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Apache Hosting Customer FAQ

  1. My website has been created, now how do I upload content?
  2. Why doesn't E-mail from my website CGI get sent properly or at all?
  3. How do I change my glint password?

Q) My website has been created, now how do I upload content?


A) Once your website has been created you will recieve communication that provides you with your new username and initial password.  Using your new credentials you can login to glint.osg.ufl.edu with one of the secure shell protocols: ssh/scp/sftp  If you're unfamiliar with these we recommend looking into WinSCP as it seems to work well for other customers.  If you're on a Mac or Linux ssh/scp utilities are available on the commandline.

You'll also need to ssh for shell access to glint in order to change your initial password.  If you're on Windows try PuTTY ssh client. Again, Mac and Linux users have ssh on the command line.  Once you have a shell on glint see the "How do I change my glint password" item in this FAQ.

Q) Why doesn't E-mail from my webapp/website CGI get sent properly or at all?

A) This is one of the most common questions we get and it has to do with our CGI environment and how smtp.ufl.edu handles email.  There's a short answer to this problem and a longer background story, so here goes...

Short answer - you need to have your mail function specify the envelope sender address (not the header from address) to the mail submission program (sendmail).  When you do this be sure to use one of (1) a valid gatorlink address or (2) an address outside of the @ufl.edu namespace.  If you would be so kind as to use a deliverable address we'd appreciate it because it will prevent our postmaster from receiving bounces.

To specify the envelope sender address with php's mail() function use the "additional_parameters" argument to mail().  See example #3 at http://php.net/manual/en/function.mail.php

Long story - In our web hosting environment when you submit mail by default your code will do so as whatever system user is executing the CGI code.  For most users this will be the cnswww- prefixed username we've given you to manage your website- let's say "cnswww-you".  So by default sendmail gets a messages submitted by cnswww-you and adds that id to the message's envelope with the assumed @ufl.edu domain.  Sendmail then hands the message off to smtp.ufl.edu which sees the envelope sender address as cnswww-you@ufl.edu.  To cut down on fraudulent email passing through smtp.ufl.edu it is configured to verify any @ufl.edu addresses that are attempting to send messages.  So when smtp.ufl.edu tries to lookup cnswww-you more than likely that's not a valid Gatorlink mailbox, so smtp.ufl.edu will reject the message.

So to prevent this rejection from occuring you can manually set the envelope sender addess (using the -f option to sendmail) to be either a valid Gatorlink mail address or some address that is deliverable on another system outside of @ufl.edu.   There is another option: if you like, CNS can setup an email alias for cnswww-you@ufl.edu and have mail to that address delivered to some real address of your choosing.  This will satisfy smtp.ufl.edu for purposes of verifying the sender's address.

If you're not sure what is meant by the "eveloper sender address" or how that differs from a message's "header from address" see the "Envelopes and Bodies" section on http://www.sendmail.org/resources

Q) How do I change my glint password?

A)  There are two types of accounts that you may use to login to glint.  Here are the two most common cases:

  1. Most of our Apache hosting customers will have a "service account" probably with a 'cnswww-' prefix, or at least a '-' character somewhere in the username.  For these users it's important to understand that your password is stored in Kerberos, so you'll need to use the 'kpasswd' utility to update your password.  Here's an example of using that utility:

    $ kpasswd <username>
    Password for <username>@UFL.EDU:
    Enter new password:
    Enter it again:
    kpasswd: Cannot contact any KDC for requested realm changing password

    You can ignore that last line- the password change will succeed even with that message.

  2. Some older customers may use their personal Gatorlink accounts.  If this is the case then you need to make sure you update your personal Gatorlink password at https://my.ufl.edu.  Keep in mind that if you do this the change will affect your Gatorlink password EVERYWHERE, not just glint.