Jan-Piet Mens.
I am a systems architect and consultant and sometimes available for
hire. I am fluent in several programming languages and in four natural
languages: English, Spanish, German and French. I'm proficient with all
things Unix and Linux, and I'm particularly efficient when given the
task of getting things to work for you.
I blog and tweet as @jpmens.
Areas of work
I play tricks with DNS and have authored Alternative DNS Servers, a 700
page book on Open Source DNS servers. I integrate Mail Transport
Agents with LDAP directory services and make the two sing. I've done a
lot of nitty-gritty with IBM/Lotus Domino (with the C API and a bit of
Lotusscript) such as creating automatic user creation server-tasks. I'm
very good at getting data in and out of systems, and I've built Public
Key Infrastructure (PKI) systems with OpenSSL as well as setting up
large Bacula backup installations.
I have successfully completed a large number of interesting projects; have a look at my profile.
Publications
In the course of the last years I've written large amounts
of text, but most of it was for my clients and has probably long
been recycled or is otherwise unretrievable from old punch cards, magnetic tapes or any other data carrier. Of the public documents,
this lists some of the notable exceptions:
Süßes oder Saures: Rechner überwachen mit samhain
an introduction to the samhain file integrity checking system
Jan-Piet Mens; iX 8/2010, S. 127
Selbstporträt; NanoBSD: FreeBSD für Embedded-Systeme erstellen
an article which describes creating NanoBSD images for embedded systems.
Jan-Piet Mens; Selbstporträt; NanoBSD: FreeBSD für Embedded-Systeme erstellen; iX 5/2010, S. 146
Graf Backup; Version 3 der Backup-Suite Bacula
new features in Bacula version 3.
Jan-Piet Mens; Graf Backup; Version 3 der Backup-Suite Bacula; iX 6/2009, S. 70
Alternative DNS Servers
A 700+ page book discussing Choice and Deployment, and Optional SQL/LDAP Back-Ends in
sundry Open Source DNS servers.
Rückversicherung, Open-Source-Backup-Software im Vergleich
a description of three Open Source backup programs: Bacula, Amanda and BackupPC
Jan-Piet Mens; Rückversicherung, Open-Source-Backup-Software im Vergleich; iX 9/2007, S. 54
Schwarze Löcher, Realtime Blackhole Lists auf DNS-Basis
this article describes the fight against Spam with DNS Black Lists and rbldns,
as well as integration with the NixSPAM lists which are
managed by the iX magazine.
Jan-Piet Mens; Schwarze Löcher, Realtime Blackhole Lists auf DNS-Basis; iX 7/2004, S. 124
Maschinen im Verzeichnis - DNS in LDAP
where I describe, in German, a select number of tools with which DNS data can
be stored, managed and retrieved from a DNS server which feeds from
and LDAP directory server. PowerDNS and ldapdns are
two programs which are discussed.
Jan-Piet Mens; DNS in LDAP;
freeX 1/2004, S.16
LDAP ruft Lotus Domino
This article in German describes the possibilities that an administrator
has when accessing a Domino Directory via LDAP and what advantages
a Unix administrator has with that combination. Topics include
setup, Directory Assistance, Mail clients such as Pine, and
directory manipulation.
Jan-Piet Mens; LDAP ruft Lotus Domino;
freeX 5/2003, S.16
Notes/Domino Integration Using Lightweight Clients
In this article I describe how to retrieve data from Lotus Notes/Domino databases via HTTP and other methods to integrate foreign Domino servers and Notes applications with Unix/Linux environments in which no Domino exists.
Jan-Piet Mens; Notes/Domino Integration Using Lightweight Clients;
The View September/October 2003,
p. 43
Ohne Schnörkel, Das Web auf der Kommandozeile mit curl
describes some of the possibilities in using the command-line
cURL by Daniel Stenberg and
installation as well as some examples in using the excellent libCurl
library on Unix/Linux and Windows systems. In the German language.
Jan-Piet Mens; Ohne Schnörkel, Das Web auf der Kommandozeile mit curl; iX
8/2003, S. 128
Pfundsache
Pound is a reverse
proxy and load-balancer which is easy to set up and very powerful.
This review in German, points out some of Pound's strengths.
Jan-Piet Mens; Pfundsache; Umgekehrter Proxy mit Lastverteilung: Pound; iX
5/2003, S.82
Oberpostdirektor
This long article in German, describes integration of LDAP with newer versions of
the sendmail MTA, detailing building, configuration as well
as usage of this powerful program.
Jan-Piet Mens; Oberpostdirektor; Sendmail mit OpenLDAP verwalten; iX
1/2003, S. 134
TCP/IP over ISDN. Frequently Asked Questions
This (very old) document describes methods which can be used to run TCP/IP and
related protocols over ISDN networks. Most of the software
and procedures described herein have only been tested on
German 1TR6 or Euro ISDN (DSS1) networks. It had a monthly
posting to the newsgroups:
de.comm.isdn, de.comm.internet, de.answers, news.answers and was last updated in June 1996
Patchup: Benutzerorientierte Shellvariablen
Conferences
I've recently held the following talks at conferences:
- Exim and LDAP -- Making Exim talk to an LDAP directory server
-
The Exim Mail Transfer Agent contains support for querying
information from LDAP directory servers. After a short
refresher on LDAP and Exim's configuration, this talk will show
you real-world examples of how to route e-mail depending on
information gleaned from LDAP. We discuss virtual hosting,
conditional routing, SMTP authentication, and adding your own
attributes and object classes to configure Exim for particular
tasks. We also show you how easy it is to add e-mail routing
for your choice Groupware system.
Held at the UKUUG Summer 2009 conference in Birmingham.
- The Perdition and NGINX IMAP Proxies
-
The Perdition and nginx (Engine X) IMAP/POP-3 proxies enable
clients to be directed to arbitrary back-end IMAP/POP-3 servers
depending on the result of a database lookup. We discuss why
you would want to implement such a proxy, what these tools can
do for you, and show you how to configure the tools to suit a
variety of situations. Held at the UKUUG Spring 2010 conference in Manchester.
- A bird's-eye view on DNSSEC
- It's inconceivable you don't know what DNS is, but do you know what DNSSEC is? As a UNIX/Linux admin you'd better. DNSSEC signs DNS replies and gives users a warm fuzzy feeling that all is well, but is it really? What is DNSSEC, and what problems does it solve? What is signing, which components are involved, what can go wrong? How do you detect that DNSSEC is working, and what can an experienced user do to prove it isn't? Held at the UKUUG Spring 2011 conference in Leeds, and at LOAD Days in April 2011.
- Unbound as a caching validating DNSSEC resolver
- You've heard of DNSSEC and want to install a validating DNSSEC caching server on your workstation to experience DNSSEC? We suggest you use Unbound -- a validating, recursive, and caching DNS resolver with some tricks up its sleeve.We'll show you how to configure Unbound to use it as a caching server on yourworkstation (yes, Windows also), ensure DNSSEC-validation is being performed, add DLV and tweak it to serve you some local DNS data. Held at the UKUUG Spring 2011 conference in Leeds, and at LOAD Days in April 2011.
- DNSSEC zone-signing tool chest
- DNSSEC key-management and zone-signing can be, but must not be, a pain. In forty-five minutes we give you an overview of utilities you can use to create keys and sign zones. Whether you prefer seeing rather than believing or want everything to be as automatic as possible, one of these tools will satisfy your signing needs. We'll discuss BIND's utilities, BIND's auto-signing, DNSSEC-tools, Zone Key Tool (ZKT), OpenDNSSEC, and PowerDNSSEC. Held at the UKUUG Spring 2011 conference in Leeds.
Contact
If you see me at a conference, I'd be glad if you talked to me. Otherwise, use e-mail. I prefer e-mail, but you can chat to me or phone.
Impressum
Inhaltlich Verantwortlicher gemaess § 10 Absatz 3 MDStV: Jan-Piet Mens, Walther-Rathenau-Str. 36, 33602 Bielefeld, 0171 8033011.
Haftungshinweis: Trotz sorgfaeltiger inhaltlicher Kontrolle uebernehmen wir keine Haftung fuer die Inhalte externer Links. Fuer den Inhalt der verlinkten Seiten sind ausschliesslich deren Betreiber verantwortlich.
Legal notices & Privacy policy
Responsible party in terms of the German TDG and data controller in terms of the GDPR:
Jan-Piet Mens
Walther-Rathenau-Str. 36
D-33602 Bielefeld
jp@mens.de
+491718033011
This Web site was designed with privacy in mind.
- upon accessing these Web pages, your Web browser transmits certain data (type of Browser, IP address, possibly referer information) to the server serving theses pages. Certain portions of this data is automatically logged by the server software in order to ensure the site can be operated. In particular the IP address is anonymized. The logs are destroyed after four weeks.
- the site does not set cookies.
- no external resources (fonts, CSS, etc.) are loaded
- these pages do not set tracking information nor does the site do analytics of any kind
- no personal data is collected, processed, or stored on this site.
This site contains links to websites of third parties ("external links"). As
the content of these Web sites is not under my control, I cannot assume any
liability for such external content. Operators of linked websites shall always
be liable for their content and accuracy of the information provided. No
illegal contents was recognizable at the time I placed the links.