Well, I’ve finally decided to move my site off of my DSL connection and on to a VPS. I’ll be running regular backups with a tool like rsync-backup to bring any changes back down to my internal systems. For now, mail still comes to my DSL, but the web side has been migrated out to a Xen-based VPS. Some rather draconian iptables rules have been implemented, such as the server isn’t actually allowed to initiate connections outbound for anything other than SMTP and HTTP (sending mail and picking up updates respectively), while inbound connections are source-limited for certain ports. I’ve also switched from Apache to Lighttpd, and I’m impressed – the memory usage is much lower, even with PHP enabled to run WordPress.
As for the odd incident – heard a very loud grinding noise this morning around 5 a.m., and decided to look out the window. A nice 2005 series Mercedes was sitting on the grass verge, and the two men inside seemed a bit agitated. It wouldn’t go forward, or backward, and the engine didn’t seem to want to start. It seemed a bit peculiar, so I watched for a while without showing myself. Went to get my camera, and they had vanished. Cranked the ISO to over 1000, dropped the shutter speed to about 1/40 and opened the aperture up (full manual FTW), shot a photo or two of the car. Observed the men coming back up the road from inside the estate, tried to get a shot of them too.
Wasn’t too sure what to think, so I laid back down, only to hear another car pull up about 5 minutes later, and voices. Stuck my head up again, and lo, the police were looking at the car. Stuck my head out the window, got their attention and gave them details on the two men. Turns out the car was probably hot (i.e., stolen), as the keys were still inside. Gave my details for them to contact me about the photo, and went back to bed for about 20 minutes. Couldn’t get back to sleep, so fired up the computer, popped the card in and tossed the photo into Lightroom.
Well, ISO 1000 wasn’t enough, but it was still damn noisy. Even with Noise Ninja, I couldn’t get a useful image that showed details of the mens’ faces. Good chance I’d recognise them though. So now to wait for the call from the police.