Potential incompatibility between running MailEnable on Windows Server 2022 and Malwarebytes Premium

Just a heads-up for anyone running MailEnable Enterprise Premium on Windows Server 2022 and Malwarebytes Premium…

We recently installed Malwarebytes to enhance security on your MailEnable mail server. I have always been happy with Malwarebytes and highly recommend it as security software on desktop PCs. However, after recently installing Malwarebytes Enterprise Premium, we’ve experienced a number of issues.

Firstly, the MailEnable IMAP service would go down, and some connections to other services would be blocked entirely. After IMAP went down, the host would become sluggish or we’d be unable to connect via RDP.

Finally, the host would crash entirely and all services would go down.

We are not certain yet of the exact cause, but we know that this problem started happening after we installed Malwarebytes and ended immediately after we uninstalled and did a Windows reboot.

The details are here:

Edition:	Windows Server 2022 Standard 64-bit
Version: 	21H2
OS build: 	20348.2340

MailEnable Enterprise Premium 
Version 10.48

Malwarebytes Premium 
File version 5.1.1.82

If you are experiencing problems running the two MailEnable and Malwarebytes together on Windows Server 2022, it could be because there’s a conflict and it’s worth uninstalling Malwarebytes to troubleshoot.

Doris Lessing on education

Ideally, what should be said to every child, repeatedly, throughout his or her school life is something like this:
“You are in the process of being indoctrinated. We have not yet evolved a system of education that is not a system of indoctrination. We are sorry, but it is the best we can do. What you are being taught here is an amalgam of current prejudice and the choices of this particular culture. The slightest look at history will show how impermanent these must be. You are being taught by people who have been able to accommodate themselves to a regime of thought laid down by their predecessors. It is a self-perpetuating system. Those of you who are more robust and individual than others will be encouraged to leave and find ways of educating yourself — educating your own judgements. Those that stay must remember, always, and all the time, that they are being moulded and patterned to fit into the narrow and particular needs of this particular society.”

The Golden Notebook (1962)

A Linux Bash script to sync the most recent version of a file on a remote host to a local host (using SFTP) and a password

This bash script will log in to a remote host using SFTP, find the most recently modified file in a directory, and download it to a specified local directory.

#!/bin/bash

datestamp=$(date +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S%z)
echo $datestamp

fileName=$(echo "ls -1rt" | sshpass -p PASSWD sftp user@host | tail -1)

echo "Latest file is: " $fileName

echo "lcd /the/local/target/directory/to/place/downloaded/file
get $fileName targetfilename.txt" | sshpass -p PASSWD sftp user@host

echo "-----"
echo ""

This script uses sshpass. Sshpass is a utility you can use to pass along a password to an ssh prompt when using a key is not feasible. It’s great for scripts. Just make sure that the script which contains your password is not world readable.

n.b. This script works on the default directory on the target machine. If you want to change directories on the remote host, you’ll need to echo a “cd /your/path/here” before the “lcd” statement.

The script was written to facilitate logging, which is why it has echo statements echoing the datestamp, filename of the file which is being retrieved, and separator markers.

  • You’ll need to update the script to replace user@host with the username and hostname of the user which has SFTP access to the remote host.
  • You’ll need to update PASSWD with the cleartext password of the above user.
  • Replace targetfilename.txt with the filename you want the downloaded file to have after you’ve downloaded a copy. If you want the same filename (no name change), then remove targetfilename.txt altogether.
  • And finally, replace ‘/the/local/target/directory/to/place/downloaded/file‘ with your target directory for where to download the file locally.

Set the script to run via cron at the appropriate times. Pipe the output using &>> to append all output (standard out and err) to the log file. e.g.

/usr/local/sbin/syncscript.sh &>> /var/log/syncscript.log

A Memento Mori from a Chinese poet

The years of a lifetime do not reach a hundred,
Yet they contain a thousand years’ sorrow.
When days are short and the dull nights long,
Why not take a lamp and wander forth?
If you want to be happy you must do it now,
There is no waiting till an after-time.
The fool who’s loath to spend the wealth he’s got
Becomes the laughing-stock of after ages.
It is true that Master Wang became Immortal,
But how can we hope to share his lot?

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_Hundred_and_Seventy_Chinese_Poems/Seventeen_Old_Poems