Need advice for Ubuntu network setup

[newtech]

I am looking to setup a network using Ubuntu as a file server and maybe a web server. I want to know of the tools and maybe some links to tutorials that you may know that will be able to assist me. I am new to Linux but I believe I have a good understanding of it. I have watched a few tutorials, read some books, and of course ran different distros of Linux in a virtual machines. I want to just install Ubuntu on its own and I just need to know of some great security tools, network management tools,firewalls, Malware spyware rootkit scanners( This machine will be on a network with Windows systems) and anything else, A little better understanding of samba so that my windows machines can communicate with Linux and anything else you believe would help me in setting everything up would be great also. I don't mind searching for answers. You can reply with links to how to sites, tools etc.. That would be good enough for me. I just believe that with all the information on the web I am sure someone else has found some good stuff that can really help me. Thanks in advance.

[Jonathan183]

Welcome to the forums newtech

You should find lots of useful info on the Ubuntu website for setting up Ubuntu servers. Check here for a quick security intro.
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I don't mind searching for answers

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[D-cat]

Are you administering with a GUI, or are you going pure server (Text mode)?

For file serving, are you serving Windows computers or sticking with Linux Clients. If GUI, there's lots of available tools out of Synaptic, if text only, keep reading.

Linux only can use NFS, simpler and native. If serving to Windows, you'll need Samba, so you should also install SWAT (Samba Web Administration Tool). Swat not only makes configuration point-and-click, but gives easy access to the Samba Manual (invaluable - that's a general warning about Samba BTW).

For web serving, most people use Apache because it comes with Linux, but it's overkill and difficult for a home server, I prefer the third party "Abyss X1", which also has a web administration tool built-in.

[newtech]

Thanks jonathan183 for the link. I got a lot of good information that has helped me get a better idea of what to think about in setting everything up.

[newtech]

D-cat

Well thats were I am not sure about going GUI or text. From what I just read I understand that GUI has a higher chance of be vulinerable to attacks, and uses more memory than text based, on the flip side of that GUI is easier for me to manage than text. So im kinda still leaning toward GUI just because of the ease of use. Yes I have my laptop on the network which is dual booted with Ubuntu Desktop 8.04 and Vista hom premium, and my desktop Pc hase XP Pro. My idea was to have an Ubuntu or any good linux server run and have all of my software, files, pics, personal website projects and also for a good learning ground. I actually watched a tutorial on that abyss web server but that was the windows version, and it was very easy to set up, so I will look into getting that for linux. Thanks for the heads up.

Also I tried installing Ubuntu on the older machine that I have and when it got done installing it did not go to the GUI. Instead it was a text based screen. This was the second time I have done an install on that machine and it gave me that. I have installed ubutu almost 20+ times before with no problems on other machines most which were VMware. I was thinking about trying a nothing distro to see if it would work. Do you have any suggestions of other good distro's to use as a server. I have Red hat8, Fadora core, Ubuntu, and Suse. I just stuck with Ubuntu once I used it the first time. also ubuntu ran from the disk on this machine and booted into a GUI, but when I installed it on the HDD after the install, and the reboot for it to start for the first time, it was all text, no GUI. It did not even prompt me for a user name and password. I tried running "startx" and other commands that I thought would work but I got nothing.

[D-cat]

GUI's attack vulnerabilities are really only exploitable if you're using it on the net or you have X11 forarding enabled in ssh. There's also the mantra "never log in as root in a GUI," good advice, since that would allow an accidental click or an Internet compromise to thoroughly corrupt your system. Even when administering your system via GUI, always log in as a user and make use of the su/sudo commands (Admin controls usually are already set up like this and will ask the password on launch, or there will be an "unlock" button).

Note that server versions of distros by default do not install GUI interfaces, Ubuntu included. That's why startx will not work, you'd need to use apt-get (or aptitude if you prefer the menu driven interface) to install a gui (you can tell it to just install gnome, and X-windows and all if its requirements will be installed as dependencies).

My favorite distro for serving even in text-only mode is OpenSuSE because the Yast panel is a central do-all interface that's just as good in text as it is in graphical mode. It makes configuration of just about any server daemon pretty darned easy, as well as user management and other administrative tasks. It also doesn't have a true text based installer any more, so 256MB is required just to install it. That is the reason I use Ubuntu server (on a 128 MB computer), and discovered just how much more efficient the apt package manager is compared against zypp (which SuSE switched to on 10.2 for rpm management and low RAM users have been complaining about since).

Some people disagree with me about Yast because once you figure out the limitations of it and opt to configure files by hand, Yast can step on and undo some of your customizations. Honestly, there's lots of other configuration tools that will also kill a custom config. Over all though, it is my opinion Yast is still the best administrative interface ever to come out of Linux projects.

A distro built with server usage in mind is Red Hat (which after going commercial has spawned the Fedora project). I haven't used a recent version of Fedora, so I'm not really qualified to critique it.

I hope this has helped you in your choice some way.

[newtech]

Thanks for the advice. I went on and installed ubuntu server on an old system then, I got the idea to do it in a virtual machine. I have not had a real good experiance with vmware and windows. So i just dual booted my main desktop with ubuntu desktop and installed the linux version of vmware. I have a vmware ubuntu desktop and a vmware ubuntu server installed and my computer and it is runnung smooth. Its amazing how less memory this uses than windows. I have not had a crash with it runnung to vm so its good now. I bleleive this will make it easier for me to learn more about the Ubuntu server having it running on one monitor and me finding tutorials in the other. Thanks alot jonathan183, and D-cat for all you help and I am going to check out Suse next.

[D-cat]

Using VM's is smart. As long as you have the capability, it's excellent for learning what you're going to be up against. Saving your VM image to a CD (or DVD) once it a while is not a bad idea either, just to make an easy restore if you mess something up.

[Bemk]

I am using Ubuntu 8.04 server for my server business, and installing a graphical interface is quite easy, just do

sudo apt-get install openbox

and the graphical interface will be installed.

I haven't yet tried Suse, but I hear good things about it.

You pointed out the memory usage in Linux and that's one of the great strengths of Linux. Linux has got a very efficient way to manage it's memory and processes. I think the Linux developers have done a great job there.

I used windows before and I always got into trouble when I had more than 5 windows open, now I am having 4 desks and per desk about 5 windows. Wow, I still need to see Windows beat that (I've heard though that the Win 7 memory management will be more Unix like, I haven't seen it since my laptop doesn't have enough memory to boot the disk XD).

[coopstah13]

i'm using ubuntu server at work for a bunch of different things, I have them installed in VM's, I did minimal installs and added X and a lightweight window manager (fvwm-crystal) and my machine is running with ~45mb ram