Server2Go - a portable Webserver

Server2Go is a Webserver that runs out of the box without any installation and on write protected media. This means that web applications based on Server2Go can be used directly from cdrom, a usb stick or from any folder on a hard disk without the hassle of configuring Apache, PHP or MySQL.

Server2Go allows you to create a standalone working web site or PHP application on a CD-ROM. There are many examples of its possible useses such as catalogue software, calculation programmes, image campaigns (CMS-based), computer based training lessons or other applicatons. Most PHP-Software such as the content management system Joomla or the computer based training software Moodle can be used from CD-ROM with the help of Server2Go.

PHP just got a major boost from Microsoft this morning with the release of FastCGI for windows. Anyone working with PHP and Windows knows just how painful it can be, if you can get it to work reliably at all. We have been working with a number of projects that all involved PHP on IIS, and seen web sites entirely wiped out due to bad upgrades, where even the backups of the backups would not work due to one technical issue after another until having to revert to the previous version of PHP on IIS.

Today Microsoft is eager to announce availability of the Go Live release of Microsoft FastCGI Extension for IIS 5.1/6.0 (FastCGI Extension) as a free download. The Go Live release is the last step in the Microsoft beta process and represents the highest level of quality and reliability. For the first time, customers have a license that permits them to deploy the FastCGI Extension on their production Internet Information Services 6.0 (IIS 6) Web servers.
Source: IIS.net

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A wildcard DNS record is a catch all record in a DNS zone that will match all non-existent requests for a domain name. Just like whenever you setup “catch all” or “nobody” email account, that will act as a “catch-all” account for any non-specified or misspelled username, as long as the domain name is correct. Then you will be able to retrieve these messages at the mail account you specify. So Wildcard DNS is just like that but is used on domain aliases of host name. On another word you can also call it as Catch all Sub domains.

For example I have setup Wildcard DNS on domain zeroarticles.info, I have not created any subdomain/aliases on that domain. So if someone visits profile.zeroarticles.info the wildcard will forward that user to www.zeroarticles.info, same thing applied on test.zeroarticles.info, abc.profile.zeroarticles.info

That means everything which comes as domain aliases will be forwarded to www.zeroarticles.info, so we can technically call that *.zeroarticles.info will forward to host name.

SHOUTcast is Nullsoft’s Free Winamp-based distributed streaming audio system. Thousands of broadcasters around the world are waiting for you to tune in and listen. You can start your own radio station and stream music and live shows. See an example of hundreds of world-wide stations at shoutcast.com

Prepare Yourself
Is is very necessary to have a root level SSH access for the installation of Shoutcast. Root level access is only provided if you have own dedicated server or VPS. If you don’t have root level access then probable you need help from your host. So I am assuming that you have own Dedicated Server or vps with root level SSH or shell access.

Why PHPSuExec and the security hole of PHP
On most Apache servers, PHP runs as an Apache Module. As such, it runs directly in the user Nobody, but doesnt require the execute flag. This means that in order to execute a PHP file, it simply needs to be world readable. The problem is that this allows every other users on the server to read your PHP files!

Allowing other users to read your HTML files is not a problem, since they can be displayed in Internet Explorer. However, PHP files are not readable, they are parsed. Many scripts use a PHP file to store a database username and password. This means that on another server every client could read your PHP files, retrieve your password and access your databases.