine these settings concerning.

This brief tutorial shows users and students how to quickly disable or re-enable Windows Quick access feature to display Recent files.

Enable | Disable SmartScreen Filter in Windows 10

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to disable or re-enable Windows 10 SmartScreen filter.

SmartScreen filter was introduced with Microsoft Internet Explorer 8 (IE 8) web browser. It was developed to protect user computers from viruses and spyware programs online.

SmartScreen filter seems to be so successful that Microsoft implemented this security mechanism within the OS itself starting with Windows 8 and it comes enabled by default.

This brief tutorial shows you how to disable and re-enable SmartScreen filter in Windows 10.

How to easily Pause | Stop Windows 10 Updates

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to easily pause or stop Windows 10 updates.

Here’s a brief tip that shows users and students how to temporarily pause or stop Windows 10 updates.

You see, Windows 10 automatically downloads updates and patches in the background, which may be real pain for folks connected to slow or low quality Internet.

While automatically downloading Windows 10 updates in the background is good and wise thing to do, at times you want priority tasks or work to be completed quickly, and if your Internet connection is slow, the background download services will make it slower.

Setup NFS Mounts on Ubuntu Servers

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to setup NFS mount points for NFS client access on Ubuntu systems.

NFS or Network File System, is a distributed file system that can be enabled in a client/server environment. NFS is very easy to configure for those wishing to allow NFS client machines to access NFS mount points on a server using NFS protocol.

This brief tutorial shows users how to setup NFS mount points on a server for client access. It should be quick and easy to understand, even for new users.

How to Use MySQL Wizard in cPanel to Create Databases

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to use cPanel MySQL Database wizard to create WordPress databases.

Few days ago we showed students and new users how to create MySQL WordPress databases via cPanel. We also mentioned in that post that cPanel was developed to help new users and beginners manage websites and domains easily.

Advanced users can use Linux and the command line terminal to manage servers and other complicated setups. However, for students just starting out managing websites, cPanel should be the way to go.

Creating and managing cPanel databases via cPanel is easy. There are two ways to do this. One way is using cPanel MySQL database portal to create and manage databases.

Create WordPress MySQL Databases via cPanel

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to you create WordPress MySQL databases via cPanel.

For students and new users who are just starting out managing online websites and blogs, there’s the easy way and the hard way. Most new users are encouraged to go via the easy way.

The hard way is for advanced users. Those who have spent countless hours managing websites and/or blogs online. They are comfortable using the command line interface and configuring Linux servers.

Because of the challenges of come with managing websites and domain the hard way, folks developed tools to help with that process. Tools such as Cpanel and others were developed so that new users can manage websites and domains easily without learning how to configure Linux servers or complicated systems.

Enable Copy/Paste Between VirtualBox Host and Guests

This brief tutorial shows students and new users how to you copy and paste clipboard content between VirtualBox host and guest machines.

We’ve written quite a bit about VirtualBox and virtualization software on this site. We wrote that VirtualBox is a very critical tool for IT professionals and students learning to become IT pros.

This brief tutorial is going to describe the steps needed to drag n’ drop content between VirtualBox host computer and guest machines. It’s a very useful feature that you’ll love.

Before you can use all these features that come with VirtualBox, you must first install VirtualBox’s guest addition tool. This tool comes with VirtualBox host software and can be installed easily.