From: John Gay (johngay at domain eircom.net)
Date: Fri 28 Sep 2001 - 00:20:33 IST
>Here's the question, would the ILUG like to take us on as a project ??
>My idea is that, with a few network cards, the 486 on linux could work
>as a router for internet traffic and run SAMBA ( I believe this would
>allow all PC's then to share the printer ).
>
As for using the 486's. One solution would be to use SmoothWall for a
firewall/Internet router. SmoothWall is specially designed for this type of
low-spec'd hardware. I believe that you should not run other services on the
firewall for security sake. E-Smith offers similar features plus file and
print server functions as well, but I've been told it was a bad idea to run
such services on your firewall.
>All PC's could then be used
>for internet access, as opposed to the primacy of the pentium right now.
>What do you think ? and more importantly Can/Will you help ?
>
A reference was made to the low power of your equipment. Linux does make
better use of older hardware, but Internet access for the common worker on
486 or Pentium class hardware is pushing it. Another idea is to use something
like the Linux Terminal Server Project www.ltsp.org and set-up the old
hardware as diskless clients running from a powerfull server. I am currently
working on the same idea for my daughters school, though I've hit a stumbling
block RE: floppy and CD access. The basic idea is:
Get a decent server setup with your favourite flavour of Linux, I prefer
Progeny/Debian but RedHat is also well supported. Add the ltsp package to the
server and check a few configs. The Documentation is very good.
The Cheap hardware then boots from bootproms on the network card, mount root
via NFS and then can connect to the server for X. Presto, Each 'Terminal'
gives a seperate login on the server presenting each user access directly to
the server and you only need to set-up the software on the server once and
all can use it. Be carefull, though. X can be hungry, even in this setup. For
KDE2.1 I found that 16M was the minimum for each terminal, but I have not
streched it yet.
>Best regards / Colm O'Gairbhith
I'm no expert, which is testimony for the LTSP. If I can do it, anyone can. I
use SmoothWall for my own firewall/Internet access and my 12 Year old
daughter has no problem with it. I can not make any comments on E-Smith. It
was reviewed in Linux Format recenty.
Hope this is helpful. If I can offer any more help, I'll try, but I've still
got to finish my own LTSP system as well and install a new kitchen.
Cheers,
John Gay
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.6 : Thu 06 Feb 2003 - 13:12:21 GMT