I think I broke my server
 

Hello all,

I just recently got a server up and running with Fedora Core 9. I was able to get Apache on it and working along with the MySQL and PhP. I got e107 up and working and was having a good time setting up a website on the server when things started going wrong.

I was testing the registration for new accounts feature on my website and it began to say it was having problems sending out the validation email. Then my SeLinux security thing started sending me alerts that it was blocking sendmail.cf and submit.cf. It recommended a command for me to run to allow them access so I ran it and it didn't work. So I rebooted.

During the reboot I switched to detailed view and sendmail.cf and submit.cf both failed during boot. The detailed view said it was denied permission. Now I can't open websites from the machine anymore or do anything network related. I am pretty sure I somehow broke the service but I have no idea what to do to begin fixing it.

I tried #service network stop and then #service network start but on the start it fails and won't come back up. It says it has a socket error.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Try and check in the apache error log what may have happened with regard to your website. Then as for the network check whether your eth0 (or whatever your card's name is) is active.

And next time you get it running, take a full backup (and after it incremental backups, for example) so you have a plan B ready if you need the server running quickly.

And whenever you're told to run a command (even if it was SElinux god), first find out what it does and only then run it, if it feels sane. Any modifications you do should be done to files you have backed up first.