I am impressed, the interface to me is more functional than the dated Cheeseshop.

It uses Django/Postgesql/Redis/Celery and the Backend and frontend code is available for download on github

You can find my Baruwa project on crate.io

In this post i will describe how you can catch the mail that has slipped through your SMTP DNSBL checks.

To identify these messages i use Spamassassin's URIDNSBL plugin which extracts the uri's in an email and checks each of them against the DNSBL.

Create a file called ispa.cf in your Spamassassin configuration directory usually /etc/mail/spamassassin with the following contents

# /etc/mail/spamassassin/ispa.cf
urirhsbl        URIBL_BARUWA    ispa.rbl.baruwa.net.   A
body            URIBL_BARUWA    eval:check_uridnsbl(’URIBL_BARUWA’)
describe        URIBL_BARUWA    Contains a URL listed in the Baruwa blocklist
score           URIBL_BARUWA    7.0

Restart Spamassassin and email from those domains that by pass the DNSBL checks by using 3rd party senders should now be tagged as Spam by Spamassassin with a score of 7.0

Feedback is welcome, as Spam fighting is always an on going battle.

Home page

• http://hewgill.com/pydkim/

Use

The pydkim module is a Python module that implements DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail) email signing and verification.

DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) lets an organization take responsibility for a message that is in transit. Technically DKIM provides a method for validating a domain name identity that is associated with a message through cryptographic authentication.

Although DKIM is implemented in most MTA's, in some cases you have a setup where you do not want to run and manage an SMTP server yourself say for example if your Python application uses Amazon SES to send out email. So you can use pydkim within your email generation code to sign your messages before passing them to SES.

Installation

pip install pydkim

Usage

The package provides a command line interface as well as a Python Class.

Python Class

Sign a message

from email.message import Message

from dkim import sign
body = """Hi There,
This is a simple message that will be signed by pydkim
--The signer
"""
# compose a simple message
msg = Message()
msg['From'] = 'Sender <sender@topdog-software.com>'
msg['To'] = 'Recipient <recipient@example.com>'
msg['Subject'] = 'Test message'
msg.set_payload(body)
# sign the message
private_key = open('default.pem').read()
headers = ['To', 'From', 'Subject']
email = msg.as_string()
sig = sign(email, 'default', 'topdog-software.com', private_key, include_headers=headers)
print sig, email

Output:

DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=simple/simple;
 d=topdog-software.com; i=@topdog-software.com; q=dns/txt; s=default;
 t=1336488625; h=From : To : Subject;
 bh=skd2vA1wrCEzamCzKOvVKCaVhhpP1ihoQgGldgTSVUE=; b=vGQgSjJxkTZe+NZZl
lqszgxGshTcixlcfFos+XpLnAj1fnhA5SuBASoB4dVQUlVW76U5s9Dn1zSSsKH
6bCahl4oPqZaE5t6Ke5wpGwA+cBWZRrSuDDD/L8g9nYi04SVb+lMF9mJyQCeZj
pBtMomaOvGF8GNXsiKTFZR9RDv0wWw=
From: Sender <sender@topdog-software.com>
To: Recipient <recipient@example.com>
Subject: Test message

Hi There,

This is a simple message that will be signed by pydkim

--The signer

Verify a message (I use the same message signed above)

from dkim import verify

if verify(open('email.txt').read()):
    print "Email verified successfully"

True

Command line

Sign a message

dkimsign.py selector domain privatekeyfile [identity]

Verify a message

cat email.txt | dkimverify.py
echo $?

And there is more.

For details of the API please refer to the documentation. Happy DKIMing

Home page

• http://www.dnspython.org/

Use

dnspython is a DNS toolkit for Python. It supports almost all record types. It can be used for queries, zone transfers, and dynamic updates. It supports TSIG authenticated messages and EDNS0.

dnspython provides both high and low level access to DNS. The high level classes perform queries for data of a given name, type, and class, and return an answer set. The low level classes allow direct manipulation of DNS zones, messages, names, and records.

Installation

pip install dnspython

Usage

Lookup DNS records (A, AAAA, MX, NS)

A Records

import dns.resolver
answers = dns.resolver.query('topdog.za.net', 'A')
for rdata in answers:
    print rdata.address

AAAA Records

import dns.resolver
answers = dns.resolver.query('topdog.za.net', 'AAAA')
for rdata in answers:
    print rdata.address

MX Records

import dns.resolver
answers = dns.resolver.query('topdog.za.net', 'MX')
for rdata in answers:
    print 'host', rdata.exchange, 'has preference', rdata.preference

NS Records

import dns.resolver
answers = dns.resolver.query('topdog.za.net', 'NS')
for rdata in answers:
    print rdata.to_text()

Transfer a Zone from a server.

import dns.zone
import dns.query
zone = dns.zone.from_xfr(dns.query.xfr('174.136.108.83', 'topdog.za.net'))
print "*" * 10, "A records", "*" * 10
for (name, ttl, rdata) in zone.iterate_rdatas('A'):
    print name, "with TTL", ttl, "points to", rdata
print "*" * 10, "MX records", "*" * 10
for (name, ttl, rdata) in zone.iterate_rdatas('MX'):
    print name, "with TTL", ttl, "points to", rdata
print "*" * 10, "NS records", "*" * 10
for (name, ttl, rdata) in zone.iterate_rdatas('NS'):
    print name, "with TTL", ttl, "points to", rdata

Generate reverse names

import dns.reversename
print dns.reversename.from_address('174.136.108.83')

Perform a Dynamic record update (example from documentation modified)

import dns.query
import dns.tsigkeyring
import dns.update
import sys

if name == 'main':
    keyring = dns.tsigkeyring.from_text({
        'host-example.' : 'XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX=='
    })
    # Replace an A record
    update = dns.update.Update('example.com', keyring=keyring)
    update.replace('host', 300, 'a', sys.argv[1])
    response = dns.query.tcp(update, '10.0.0.1')

And there is more

There is more that can be done using this package please refer to the documentation.

Home page

• https://github.com/haypo/python-ipy/

Use

The IP class allows a comfortable parsing and handling for most notations in use for IPv4 and IPv6 addresses and networks. It was greatly inspired by RIPE's Perl module NET::IP's interface but doesn't share the implementation.

Installation

pip install IPy

Usage

Print IP addresses in an IP range

from IPy import IP
network = IP('192.168.0.0/30')
for ip in network:
    print ip

Output:

192.168.0.0
192.168.0.1
192.168.0.2
192.168.0.3

Generate Reverse names for reverse lookup/PTR records

from IPy import IP
network = IP('192.168.0.0/30')
for ip in network:
    print ip.reverseName()

from IPy import IP
network = IP('192.168.0.0/30').reverseNames()
for ip in network:
    print ip

Output:

0.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa.
1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa.
2.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa.
3.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa.

Check IP version:

from IPy import IP
print IP('192.168.0.0/30').version()
print IP('::1').version()

Output:

4
6

Get network prefixes

from IPy import IP
print IP('192.168.0.0/30')
print IP('192.168.0.0/255.255.255.252')
print IP('192.168.0.0-192.168.0.3)

Output:

192.168.0.0/30
192.168.0.0/30
192.168.0.0/30

Get the broadcast address

from IPy import IP
print IP('192.168.0.0/30').broadcast()

Output:

192.168.0.3

Get the network mask

from IPy import IP
print IP('192.168.0.0/30').netmask()

Output:

255.255.255.252

Check if an IP address is within a network

from IPy import IP
'192.168.0.1' in IP('192.168.0.0/30')

Check a network type LOOPBACK, PRIVATE, PUBLIC, RESERVED

from IPy import IP
print IP('192.168.0.1').iptype()

Output:

PRIVATE

And there is more

There is more that can be done using this package please refer to the documentation or run.

import IPy
help(IPy)

Home page

• http://xael.org/norman/python/pyclamd/

Use

pyClamd is a python interface to Clamd (Clamav daemon). By using pyClamd, you can add virus detection capabilities to your python software in an efficient and easy way.

pyClamd may be used by a closed source product, as it does not link with the GPL licensed libclamav.

Installation

This package is not available on the cheeseshop (PYPI) so you need to install it by downloading the module.

wget http://xael.org/norman/python/pyclamd/pyclamd.py
mv pyclamd.py $(python -c "from distutils.sysconfig import get_python_lib; print get_python_lib()")/

Usage

pyClamd supports connections to clamd using both TCP and UNIX sockets.

TCP

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_network_socket('localhost', 3310)
print pyclamd.version()

Output:

ClamAV 0.97.4/14869/Tue May  1 22:38:26 2012

Unix socket

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
print pyclamd.version()

Output:

ClamAV 0.97.4/14869/Tue May  1 22:38:26 2012

Scan files

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
pyclamd.contscan_file('/tmp')

Scan and stop if virus detected

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
pyclamd.scan_file('/tmp')

Ping server to check if still alive

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
pyclamd.ping()

Scan a stream

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
mystring = 'X5O!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*'
pyclamd.scan_stream(mystring)

Output:

{'stream': 'Eicar-Test-Signature'}

Reload clamd

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
pyclamd.reload()

Output:

'RELOADING'

Shutdown clamd

import pyclamd
pyclamd.init_unix_socket('/tmp/clamd.socket')
pyclamd.shutdown()

The module raises various exceptions that you will need to catch, please refer to the documentation for details.

So head off and get your copy.

Home page

• http://alastairs-place.net/projects/pwtools/

Use

pwtools is a Python package that provides the ability to generate passwords, and also allows you to test them to ensure that they are reasonably secure.

The algorithms used were borrowed from the Openwall Project’s passwdqc project, but have been re-implemented in Python for increased portability.

Installation

This package is not available on the cheeseshop (PYPI) so you need to install it from the Mercurial repository.

pip install hg+http://alastairs-place.net/hg/pwtools

Usage

Generate a strong password:

from pwtools import PasswordGenerator
pwgen = PasswordGenerator()
pwgen.generate()

Output:

'amaze*Period&Thirst'

Check password strength:

from pwtools import PasswordChecker
pwchecker = PasswordChecker('/usr/share/dict/words')
pwchecker.checkPassword('password')
pwchecker.checkPassword('zxcvbnm')
pwchecker.checkPassword('123456abcdef')
pwchecker.checkPassword('m1ll10n')
pwchecker.checkPassword('amaze*Period&Thirst')

Output:

'too simple (not enough different kinds of character)'
'too simple (not enough different kinds of character)'
'based on a common sequence of characters'
'too simple (not enough different kinds of character)'
False

Home page

• http://slimit.org/

Use

SlimIt is a JavaScript minifier written in Python. It compiles JavaScript into more compact code so that it downloads and runs faster.

SlimIt also provides a library that includes a JavaScript parser, lexer, pretty printer and a tree visitor.

Installation

pip install slimit

Usage

The package provides a command line interface as well as Python functions.

Python functions

Minify Javascript

from slimit import minify
minified = minify(open('jquery-1.7.2.js').read(), mangle=True, mangle_toplevel=True)
print minified

Modify Javascript within Python and beautify it

This example is taken directly from the documentation. It modifies the counter variable changing it from "i" to "hello" and formats it in a more readable style.

from slimit.parser import Parser
from slimit.visitors import nodevisitor
from slimit import ast

parser = Parser()
tree = parser.parse('for(var i=0; i<10; i++) {var x=5+i;}')
for node in nodevisitor.visit(tree):
    if isinstance(node, ast.Identifier) and node.value == 'i':
        node.value = 'hello'
print tree.to_ecma()

Output:

for (var hello = 0; hello < 10; hello++) {
  var x = 5 + hello;
}

Command line

slimit --mangle < jquery-1.7.2.js > jquery-1.7.2.slimit.default.js

Performance

The performance is very good, most times it creates smaller files than the YUI compresser. I tested minifying Jquery using 3 javascript minification tools:

• jsmin
• yuicompressor
• slimit

The results are below.

-rw-r--r--  1 andrew  staff   247K Mar 21 21:46 jquery-1.7.2.js
-rw-r--r--  1 andrew  staff   138K Apr 30 08:26 jquery-1.7.2.jsmin.js
-rw-r--r--  1 andrew  staff    96K Apr 30 08:22 jquery-1.7.2.slimit.js
-rw-r--r--  1 andrew  staff   103K Apr 30 08:19 jquery-1.7.2.yui.js

And there is more

Slimit also exposes JavaScript parser and lexer functions which you can use within your code, please refer to the documentation for usage information.

The cssmin package is used to minify css files.

Home page

• https://github.com/zacharyvoase/cssmin

Use

cssmin is a Python port of the YUI CSS Compressor. It is used to minify css files, which helps improve web application performance by reducing page load times.

Installation

pip install cssmin

Usage

The package provides a command line interface as well as Python functions.

Python function

import cssmin
minified = cssmin.cssmin(open('style.css').read())
print minified

Commandline

cssmin --wrap 1000 < style.css > style.min.css

Thats it, nice and sweet.