Runbook for telling broadcast fundraising solicitation from genuine
mentions: signal checklist, SQL to investigate the account and its
origin instance via nodeinfo, BlockService snippet, and a proportionate
escalation ladder (mute -> block -> report -> domain-limit -> domain-block).
Registered in SUMMARY.md and the self-hosting section index.
Three updates to the inbound spam filtering guide, all driven by the 2026-06-04
majormail-hetzner Phase 6 cutover and follow-up tuning:
1. Section 6 (Dovecot Sieve): warn explicitly that `plugin/sieve_before` was
dropped in Pigeonhole 2.4 and silently does nothing — no startup warning,
spam just keeps landing in INBOX. The 2.4 replacement is a top-level
`sieve_script <name> { type = before; path = …; }` block. Also note the
Fedora-flat-dovecot.conf pitfall (some packagings ship dovecot.conf
without `!include conf.d/*.conf`, so the block has to live in the main
file directly). Added a `sievec` compile step.
2. New §6b: route spam to a separate `junk@` mailbox via Postfix cleanup
`header_checks` REDIRECT. This makes spam invisible to the user's
mailbox entirely — Spark/IDLE-based clients don't push-notify because
the message never reaches the subscribed mailbox at all. Includes the
`regexp:` vs `pcre:` map-type tip (use regexp on stock Fedora to avoid
the postfix-pcre package dependency).
3. New §7a: weekly systemd timer for sa-learn. The §7 warning about
"don't run sa-learn from cron unless folders are clean" is correct as
the safe default — but when you adopt the §6b REDIRECT-to-junk@
pattern, the junk@ mailbox is pure spam by design and a weekly
`--spam`/`--ham`/`--sync`/`--force-expire` chain becomes safe and
useful. Full unit templates included.
Gotchas table gains four entries:
- Pigeonhole 2.4 silent breakage of plugin/sieve_before
- postfix-pcre vs regexp map type confusion
- Why sieve fileinto Junk still pushes a Spark notification
- Why local `sendmail` injection doesn't trigger the REDIRECT (smtpd
milters skip sendmail-injected mail, so X-Spam-Flag isn't added)
All changes match what's now codified in the `majormail` Ansible role
(commit 7a8b9eb in MajorAnsible).
New 02-selfhosting/services article: the full Postfix/Dovecot inbound spam stack
on Fedora — spamass-milter tag-only wiring (the -r footgun), socket permissions
(sa-milt group + UMask), site-wide Bayes DB, Sieve-to-Junk, and sa-learn training
(folders, spam/ham balance, manual-not-cron). From the majormail setup.
Also extends selinux-dovecot-vmail-context with a Permissive-mode variant + a
postfix_cleanup->mysqld_etc companion-denial note. SUMMARY.md nav updated.
New article mastodon-s3-acl-upload-failures.md: a BucketOwnerEnforced S3
bucket plus a stale S3_PERMISSION/S3_ACL in .env.production makes every
Mastodon upload fail with AccessControlListNotSupported, silently. Covers
symptoms (incl. why a missing object returns 403 not 404), diagnosis,
the fix (S3_PERMISSION= empty, public read via bucket policy), recovery,
a synthetic-write health check, and Ansible enforcement.
Extend mastodon-prune-profiles-trap.md: add a "Bulk restore at scale"
procedure (list existing keys, null missing DB refs, enqueue
RedownloadAvatar/HeaderWorker), a "storage-level deletion without DB
de-ref" section, and a stronger recommendation to disable automated
profile pruning (and scheduled accounts refresh --all) entirely.
Link both from SUMMARY.md and the selfhosting index.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Two related additions covering the 2026-05-31 cutover-night incidents on
majorlinux and majortoot-hetzner.
ssh-socket-tailscale-race-condition.md (update Race 1 fix):
- After=tailscaled.service Requires=tailscaled.service orders against the
service becoming active, not against tailscale0 having an IPv4 — hosts
kept losing SSH intermittently after reboots (incident: majorlinux +
majortoot-hetzner 2026-05-31, during cutover-night Ansible reboot).
- Canonical fix: a oneshot tailscale-wait-ready.service that polls
`ip -4 -o addr show tailscale0` until an address is present, with
ssh.socket After=/Requires= that service. Document the full evolution
(2026-05-19 BindsTo → 2026-05-23 Requires → 2026-05-31 wait-ready) so
future readers don't try the half-fixes thinking they're sufficient.
- Add majortoot-hetzner to affected hosts.
mastodon-post-install-hardening.md (new):
Four upstream-install gaps that bit during the majortoot-hetzner cutover:
1. /home/mastodon at 0750 (useradd default) → nginx www-data can't
traverse → every static asset 403s → unstyled "purple screen" in the
browser while API/HTML still work through the puma proxy.
2. .env.production at 0644 (mastodon-setup default) → DB_PASS,
SECRET_KEY_BASE, OTP_SECRET world-readable once gap (1) is fixed.
3. mastodon user shell at /usr/sbin/nologin → `su - mastodon` blocked.
4. rbenv init in .bashrc only → login shells don't source .bashrc; even
when chained, Ubuntu's .bashrc returns early for non-interactive
shells. Fix: .bash_profile sets up rbenv BEFORE sourcing .profile +
.bashrc, so it works for both interactive and non-interactive logins.
All four codified in MajorAnsible configure_mastodon_permissions.yml
with self-asserting verification steps.
02-selfhosting/index.md + SUMMARY.md:
Add a "Services" section to the selfhosting index linking the
mastodon-post-install-hardening article (and the other orphaned
services/ entries while there). SUMMARY.md gains one new entry.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Documents the long-standing UX regression caused by
`tootctl media remove --prune-profiles` (and `--remove-headers`)
running on a schedule: cached remote avatars are deleted, but
Mastodon does not auto-refetch on profile view, so quiet remote
accounts stay broken indefinitely.
Article covers:
- The mutually-exclusive flag bug (silent skip if combined)
- Mastodon's actual avatar-refresh trigger model (Update activities,
not profile views)
- A `refresh-my-follows.sh` pattern with a defensible WHERE clause
(avatar NULL AND avatar_remote_url present) to avoid infinite
retry on accounts whose origin has no avatar
- Why header_file_name IS NULL is a bad signal (~20% of users
legitimately have no custom header)
- The cron decision: most admins should drop --prune-profiles
- fail2ban-digest-mode-fleet: recidive-only email model, sshd now silent,
defaults-debian.conf gotcha added
- netdata-docker-health-alarm-tuning: 30m/10m config, tuning history table
- New: wp-fail2ban-logpath-debian-ubuntu, lora-adapter-gguf-conversion-fails,
tailscale-status-json-hostname-localhost-ios
- Various article updates and nav index refreshes
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Articles from prior sessions that were written locally but never shipped:
- 02-selfhosting/cloud/aws-s3-cost-management.md — lifecycle rules, storage class selection, bucket inventory, unexpected-growth investigation
- 02-selfhosting/dns-networking/wake-on-lan-router-ssh.md — WOL magic packets via Asus router SSH + ether-wake, Ansible vault integration
- 02-selfhosting/services/claude-code-remote-control.md — mobile access to a persistent host Claude Code session
Nav updated (index.md + SUMMARY.md):
- Added Cloud subsection under Self-Hosting for aws-s3
- Added wake-on-lan and aws-s3 entries to SUMMARY
- Added claude-code-remote-control to index's Services section
- Added ansible-ssh-host-alias-bypass nav entry (article shipped in 2dbeb22)
- Article count 87 → 89, self-hosting 30 → 32, troubleshooting 33 → 34
- Fixed 4 broken markdown links (bad relative paths in See Also sections)
- Corrected n8n port binding to 127.0.0.1:5678 (matches actual deployment)
- Updated SnapRAID article with actual majorhome paths (/majorRAID, disk1-3)
- Converted 67 Obsidian wikilinks to relative markdown links or plain text
- Added YAML frontmatter to 35 articles missing it entirely
- Completed frontmatter on 8 articles with missing fields
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
Covers version checking, pinned-tag update process, SQLite password
reset, and why Arcane may not catch updates when the latest tag lags
behind npm releases.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
