[WEB4LIB] Advice on Linux

[Rich Kulawiec]

On Mon, Jun 03, 2002 at 09:52:33PM -0700, Charlie Irwin wrote:
> I'm thinking of trying Linux on my home machine. My thought is to add a hard
> drive to my machine and run it "dual-boot". Does anyone have any
> ideas/suggestions as to what favor Linux (ie Red-Hat, Mandrake, etc.) or
> tips, hints, etc? 

You might find this recent article helpful:

<a href="http://www.eweek.com/article/0,3658,s=702&a=27364,00.asp">3 Distributions Power Up Linux</a>

I think choosing among those will come down to your particular requirements
and preferences.

I'd also like to make two quasi-related recommendations:

1. If you're thinking of setting up a server (as opposed to your home
machine) then I'd strongly recommend considering OpenBSD instead of Linux.
It's quite mature (like FreeBSD and OpenBSD, it's based on the BSD series
of Unix operating system releases), runs on multiple platforms -- Intel,
Sparc, Alpha, etc. -- and has a STRONG emphasis on security.  Significant
security holes have been few and far between, with fixes issued very
promptly.  New releases occur roughly twice a year and a large supply
of precompiled software is freely available.  (And the usually plethora
of open-source software which compiles and runs on Linux, Solaris, HP-UX,
etc., does the same on OpenBSD.)

I think most people will find one of the Linux distributions (see article
referenced above) more to their liking for a desktop.  But for a server
that runs Apache/sendmail/postfix/ssh/BIND/proftpd/etc., it's really
hard to beat OpenBSD for reliability and security.  (Example: I have
a pair of OpenBSD/Sparc boxes that were booted and plugged into the 'net
in January 2001 and were still running without a reboot in March 2002
when it came time to move them.)  And anyone who's accustomed to doing
admin for Linux boxes can learn to admin *BSD boxes in a few days: same
song, different key.

2. You can of course download all of the Linux and *BSD distributions
for free and burn your own CDs provided you have sufficient bandwidth
and/or patience. ;-)   But if you don't, the place where I've been buying
my copies for several years is www.cheapbytes.com: good prices, decent
online store, fast delivery, clueful answers to inquiries, no spam.  They
tend to offer most products in two forms: (1) the manufacturer's full
product with documentation, support, etc. (2) the CheapBytes version:
"Here are the CD's that we burned from the download and our best wishes,
you're on your own."  I've bought both depending on the situation: (2) is
often considerably cheaper.

---Rsk
Rich Kulawiec
rsk at magpage.com