How did you find this page?

Besides being listed with other posts here at nool.info, this page is a destination for visitors to my server laptop.nool.info. My laptop, a 2014 System76 Kudu, is running a stack of Ubuntu Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP.

I am using my laptop to demonstrate my skills at configuring and deploying servers. Here is a list of the services that the laptop is running.

My Learning Platform

My learning platform at laptop.nool.info/learn is implemented in Moodle, a free and open-source learning management system (LMS) implemented in PHP, using a MySQL database deployed in my laptop. The learning platform showcases a review and practice exams for the CompTIA A+ certification.

My Forum

The nool.info Forum at laptop.nool.info/forum is implemented in Discourse, an open-source platform for community discussion. The forum comes with its own web server, which is configured to use my Apache installation as a reverse proxy on port 443.

My RStudio Server

My RStudio Server at laptop.nool.info/shiny provides my shiny-census web app. The server is configured to use my Apache installation as a reverse proxy on port 443.

Identity Manager

The nool.info Identity Manager at laptop.nool.info/auth is implemented in Keycloak, an open-source identity and access management platform. My implementation uses a MySQL database deployed in my laptop. The identity manager is configured to provide OpenID Connect services to the nool.info forum and learning platform. It allows user to login into nool.info using Google, Facebook, GitHub, email, and others.

The identity manager comes with its own web server, which is configured to use my Apache installation as a reverse proxy on port 443.

Security

The nool.info website is using HTTPS certificates from Let’s Encrypt provisioned automatically by Netlify. The Netlify provisioning does not extend to laptop.nool.info. Instead, I used EFF’s Certbot to automate the installation of a dedicated certificate into my Apache server. The secure connection covers all the services described above.

Credits

Featured photo: Business people working on a laptop 2018 by rawpixel.com, available here. Licensed under CC0 public domain license, free for personal & commercial use, no attribution required.