As far as distros go, I use gentoo (www.gentoo.org) I switched when redhat8.0 wouldn't load on a server of mine. The forums on their website are amazing, and I haven't even had a problem that somebody couldn't fix. My suggestion is gentoo. I'm still a bit of a novice myself when it comes to Apache and Samba, so I'm prob not the guy for the job. If you had a bit of time maybe, but I'm still learning. What ver of windows are your running on your laptop? And just so you know, default installs of windows are horribly insecure. There's prob an account with a blank password somewhere, or you could be running 9x and they didn't even care about security then. Yeah, your http port will prob be getting hit daily with people trying to pull funny stuff, worms trying to hurt you, etc.. Sorry I can't be of anymore help...a decent samba referece is on O'Reilly's openbooks site, www.oreilly.com/opnebook; Using Samba, 2ed. Eric -----Original Message----- From: Pete Wason [mailto:rogue@hynoom.com] Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 2004 11:28 AM To: Worcester Linux Users Group Subject: Re: [Wlug] Repartitioning for Installfest Martin, Eric wrote:

What are you looking for as far as help?

I'm running RH8.0 on my server. a. I'm not sure if I should continue to use RH as support has expired, and I can't affort their enterprise version. b. I'm not sure of/satisfied with my Apache configuration c. I'm not sure of/satisfied with my Samba configuration d. I'm not sure of/satisfied with general file permissions as they relate to (b and c) e. I want to install tcpserver and qmail, and disable sendmail (which I'm not using anyway) Network: CAT-5 ethernet Server: Dell 600SC/RH8.0 (http, samba, sshd, etc.) Router: LinkSys BEFSR81, on a cablemodem... Wkstns: Pegasos I/Morphos 1.4 (samba server also, I think) Clone PC/Win2000 Pro (windows shares, printer) Amiga 3000D/AmigaOS3.1 (printer, accesses shares via smbfs) Amiga 3000D/AmigaOS3.1 (smbfs) Sony Vaio laptop/WinXP Home (windows shares) Questions, Comments: 1. Is it normal that my http port should be getting hit hundreds of times a day with intrusion attacks aimed at an NT server? Strange days indeed... 2. I also am constantly bombarded with hundreds of virus-infected spam messages; right now I'm using a mailserver in NJ -- when I get mine set up, I'll switch. 3. I find it strange and somewhat disturbing that if I have my laptop booted to the logon screen, I can connect to its shares via samba - without a password! Is this normal (read: goofy) windows security? 4. If I didn't have to spend all my time looking for a job, doing part-time work on the side, and acting as non-paid VP of an ill-fated (so far) software startup, I could just hunker down and learn all this stuff myself. Right now, that's not an option. Pete _______________________________________________ Wlug mailing list Wlug@mail.wlug.org http://mail.wlug.org/mailman/listinfo/wlug