Shell Server Turn Down

[sjs]

The other day when the ATT guy was here asking why I wouldn't sign up for their service even though it was less expensive than Sonic, I told him "in part because I have a shell account there."

Even though all my machines (except one old XP laptop) runs linux, I still use that account.

It's one of the things that makes you different.

Just saying...

[pdonahue]

What about hosting on username.users.sonic.net? I use "scp sh.sonic.net" to copy things to that area. Will the hosting continue? How do I get stuff over there?

[jorin]

I'm curious about how web sites are going to be handled - I still use the shell host to edit html directly with vim (yes, I'm ancient), and scp files up to the shell box to drop onto my web site. What's the model for that going forward?

[lr]

Second the question about how to update the hosted web pages. I'm sure there is a solution (I suspect it's ftp), but I'll have to find it and learn it. While we are at it: I also occasionally look at my web server logs. Again, I'm sure they'll continue to exist somewhere, but I don't even know where to look. No need to post detailed instructions just for me, I'll find them.

I also agree with sjs: One of the wonderful things about Sonic is that it is so much more than just a "bandwidth provider", someone who sets up a wire, and otherwise doesn't care about the bits. It is also a domain registrar (matter-of-fact, it is the designated registrar for the domain we use, which is in the locality namespace of the US domain). It is a mail service provider, and as far as I can see, the best of the small ones. It is a hosting provider for web pages, although that functionality is declining. It does a lot of other things, some of which I may not use, others I use and have forgotten about. But most importantly, in all these things, it has always been the most reliable and trustworthy provider (with occasional technical and customer service glitches, and yes, I've yelled at Dane, a few times over the phone, but things always get fixed quickly). Having a shell server as a central "spider in the middle of the web" for self-administering has always been part of that "complete end-to-end ISP solution". And as Sonic loses that completeness, it stops being distinguishable from other "just bandwidth providers".

[virtualmike]

• VPN

• Faxline

• Send-a-fax

• Multiple mailboxes (depending on the service level)

• Top score on the EFF privacy scorecard

Few ISPs in CA offer those features as part of the standard package.

[mikefr]

I actually use my shell account just for two things: uploading content to my web site and accessing my web site logs.

For the former, I use WinSCP (Windows 11 on my home PC). For my logs, I run a Perl script on my shell account that copies each daily log to my personal home directory, does a DNS lookup on the source addresses within and edits the log file accordingly so that domain names rather than IP addresses appear in the log file (where possible). This script runs in a cron job each day on my shell account. I regularly copy the resulting log files down to my PC, where I retain them as an archive because the original logs are kept only for a few days by Sonic. After downloading the edited log files, I delete them (via WinSCP) from my shell account home directory.

So, my question is, how much of the above functionality (or something like it) will still be possible after the announced change?

[nbs]

Hoo boy. I'm literally having a bit of a panic attack over here, thinking about dealing with the loss of a shell server here on Sonic. (Been here over 25 years; more than half my life! )

I maintain all my websites (a couple hosted on sonic.net, a couple another server) via the shell (git is very handy). I do all of my email via Mutt -- both personal (via Sonic) and at work (connected to a Gmail account). I have benefited from being able to access my email -- 25 years worth of it! -- from anywhere that has an SSH client (my home laptop, my work laptop, other devices). I absolutely despite Gmail & Outlook whenever I'm forced to use it "natively" (web browser).

I guess I need to move all my email to my laptop, and get used to only having [good, Mutt-based] access to it from a single device. Eep.

[vtrinh95050]

I'm very particular to the shell service on sonic since I'm a frequent participant of the various technical chatgroups such as emacs, galliumos, termix etc.

With the sonice shell service, I am able to keep my chat presence persistent and participate whenever I'm on the road by simply logging in to sonic shell and reconnect to my IRC client.

This is one of the reasons that I still maintain my sonic account.

Please don't shut it down. Thanks.

[sjs]

This is part of a reply I received from Justin in Sonic tech support:

Thank you for contacting Sonic Technical Support.
We apologize for the inconvenience this may cause you. Unfortunately,
this is no longer going to be supported and is a direction we will no
longer be headed in. We appreciate your support with Sonic thus far"...

I'm disappointed but they seem pretty determined to "no longer be headed" in this direction.

[patty1]

As sad as I am to see the end of Sonic's shell server, I appreciate that Dane himself posted a fond farewell to it, including some Sonic history I didn't know.

I'm one of those diehard shell users, although I don't log in manually to the shell much these days. I do so occasionally to tweak the HTML on the older part of my website; the newer part is now on WordPress so I can modify that from a web browser.

FYI to anyone else who's been using cron jobs for calendar event emails: I just discovered that I can have Apple Mail send me email notifications of Apple Calendar events. Even better, I can hide the calendar that holds those reminders (I named it "Email Reminders") but IT STILL WORKS. In other words, I don't need to have those reminders (e.g. "Check the cash balance in my IRA") cluttering up my Apple Calendar; I can uncheck the display box for Email Reminders, but that calendar still exists, so it still generates reminder emails. I just finished testing that, so now I'm going to re-create my Sonic shell .calendar file in Apple Calendar.