LexiConn – April 2006 Newsletter

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LexiConn – April 2006 Newsletter
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In this month’s issue:
* Using PHP/MySQL in your website
* Featured Client – chinasprout.com
* Spam/Virus information and updates
* phpBB2 forum software upgraded to latest version – 2.0.20

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Using PHP/MySQL in your website…

If you are looking to add dynamic content to your website, the combination of PHP and MySQL is a powerful yet easy to implement solution. LexiConn fully supports PHP and MySQL, and there are many resources on the internet that can provide tips, tutorials, and scripts. Below is a quick overview of each technology.

PHP stands for Hypertext Preprocessor, and is an open source programming language that allows you to create dynamic content for your website. PHP scripts are embedded within a page along with the corresponding HTML. Before the page is displayed, the web server makes a call to PHP to perform the necessary operations specified in the script. It is compatible with many different kinds of databases, but is most commonly used in conjunction with MySQL. Here are some excellent links for tutorials on PHP:

http://www.tizag.com/phpT/
http://www.zend.com/php/beginners/php101-1.php

MySQL is a powerful open source relational database management system that uses Structured Query Language (SQL). SQL is the most commonly used language to access databases, and the MySQL database server is the most popular open source database in the world. This popularity stems from the fact that MySQL is unmatched in speed, compactness, stability, and ease of deployment. More information regarding MySQL, including tutorials, can be found at:

http://www.tizag.com/mysqlTutorial/
http://www.webmonkey.com/webmonkey/99/21/index2a.html

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Featured Client – chinasprout.com…

This month’s featured client is chinasprout.com. ChinaSprout provides Chinese cultural and educational products as well as online community services to anyone with an interest in Chinese culture. Their products include books, music, Chinese arts & crafts, toys, apparel, and more.

The website itself is fully query-driven and was built with PHP and MySQL. Be sure to visit their website to see this functionality in action:

http://www.chinasprout.com/

For more detailed information on this month’s featured client, please go to:

http://www.lexiconn.com/clients/featured.html

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Spam/Virus Information and Updates…

LexiConn offers an optional spam/virus protection service that can be added to any account. The service is $5 per month for any shared account, and covers all of the POP boxes in the account. You may request this service at:

https://lexiconn.com/lexiconn/secure/add_spam.html

The spam and virus protection system is customizable, easy to use, and extremely effective in preventing unwanted spam emails and viruses. You may choose to only tag emails that are considered spam, or delete them. The software also learns from past emails to help gauge whether future emails are spam or not. The system allows you to setup white and black lists as well. This feature can be enabled or disabled for any or all POP boxes in your hosting account.

The core spam protection software has recently been upgraded to include even more tests, advanced algorithms and learning routines for better spam detection while minimzing false positives. Every few days new rules and patterns are added as well to keep the software up to date.

The core antivirus software has also been updated to the latest version. This version includes more functions for detecting hidden viruses in zips and archived files. As always, new virus definitions are downloaded every six hours to keep up to date with the latest email viruses.

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phpBB2 forum software upgraded to latest version – 2.2.20…

phpBB2, the online forum software that is easily installed from the LexiConn Account Manager, has been upgraded to the latest version, 2.0.20. Major changes include:

- Prevent login attempts from incrementing for inactive users
- Do not check maximum login attempts on re-authentication to the admin panel
- Regenerate session keys on password change
- Improved index performance by determining the permissions before iterating through all forums
- Better handling of short usernames within the search
- Improved handling of forums to which the user does not have any explicit permissions
- Added configurable search flood control to reduce the effect of DoS style attacks
- Enabled Visual Confirmation by default
- Changed default forum permissions to only allow registered users to post in new forums

If you are running a previous version of phpBB2, you will need to upgrade your forum manually if you wish to upgrade to this version. If you need help with this upgrade, please let us know.

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