Linux based router/firewall

[Rifter]

Good evening all, im going to be setting up a home server mainly because i have alot of the hardware and want to learn the hardcore inner workings of linux. I have been a windows user for many years and know how to do all the things i am asking about in a windows enviorment(up to server 2003 anyways) but am completly clueless in linux.

Server hardware:

AMD 7750
2GB DDR2 1066
2 Intel gigabit NIC
OS drive 500GB
4 1.5TB Drives in RAID5

Server needs to accomplish:

DHCP server/routing
FTP server
HTTP server
Sharing RAID 5 array to linux and windows wired/wireless computers with read/write access on network(7 of them counting the PS3/laptops)
Caching Web Proxy server
Firewall
Print server(3 printers)


Currently am using a Tomato flashed WRT54GL for router, want this to be for wireless only and have server handle all wired connections as well as DHCP/firewall. Have a 8 port Gigabit switch.

What Linux Distro do you reccomend? i was going to use Mint because thats what i have been useing for my desktop for a year and am used to it now, have been waiting for Mint 8 64bit to be final.

What programs do you reccomend for software RAID? i hear linux software raid is great and want to try it out so i dont need to buy a $400+ RAID card.

What firewall do you reccomend? I want it to do packet sniffing/inspection. Will lock down ALL PORTS and only open what i need to, want to learn how to secure a linux network. Main reason for this is a HATE WITH A PASSION windows firewall, it has caused me nothing but trouble and want to have server run the firewall so i can get rid of windows firewall forever and not need to worry about securing each computer individually.

What FTP/HTTP servers are good? Apache?

What caching proxy programs are good, i hear Squid is great.

This does not need to be done overnight and will keep useing the router till i get server up and running so i can take as much time as i need to learn and configure it.

Currently have all server components except RAID 5 drives, just waiting to install OS and start screwing with it. I plan to read ALOT and i know i need to learn ALOT.

Might get into domain stuff later.

Any helpful website's or suggestions on where to start?

 

[gsaldivar]

I've had good experience doing most of what you described with eBox. If you're new to Linux, eBox will shorten the learning curve significantly, but as with any distro you will still have some learning to do if you want to do any major customization. I'm sure the RAID thing can be done with eBox but just might not be totally managed within the GUI. I would look through their docs and forums posts for others that have integrated RAID successfully.

IMHO your CPU seems overkill for all of the tasks you've described with the exception of software RAID. I think you'll be surprised at how light of a CPU footprint these tasks really are on a dedicated server. Presumably you would be running the server 24/7, you can save a bit of money on your energy bill by aiming for a lean & mean build. Again, I'm not sure about the processor load of software RAID, so you would have to test that yourself to find where the best bang-for-buck spot is.

http://www.ebox-platform.com/

http://trac.ebox-platform.com/wiki/Features

http://trac.ebox-platform.com/screenshots

Good luck!

 

[Rifter]

i know its CPU overkill, i just had it sitting so it cost me nothing.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I liked smoothwall when I wanted to play around with a linux firewall.

 

[her209]

Server needs to accomplish:

DHCP server/routing - dhcpd
FTP server - ftpd
HTTP server - httpd (Apache)
Sharing RAID 5 array to linux and windows wired/wireless computers with read/write access on network(7 of them counting the PS3/laptops)
Caching Web Proxy server - squid
Firewall - iptables
Print server(3 printers) - cupsd

For DNS, just use bind

 

[kornphlake]

Google is your friend for all things Linux, if you use www.google.com/linux it will pull results from only Linux related sites. I've had best luck looking at each component seperately, find everything you need to know about DHCP by searching google for dhcp3 server, get dhcp setup and running and test with multiple clients, then move on to squid, iptables, etc.


I find iptables very difficult to configure from the command line, it's not very intuitive and the config files don't offer enough guidance. I suggest you use a GUI for Iptables, I've used Firestarter as a GUI and had some success, it took some manual editing of config files to get everything working right. I haven't tried Smoothwall but it may be a better option.

 

[Rifter]

Thanks for all the help so far, doing some reading it seems ebox would work well, its for ubuntu by the looks of it and since Mint uses the same repos i think i can get it running under Mint.

 

[deaner]

I find iptables very difficult to configure from the command line, it's not very intuitive and the config files don't offer enough guidance. I suggest you use a GUI for Iptables, I've used Firestarter as a GUI and had some success, it took some manual editing of config files to get everything working right. I haven't tried Smoothwall but it may be a better option.

Yeah, iptables can be a pain, but once you learn, its not too bad from the terminal..

 

[NickOlsen8390]

I've been running 4x 1tb drives in software raid 5 for a long time. Have a server doing file serving and some other stuff. Its just running a base install of centos 5.4. Have separate boxes for dns web router ...ect..

 

[Rifter]

Hey guys whats a good filesystem for linux software RAID? i want something at least 64bit so i can have files larger than 2GB which a buddy told me is the limit of 32bit filesystems.

 

[Nothinman]

Hey guys whats a good filesystem for linux software RAID? i want something at least 64bit so i can have files larger than 2GB which a buddy told me is the limit of 32bit filesystems.

Pretty much all of the filesystems available for Linux, minus FAT and some special ones, allow files >4G.

Generally ext3 is the safe default that most distros choose, although I believe Ubuntu defaults to ext4 these days. I personally like XFS.

 

[gsaldivar]

Hey guys whats a good filesystem for linux software RAID? i want something at least 64bit so i can have files larger than 2GB which a buddy told me is the limit of 32bit filesystems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_systems#Limits

 

[Rifter]

Thanks guys, will go with ext4 it seems to be the default for mint 8.