Convert Desktop PC to Linux Network Storage&Home Web Ser

I have an old desktop pc that I dont really use now because I do everything on my laptop so I can carry it around with me. So my plan is to use it as a Network Storage. I have five computers in my house and they're all networked. But there is no one place to store data. I aslo want this computer to be a Home Web Server. This is one reason why I'm posting this here. Most web servers are linux. So whats the best free linux that will run Apache and PHP. I would want to be able to explore my server with an ip. Can this be done on a network?

yes. lol

posts like these are usually answered with a "try them and find one you like" answer, but heck - give this distro a try: CentOS

you may also be interested in looking at the desktop infrastructure part of the page for Solaris

Oh god no! Not Solaris! Anything but that -- well, ok not "anything".

So, as predicted, here is the ubiquitous "try them all" message.

Try them all -- they are ALL free (except the enterprise class versions) -- and decide for yourself which you prefer.

From a basic file-serving perspective, you are not going to see a great deal of difference, just try to pick one that does NOT boot into a GUI. If you have old hardware, you want to use your processing to handle ATA drive I/O, not put pretty graphics on a screen you will never need to look at. Boot into CLI, and run Samba for your CIFS sharing. That seems to be the easiest to install and configure.

Cheers.

*shrug* i've never tried it myself. i was going to install it one night but i fell asleep while it was preparing the installer and it was just being slow as dirt which is not fitting for my pc so i hit the reboot button :]


you may want to go to this site: http://www.zegeniestudios.net/ldc/
and see what that spits out for you, just for sh*ts and giggles, lol.

I went to CentOS and went to the download page. How long does it take to download these theres like 100 individual files (or more) did I hit a wrong link or is this the price one pays for a free OS, or is this CentOS way of making you buy the cd? lol

sigh... lol, go to http://www.centos.org, in the menu hover over "download" and click on "mirrors". click on the "CentOS 4 ISOs" link. its rather large and right in front of you, you can't miss it. next, you select your cpu architecture. it sounds like you're running a pc so its probably either going to be i386 or x86_64 and unless you have an Athlon64 cpu, you're going to want i386. so you click the link for i386 (it's the 4th link down starting at "Parent Directory" ). next, you should choose a mirror that is or seems close to your location. a.k.a. i'm guessing you dont live in hawaii so downloading from a mirror based in hawaii probably isn't what you want to do :] but click on one of the links for the mirrors (it's not going to matter tremendously which one you choose). i'm clicking the second link, http://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/l ... isos/i386/ and from there it brings you to the directory where the iso's and torrent files are stored for CentOS. if you want to download the ISOs directly from the server, go for it. it appears as though there is 4 disks so make sure you download all 4 ISOs. if you'd rather use the torrent files with a program such as bit torrent, bit tornado, utorrent, azureus, etc. go for it, its your choice. once you've downloaded the ISOs you're going to need to burn them to cd's. do you know how to do this?

Im guessing its not as simple as open the burner and drop the ISO file into the cd (burning from software such as Sonic)? If it is then, Yes I can burn cds

you just have to burn it as a disk image. most people try to burn the iso as a data cd and it fails miserably because thats not going to be bootable :]

i've never used this "sonic" software, but do you see an option on a main menu to burn a disk image?

Well, Im using Ubuntu. So far its good. Took me about 1 minute to work my way through the options to find where to find the Internet options but I was on the internet in 1 click so its got a Plus from me. I tried to just install the server verision but it froze on me so Im using the normal one. But it seem to be a server of it self, it has alot of network tools so Im going to be looking around and playing with it to see if i can get to to do what i want. But if you know anything about Ubuntu what you think I might need to work want to know please post,

Im now looking at how to install Apache httpd, MySQL and PHP. I found this tutorial http://www.hostlibrary.com/installing_a ... p_on_linux but im not sure how to get to a root directory. It seem that the commands they are using look like those of console.

ubuntu uses the sudo command. so in order to install apache (if its not already), i do believe you'd open a terminal and enter:
to install other programs or update the software, you'd do similar. enter: apt-get in a console to see the other options you can use. but remember, in order for apt-get to be able to execute you're going to need the sudo before it (i believe every time but i disliked ubuntu so i didn't have it installed long). you will have to enter your password that you use to logon after entering the command, but i believe you only have to enter it once per console session.

Okay I got Apache installed and I think I have MySQL. I installed them through a thing called Synaptic Package Manager. I still dont have php installed though.

When I go to my networking under Administration I am given some tabs.Connections General DNS Hosts Under DNS Im given an IP 192.168.0.1 I typed this into my browser and Im propted with a User and Password for DI-624. Does anyone know what this means? Or what the ip is used for? Its not my IP because my IP is 71.115.240.26

The reason I am asking this is I want to know how to connect to my Apache through another computer.

ahh, you have a D-Link router :]

when prompted try: Username admin, Password admin

try going to http://71.115.240.26 and see what you get. if you dont get your apache server then your router isn't forwarding port 80 to your pc. otherwise to test your server locally, go to http://localhost

synaptic is a wonderful program. i<3it :] i've used it in fedora and i like it far better than any yum gui.



mm...you'd probably also want to install mod_secure for apache. you should be able to do that through synaptic no prob., just do a search for it..

Where would I make it forward port 80 to my computer? Would it be in my D-Link setup? If it is would you have any idea where it is?

I went looking through my D Link settings and found some other IP's and being my self, very curieus, i typed them in. 192.168.0.100 gives me my apache directory. But for all I know only on my network.

Another thing is I cant edit anything in my www folder. It says im not the owner. Do you know where the settings to change this are? If you dont I'll go back home to the programers forum and ask there

Im on vacation from answer questions to asking them.

lol you remember that 192.168.0.1 that you found where you needed a username and password? all d-link routers have that, i'm pretty sure the defaults are admin & admin. i do believe thats what mine was until i changed it. but thats where you would want to go for port forwarding, placing your pc in the demilitarized zone (not recommended, lol), etc.

yes, your ip behind your router is 192.168.0.100. so is mine. my dad is 192.168.0.102 and my mom is 192.168.0.103 lol. if you have any other computers on your network, they will follow a similarly ascending order of ip addresses assigned automatically via dhcp.

you can't edit anything in your www folder because it's not lying - you're not the owner. that folder is owned by root. therefore if you wanted to copy a file from /home/spoof/Desktop to /var/www/html (i'm making these up, kinda, thats the path to my html folder but it may not necessarily be on your pc as i'm running FC5) then you would have to do: get it?
of course you could always make your user the owner of the folder but that is HIGHLY NOT recommended as if someone hacked your server but didn't get root privileges, they would have access to your html folder so they could deface the balls out of your site :]


one more thing - if you want your url to be more visually esthetic than http://abunchofnumbers lol i'd suggest heading over to http://www.dyndns.com/ and signing up for a free subdomain. all you do is create an account, enter your ip, choose whatever you want for your http://thisisyou.thisisthem.com and save (thats what i did, http://willc0de4food.is-a-geek.com ^_^ i love that..haha)
whenever you have a problem with access privileges, try re-entering the command with the word "sudo" in front of it and see what happens..



mm...another idea i just had for editing your website, you could go like: sudo gedit
and then gedit will open BUT it will have root privileges so therefore you have read-write access to anything on your hard drive :] just dont get TOO curious and modify something.. lol

Awesome, you have all the answers lol. I found that site when I was looking about how to do some stuff,lifehacker.com, This site is AMAZING It has everything about anything related to computers. Anyways.

I found -
DMZ (Demilitarized Zone) is used to allow a single computer on the LAN to be exposed to the Internet.

Is this the same as Port forwarding?



If Ozzu says im online them my computer is on. Can you test

travislperson.is-a-geek.com