| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-12-2011, 10:41 AM | | This may be an unusual request but I wonder is there anyone who can help with this question?
There are many institutions who are using Moodle 2 while hosted on a Zeus Server. I assume this is hosted in a Virtual Server and uses the load balancing service.
Moodle 2 users have a discovered a problem with servers like Zeus (and perhaps Litespeed). Some Http requests are being changed to Https (even though this is not chosen in Moodle's default settings. For those who don't have an ssl certificate purchased this is a problem.
I just wonder is there anyone with experience in writing scripts for Zeus who could make all Https requests in a specific hosted domain or subdomain revert to Http. I know this can be done in reverse so I assume it is possible. It's not that Moodle users can't pay for an ssl cert but this should not be required and is not necessary on Apache or IIS servers.
Any help would be most welcome.
Yours sincerely,
John Bonner
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| Posted by mugo, 02-13-2011, 03:37 AM | | Can you clarify...the "Zeus server", are you referring to the Zeus web server, or Zeus ZXTM load balancer? Or possibly both? Answer depends on that...
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| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-13-2011, 05:52 PM | | Thank you for your help. As far as I know it's on Zeus WebServer ZWS (virtual server) and does use ZXTM load balancing. I can confirm this later.
John
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| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-15-2011, 02:02 PM | | Just to confirm that our site is on Zeus web server ZWS and does use load balancing (ZXTM).
So I would be really grateful if you could provide a script to change all https requests to http (in a specific domain or subdomain).
John
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| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-17-2011, 05:23 PM | | I had only one reply to this question which looked promising but having supplied more details I still await his response. Perhaps I should be more patient.
Can anyone else help with this?
John
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| Posted by mugo, 02-19-2011, 04:23 AM | | Sorry, life got in the way and I just got a break to even hit WHT since the night I last posted
There are a few ways to do this...I'm not sure what the Moodle / Zeus www srv issue is, so I'm going to assume that ZXTM, the load balancer and first-touch, will be able to intervene in this instance.
When you setup a Virtual Server in ZXTM, you create the virtual IP *and* which port to listen on. When you define the "pool" of servers this will then be balanced to on the backend, you *also* define the port you want to hit the actual web server on.
So, you can setup the ZXTM virtual server (main IP of domain, which the A record is usually pointed to) to listen on port 443, but when you define the backend nodes, define those with port 80.
When you add nodes in ZXTM, you simply give ip.add.re.ss:port (192.168.100.100:80).
Normally, you setup two virtual servers for a given IP, if you are doing 80 and 443, one virtual server for each listening port you want balanced. The port 80 would be setup normally, listening on 80, hitting backend nodes on 80, but the one setup to listen on 443 would just have the backend nodes also defined as 80, so no matter what the client hits the IP on, he hits the backend servers on 80. This would nail any request coming to that IP on 80 or 443 to port 80 on your web server(s).
There are a few reasons this may not work out for you, if you actually have legitimate 443 traffic for the given IP, obviously...but it sounds like you were looking for a generic script that just redirects all https to http anyway, which, this method would do, and do well.
I'm not sure if you also have access to Traffic Script (an add-on license for ZXTM), you can get a little more eloquent with it. You do have Rulebuilder, which would also get the job done (just a ruleset included with ZXTM), just not as straight forward as the port redirect.
If, because this is shared hosting or something, and you just need to rewrite specific URLs (regardless of IP) as they hit the Zeus www server, you can also do rewrites on the web servers themselves...but I won't go into that unless that's what you actually end up needing.
So, many ways to get-r-done, it's just going to depend on which one works best for you.
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| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-21-2011, 05:56 PM | | Thank you very much for your helpful information and sorry for not replying to you sooner.
As I may have explained, I will be asking my hosting company to change one or more settings in ZXTM (and perhaps ZWS if necessary). So I need to be really clear and have my request well thought out (in simple steps and language) so that they don't get annoyed and refuse my request.
As I don't use Zeus myself, I downloaded a demo of ZXTM, which I am running in a Oracle VirtualBox Manager, but using a Windows browser to see how it works. I see that it's possible to set up virtual servers which can be set to listen at port 80 and/or 443. This bit seems very easy to setup.
I hope that it's just as easy to do what you suggest with the backend nodes -
ip.add.re.ss:port (192.168.100.100:80)
I would need to tell them exactly what to do here in simple language without it sounding difficult for them to do.
Again, I assume it's not difficult but need to convince them.
I also see in "Catalogs/Rules" that it's possible to use RuleBuilder or TrafficScript. I hope my hosting company knows how to edit these but assume they can.
Assuming that using RuleBuilder or TrafficScript is only necessary if the editing of the Backend nodes to port 80 is not possible, can you please send a script for either or both of these 'Rules' just in case the earlier step is not possible or is refused.
I have also downloaded a "short trial period" demo of ZWS which I ran in a Fedora linux PC, and I see it uses virtual servers also. However, I won't ask them to do anything with ZWS unless the steps with ZXTM are unsuccessful.
So I will write to the hosting company support and see if they can help. I just hope that even though they use various virtual servers and sub-groups that editing our domain (or subdomain) will be possible without damaging other peoples' sites hosted on the same ZWS server.
Hope I am doing all this correctly.
John
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| Posted by whitecloud1, 02-26-2011, 07:31 AM | | Dear Mugo,
Thank you very much for all your advice.
I now find I don't need to use it as Moodle 2 community have just updated their program including a fix for the problem. So I am no longer directed to a https page against my wishes.
So many Moodle 2 users hosted on Zeus and Litespeed are much happier now.
Thanks again and Best wishes,
John
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