I ported some old shell scripts over to PHP - they send various emails to a group each week.

The emails went out to everyone, but all of the @hotmail.com address bounced back with this (from my Postfix log):

May 31 12:13:03 milhouse postfix/smtp[3195]: DEC6B97001: to=<xxxxxxxx@hotmail.com>, relay=mx3.hotmail.com[65.54.245.72]:25, delay=1.3, delays=0.06/0.04/1/0.23, dsn=5.0.0, status=bounced (host mx3.hotmail.com[65.54.245.72] said: 550 Your e-mail was rejected for policy reasons on this gateway. Reasons for rejection may be related to content such as obscene language, graphics, or spam-like characteristics (or) other reputation problems. For sender troubleshooting information, please go to http://postmaster.msn.com. Please note: if you are an end-user please contact your E-mail/Internet Service Provider for assistance. (in reply to MAIL FROM command))



After some googling, it appears that hotmail (unlike the rest of the world) aren't accepting emails originating from a dynamic range. When my "generate game and email everyone" php script runs, the mail is sent directly from my mandriva server machine to each of the mail exchangers for every address in the mailing list.

I had to edit /etc/postfix/main.cf and add this line:
relayhost = smtp.sky.com

Sky is my ISP - now they are relaying my servers email. Hotmail is happy since the Sky SMTP server is on a fix ip address. See the log:

May 31 12:45:22 milhouse postfix/smtp[3788]: 17575D6609: to=<xxxxxxxx@hotmail.com>, relay=smtp.sky.com[87.86.189.12]:25, delay=21, delays=0.05/0.02/20/0.27, dsn=2.0.0, status=sent (250 OK id=1Htj1T-0007FI-J6)

After my rant about Sky customer services it looks like they're planning to scrap the £10 per month charge for enabling the Sky+ facilities such as record and live tv pausing.

My collegue Lukasz pointed me in the direction of digitalspy.co.uk:

www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=577960

... I wasn't the only person complaining about this charge.

We went to the Speciality and Fine Food Fair on Sunday.

The food was amazinging.

We were invited by my brother-in-law Tim, his company ESS Foods Ltd were exhibiting. Thier website is www.essfoods.co.uk where you can order products online. I have to say you have never tasted tomato sauce like his "Stokes: Real Tomato Ketchup":



Thanks for inviting us Tim!

I just spotteed LR comes with two apache config files here:

C:Program FilesMercuryLoadRunnerdatmonitors
... and the default is for Apache 1.3.

Two steps to change to Apache 2.x config:

1. Rename apache.cfg to apache-default.cfg
2. Rename apache-2.0.x.cfg to apache.cfg

Restart the LR Controller and when you add the Apache monitor you should be able to select/use 4 of the monitors from the list:

1. #Idle Workers (Apache)
2. Hits/sec (Apache)
3. KBytes Sent/sec (Apache)
4. #Busy Workers (Apache)

This was a case of RTFErrorMessage:

"Monitor name :Apache. Parsing error, cannot find token: BusyServers. Measurement: BusyServers:ty1109. Hints: 1) Such a measurement does not exist, or the html page may be different from the supported one. 2) Try to replace the Apache.cfg with appropriate Apache_<version>.cfg file in <Installation>datmonitors and rerun the application (entry point: CApacheMeasurement::NewData). [MsgId: MMSG-47479]"

I've recently been on a Mercuty LoadRunner training course.

Load Runner has various "Monitors" which allow you to get remote system or process information into your performance test results. One of these monitors is for the Apache web server.

Add these lines to you Apache httpd.conf file:
ExtendedStatus on

<Location /server-status>
SetHandler server-status
Order Deny,Allow
Deny from all
Allow from all
</Location>

And uncomment this line:
LoadModule status_module modules/mod_status.so

This will enable a new web (http://machinename/server-status) page giving Apache server information such as:

Current Time: Thursday, 10-May-2007 09:28:27 GMT Standard Time
Restart Time: Thursday, 10-May-2007 08:37:28 GMT Standard Time
Parent Server Generation: 1
Server uptime: 50 minutes 58 seconds
Total accesses: 886 - Total Traffic: 4.5 MB
.29 requests/sec - 1540 B/second - 5.2 kB/request
1 requests currently being processed, 249 idle workers


Now from Mercury LoadRunner you can use the built in Apache Monitor, by adding the server name and ther path server-status?auto - which is the default. Adding the ?auto to the end of the URL give a machine readable (data only) version of the status page.

More information can be found in the Apache documentation:
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.2/mod/mod_status.html

I did notice that all of the Apache monitors that Load Runner listed were not provided by the Apache binary I had installed.

Note: If your on a public webserver, be sure to change Allow from all to something like Allow from machine1, machine2.