AWS create vsftpd (FTP) server

I recently had to create a vsftpd (FTP) server on an Amazon aws virtual server running Ubuntu 12.10.

There are some issues with the default vsftpd tool that installs with apt-get on Ubuntu 12.10 (version 2.x… not sure which one off the top of my head).   It will not allow virtual users access to their root directories.   I wrote up a guide in May-2013 that showed how to get around this by writing to a sub directory, but that just does not feel right.

So this guide will go over how to do it properly and with a virtual AWS machine.

Debt Free!

I try to keep this blog focused and not just about what my thoughts are day to day.

But today I am making an exception.   My wife and I just had our last check to debt payments clear and we are debt free!

I just wanted to shout to the world my debt free scream  "We are debt free!"
And I gotta say it feels nice knowing I owe no one any  money.  Now, we can use the interest we used to pay banks to build wealth and give it away.


We did it following the Dave Ramsey  plan (we are big fans)



A few details for those who care to know
Since I married my wife in 2007 we have paid off  $92,469.99 in debt (and interest)
We did it on one income
Our lowest yearly income, during this time, was $38,000 and our highest is over $80,000

Creating a startup script for your play program

I am running a play server on Ubuntu 12.10.  I wanted to create a simple start/stop script in the /etc/init.d folder for it.

Here are the steps I took to accomplish this.

Installing Wordpress on nginx / Ubuntu

I have done several installs of wordpress using apache and php. Typically using this simple set of apt-get commands to install all the tools I need for apache/php

> sudo apt-get install apache2 > sudo apt-get install php5-mysql > sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-php5 > sudo apt-get install imagemagick > sudo apt-get install php5-imagick > sudo a2enmod rewrite

But now I am getting impressed with nginx I like the configuration files better and its overall faster than apache (or so I have been told).

Installing Swagger RESTful API documentation tool on an nginx server

Swagger is a great program for documenting your RESTful APIs.  It is made by the good folks at Reverb.  It is open source, apache license and can be found here https://developers.helloreverb.com/swagger/ [1]

Their demo page is located at http://petstore.swagger.wordnik.com/ [2]

And the git repository for this software is located at https://github.com/wordnik/swagger-core [3]

In this document I am going over setting up an nginx server, installing swagger and setting up a swagger API documents in simple static json files.  Also I want to do a simple password protection of my swagger API notes as I am currently doing this just for internal use.  (I just have never done this in nginx so I want to document it)

This was installed on Ubuntu 12.10