17-Jan-2015

PHP again
Because installation of WordPress failed, apparently due to PHP issues, I contacted Mark Berryman whohas done thr port of PHP to VMS. From him I learned that 5.2.6 is basically a port of HP’s version where all modules are included. At least, most are. And the glob function is one of those that is missing. The latest version that is available (5.2.13) should work. So would the latest of 5.3 and 5.4, he uses that one now. So I’ll update the PHP installations ans see what works best. Probably 5.4…
Another port he has done is MySQL fork named MariaSQL. I think the guys behind this database come from the original owner of MySQL, that have left this company after it was acquired by Oracle. Frustrated? Perhaps. Anyway, the database is a straight replacement of MySQL and according Mark, it is far more stable than any MySQL version ever ported to OpenVMS. Well, I have no real complaints on that, except WordPress looses connection executing a particular query, but that doesn’t interfere with normal activities. But it is worth a try.
So there’s some work to do this weekend

<Strong><font color=”red”>OpenVMS.org down</font></strong>

Forseveral weeks,  the unofficial VMS community site OpenVMS.org is not responding,  nor is any site in that family.  It appears the domain is ‘parked’  at GoDaddy,  and can be purchased. For now I have disabled the link.  However, there is a new kid on the block and that will be named in my list: OpenVMSToday.com, by eCube.

01-Jan-2009

Housekeeping December
Mail statistics:
PMAS statistics for 12
Total messages    : 4413 = 100.0 o/o
DNS Blacklisted   : 2537 =  57.4 o/o (Files: 31)
Relay attempts    :  782 =  17.7 o/o (Files: 31)
Processed by PMAS : 1094 =  24.7 o/o (Files: 31)
        Discarded :  460 =  42.0 o/o (processed),  10.4 o/o (all)
     Quarantained :  261 =  23.8 o/o (processed),   5.9 o/o (all)
        Delivered :  373 =  34.0 o/o (processed),   8.4 o/o (all)
That’s quite a lot more ignored messages. Especially the number of relay attempts need further investigation. As for the last days, there was little that was delivered. Most simply rejected, not even filtered.

Of course, all of 2008 is now archived. I moved all that was created before 2008 to off-line storage (DVD, mainly).

PHP notification
I compiled a short notice to HP on the findings on PHP 5 – and a small note to Mark, I think there’s something within PHPWASD that may cause a problem. And I still have to figure out why PHP4 cannot be started….

24-Dec-2008

Patches installed.
Today, I installed a number of patches – after having made a proper image backup of the system disk.
That was no problem, as could be expected.
First tests of PHP
A few weeks ago, I learned a new version of PHP was coming soon. It’s abit delayed,but I was able to put it to thye test. Well, some tests.
To keep the previous version at hand, I renamed the previous directory trees to PHP4 and the newly created one PHP5. From there all updates have been done: PHPWASD that had to be changed a bit.
After reboot, PHP5 was enabled but there were some slight problems in the startup script, that caused PHP_ROOT not be defined. A small change solved that problem. I also forgot to move PHPWASD to the right spot, but once these issues were settled, I could start running tests.
MyPHPAdmin fails. From the start, it gives a non-CGI-conformance reply. Obvious, it doesn’t return the status as a first issue. Weird, since that should haven been returned. Or it’s caused by the MySQL 4.1 engine that came with the PHP package. That’s something to be reconsidered!
WP – the test blog – runs but is VERY slow. Login may fail, but will in the end succeed. Or may return an eror, but WATCH shows the full HTML output, which is valid. And some data is added, which may cause a problem.
This blog had a problem on login – but refreshing the screen would come back with the admin page in the end. Not sure yet what caused it. But where I previously found a message that PCRE lacked UTF-8 support, I get a more severe error:

%SYSTEM-F-STKOVF, stack overflow, PC=00000000002399E0, PS=0000001B
%TRACE-F-TRACEBACK, symbolic stack dump follows

 image     module      routine        line    rel PC           abs PC

 PHPSHR                                    0  00000000001E79E0 00000000002399E0
 PHPSHR                                    0  00000000001E931C 000000000023B31C
 PHPSHR                                    0  0000000000266634 00000000002B8634
 PHPSHR                                    0  00000000001A1AC4 00000000001F3AC4
 PHPSHR                                    0  0000000000189D94 00000000001DBD94
 PHPWASD   PHPWASD     ProcessRequest  44025  0000000000001C58 0000000000031C58
 PHPWASD   PHPWASD     main            43639  00000000000005A8 00000000000305A8
 PHPWASD   PHPWASD     __main          43565  000000000000006C 000000000003006C
                                           0  FFFFFFFF80379CE4 FFFFFFFF80379CE4
%TRACE-I-END, end of TRACE stack dump

and later on, where plugins list is shown, the same error is found.

Second, it’s VERY slow. And where I previously could handle fo9rms nicely within a 12Mb linit, I get Out-of-core messages now and than – on logout, for instance.
Testing getting an image wasn’t changed. After uploading the image, stating the image being included in the post, dows not return to the editor: IE states “The object doesn’t support this property or method”.
But the script is there if you view the source:

<script type="text/javascript">
/* <![CDATA[ */
var win = window.dialogArguments &vbar;&vbar; opener &vbar;&vbar; parent &vbar;&vbar; top;
win.send_to_editor('<a href=\"https://homedesk.grootersnet.nl/wp265/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/3c75_nrao_big.jpg\"><img src=\"https://homedesk.grootersnet.nl/wp265/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/3c75_nrao_big.jpg\" alt=\"Some astronomical image\" title=\"3c75_nrao_big\" width=\"500\" height=\"500\" class=\"size-full wp-image-20\" /></a>');
/* ]]> */
</script>

Well, I found that adding the data between the “” tags would do the trick. With, without these tags.
In the course of the next day, I’ll do some more testing to find out what’s going on.
UPDATE
Another issue just found: Where previously lines in withing <code> tags would wrap if they exceeded the width of the section, it’s not chopped on the right.
But I also found that once the site environment is set up, access to pages is faster than before. But that’s more like the result of Mark’s coding than the PHPSHR module 🙂