Hi Mike,<br><br>Unfortunately my expertise sits within taking what someone else made and tweaking settings for my purpose.<br>IE: Forums (phpBB / punBB / SMF) / Wiki (MediaWiki) / Wordpress and for a very brief horrible experience, Joomla.<br>
<br>Regards,<br>Victor<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 12:32 AM, <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mw@freenet.net.au">mw@freenet.net.au</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
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<p class="MsoNormal"><font color="#1f497d" size="2" face="Calibri"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Hi Victor,</span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font color="#1f497d" size="2" face="Calibri"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);"> </span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font color="#1f497d" size="2" face="Calibri"><span style="font-size: 11pt; color: rgb(31, 73, 125);">Sounds like you have some useful expertise
here.<span> </span>Perhaps you should be a part of
the coders group?<span> </span>Interested in
contributing?<br>
<br>
Cheers!<span> </span>Mike.</span></font></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b><font size="2" face="Tahoma"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-weight: bold;">From:</span></font></b><font size="2" face="Tahoma"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"> Victor [mailto:<a href="mailto:dawormie@gmail.com" target="_blank">dawormie@gmail.com</a>] <br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sent:</span></b> Wednesday, 17 March 2010
12:10 AM<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Tom Fifield<br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Cc:</span></b> <a href="mailto:mike@viewbankrise.net.au" target="_blank">mike@viewbankrise.net.au</a>;
Melbourne Wireless<div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
<b><span style="font-weight: bold;">Subject:</span></b> Re: [MLB-WIRELESS] wiki
and spam</div></div></span></font></p>
</div>
</div><div><div></div><div class="h5">
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"> </span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Just noticed I only
replied to tom before.<br>
<br>
My response to the Captcha comments.<br>
----------------<br>
Look at reCaptcha? It's free to use and in my view in all the sites I've used
it on... it's done wonders.<br>
<br>
A simple Human Check would be enough to stop any bot signups at a basic level.<br>
<br>
<br>
3 questions - 2 of them hold no sway on the end result but need SOMETHING in
them - the third can ask you what the 4th word of the first question was.<br>
<br>
That did wonders for ages on a busy forum I ran for a guild for age of conan
for ages, every now and then just change the 'real' answer to ask for something
else. Perhaps the page title has an extra word in it and
users need to input what that word is.<br>
But still, reCaptcha I find is the best one out there so far.<br>
----------------</span></font></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 12:07 AM, Tom Fifield <<a href="mailto:tfifield@melbournewireless.org.au" target="_blank">tfifield@melbournewireless.org.au</a>>
wrote:</span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Thanks for the support!<br>
<br>
If it has approval from the people, then I can probably find time to do<br>
it this week.<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<font color="#888888"><span style="color: rgb(136, 136, 136);"><br>
Tom</span></font></span></font></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br>
Mike Everest wrote:<br>
> Sounds like a real solution - so who is going to have a crack at it?<br>
><br>
> My hand is still up.<br>
><br>
> Cheers.<br>
><br>
>> -----Original Message-----<br>
>> From: Tom Fifield [mailto:<a href="mailto:gummay@gmail.com" target="_blank">gummay@gmail.com</a>]
On Behalf Of Tom Fifield<br>
>> Sent: Tuesday, 16 March 2010 11:48 PM<br>
>> To: Steven Haigh<br>
>> Cc: <<a href="mailto:mw@freenet.net.au" target="_blank">mw@freenet.net.au</a>>; <a href="mailto:committee@melbournewireless.org.au" target="_blank">committee@melbournewireless.org.au</a>;
'Melbourne<br>
>> Wireless'; 'Tyson Clugg'; <a href="mailto:coders@melbournewireless.org.au" target="_blank">coders@melbournewireless.org.au</a><br>
>> Subject: Re: [MLB-WIRELESS] wiki and spam<br>
>></span></font></p>
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<div>
<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">>> Hi,<br>
>><br>
>> Random pastings from my postings on the coders list ...<br>
>><br>
>> Based on what we've seen so far, my guess is that spammers:<br>
>><br>
>> * are not members<br>
>> * don't give us any optional information (address, phone)<br>
>> * don't use anything advanced (adv & subscribed)<br>
>> * don't have any nodes<br>
>><br>
>> SELECT * FROM `users` WHERE memberNo=0 AND address = '' AND phone = ''<br>
>> AND adv IS NULL and subscribed IS NULL AND users.username NOT IN
(SELECT<br>
>> owner from nodes) ORDER BY `users`.`last_seen` DESC<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>> So if we want a permanent solution to the spam problem, we need to<br>
>> somehow restrict wiki access to accounts fitting the criteria.<br>
>><br>
>> Right now only 835 of the 4000 account fit these criteria - we can<br>
>> reduce this further by looking at email domain names.<br>
>><br>
>> One idea would be to introduce a captcha for these accounts. However,
in<br>
>> the past I've actually got into email discussions with the spammers
...<br>
>> and they seem to be real people (in 3rd-world countries) rather than<br>
>> scripts. One even (in chinese) said he understood and would stop!<br>
>><br>
>> So I'm not convinced a captcha would give results, but it can't hurt
too<br>
>> much to try.<br>
>><br>
>> However, this doesn't stop people creating accounts in the first
place.<br>
>><br>
>> ....<br>
>><br>
>> Interestingly, only 100 of our 600+ hotmail users(the most popular<br>
>> domain) have a node and 77 of those haven't been seen for over a year:<br>
>> select users.username, <a href="http://users.name" target="_blank">users.name</a>,
users.last_seen from users INNER JOIN<br>
>> nodes ON nodes.owner=users.username WHERE
SUBSTRING_INDEX(email,'@',-1)<br>
>> ="<a href="http://hotmail.com" target="_blank">hotmail.com</a>"
AND users.last_seen < '2009-1-29'<br>
>><br>
>> So given current spam levels, I'd probably add <a href="http://hotmail.com" target="_blank">hotmail.com</a> to the<br>
>> email-blacklist.conf too.<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>><br>
>><br>
>> Still thinking.<br>
>><br>
>> Regards,<br>
>><br>
>> Tom<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>> Steven Haigh wrote:<br>
>>> On 16/03/2010, at 11:34 PM, <<a href="mailto:mw@freenet.net.au" target="_blank">mw@freenet.net.au</a>>
<<a href="mailto:mw@freenet.net.au" target="_blank">mw@freenet.net.au</a>><br>
>> wrote:<br>
>>>> Since the issue has been raised and complained about several
times, I<br>
>> guess<br>
>>>> it is high time that someone put up a hand to chip in and fix
it.<br>
>>>><br>
>>>> Before that can be done, there are a couple of obvious
questions that<br>
>> need<br>
>>>> to be asked:<br>
>>>><br>
>>>> 1. what is it based on - I assume it is some open source
solution<br>
>> that's<br>
>>>> been somehow integrated to the MW site, so what is the
original source?<br>
>>> I believe Tyson wrote it from scratch. It's a flat file based wiki
that<br>
>> was custom written.<br>
>>>> 2. where is the admin for it (if any)? Again, the
assumption is that<br>
>> there<br>
>>>> is some kind of admin interface where access security can be
set for<br>
>>>> individual users, grant and revoke read/write rights etc.<br>
>>> I guess Tyson would be the admin? or writer? Everyone in the<br>
> melbwireless<br>
>> group on the server has access to change it - however I don't think
anyone<br>
>> is really up to scratch on how it all works.<br>
>>>> There are two possible solutions to this problem the way I see
it:<br>
>>>><br>
>>>> a. shut down write access to the wiki to only users who have
been<br>
> vetted<br>
>> -<br>
>>>> e.g financial members or similar<br>
>>> This would need more discussion - as you wouldn't want to exclude
just<br>
>> about everyone - as that takes away the usefulness of a wiki - however
I<br>
>> think the issue is more a fact that people can automate signups to the
web<br>
>> site and then spam away.<br>
>>>> b. add captcha test on account sign-up<br>
>>> Might help - but as far as I know, most have been broken at some<br>
> stage...<br>
>> It will still be better than it is now however...<br>
>>>> the latter probably has limited value if a real human is even
involved<br>
>> in<br>
>>>> creation of user access accounts - dunno if that is the case
here<br>
>> though...?<br>
>>> I think this was fully automated to eliminate the overhead of
someone<br>
>> actually having to do it.<br>
>>>> Anyhow, if someone can give up some access details and
background info,<br>
>> then<br>
>>>> if nobody else fesses up to having any skills in this sort of
thing,<br>
>> then<br>
>>>> let me at it. I have about as much spare time as the
next giy (as in<br>
>>>> 'bugger all' ;-) so let me at it!<br>
>>>><br>
>>>> Cheers, Mike.<br>
>>>><br>
>>>><br>
<br>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br>
<br clear="all">
<br>
-- <br>
Victor ('Daworm')<br>
* Melbourne Wireless Node: KDJ & KDT<br>
* Natural Selection 2 Wiki Sysop (<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/wiki/" target="_blank">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/wiki/</a>)<br>
* AoCWiki Sysop (<a href="http://aoc.wikia.com/" target="_blank">http://aoc.wikia.com/</a>)<br>
* Twitter: @dawormie</span></font></p>
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<br></blockquote></div><br><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Victor ('Daworm')<br>* Melbourne Wireless Node: KDJ & KDT<br>* Natural Selection 2 Wiki Sysop (<a href="http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/wiki/">http://www.unknownworlds.com/ns2/wiki/</a>)<br>
* AoCWiki Sysop (<a href="http://aoc.wikia.com/">http://aoc.wikia.com/</a>)<br>* Twitter: @dawormie<br>