wash your mouth out - Horst only uses Linux
n

Mark Evans wrote:
Horst,
        I must have missed something.
20 minutes from UNFORMATTED Hard Drive to working Server?
Can't be Microsoft....

Mark Evans
e-Health Development

-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Horst Herb
Sent: Friday, 31 March 2006 8:31 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; General Practice Computing Group Talk
Subject: Re: [GPCG_TALK] Re: A typical cycle of backups


On Thu, 30 Mar 2006 22:28, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

is there a linux alternative for thin clients , e.g. X window system, and a
windows


emulator , and using a common data directory in wine with md2  (


Four years ago when I bought the practice in Dorrigo I "inherited" 5 years worth of patient records in MDW.

First thing I did was setting up a Linux server, installing the Win4Lin TS emulation layer, installing a Win98SE image within the Win4Lin emulation, and using Linux desktops as clients in every room, accessing the "Windows" sessions running on the server via ssh forwarded X sessions (command "ssh -X <room>@my.server win"). I had the windows sessions configured per *room* and not per user, because that way the local printers (and scanners, via SANE->TWIN bridge !) never needed to be reconfigured

If I need a new server, I simply install Mepis Linux - a distro with Win4Lin pre-patched kernel (takes about 10 minutes on a spanking new server from the time you switch it on first time ever), install Win4Lin (takes about a minute via Internet, no more), insert my backup CD, run a single command from it that creates a virtual user for each room and copies the corresponding "Windows" images into each users home directory, which takes another 5 minutes.

All in all I can say that it honestly takes no longer than 20 minutes from the time I unwrap a brand new server with blank unformatted harddisk until it is set up in a way that I can just plug *any* computer capable of running the X protocol into our network, log in onto the new server as the room you are sitting in, and everything works automagically without any need for configuration (if you have a standalone print server in each room), else you need to create a script that
- downloads printer configuration (cups.conf and smb.conf)
- restarts cups and samba daemons
- then starts X session
(all of this might take 2 seconds, no more)

I always have locums dropping jaws when they can just plug in their own laptop, put in a Knoppix CD, boot from it - and 3 minutes later they are writing and printing scripts without configuring anything after typing in a single command, and nothing gets installed on their computers either. To them, it is pure magic. To me, it just simplifies network administration to the extreme.

Horst
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