Assuming you’re running a Debian server (I have 6.0 Squeeze), on which WordPress is installed in /var/www/site/public_html:

1) Install required packages. I used vsftpd.

sudo apt-get install vsftpd openssl

2) Configure vsftpd. I set the following options in /etc/vsftpd.conf

# Enable only local users, no anonymous
anonymous_enable=NO
local_enable=YES
write_enable=YES
local_umask=022

# Allow only our special FTP user
userlist_enable=YES
userlist_deny=NO
userlist_file=/etc/vsftpd.allow_list

# Here's the security trick -- listen only on the local interface to 
# prevent external connections
listen_address=127.0.0.1

# Enable debugging until everything works :)
log_ftp_protocol=YES

3) Add a user for ftp access

# Add the user
sudo useradd ftpsecure -d /var/www

# Set a password. Since vsftpd is only listening on localhost, the 
# security of this password isn't too important.
sudo passwd ftpsecure

4) Turn on vsftpd:

sudo /etc/init.d/vsftpd restart

5) Set permissions for ftpsecure to access your wordpress files. I use access control lists (ACLs), but you could use chown/chmod if you want. These may seem like a bit to permissive — keep in mind that the only way ftpsecure can log in is from your server.

setfacl -m u:ftpsecure:r-x /var/www/site/

# The updater needs access to the root site
setfacl -R -m u:ftpsecure:rwx /var/www/site/public_html
setfacl -R -d -m u:ftpsecure:rwx /var/www/site/public_html

7) Tell WordPress about your FTP credentials. In /var/www/site/public-html/wp-config.php:

define('FTP_HOST', 'localhost');
define('FTP_USER', 'ftpsecure');
define('FTP_PASS', '<password>');

6) Run an update. If WordPress asks for the connection type, choose FTP. Try getting WordPress to update a plugin or the entire site. If it fails, view the log with

tail -f /var/log/vsftpd.log

and run the update again. You’ll be able to tell from the log if there was a permission problem.

7) Disable logging. Remove the line

log_ftp_protocol=YES

in /etc/vsftpd.conf

8) You’re done!

Comment below if these steps didn’t work for you.

For reference, I used:

• Updating WordPress via installed SSL FTP Server on Debian (FTPS)
• vsftpd Configuration Manual
• How To Configure WordPress To Remember FTP Details

For some reason, the messages in this example were uploaded in a way that caused them to be loaded in the wrong order on iOS 5.0.1. Since I run the mailserver myself, I took a look at the message files to see if I could deduce the cause of the issue. I noticed a series of messages on the mail server that looked like this:

1324697191.M91227P15574V000000000000CA00I0004B07D_556.hostname,S=5622:2,S
1324697192.M322096P15574V000000000000CA00I0004B07F_557.hostname,S=225691:2,RS
1324697196.M144018P15574V000000000000CA00I0004B081_558.hostname,S=7702:2,RS
1324697197.M715598P15574V000000000000CA00I0004B083_559.hostname,S=15741:2,S
1324697199.M327587P15574V000000000000CA00I0004B085_560.hostname,S=8744:2,RS

The received times of these messages, in the same order as listed above, are:

01/15/2010
01/09/2009
07/13/2010
02/21/2010
05/06/2010

It turns out that due to the messages in this example having a modification date that doesn’t match their receive timestamp the messages appear in the wrong order on an iOS device, where the mail application assumes the order of the messages it gets from the imap server is already sorted by date. This isn’t a problem with desktop mail clients — they simply fetch all the messages, sort them, and everything is fine. Several google searches on this subject yielded threads where people were trying to get their messages in the correct order and the suggested remedy was “sort them on the client side.”

To fix this, I wrote a perl script script to read the message headers, determine the receive time, and update the file name and modification date to match.

Use the script like this:

perl rename.pl cur/*

When you’re convinced it will do the right thing:

perl rename.pl cur/* --output-dir cur_renamed

After ensuring the rename was correct, I swapped the cur and cur_renamed directories, deleted the courierimapuiddb file, and restarted courier-imap. I also had to quit Mail.app on OS X and delete and read the mail account on the iOS device to get the messages to come in in the correct order.

I use the Google Authenticator app on iOS for 2-factor authentication into Google’s services. Recently, I was transitioning to a new phone after giving my existing one to my mom for Christmas. I did the standard backup -> restore plan which put most of my settings on my new device without issues. Fortunately, before I erased the old device, I made sure all my apps worked, including the authenticator.

Apparently, the data the authenticator app stores is not backed up for whatever reason, which means that instead of being able to generate the keys needed to access my accounts, the authenticator was prompting me to set up a new account. The smart folks over here recommend taking a screenshot of the QR code Google’s site gives you when you set up 2-factor authentication.

Questions:

To Google: Why doesn’t the authenticator back up its data? Seems this could be a nasty surprise for someone.
To Android users: Does this happen on Android as well?

[Update] Zon Wakest was nice enough to upload additional plugins. Thanks Zon! These are now added into my archive and the combined list is below. If you got the old archive, download just the additional plugins.

[Update2] Quicksilver now links to 3814 instead of 3813.

The plugins included are as follows:

Adium Module.qsplugin Airport Module.qsplugin Apple Address Book Module.qsplugin Apple Mail Module.qsplugin Automator Module.qsplugin Bezel Interface.qsplugin Calculator Module.qsplugin Camino Module.qsplugin Chat Support.qsplugin Clipboard Module.qsplugin Command Line Tool.qsplugin Cube Interface.qsplugin Desktop Picture Action.qsplugin Developer Module.qsplugin Deviant Module.qsplugin Dictionary Module.qsplugin Download Actions.qsplugin Email Support.qsplugin Extra Scripts.qsplugin File Attribute Actions.qsplugin File Compression Module.qsplugin File Tagging Module.qsplugin Finder Module.qsplugin Firefox Module.qsplugin Flashlight Interface.qsplugin Flickr Upload.qsplugin Gmail Module.qsplugin Google Calendar Module.qsplugin Growl Module.qsplugin HotKey Triggers.qsplugin Keychain Module.qsplugin Menu Interface.qsplugin Mini Interface.qsplugin Music Support.qsplugin NotificationHub.qsplugin Primer Interface.qsplugin Process Manipulation Actions.qsplugin QSFumoInterface.qsplugin SSH Plugin.qsplugin Safari Module.qsplugin SafariStand Queries.qsplugin Services Menu Module.qsplugin Shelf Module.qsplugin Slideshow Action.qsplugin Social Bookmarks.qsplugin Spotlight Module.qsplugin Tatau Module.qsplugin Terminal Module.qsplugin Text Manipulation Actions.qsplugin TextMate Ranker.qsplugin Todoist Module.qsplugin Transmit Module.qsplugin UI Access.qsplugin Web Search Module.qsplugin Window Interface.qsplugin iCal Module.qsplugin iChat Module.qsplugin iPhoto Module.qsplugin iTunes Module.qsplugin

If you have other plugins that I don’t, upload them somewhere and post the link in the comments and I’ll add them to my collection.