[docholiday]

Hi,
I'm setting up a file/printer (and eventually web/mail) server for my home. I am thinking about going with a Linux distribution for my server.

I have 5 PCs (all XP Pro) and 4 Macs (all OS X) at home and want to have a solution that works well with Windows and also with Macs.

My questions:
1) Which distribution would be a good one to go for?
2) Would I use Samba for my networking? I know it will work with Windows, but will it work with Macs well too?
3) I also want to learn more about Unix in OS X. Is there any app/guide that will help me make the most out of the Linux-OSX relationship?

Thanx,
Doc Holiday

[Arkham_c]

1) As far as distributions, go with a major distro if you're a new user -- Red Hat or Mandrake. Some of the others (Debian, Slackware, etc) have specific advantages to power users, but for most people Mandrake or Red Hat are the easiest way to get up and running with Linux.

2) SAMBA is fine. If you get adventurous, Linux supports Appletalk and SAMBA on the same filesystem, so Macs can use Appletalk (AFP) and Windows can use SAMBA. You could also look into WebDAV, since both OSX and Windows support that as well.

3) OSX and Linux are very similar, so most things will translate between them. Stuff like NIS (using the same user accounts on both boxes) will work pretty well. Consider getting a "UNIX with OSX" type book. Others can recommend one.

[docholiday]

Thank you for the reply. I decided to go with Red Hat... I ordered the "Red Hat 9: Unleashed" book as well as an intro book to Unix in OS X.

The Red Hat book already has Red Hat 9.0 personal edition in it. Should I bother getting the Pro or will the Personal be enough?

[Ludovic Hirlimann]

Originally posted by docholiday:
Thank you for the reply. I decided to go with Red Hat... I ordered the "Red Hat 9: Unleashed" book as well as an intro book to Unix in OS X.

The Red Hat book already has Red Hat 9.0 personal edition in it. Should I bother getting the Pro or will the Personal be enough?

Personnal edition should be enough.

If I where you I'de choose no linux but the exellent FreeBSD.

[EnVoy]

You might want to look into Netatalk. From the Netatalk page:

A Unix system running netatalk is capable of serving multiple Macintosh clients simultaneously as an AppleTalk router, AppleShare file server, Unix print server and for accessing AppleTalk printers via Printer Access Protocol (PAP).

I run it on my Mandrake 9.1 machine, works great.

Netatalk site here

[m@]

you should note that there is a problem with NetaTalk and MacOSX. It has something to do with OS X using AppleShare 3.x and NetaTalk reverse engineering AppleShare 2.x and not having an idea about 3.x. Read there site as they have more info.

In theory you can mount the linux box shares as native apple shares, however the trouble comes when you want to copy files with really long file names. Which system files are so fond of. I started to use Deja Vu to backup 30 Gb HD over AppleShare(OS X)/NetaTalk(SuSE 8.2) and half of my files didn't backup!

There is also a problem with the way files with resource forks are split (on upload) and recombined (on download). As different network protocols use different file name. (there is a software solution to this but have forgotton the name)

I ended up using an NFS share from Linux and mounting it via NFSmanager before the backup.

SMB works, but is a bit flakey.

Please feel free to correct me as would really like a OS X'able NetaTalk.

[docholiday]

Originally posted by m@:
SMB works, but is a bit flakey.

I probably won't use Appletalk anyway. I thought Samba was the way to go.

So if Samba is a bit flakey (if you care to expand on that I'd greatly appreciate it), then what should program/protocols should I use for file sharing?

[m@]

I have just dont seam to very reliable connections with smb form OS X to Windows.

For my backup I needed the reliably, and didn't really want to keep mounting the server.

Where as with NFS I am connected to 6 5 SGI's and one Linux box and once set up it hasn't gone down. Is really nice to have remote directories seam local in your file structure.

Might be more stable as will be samba(linux) talking with samba(OS X).

[OreoCookie]

Works fine for me (both, OS X and FreeBSD running samba).

If you want to take a look at NFS, that should work for PCs as well, but you have to buy some software, I think. OS X works fine with that (simply connect nfs://[name of machine]/[name of shared directory].

[docholiday]

Alright.. my system is set and ready to go. I am using the GUI startup, but am learning the command line as I go. My system is a P3-1Ghz, 512MB RAM, 120+20GB Storage.

Yesterday a friend, who does a lot of webserving, came over to check out the sysetm and he was trying to convince me to go FreeBSD and ditch Linux. According to him FreeBSD is a lot less "bloated" and mature. Is that true?

Doc Holiday


PS. Thanx for all the advice guys.

[OreoCookie]

Yup, but it is not easy to set up if you are starting from zero and for yourself. But sounds like you got a friend that can help you.

It's not hard to set up, but the thing is that the small mistakes have cost me. BTW, I would run into the same problems if I was to set up Linux by hand. The only difference is that every Linux distro (and SuSE hasn't been mentioned yet which is excellent) has a graphical utility for that kind of stuff.

Plus FreeBSD is the reference platform for Darwin I like it.

[webvandals]

Man do I envy you guys! I spent literally 12 hours trying to get my RH9 volumes to mount on my Mac with 10.2. I tried NFS (with NSFManager on the Mac) and Samba. Just couldn't see anything. Nothing would show up on the the Mac's connect to server menu. I could ping the RH box, even transfer files with ftp. But no luck with Samba or NFS.

Can some kind soul recommend any tips/rescources for OSX/Linux networking? I really want to run my RH9 box headless as a file and print server. How should I approach this?

[utidjian]

Originally posted by webvandals:
Man do I envy you guys! I spent literally 12 hours trying to get my RH9 volumes to mount on my Mac with 10.2. I tried NFS (with NSFManager on the Mac) and Samba. Just couldn't see anything. Nothing would show up on the the Mac's connect to server menu. I could ping the RH box, even transfer files with ftp. But no luck with Samba or NFS.

Can some kind soul recommend any tips/rescources for OSX/Linux networking? I really want to run my RH9 box headless as a file and print server. How should I approach this?

Couple of questions...

Did you actually export any folders from the RH9 box deliberately? If not then your Mac won't be able to mount the NFS share. Is NFS running on the RH9 box? Did you configure any firewalling on the RH9 box?

Same questions for Samba.

If you have firewalling turned on on the RH9 box you will have to turn it off or reconfigure it to allow file sharing. You might as well just turn it off. For now (as root):

service iptables stop

So that it doesn't restart when you reboot:

chkconfig --level 2345 iptables off

which will turn off iptables in runlevels 2,3,4, and 5. To check which services are started and stopped in each runlevel:

chkconfig --list | less

(press Q to quit). To see which services are currently running:

service --status-all

RH9 also comes with netatalk though it is not installed by default. I forget which of the three CDs it is on but once you find it (as root):

rpm -ivh netatalk-1.5.5-6.i386.rpm
service atalk start

To make it so that the AFP service (called atalk) will start automatically after a reboot:

chkconfig --level 35 atalk on

Which will start the AFP service in runlevels 3 and 5. Runlevel 3 is non-GUI+networked, runlevel 5 is GUI+networked.

You should be able to mount the AFP shares without any problems. By default netatalk is configured to share /home/userid folders. So to mount your home folder from the RH9 box to a Mac that is running Mac OS 9 or earlier:

Apple menu --> Chooser --> AFP icon
type in the IP address of the RH9 box
when prompted type in your userid and password for the account you created for yourself on the RH9 box. A network share disk icon should appear on the desktop with your userid as the label.

Note: it will handle resource forks correctly but will be confused by files and folders with similar names. Such as "folder" and "Folder".

For a Mac OS X client:
Click on the Go menubar item then type in:

afp:/RH9.ip.add.ress
Then enter your userid and password. The rest is the same as for Mac OS 9.

I have been using Red Hat Linux from 6.2 to 9 for years to serve files and printers to Macs and never had a problem. I usually use netatalk but NFS and Samba also work. From one server I can share files to Windows, Macs, and Unix boxes.

[sweetsdream]

I say stick to Samba only. Netatalk dosn't work right and having NFS and SMB creates more open ports for hackers.

I have RedHat 9.0 with SMB running so that all my computers can share files (1 Win XP and 3 Macs). You can even 'connect to server' from your Mac, type in your user name and password and click the save password checkbox. After you connect, drag the desktop icon of the share to the dock to create a short cut.

Check out my article on how to create an iTunes server either here by searching or at:
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.p...30711140157143