networking with linux

nephilim

Where I work, we are slowly crossing over to linux based softwares, and the install is fine, but the network is a pain in the !!!!, anyone got any tips on how to network a mass amount of computers with minimal hassle?

Regards

Neph

BillScarab

I don't think this is really the place to ask about setting up a network in a commercial environment for a 'mass' of computers. If no-one in your organization is capable of doing the work you either need to get people in or get people trained.

Having said that from a pure networking point of view it doesn't matter what OS the systems are running, the switches, routers and firewalls function the same.

For configuring interfaces on an actual Linux box try 'man ifconfig'

unrich

If you are not using static IP addresses then you will need a DHCP server.

I would suggest you look at SME (LINK) as an easy to configure server for file and print.

Its free, its linux.

Here's an overview.

Smirch_This

It's the same settings required as windows - just the dialogs looks different. IP networking on any platform is pretty straightforward.

Do you mean file sharing, network configuration, internet .... be more specific.

Conor_3

No it's not the same settings as Windows. You need to install the Samba Client to connect to Windows Shares and install the Samba Server to allow Windows computers to connect to shares on the Linux machine and then NFS for Linux to Linux sharing. You've then got to have user accounts with passwords on the windows machines that are mirrored on the linux machine.

In short, it can get fairly complicated. Ubuntu makes the best stab at being able to do this with the GUI although you'll still need to drop to CLI to do a su smbpasswd <username> -a. Mandriva's GUI tools just do nothing at all.

I gave up after several hours.

fwor

It gets worse if you use a firewall.

For example, I can get NFS-based file sharing between several PCs working fine, but turn on the iptables firewall - with the official NFS port(s) permitted - and it all stops working... I'm guessing that there's another port that NFS uses for auto-discovery that isn't properly documented, but I gave up at that stage...

unrich

I think SME has the windows bit in its i-bays.
And a firewall.
And its got a web based configuration system.

here's a howto link.