OAuth 2 is an authorization framework that enables applications to obtain limited access to user accounts on an HTTP service, such as Facebook, GitHub, and DigitalOcean. It works by delegating user authentication to t...

Kubernetes is a container management system meant to be deployed on Docker-capable clustered environments. In this guide, we will discuss some of the basic concepts that Kubernetes introduces. We will discuss some o...

A basic understanding of networking is important for anyone managing a server. Not only is it essential for getting your services online and running smoothly, it also gives you the insight to diagnose problems. This ...

When setting up infrastructure, getting your applications up and running will often be your primary concern. However, making your applications to function correctly without addressing the security needs of your infras...

Apache and Nginx are the two most common open source web servers in the world. Together, they are responsible for serving over 50% of traffic on the internet. Both solutions are capable of handling diverse workloads a...

This article compares and contrasts three of the most widely implemented open-source RDBMSs: SQLite, MySQL, and PostgreSQL. Specifically, it explores the data types that each RDBMS uses, their advantages and disadvant...

Sharded databases have been receiving lots of attention in recent years, but many don't have a clear understanding of what they are or the scenarios in which it might make sense to shard a database. This conceptual ar...

Nginx is one of the most popular web servers in the world. In this guide, we will discuss how Nginx selects the server and location block that will handle a given client's request. We will go over the algorithm in p...

When deciding which server architecture to use for your environment, there are many factors to consider, such as performance, scalability, availability, reliability, cost, and ease of management. Here is a list of com...

SSH, or secure shell, is an encrypted protocol used to communicate with remote servers safely. The practical uses of SSH are widely discussed in other guides. In this article, we'll examine the underlying encryption...

Nginx is a high performance reverse proxy server and web server. In this guide, we will explore Nginx's http proxying and load balancing capabilities. We will cover how Nginx can use buffers and caching to improve t...

When setting up a web site or application under your own domain, it is likely that you will also want a mail server to handle the domain's incoming and outgoing email. While it is possible to run your own mail server,...

An introduction to basic load balancing concepts and terminology, using HAProxy, with some examples.

IP addresses, networks, submasks, and CIDR notation can be difficult concepts to understand. In this guide, we will cover some of the basic ideas behind how these systems work together to allow computers to communica...

Increasingly, Linux distributions are adopting or planning to adopt the systemd init system. This powerful suite of software can manage many aspects of your server, from services to mounted devices and system states. ...

Nginx is one of the most popular web servers in the world, focused on performance and scalability. In this guide, we will explore the Nginx configuration file structure and discuss the configuration "contexts" that N...

DNS, or the Domain Name System, is an integral part of how the internet functions today. However, the way that DNS works is often quite mysterious for new administrators. In this guide, we will discuss some of the c...

This guide focuses on identifying and troubleshooting the most commonly encountered HTTP error codes, i.e. 4xx and 5xx status codes, from a system administrator's perspective. There are many situations that could caus...

Open-source projects that are hosted in public repositories benefit from contributions made by the broader developer community, and are typically managed through Git. This tutorial will discuss the benefits of contrib...

Machine learning is a subfield of artificial intelligence (AI). The goal of machine learning generally is to understand the structure of data and fit that data into models that can be understood and utilized by people...