Fedora on company's small network

[gablaxian]

Hey all.

Quick bit of background: I recently got employed as a web designer for a small recruitment firm, and they have also expressed that I deal with their network, which is appalling at best. There are 5 computers in the office that are currently networked.

I'm fairly new to Linux, and network administrating in general, though i'm slowly migrating my own pc to linux, and recently used ndiswrapper to install a wifi card to give an indication as to my current level.
I'm determined to change their server from win2000 to Linux, and preferably Fedora. Since Red Hat provide subscriptions such as ES and AS, I was wondering if there are any legal implications to using Fedora and not a paid for business package. I see windows 2003 server needs a license and then you need to pay for more clients to use the server as well. I'd be grateful for any assistance you could provide.

thanks,
graham.

[fjleal]

Fedora is totally free. You can use as you wish, but you don't have any kind of technical support from Red Hat - you have these forums ;), and the Linux community of course, but not official support. If you buy Red Hat's ES/AS packages, then you have official support from them. Do you need it?

[tchung]

I can't really give you any legal advise on any subject but you should read following Fedora Core EULA (End User License Agreement) before using it:

FC1: http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/1/i386/os/eula.txt
FC2: http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/2/i386/os/eula.txt

Thomas

[gablaxian]

I recently finished a degree in Artificial Intelligence, which had me programming in Java, and C++, so I'm picking up linux quite quickly. I suppose the only problem I would have with linux is hardware support. I'm going to get my boss to buy a whole new PC, but it would probably be a pentium 4, nothing too new. I've had some issues with RAID on my machine and Fedora Core 1, where Anaconda wouldn't even boot to allow me to install until i turned off the RAID in the bios and i'm hoping I don't run into similar problems.

[fjleal]

I think hardware RAID isn't well supported under FC2 yet, due to the 2.6.x kernel. I remember reading something about it, a few months ago... Anyway, to test your boss' box (or any other) for compatibility, why don't you use a live distro before doing the full installation? I often use Slax. Knoppix is also nice for such purpose.

[crackers]

For a small office, RAID may be over-kill. If you need a file and printer server, yes, FCx is quite good for this situation. Just get a big enough hard-drive (or drives) for the file-sharing partition and make sure you back it up to an off-line medium (e.g. tape, CD, Iomega products, etc.). You can even leave the other workstations running Windows if the other folks balk at Linux (don't force them - you'll run into cognitive dissonance, which will ruin your efforts), but you'll need to make sure that your print/file-server is properly set up with the SAMBA server.

None of this is all that difficult, and there's plenty of on-line material about doing these things.

[fjleal]

Yes, I agree with crackers. Configure your FC2 server's Samba server as a PDC for Windows NT4, and you can even easily log in on Windows workstation (Win NT, 2K or XP Pro can belong to a NT4 domain). You won't have Active Directory, but a small network can live very well without it.

You can even leave the other workstations running Windows if the other folks balk at Linux (don't force them - you'll run into cognitive dissonance, which will ruin your efforts)
This is a very important subject! Forcing people to work in an environment they consider hostile is a huge mistake. Let'em see how Fedora works, show them an easy GUI like Gnome, and slowly they'll probably be willing to try it. And if they don't, your boss can probably afford a few Windows licenses... ;)

Back to RAID again, in a SOHO environment, the overhead created by a RAID system (maybe) isn't worth it. After all, for maximum safety, even with a RAID system, you better keep some backups outside of the server, even outside of the office. I already had power sources that fried and burned the boards, HDDs, FDD, CD-Roms, etc. that they were connected to. So what good would a RAID system have done for me in such situation? (I'm assuming we're talking about RAID 1, here...)

[kosmosik]

This is a very important subject! Forcing people to work in an environment they consider hostile is a huge mistake. Let'em see how Fedora works, show them an easy GUI like Gnome, and slowly they'll probably be willing to try it. And if they don't, your boss can probably afford a few Windows licenses... ;)
forcing anybody to do whatever is mistake IMHO. :) I have another view on that. you must explain to users, that the new "hostile" environment is in fact your company advantage, that it is better, cheaper, safer and so on. I mean that you should tell them that it is also part of their job in company to get used to this new things and work on it. that is what they are being paid for isn't it? to force some obstacles that go with job, educating themselfs is also with benefit for themselfs. they can put on their resume that they are familiar with using Linux. it is an advantage :) in my offices generaly people accept that and this is fine. some of my users are even content that they can learn something new.

as for RAID it depends on purpose. if you consider it as a HA it has benefits. as for efficency improvement I think SCSI (or SCSI RAID) is better than simple IDE RAID, or maybe consider even SATA (but choose hardware carefully as it is tricky with Linux) - is quite cheap and offers significant performance boost. but I bet on SCSI and good SAN... :)

[kosmosik]

as for burning hardware UPS is neat stuff too :PP and DVD burners - quite cheap storage for backup data... and it is easy to operate. just give a secretary or somebody instructions to change the disk daily, label it and put it to safe and it works automagical :)

[fjleal]

. just give a secretary or somebody instructions to change the disk daily, label it and put it to safe and ...
...you'll end up with a safe bunch of empty disks! :D

[kosmosik]

but copies are made at night :P

[fjleal]

but copies are made at night :P
Oh, sorry, I didn't understand well. I thought you were suggestion that it should be the secretary to make the backups, not just change the disks. :o

Well, secretaries have already way too much power in the office, anyway... ;)

[GreyGeek]

Fedora is GPL, so you can make and use as many copies as you wish. So is RHEL3, if you can get a hold of a copy that is installable --- but FC2 is more than adequate.

Like many others have suggested, don't force Microsurfties to use the Linux desktop. Let their PCs dual boot and let them dip their toes in the Linux partition every so often till they get used to it. Be sure you have the latest OpenOffice installed on the WinXX boxes, and remove Internet Explorer, replacing it with Mozilla (the version which includes the mail and news features), that way you can shutdown Exchange and keep your WinXX relatively safe.


Also, connect your network to the Internet using a Linux box setup as a server with security enabled and IP_FORWARD turned on. If you have a broadband connection use DHCP. Then all the users can browse the internet from their workstations at any time without using dialup.

[gablaxian]

Thanks guys, you've all been helpful. I'm still in the middle of building the company website, and I won't get round to dealing with the network until it's done. So you can expect me back here soon enough while I learn everything I need to before the big move ;)

Unfortunately, even if i wanted to, I won't be able to move many people onto linux, including the machine I work on, as I use Photoshop and Dreamweaver extensively, and some people use Quark Express (for the design of a magazine soon to be published). I have already started to sway people onto open source software, and I don't usually touch IE unless i'm testing the website layout. Pretty soon I should have my boss off Outlook and onto ThunderBird instead. Which is nice.

I have a lot of possibilites open to me for the network though. It is currently in such a bad state that I get to start all over again with whatever I want, provided I can get it all to glue together. I was thinking of purchasing a whole new PC for the server which would run Fedora, probably a Xeon single CPU machine. And I was thinking of using the awful pc that is the server now as a firewall only machine running LEAF, as I hear that's a pretty amazing piece of open source software. A quick question. Does the machine that runs LEAF need to be only running LEAF? or can you boot it into RAM then load up an OS?

thanks

[crackers]

There are plenty of "RAM-only" boot disks and CD's that run firewalls. They actually do need an OS to run, so the OS is already loaded. If you want your firewall/router to do other things, just set it up as a "regular" Fedora server with the other stuff you want (like Apache, etc.) and then use Firestarter or Guidedog/Guarddog to set up the firewall/router services. All that "stuff" that makes up a firewall and router is already there in the OS...

[chiringuito]

Unfortunately, even if i wanted to, I won't be able to move many people onto linux, including the machine I work on, as I use Photoshop and Dreamweaver extensively, and some people use Quark Express (for the design of a magazine soon to be published).

Look at either WINE, or Crossover Office (www.codeweavers.com)

I run Photoshop (could use Gimp instead), Dreamweaver, and Office on FC2.. works pretty well...