You have an isdn to your work station? if so why not throw up an old 486 with a distro you know and trust setup to do nat and firewalling and run what ever you like on your work station, that way your ws wont be slowed down if some smart arse decides to (d)dos you.
-- Karl Clements "Everyone is stupid, its just the degree that varies" <reply who="Penguin" date="Sat, 5 Jan 2002 19:31:23 +1100"> > Hmm, now I am not sure what to do ;) > > I haven't moved away from Debian, just thinking about it. I am very > particular about a nice tight base system, and just installing the stuff I > want, apart from KDE. The thing with Debian is that it sucks majorly for > modern PCs. I have an nVidia GeForce II 64M AGP card and Debian hates it. > Well, what I mean is that I need XFree 4.0.1 or higher, and when I try to > install these required XFree things at 4.1, it never works! I asked several > times if I had to install in a particular order, and it still says I can't do > it. Debian just pisses me off majorly in this regard. I am seriously thinking > of buying hardware around a distro, like getting a generic PCI TNT2 video > card ot an ATI or something that Linux installers can probe and install the > necessary stuff, and I don't need the latest XFree for. > > It's true that I don't want to sit here and become a bloody sysadmin just to > get the system running, I do just want to get stuff done. But I am security > concious and very paranoid. I have my firewall on tight security mode, only > allowing incomming HTTP from certain IPs and stuff. I also only allow ICMP > when necessary, I don't even allow ping (actually thinking of allowing ping > for those who I let use my HTTP port). > > Aside from that I am still stuck! Don't know what the hell to do. Never want > to go back to Windows, no way. So it's Linux or BSD. But I am not familiar > with BSD and don't really fancy running my 128K ISDN connection which is on > most of the time with a static IP with a new distro I am not familiar with. > > Cheers > James > > > On Saturday 05 January 2002 12:38 pm, Alan Vink wrote: > > Another Devils advocate, I agree with Stephen Borg. > > > > It is important to "understand" what you are doing when using any distro, > > with the more "efficient" or "modern" as someone called it distros - it is > > possible for people that do not understand to go wild and install services > > and apps with packages while never even thinking of possible ramifications > > and system compromises that this "loose cannon" approach can cause. > > > > I prefer to think of the more current Redhat distros as giving the average > > user alot of options, those that "understand" will install only what they > > need, possibly by selecting the packages individually from a requirements > > list or doing a scripted install. After that it is always important to > > "check" the core services. How are they installed, does that suit my > > application, are there any suggested updates, install a known good firewall > > config etc? > > > > It's also important to "understand" the release philsophy of distros, > > Redhat for one (opinion follows) get stuff out the door quick, Debian is > > far more conservative, and perform better QA (which I like personally). > > Work with past experiences and this *type* knowledge in mind at all times. > > > > By moving away from the more "modern" distros you will undoubtedly be less > > efficient on some areas of admin on a linux box. I believe that cutting > > down options is never a good thing, don't move away from Debian or Redhat > > for the wrong reasons. Both these distributions are commonly used and have > > a large user base - for good reason. > > > > Advice: Install the latest RH, be selective with the install, fix the stuff > > that is broken (most of it is available on www.redhat.com), update and note > > core services - you then have a base system that is current, well supported > > and you know whats running on it too. > > > > You never mentioned why you moved from Debian??? Many people stop there:~) > > > > Regards, > > Alan Vink > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of > > Karl Clements > > Sent: Saturday, 5 January 2002 10:43 AM > > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > Subject: Re: [SLUG] Slackware anybody? > > > > > > I have been using slackware on my gateway/firewall machne for the better > > part of a yer i think, it originated as rh5 then slack 4 now slack8, its > > good it stays up for days/weeks/months on end (subject to power outages). I > > had no problem getting it going at all on my gateway > > > > I also use slack8 on my workstation, i didn't want to have a bloated > > install so i installed mostly the base packages then downloaded and > > compiled them, there are advantages to downloading and compiling over a > > packagemanagment tool > > a) you know where it will end up > > b) you can optimise it for your system > > c) you configure it with options you want > > > > I did have some trouble getting X going on my workstation but that was > > primarily because my video card and monitor suck, but after spending > > 20-30mins reading the XF86Config man file i was able to write my own config > > that worked. > > > > I think slack is a good distro because it doesn't have the bloat of others, > > and it is very easy to install. > > > > As for your questions,video is a kernel thing, slack8 does have isdn > > packages (plus the kernel aspect) it comes with kde2.1.1 > -- > SLUG - Sydney Linux User Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ > More Info: http://lists.slug.org.au/listinfo/slug -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ More Info: http://lists.slug.org.au/listinfo/slug
