John --
How specific is your question here?
1. Can Linux be installed over a LAN? Yes. Easily. I've done both Slackware
and Debian installs that way for years. Don't actually know about Caldera or
Red Hat.
2. Can Linux be installed over a WAN? Yes. Easily. Over the Internet, via
ftp, is one of the standard ways to install Debian, and I did it many times
before we set up our Debian mirror here. Again, I don't know abotu Caldera
or RH specifcially.
3. Can Linux be installed "on top of" Open Server? What does this mean
exactly? Linux would replace Open Server, requiring new filesystems and
replacement of all apps. The usual way to do a "network" install Linux is to
use one, or a few, boot disks (or a CD) to set up the drives and install a
small "base" system. This base system then handles the rest of the install.
I'd be surprised if any distribution had a system lying around to install
itself on a system already running SCO, but it might be possible to adapt
some existing system if needed -- certainly "several thousand" cutovers
justifies a bit of development effort.
4. Can Linux be installed remotely? I suspect this may be what you want to
know. I hesitate to say NO flat out ... but if it is possible, it would be
difficult. Somewhere in the process, you have to reboot the system to switch
from the SCO kernel to the Linux kernel ... and a reboot interrupts any
remote connection. If there is any problem with configuration of the new
system that reboots (wrong NIC driver, a small error in interface or routing
setup, etc.), there would be no way to get back on the system remotely to
fix it.
Probably your best bet would be to create a custom bootdisk (or CD-ROM) that
could be run at each site to boot the machine with a temporary filesystem,
repartion the hard disk, and do a network install. Again, this is definitely
doable in Slackware or Debian (albeit with some work), and probably could be
done with Caldera or Red Hat too.
This all assumes the hardware involved isn't too weird or limited. With
sufficiently limited systems, doing any install at all requires
inventiveness, and network installs wouldn't be possible. I'm assuming at
least 16 megs of RAM, mainly.
At 04:19 PM 8/10/00 -0700, Baskette, John wrote:
>Hello,
>
>The place where I am currently working is contemplating converting several
>thousand stores that have back office systems running on SCO Open Server
>5.0.5 over to some version of Linux. Probably Red Hat or Caldera. This is
>only preliminary discussion at this point. But someone asked me if Linux
>could be installed over a LAN (WAN?) on top of Open Server. Later this
>year, this company will be putting DSL into all their stores.
--
------------------------------------"Never tell me the odds!"---
Ray Olszewski -- Han Solo
Palo Alto, CA [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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