[ZendTo] ZendTo ANNOUNCE: Version 4.27-1 released (production)

Jules Jules at Zend.To
Wed Apr 19 18:26:45 BST 2017


Peter,

I've just remembered why I didn't switch to filter_var().
My regexp splits the address into the left-hand side and right-hand side 
too, which I use in quite a few places.
I guess I could use filter_var() and then split it at the last "@", but 
I'm not quite convinced that's any better than the situation now.

All thoughts welcome!

Cheers,
Jules.


On 19/04/2017 18:07, Jules wrote:
> Peter,
>
> On 19/04/2017 15:58, Der PCFreak wrote:
>>
>> Hi Jules,
>>
>> I tried the new version today on a blank CentOS 7 system. First of 
>> all, great work. Setup was nearly perfect. Here some notes.
>> I had the following error during setup multiple times:
>>
>> |hostname: Temporary failure in name resolution |
> Looks more like you haven't got any DNS entry for the server or 
> something like that.
>
> I didn't modify anything during my test blank CentOS 7 installation. 
> Mine picks up the hostname and so on via DHCP.
>>
>> and I think this happened because the hostname was not set in 
>> |/etc/hosts| or because the hostname that the |hostname| command 
>> shows is not an FQDN.
>>
> The hostname command should only produce the FQDN with "hostname 
> --long" or "hostname --fqdn".
>>
>> I will verify that as soon as I can.
>> Because of the name resolution error the entry for |ServerName| in 
>> |/etc/httpd/conf.d/zendto.conf| and 
>> |/etc/httpd/conf.d/zendto-ssl.conf| was empty and
>> I had to add it myself. - Not a big problem but maybe the installer 
>> could be optimized to catch that problem of an unset hostname in the 
>> future?
>>
> On your system, as it stands at the moment, what is the output from 
> each of these commands?
> 1. hostname
> 2. hostname --short
> 3. hostname --fqdn
> 4. hostname --domain
>
>
>> I found a typo in |preferences.php| :
>>
>> |WRONG // If Windows web browsers have problems with the upload 
>> progrss bar CORRECT // If Windows web browsers have problems with the 
>> upload progress bar |
> That's easy for me to fix! :-)
> And while I was there, I noticed I forgot to remove the note about the 
> "real" progress bar not working on Ubuntu 16 or PHP 7. It now works 
> fine on that, so I've removed that note.
>
>> I also think the |validEmailRegexp| could be optimized. I tested the 
>> regex at regex101.com <https://regex101.com/> (btw. a very cool site) and
>> it also matches when there is one or multiple dots |.| at the end of 
>> the email address.
>> Maybe it would be better to make it look like this:
>>
>> |'validEmailRegexp' => 
>> '/^([a-zA-Z0-9][a-zA-Z0-9\.\_\-\+\&\']*)\@([a-zA-Z0-9][a-zA-Z0-9\_\-\.]+)([a-zA-Z0-9].)$/i', 
>> |
> You actually can't do it perfectly with a regexp, so don't bother 
> trying to do it perfectly.
> https://davidcel.is/posts/stop-validating-email-addresses-with-regex/
>
>> or use PHP |filter_var()| function with |filter_var($email, 
>> FILTER_VALIDATE_EMAIL)|
>> (found via Stackoverflow 
>> <http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5855811/how-to-validate-an-email-in-php>)
>>
> Yes, I could do that, but then people wouldn't be able to tweak it. 
> But then again, they probably shouldn't be trying to, so I think I'll 
> swap the regexp check to that instead.
> Thanks for the suggestion!
>>
>> Not big stuff but I think only reporting all pieces of problems could 
>> make this software better (and it is really good already).
>>
> Thank you! All appreciated.
>
>> A question:
>> On fully updated latest CentOS 7 the installer recompiles PHP 5.x for 
>> ZendTo. Wasn’t big file support already in there in never versions?
>>
> No. Not properly implemented until PHP 7.
>>
>> And if not would the installer detect if I would enable the IUS 
>> repository <https://ius.io/GettingStarted/> which provides |php71u| and
>> would this make the recompiling of PHP unnecessary?
>> I am asking this because I am thinking about upgrading the system in 
>> the future without the need of recompiling PHP all the time.
>> Maybe I get something wrong here, but please correct me, if so.
>>
> A lot of corporates and big organisations wouldn't encourage the use 
> of 3rd party repos any more than *absolutely* necessary.
> If you pay for RedHat support they certainly aren't going to be keen 
> on you replacing PHP with a totally different version (which is not 
> 100% backward compatible with PHP 5), as you are likely to break 
> things as a result.
>
> So while replacing PHP 5 with PHP 7 might work well enough for you, 
> it's certainly not an upgrade I would attempt on a production service 
> without an *awful* lot of testing first. And by doing it, I know that 
> I would almost certainly invalidate/damage any support contract I had 
> with anyone.
>
> If you really want to use the IUS version, you could add the repo 
> before starting the installer, then run just stage 1, then install 
> your favourite PHP including the required modules, then run the 
> install.sh again and tell it not to do the "rebuild PHP" stage. You 
> can run the separate stages of the installation on their own if you 
> want to. Take a peek in install.ZendTo/CentOS-RedHat/ and you'll see 
> what I mean. Provided your current directory is either in 
> "install.ZendTo" or in "install.ZendTo/CentOS-Redhat" (or 
> "install.ZendTo/Ubuntu") then you can directly run individual stages 
> just fine.
>
>> Hint:
>> A colleague of mine does ZendTo as its project for his master’s 
>> project and we will run the installer many many times the next weeks.
>>
> What sort of project? What is he actually doing for his Master's 
> project (what is the topic of the project)?
> And out of interest, what sort of Master's and where?
>
>> I will constantly update you on anything more we find.
>>
>> Thank you again for your good work.
>>
> Thanks!
>>
>> Kind regards
>>
>> Peter
>>
>> PS:
>> If ths email does not render correctly give me feedback. I used the 
>> Toggle Markdown Extension for Thunderbird to create it.
>>
> It's fine, don't worry.
>
> Cheers,
> Jules.
>
>> On 17.04.2017 17:42, Jules wrote:
>>
>>> Hi folks!
>>>
>>> I hope you have all had a good Easter/weekend.
>>>
>>> Enough of the betas, I've finally decided to make a full "production"
>>> release of ZendTo.
>>> So this is version 4.27-1.
>>>
>>> There are lots of improvements, changes and fixes since the last
>>> production release (4.20). The full Change Log since then is at the end
>>> of this email, but the highlights are:-
>>>
>>> * Full support for HTML email, along with TLS encryption, SMTP auth and
>>> much simpler email configuration. Postfix or sendmail are no longer
>>> required.
>>> * Improved "New Dropoff" forms, with a new progress bar that works on
>>> Ubuntu 16, PHP 7 and future versions as it is entirely implemented in
>>> the browser.
>>> * Reminder emails are much improved (for drop-offs that are about to
>>> expire but no one has picked up). These can also be disabled.
>>> * You can stop users outside your organisation sending files to users
>>> inside, unless the external users have explicitly been sent a Drop-off
>>> Request.
>>> * 'upgrade_zendto_conf' tool added in addition to
>>> 'upgrade_preferences_php' tool to make upgrading a whole lot easier.
>>> Just run either of them without any command-line arguments and they will
>>> show you how to use them.
>>> * The installer now sets up a complete https version of the website for
>>> you, with a self-signed certificate to get you started. It even sets up
>>> the http->https site redirection.
>>> * The installer now sets up your internaldomains.conf file.
>>>
>>> I strongly advise you to install it on a basically-blank Ubuntu, CentOS
>>> or RedHat Enterprise system by using the installer available from the
>>> downloads page:
>>>       http://zend.to/downloads.php
>>>
>>> If you are upgrading from a previous version, you can just update using
>>> apt/yum and then use the upgrade_preferences_php and upgrade_zendto_conf
>>> tools in /opt/zendto/bin.
>>>
>>> If you are upgrading from a previous version and want to rebuild the
>>> latest PHP as well, *first* upgrade ZendTo itself with apt/yum, then use
>>> the installer to just run the first 2 stages (web server & development
>>> tools, then rebuild PHP). If you do this the other way around, it will
>>> probably try to remove your existing ZendTo installation!
>>>
>>> So please head over to the downloads page at
>>>       http://zend.to/downloads.php
>>>
>>> Please do let me know how you get on. All constructive criticism,
>>> suggestions and requests are most welcome!
>>>
>>> Cheers,
>>> Jules.
>>>
>>> P.S. As promised, here is the Change Log since the last full release. I
>>> have broken it down by topic to make it easier to digest.
>>>
>>> User Interface
>>> - Added support for HTML email, TLS encryption and SMTP auth.
>>>     NOTE: its use is entirely optional, and disabled by default
>>>     (so the old email code will be used instead).
>>>     Note: the HTML email templates (/opt/zendto/templates/*_email_html.tpl)
>>>     are optional. If they don't exist, it will continue to send only plain-
>>>     text emails.
>>>     Read the docs in preferences.php just above the 'SMTPserver' setting
>>>     for more information and tips.
>>> - Wrote HTML versions of all the email templates for you to start from.
>>>     For simplest deployment, copy www/images/email-logo.png and replace it
>>>     with your organization's logo of the same height. For more details,
>>>     see the templates. They all have "email" and "html" in their name.
>>> - Reminder emails for about-to-expire drop-offs are now noticeably
>>>     different. (There is a slight template change to dropoff_email.tpl)
>>> - Improved "New Dropoff" form so it's much clearer for users.
>>>     Note: addition to CSS style file swish.css.
>>> - Instead of pausing at 100% while virus-scanning uploads, the progress
>>>     bar now displays a 'scanning for viruses...' message. This is just a
>>>     change to new_dropoff.tpl template file.
>>> - Inbox now looks and behaves like Outbox, with sort and search provided.
>>> - Switched over "Request a Drop-off" and "Pickup..." buttons in main
>>>     menu for logged-in users.
>>>
>>> Internals
>>> - Progress bar now works better on 64-bit browsers. Does not require
>>>     APC or APCu modules. Works fine on Ubuntu 16 and PHP 7.
>>>     Many thanks to Milan Babel for showing me how to do this!
>>> - Changed default for 'showRecipsOnPickup' from TRUE to FALSE, and added
>>>     a short description of what it does. I strongly advise you to change this
>>>     to FALSE, otherwise it may/will leak information to external users.
>>> - Reminder warnings can be disabled by setting 'warnDaysBeforeDeletion'
>>> to 0.
>>> - New setting 'allowExternalUploads' allows you to stop external users
>>>     (who cannot login) being able to send files to people inside your
>>>     organisation unless they had been explicitly sent a request for the
>>> file(s).
>>> - Logging to /var/zendto/zendto.log is now much more readable.
>>> - ClamAV output now logged whenever virus check fails.
>>> - Changed preferences.conf clamdscan command to enable logging.
>>> - Moved a few words used in the UI out of the code and into zendto.conf
>>>     so you can translate them more easily. Thanks to Thomas Texier.
>>> - Upgraded to very latest version of Smarty template engine 3.1.
>>>
>>> Bugs
>>> - Bug fixed where logout didn't, on combination of Ubuntu 16 and Chrome.
>>> - Fixed bug in cron job that sent out reminders containing broken links.
>>>     NOTE: There is a new setting in preferences.php called 'serverRoot'.
>>>     This is the root URL of your ZendTo website, and must end with a '/'.
>>> - Bug where empty email messages were sent (when 'SMTPserver' was
>>>     undefined) should now be fixed.
>>> - Bug fixed where pickup notification email could refer to invalid
>>>     email address in very rare circumstances.
>>> - Broken links on "security" page fixed.
>>> - Fixed RPM spec file error. The error was actually harmless, but looked
>>> bad.
>>>
>>> Installation, Upgrading and Tools
>>> - Added 'upgrade_zendto_conf' to help you upgrade your zendto.conf file,
>>>     in addition to existing 'upgrage_preferences_php' tool. Just run them
>>>     no command-line options and they will show you how to use them.
>>> - upgrade_preferences_php and upgrade_zendto_conf now tell you about
>>>     newly added and removed settings, so you know what to check.
>>> - Installer now also creates a complete SSL https version of the website,
>>>     using a self-signed certificate. It will even offer to redirect all
>>>     http connections to the https site automatically. All you need to do
>>>     for production use is get yourself a proper SSL certificate and drop
>>>     the files in the right places.
>>> - Installer now sets up your internaldomains.conf file, based on the
>>>     domain name (excluding sub-domains) of your server. Thanks to the DMARC
>>> - Installer updated to configure PHPMailer instead of sendmail/postfix.
>>> - Installer updated to not build APC/APCu module.
>>> - Installer now copes with EPEL repo pre-installed but disabled.
>>> - adduser.php now corrects SQLite database file ownership back to that
>>>     of the web server, in case you ran it before rendering the home page
>>>     to get the web server to create it with the right permissions.
>>> - CentOS 5 and RedHat 5 can no longer be built as the packages have all
>>>     been removed as they are end of life.
>>> - CentOS have mucked up their SRPM repository for CentOS 6, so only
>>>     sources for version 6.8 currently exist, despite 6.9 being the current
>>>     version. I've improved the installer so it looks from the current version
>>>     all the way down to 6.1 then 6, trying to find a working source repo.
>>>     It then uses the latest version it can find.
>>>     folks for the elegant code to calculate this.
>>>
>>> Jules
>>>
>>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ZendTo mailing list
>> ZendTo at zend.to
>> http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/zendto
>
> Jules
>
> -- 
> Julian Field MEng CEng CITP MBCS MIEEE MACM
>
> 'I never saw a wild thing
>   Sorry for itself.' - D.H. Lawrence
>
> www.Zend.To
> Twitter: @JulesFM
> PGP footprint: EE81 D763 3DB0 0BFD E1DC 7222 11F6 5947 1415 B654
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> ZendTo mailing list
> ZendTo at zend.to
> http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/zendto

Jules

-- 
Julian Field MEng CEng CITP MBCS MIEEE MACM

'The best and most beautiful things in life cannot be seen or even
  touched; they must be felt with the heart.' - Helen Keller

www.Zend.To
Twitter: @JulesFM
PGP footprint: EE81 D763 3DB0 0BFD E1DC 7222 11F6 5947 1415 B654

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/pipermail/zendto/attachments/20170419/2e036bf1/attachment-0001.html 


More information about the ZendTo mailing list