September 2000 - openSUSE Edu - openSUSE Mailing Lists

Re: Skips
by adrian.wells 27 Sep '00

27 Sep '00

>> An ex-employer used to give us their old PC's, but because of a court case >> against them they had to be put into a skip. We removed them from there, >> which is actually stealing. >Very strange... my mind is boggling... Anything put into a skip becomes the property of the owner of the skip (unless I find someone filling my skip in which case they get it back! - usually on their front garden!). Kind Regards Adrian Wells _______________________________________ Systems Manager Sidcot School Oakridge Lane, Winscombe, Somerset BS25 1PD. Please reply to adrian.wells(a)sidcot.org.uk admin(a)sidcot.org.uk for general enquiries

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Wrapping up command line utilities as GUI apps ...
by kevin.taylor＠powerconv.alstom.com 27 Sep '00

27 Sep '00

Hi, Was reading about the following : http://www.hszk.bme.hu/~tz124/kaptain/ Basically, you provide a grammer file, describing the operation of the command line utility (options and so on), and this utility will wrap that all up in a GUI for you - so you get a GUI frontend (based on QT - it is a KDE app) to the command line tool. Sounds really interesting ... Anyone seen it or tried it for custom scripts ? Kevin.

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Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Recycling old PC's/Company Upgrading. - was Letter etc
by Nigel Metheringham 27 Sep '00

27 Sep '00

clive(a)tux-it.co.uk said: > An ex-employer used to give us their old PC's, but because of a court > case against them they had to be put into a skip. Very strange... my mind is boggling... > Another angle may be to study the eco-angle (there is a relevant > howto), then get your local environmental pressure group to do all the > collecting etc. for you. You may wish to read http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2000/09/18/toxic_pc/index.html for a US centric article (littered with words like U-Haul). There are references to (proposed?) EU legislation for Computer Manufacturers to be responsible for ultimate disposal. What is the current state on this... surely the actual content of PCs is such that they should be disposed of as hazardous waste rather than landfill. Our company removed some halon last year at an immense cost for disposal (and you need to ensure that you get appropriate disposal certs so that when the stuff turns up dumped somewhere you have evidence that you correctly disposed of it). The Ecology howto skips the subject of disposal and recyling... its aimed at running a computer with minimal environmental impact Linux Ecology HOWTO http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/Ecology-HOWTO.html Nigel. -- [ - Opinions expressed are personal and may not be shared by VData - ] [ Nigel Metheringham Nigel.Metheringham(a)VData.co.uk ] [ Phone: +44 1423 850000 Fax +44 1423 858866 ]

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Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Setting up a web proxy server
by Phillip Deackes 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

I really must thank all of you who have (and are still) responding to my request for help. I have printed out all the messages and as soon as we get the new machine we will get going with setting it all up. Wonderful support. Thanks again! -- Phillip Deackes Using Storm Linux

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Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Setting up a web proxy server
by Giles Nunn 26 Sep '00

26 Sep '00

It sounds as if the simple solution will suit you. Squid is very easy to set up. Under SuSE it comes ready to go, all you need to change is the line in /etc/squid.conf for cache_host to point to your IFL proxy. eg. cache_host IFL_proxy parent 3128 3130 using whatever name/IP and ports thay suggest. There is also Squid2 which is supposed to be better but has a slightly different syntax for the conf file. Under SuSE it comes set to deny access to all as the default. This needs changing to suit your requirements - for details see earlier comments on this list. I would expect most of this to apply in principle to any distro. I have only used Storm for a workstation so I don't know whether it includes Squid or Squid2 and how it is set up by default. If you haven't already got an intranet server you could consider setting up Apache on your proxy as well. Good luck, and let us know how you get on. ____________________________________ Giles Nunn - Network Manager Carms Schools ICT Development Centre Tel: +44 01239 710662 Fax: 710985 ____________________________________ On Mon, 25 Sep 2000, Phillip Deackes wrote: > Giles Nunn <giles(a)satproj.org.uk> wrote: > > > > Which distro are you intending to use? The all do the same job but > > vary in > > the tools used to set them up and the packages included. We used SuSE > > 6.3 > > for most of ours and squid comes as a package ready to install - all > > it > > needs is the access control lists editing. You haven't said whether > > you > > want your proxy to be used for access control or is it just to speed > > up > > the Internet? Our schools don't connect to IFL (that is what we are > > here > > to provide) but I believe that they do implement some form of content > > filtering. If you do need the access control function then you can use > > the > > facilities of RM Connect to disble access to the proxy settings in IE > > to > > stop anyone bypassing the proxy. If you need proxy settings for IFL > > then > > you will need to point squid at their filter as a parent cache. > > Haven't got as far as deciding on the distro yet. I am most familiar > with Debian and personally use Storm Linux, so I might go down this > route. I will post a message on the Debian mailing list so I can get > advice as to how easy the Debian squid package is to set up. > > Our access to the Internet is via the IFL proxy. We cannot bypass this > proxy unless IFL allow it for a paticular IP address in our range. > > I want to set up this proxy server to speed up Internet access. I have > no interest in content control - we are quite satisfied with IFL's > efforts. > > > -- > Phillip Deackes > Using Storm Linux

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Setting up a web proxy server
by Phillip Deackes 25 Sep '00

25 Sep '00

I have seen some messages on the list about setting up a web proxy server. I am ICT Coordinator in a Leicestershire High School and we are about to take delivery of a new RM PC which I would like to set up as a proxy server. I understand I would use squid. I have never set up anything like this before - I can install and configure Linux on an internet connected workstation standing on my head, but I still view networking as something of a black art! We currently run an RM 2.3 Connect network - 1 Windows NT server and around 40 Windows 95 workstations, most are Pentium 100 with 16 MB RAM (and don't we know it!!). As I understand it, I need two network cards on the new machine, one connected directly to our ISDN router, the other to our current network. I configure the new machine to talk to the router and all other machines on the network to talk to the new machine, hence all requests pass through the proxy server rather than directly to our ISP. I assume non-web traffic would pass through transparently. Excuse me if this is a little simplistic - I will have the use of a technician from another school for a few hours, although he knows very little about Linux. He is more knowledgeable about networking generally though. I would appreciate it if anyone could let me know of any useful web sites on this topic - I am sure some members of the list set up a help page for this sort of thing. Many thanks indeed for any help list members are able to offer. -- Phillip Deackes Gartree High School, Oadby Leicester

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Setting up a Web Proxy
by Matt Johnson 24 Sep '00

24 Sep '00

Hi, Just to mention what I did... I had the router plugged straight into a hub. I had the Proxy connected to the network (again obviously into a hub). You can do it therefore with one network card in your RM machine. I pointed all the Browsers on the clients to 172.16.103.1 (the proxy), port 8080 as their http proxy (advanced options in Netscape or IE. Maybe all this was technically slack. I don't know. In fact if it was bad...someone tell me...'cos I'm about to embark on the same plan at another school! But what I ended up with was a proxy server that cached pages and wasn't a router. It wasn't trying to be. You can do one without the other. It definately sped up the internet connection from the clients. They grabbed all their objects from the squid machine. Nice. But if the squid machine didn't have something, then off it went and grabbed it from the ISDN link to the outside world. Do you need this firewall 'two network cards' bit? If you have a managed service, you probably have your content filtered, and protection too. Just my spanner in the works. It wasn't hard to set up this way! If I'm wrong...let me know! -- Matt __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Send instant messages & get email alerts with Yahoo! Messenger. http://im.yahoo.com/

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RE: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Setting up a web proxy server
by Gary Stainburn 24 Sep '00

24 Sep '00

-----Original Message----- From: Phillip Deackes [SMTP:gsmh@gmx.co.uk] Sent: Sunday, September 24, 2000 10:58 AM To: suse-linux-uk-schools(a)suse.com Subject: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Setting up a web proxy server (disclaimer: Most of this is off the top of my head and is not a complete description) >I have seen some messages on the list about setting up a web proxy >server. I am ICT Coordinator in a Leicestershire High School and we are >about to take delivery of a new RM PC which I would like to set up as a >proxy server. I understand I would use squid. I have never set up >anything like this before - I can install and configure Linux on an >internet connected workstation standing on my head, but I still view >networking as something of a black art! Everything's a black art until you've done it twice - once to learn, once for it to work. Please don't be put off by the length of this response - I tend to waffle. The first problem you will come across is that Linux will only auto-detect the 1st NIC that it sees. You will have to tell it about the other one. In fact you will have to tell it about both because if you tell it about one it will not try to detect the other. You will need to tell it the IRQ and address for both cards. Unfortunately, the easiest way to do this is to boot DOS. Most NIC's come with a DOS diag disk. Simply boot DOS, run the diag program and write down the settings. To pass these details to the Linux kernel you need to add a line to /etc/lilo.conf and then re-run /sbin/lilo to apply the updates. An example line is : append="ether=12,0x300,eth0 ether=11,0x6600,eth1" I always use the same type of card as well, although as the example above shows (one is an ISA card, one is PCI) this is not essential. As you need to update/run Lilo this is best done after the Linux install. However, this will mean that Lilo has already configured one of the NIC's, so check which one it is, and make sure that you make this eth0 in Lilo. Once you have done the above steps and re-booted, you should then be able to use LinuxConf/Control Panel etc to configure both NICs. If you can't then you will have to do it manually. You will need to go the /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts and clone all the eth0 files for eth1 making appropriate changes. Next, you will need to set up a default route pointing to the ISDN router. It does not need a route to your network as it's already on it. You should now have a Linux box that itself can now access your internal network and can access the internet. However, the two networks cannot talk to each other. > >We currently run an RM 2.3 Connect network - 1 Windows NT server and >around 40 Windows 95 workstations, most are Pentium 100 with 16 MB RAM >(and don't we know it!!). As I understand it, I need two network cards >on the new machine, one connected directly to our ISDN router, the other >to our current network. I configure the new machine to talk to the >router and all other machines on the network to talk to the new machine, >hence all requests pass through the proxy server rather than directly to >our ISP. I assume non-web traffic would pass through transparently. Your basic idea is correct. Here is *MY* suggested way to proceed - there are many other. I don't know the RM Connect setup and you haven't supplied much in the way of config details so I'll have to make some assumtions. There are three possible setups that I can see you having: 1) each PC has a public IP address and talk directly to the ISDN Router 2) each PC has a private IP address and all traffic goes through the NT Server which perform Network Address Transaltion (NAT/Masquarading). 3) each PC has a private IP address and talks directly to the ISDN Router which does the NAT. If you have setup 1 then you will have big security problems as each and every PC will be accessable (read attackable) from the internet. Setup 2 and 3 will hide your PC's and present only one PC to the internet. My method will give you a network similar to setup 2 except that you will be using a Linux box instead of the NT box. To enable traffic to pass between the public (internet) and private (internal) networks you will need to turn on IP forwarding. Even if each PC has a public IP address I would still turn on IP Masquarading for the reason given above. The exact way to do this has changed between kernel 1 (ipfwadm) and kernel 2 (ipchains) releases so you will need to look up in the howto's how to do this, although I think it can now be done in Linuxconf. Once you've turned on IP forwarding for all services, you then need to turn it off again for www services (port 80, 8080, 8081) otherwise people will try to bypass your squid. Actually installing squid should be the easiest part. Either get the package for your distribution (.deb, .rpm etc.) or get the sources and compile it. Remember to add it to you start-up services so that if you reboot the PC it restarts squid. To do this, use Linuxconf or look at the /etc/rc.d tree structure. All you should need to do now it go to each PC and reconfigure the network gateway and turn on the proxy settings in internet explorer. That's it - all should be done. > >Excuse me if this is a little simplistic - I will have the use of a >technician from another school for a few hours, although he knows very >little about Linux. He is more knowledgeable about networking generally >though. > You have not mentioned the other services that you want to use. Have you looked at setting up a caching DNS service? What do you use for email? There are excelent howto's for setting these up on your Linux server. I would also strongly suggest that you install Port Sentry which is a deamon which looks out for incoming connections that look like possible attacks, and blocks that site's access. Reading the Security Howto is another must do. >I would appreciate it if anyone could let me know of any useful web >sites on this topic - I am sure some members of the list set up a help >page for this sort of thing. > The squid web site is http://www.squid-cache-org. The Howto's should be on the distribution CD and in /usr/doc if you chose to install the documentation. >Many thanks indeed for any help list members are able to offer. > > >-- >Phillip Deackes >Gartree High School, Oadby >Leicester ----------------------------------------- Gary Stainburn. Work: http://www.ringways.co.uk mailto:gary.stainburn@ringways.co.uk REVCOM: http://www.revcom.org.uk mailto:gary.stainburn@revcom.org.uk ----------------------------------------- Murphy's Laws: (327) Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will use it. -----------------------------------------

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Installing SuSE 6.4 on IBM Thinkpad 755CD Model 9545
by Alan Harris 22 Sep '00

22 Sep '00

Help Please, I'm trying to install SuSE 6.4 on an IBM Thinkpad 755CD. The Thinkpad has 40Mb Ram and 5.2 Gb Hdd. It also has a removable CD ROM/ FDD combination - I can either have the FDD or CD ROM drive in the bay but not both! It also has a D-Link PCMCIA Ethernet card installed (DE-660CT) which works under Windows '95 but not under Linux. I can get an install (after a fashion) by running setup from the CD ROM but am then unable to access the CD ROM drive. Any ideas any one? Alan Harris Network Manager Bryngwyn School Tel: 01554 750661 Fax: 01554 758255 Email: alanh(a)bryngwyn.carmarthen.sch.uk

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LinuxUser article - Opening Up Education
by Nigel Metheringham 22 Sep '00

22 Sep '00

Folks, I've not seen it mentioned on this list, so its worth pointing out a that there is a 3 page article in LinuxUser (Issue 3 - September 2000), basically covering Open Source in education, comparing the UK to Mexico, and covering a few things that will be familiar to many here (Powys servers, Becta, Roger Whittaker at Suse...) LinuxUser have previously posted all their articles on-line, but issue 3 is not there yet. I'm blind-copying this to their Editor to see if he wants to comment or make an online copy available. However LinuxUser does give away trial issues and is available on free subscription to qualified recipients (sorry I seem to have slipped into marketing mode... I'm not related to the company). Its the best UK based Linux Magazine I have seen to date - but it is *not* aimed at the home user or hacker, it says its aimed at "IT Decision Makers". There is also an article in the issue about open source in goverment. Nigel. -- [ - Opinions expressed are personal and may not be shared by VData - ] [ Nigel Metheringham Nigel.Metheringham(a)VData.co.uk ] [ Phone: +44 1423 850000 Fax +44 1423 858866 ]

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