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What is a Personal Server?
A Personal Server is personal computer that runs 24x7
and provide a number of useful functions for the owner such
as file server, ftp server, mail server, web server etc.
Today everyone uses a mobile device or a laptop. The good
old desktop PC is not the key computing device. Cloud
services and remote server services took lot of your
personal data away from your home into the Internet
somewhere where you don't have control over your personal
data. A Personal Server can run similar applications but
keep the application and data under your control in your own
home. You don't have to be bound by remote service terms.
The control of your data also comes with some
responsibilities such as managing your personal server, but
we at Pexus believe this slight incremental responsibility
is worth the control and privacy of your data. We make it
real easy to own a personal server. With increasing use of a
connected home a personal server can provide a number of
services with additional applications to manage your home
and daily lives without relying on (not really) free third party services
or services that charge you a subscription fee every month.
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What is Patriot PS Personal Server>
Patriot PS Personal Server is a Pexus LLC offering
offering for Personal Server solutions. Pexus LLC offers the
following editions of Patriot PS Personal Server solution:
- Patriot PS Personal Server System
- Patriot PS Personal Server ISO Image
- Patriot PS Personal Server Virtual Appliance Image
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What is Patriot PS Personal Server System?
Patriot PS Personal Server System is a complete system and
software solution with Pexus LLC Patriot PS OS software and
related applications pre-installed on a small compact fan
less personal computer that offers easy plug and play on the
home network. It does not need a monitor, keyboard or mouse
for normal operation. Once plugged into the home network
using the supplied Ethernet cable to your home router/switch
in your home network, it can be discovered using Windows
Network discovery or using Apple's multicast DNS (mDNS).
Patriot PS Personal Server system comes with Intel dual core
64 bit Atom processor, 4GB memory and 500 GB or more hard
disk (Note: the configuration spec may change in future,
always check the product page for latest spec). It has been
designed with 24x7 operation in mind. More information at http://www.pexus.com/patriotps
or https://store.pexus.net
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What is Patriot PS Personal Server ISO Image?
Patriot PS Personal Server ISO Image is a customized
Debian based Linux OS software distribution that includes all Pexus Patriot PS Personal Server applications that can be installed to a compatible PC system containing 64-bit
AMD/Intel computer with at least 2GB memory and 100GB or
more hard disk and a wired network card. It comes with
an auto install that will install the OS and
Patriot PS applications on the first hard disk on the
system. The install takes about 2-3 hours or so depending on
the speed of the system. This software only image
distribution and is ideal for users who wants to install on
their own system or reuse an old desktop PC that is
currently not used. This is a more cost effective solution
and comes with all Patriot PS configuration applications.
New applications included as part of Patriot PS will also be
available for users.
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What is Patriot PS Personal Server Virtual Appliance
Image?
Patriot PS - Personal Server solution is also available as a
virtual appliance image in Open Virtual Appliance (OVA) 1.0 Image
format, that can be easily imported in to virtual machine
software such as Virtual Box or VMware
Workstation or VMware player. This option is useful if you
want to run a Personal Server as a virtual machine within
your existing Operating System and you have unused capacity
in terms of memory and hard disk. You can also use this to
evaluate the personal server solution before investing in a
separate dedicated personal server system. As it is
pre-installed you can be up and running in minutes.
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I already have a free email service such as Hotmail,
Gmail, Yahoo Mail why would I need a mail server?
Free e-mail services does not provide any privacy and
confidentiality of e-mails messages. All e-mail using free
e-mail are scanned for data that is analyzed and profiled to
generate data that can be monetized. Chances are you already
accepted for such use of your e-mail messages as no body
reads the fine prints these days and are too eager to comply
with anything for free services. E-mail left after a certain
number of days on remote servers are considered abandoned
and can be used for any purpose. Using your own e-mail
server you can keep your e-mail private. Avoid being scanned
and profiled and have anyone use the data against you. With
your own mail server at home, you can create any number of
mail boxes and don't have to worry about email storage. You
can download the e-mail to your device or PC easily for more
secure and long term storage. Of course remember to keep your personal and work e-mail separate!
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Having my own e-mail server sounds good, what is the
catch?
Apart from a one time investment in a personal server system
such as Patriot PS Personal Server or an OS such as Patriot
PS Personal Server ISO image or a Patriot PS Personal Server
Virtual Appliance Image, you will need to register a domain
name which usually costs about $1 a month. With so many
choices in domain name suffixes you can create your own cool
domain name and even host one for free at services like DNSExit.com. That is all you
need to start running your own mail server using Patriot PS
Personal Server.
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I already use a free Drop Box service for file
sharing and access from multiple devices, why do I need my
own?
Owning your own file storage service allows you the
freedom to keep your files without any terms. Files stored
on remote servers may be given to third parties. All free
services use the customers data to create derived data that
can be monetized to serve advertisements and selling the
data to any company for a price. Though lot of companies
claim they don't use personally identifiable data (PII) but
collecting vast amount of data over a long periods of time
and correlating with multiple sources of data one can easily
derive personally identifiable information indirectly. Use
by third party companies that you don't have any control
over and leaves the door open for misusing your data. Your
privacy is your freedom. Your personal data is your
information that provides you the strength to negotiate
better deals for yourselves in whatever you do. Searching
for deal on the Internet is moot as every advertiser know
exactly what your preference and interest are in any product
you may choose to buy based on data derived from your files
and e-mail exchanges you have done without your knowledge.
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Can I use Patriot PS Personal Server to share files
in my home network?
Yes. Patriot PS Personal server allows sharing of files
easily, as the special admin user - ppsadmin's home
directory can be mounted to Windows or Apple computers. You
can also attach external USB storage devices that can be
mounted and shared easily. Putting media files to
specifically designated directories enables sharing media
with DLNA certified devices such as TV, Music Players,
Windows Media Players. Community edition or popular personal
cloud and file sharing application - ownCloud and Pydio can be easily downloaded
and installed on your Patriot PS Personal Server using the ppsconfig
application.
For more information on sharing refer this presentation: Sharing with Patriot PS Personal Server
Associated desktop clients from ownCloud and pydio make file syncing easy with the coomunity edition of ownCloud and pydio software running on your Patriot PS Personal Server.
Check out our documentation on file sharing on how easy to get this setup.
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Why is Patriot PS Personal Server also called an
Automation Server?
Patriot PS Personal Server includes a simple scheduler
that can be used to automate tasks. Some out of the box
tasks such sending an e-mail on a schedule or enabling /
disabling certain application can be done easily. It also
provides custom Linux shell scripts that can be executed on
a schedule to allow for integration with any system in the
home e.g. sending commands to other connected devices in
home and controlling them on a schedule.
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Where can I purchase Patriot PS Personal Server?
Patriot
PS Personal Server System, Patriot
PS Personal ISO Image, Patriot
PS Personal Server Virtual Appliance Image is available for
sale in the United States of America only and available via
our online Pexus Store at https://store.pexus.net
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Do you resellers for Patriot PS Personal Server
solutions?
Currently we donot have resellers. If you are interested to
become a reseller by reselling Patriot PS Personal Server
solution software on your systems and re-sell, please
contact us at partners@pexus.com
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What kind of warranty you have on Patriot PS Personal
Server System?
If you are not satisfied with Patriot PS Personal Server
System, you can return for full refund minus the shipping
charges within 30 days. There is limited general warranty on
the system for 1 year. Please review the warranty
statement here.
There is no refund on
the software editions of the Patriot PS Personal Server i.e.
Patriot PS Personal Server ISO Image and Patriot PS Personal
Server Virtual Appliance. You can do free checkout of the
evaluation version of these before buying the product.
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Is the Patriot PS OS software open source?
Patriot PS OS software is based of Debian OS. It uses
unmodified binaries of Linux Kernel and OS packages. The
sources of these packages and linux kernel are available
from official Debian
site. They can also be requested from Pexus by sending an
e-mail to support@pexus.com
Due to the large size of source archives, Pexus may charge a
download fee to cover our network bandwidth and hosting
charges. All packages and software included are available to
users based on the original licenses. Community Editions of
some software are only downloaded and installed based on
your selection and are not included in the base software
distribution. You have the right to use such software based
on their respective licenses and their sources can be
obtained directly from their respective web sites.
Applications specifically developed and included by Pexus
are copyrighted by Pexus LLC. If you have any questions and
wish to review the sources for privacy or security concerns
you can send a request for more information to corp@pexus.com.
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How do I get updates to the Patriot PS OS and
applications?
Updates to OS is pulled directly from ftp.us.debian.org and security.debian.org
Debian official site. This ensures you get all critical
security updates when available on the Debian site. Updates
to Pexus applications is pulled from https://repo.pexus.net
site. Other application such as Community Edition of
OwnCloud, Pydio, webmin etc. use their own respective
repositories.
Use webmin to update packages.
Webmin can be accessed from Patriot PS Configuration
Application ppsconfig. in ppsconfig
application click menu More -> Launch webmin.
Once in
webmin, Navigate to System -> Software Package Updates to
update
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What is the registration key for?
When you purchased or requested free evaluation for any of
the Patriot PS Personal Server Solution you receive a
registration key e-mail. The registration key is for Pexus
Applications included in the distribution. You do not need
the registration key or any license to use the Linux OS and
packages included in the distribution. They are distributed
using the same terms as the Debian OS terms and available
without any charge. However we are confident that you will
love the convenience of using Pexus applications to
configure, manage and run your Personal Server as they are
specifically developed to make owning and running a Personal
Server as easy as possible. Currently Pexus does not charge
a download fee for evaluation requests. We may in future; to
cover the network bandwidth and hosting charges for large
file downloads. The Patriot PS Personal Server System is
currently only available in the USA. Software editions i.e.
the ISO Image and Virtual Appliance image is available
worldwide to non-embargoed countries, however the user is
responsible to ensure they comply with all cryptographic
laws prevalent in their country. Patriot PS Personal Server
uses strong cryptography where needed and some nations may
have laws
on individuals on the strength of
cryptography keys permitted.
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How is Patriot PS Personal different from NAS and
Cloud Storage?
While Patriot PS Personal Server can be used as NAS
and Personal Cloud Storage, it does more. With Patriot PS
Personal Server, you can set it as a mail server, do
automation tasks, use it as a personal communication hub
include secure mail messaging applications. Patriot PS OS is
a customized Debian based Linux distribution. This means you
have access to a large existing applications that you can
install. It uses an open source platform that will bring in
scores of personal server based solutions that can be
developed by any software vendor. Pexus is working on
additional personal server solutions that will greatly
increase the utility of your Patriot PS Personal Server.
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How to import self-signed HTTPS certificate in to
trusted store in Internet Explorer?
Importing the self-signed HTTPS certificate in to
trusted store in Internet Explorer is a little involved
unlike the other browsers. You can use the following steps
to import the self-signed certifcate.
- Browse to the site whose certificate you want to
trust.
- When told "There is a problem with this website's
security certificate.", choose "Continue to this website
(not recommended)."
- Select Tools -> Internet Options.
- Select Security -> Trusted sites -> Sites.
- Confirm the URL matches, and click "Add" then
"Close".
- Close the "Internet Options" dialog box with either
"OK" or "Cancel".
- Refresh the current page.
- When told "There is a problem with this website's
security certificate.", choose "Continue to this website
(not recommended)."
- Click on "Certificate Error" at the right of the
address bar and select "View certificates".
- Click on "Install Certificate...", then in the
wizard, click "Next".
- On the next page select "Place all certificates in
the following store".
- Click "Browse", select "Trusted Root Certification
Authorities", and click "OK".
- Back in the wizard, click "Next", then "Finish".
- If you get a "Security Warning" message box, click
"Yes".
- Dismiss the message box with "OK".
- Select Tools -> Internet Options.
- Select Security- >Trusted sites -> Sites.
- Select the URL you just added, click "Remove", then
"Close".
- Now shut down all running instances of IE, and
start up IE again.
- The site's certificate should now be trusted.
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How do I login to my Patriot PS Personal Server
directly?
You can either use PuTTY or Windows Remote Desktop
Protocol to login into your Patriot PS Personal Server. When
using PuTTy, use the IP address or hostname in your Local
Area Network and port 22 to login. Use the ppsadmin and
password you have set in your profile to login.
When using Remote Desktop, use the IP address and the
default Remote Desktop port. When prompted for login use
ppsadmin and the password you have set in your profile.