UKC

Multi year domain registration and renewal periods

Finally it is now possible to register .UK domain names for periods other than 2 years.

Since it’s inception, Nominet (the UK domain registry) have only facilitated 2 year domain name registrations and domain name renewals. It was not possible to register or renew for any other period. Unlike pretty much all other domain extensions which have since the year dot had registration and renewal options starting from 1  to 10 years.

We now support .UK domain name registration periods from 1 year to 10 years. Renewal periods of the same value are now also offered at time of renewal. You can see the official Nominet news release under Nominet to roll out multi-year reigstration periods for UK domains.

To get the best value from your domain name registration or renewal, go for 10 years (or as long as you can afford) as the price is stepped down and discounted for longer term registrations and renewals. Prices drop to as low as £2.99 per year if you register or renew for the longer periods, these terms are set and forget, no need to remember to renew.

Automatically scheduled 10 year renewal orders

Domains can be renewed up to 180 days before the expiry date. However this poses another problem which Nominet are aware of. That is, let say you have 100 days left on your domain name and you want to renew, you choose the 10 year renewal. Sounds ok? Well this will be a big fail. This is because a .UK domain name cannot have more than 10 years remaining. So in this case, if the renewal worked, you would have 10 years and 100 days remaining. No possible, so we automatically schedule your renewal order to execute on the expiry date – this resolves the (annoying) problem of timing your renewal perfectly.

How to delete files older than a specific number of minutes

Re: Use BASH to delete files older than so many minutes

When working with temporary files it is often good housekeeping to clear (delete) files older than a specific number of minutes. Use the following in bash command to achieve this goal:

# find /tmp/file* -type f -mmin +65 -delete

The above command will delete all files older than 65 minutes. Modify as appropriate.

MICROLITE4 IP Switchover (Migration)

Re: Network Migration of MICROLITE4 Server

We will be moving the MICROLITE4 hardware to a new higher performance network which will require a physical relocation and a number of IP address changes to the servers. This process will be completed automatically and no action from yourself is required. Apart from IP changes there will be no data configuration changes on the server.

The migration will take place on 2nd September 2012 between the hours 0900 – 1600

Unfortunately this means that there will be disruption to services during the migration, especially during the physical hardware relocation. We do apologise for this unavoidable disruption to services. We promise to keep the disruption period as short as possible.

Thank you for your patience during this mandatory migration period.

Network Support Team

How to Install ImageMagick on Plesk

Re: ImageMagick on a Plesk Server

ImageMagick is not installed on your Plesk server by default. However, the installation is quite simple using the yum repositories and packages.

# yum install gcc
# yum install ImageMagick
# yum install ImageMagick-devel
# yum install php-pear
# yum install php-devel
# pecl install imagick
# echo "extension=imagick.so" > /etc/php.d/imagick.ini
# service httpd restart

To test it is working, try the following:

# php -i | grep imagick
imagick
imagick module => enabled
imagick module version => 3.0.1
imagick classes => Imagick, ImagickDraw, ImagickPixel, ImagickPixelIterator
imagick.locale_fix => 0 => 0
imagick.progress_monitor => 0 => 0

This output confirms that the imagick.so module is operating and active. That completes this ImageMagick installation tutorial, we hope you found it useful.

Problems forwarding to Gmail / AOL / Other email address

Re: Forwarded emails not arriving, no bounce message

Many free email services such as Gmail, AOL, Hotmail (and ISPs) are constantly tightening up their spam systems and are being increasingly particular about which emails they allow in to their system.

If you find that forwarding email to one of these addresses is simply ‘disappearing’, ie. no bounce message then you can be safe in assuming that your email alias (address) is temporarily blocked from the target mail system.

Why does this happen?

Let’s assume you are doing all the right things. ie Your SPF record is correctly set, your MX records are correct.

When forwarding emails from your parked domain name, you are also forwarding SPAM to your destination email address. If you send enough SPAM messages then you will block your own alias. Often the block is only in place for a limited time, for example 24 hours. Then it will start working again and once you have forwarded enough SPAM the block is re-applied. Does this sound like the problem you are experiencing?

What can you do?

  • If you are receiving SPAM to your forwarding alias then try a new alias. This will be a suitable solution until you again start receiving SPAM to this new alias.
  • Try to keep your alias names as unexposed as possible to reduce the SPAM sent to them.
  • Create a Mailbox for your alias. The Mailbox will receive 100% of emails sent to it.
  • Do not use forwarding aliases for important or mission critical applications, use a Mailbox.
If you require any  further assistance or advice do not hesitate to contact support.
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