Hey guys.

I am glad I found these forums. I was hoping some of you Linux Pro's could help me with my current project.

I need any information you can give me on building my own linux server. I do consider myself a Windows Professional as I am in the IT field. But this is my first real experience with Linux. I want to build a linux webserver using Redhat.

Answers I may need..

1. Is Redhat the best OS for me to use as a webserver? If not then please recommend me one. Suse?

2. How do I go about setting up the IP Address' for my domain names?

3. I will need to have PHP installed on the server as well. Any information on doing this will be helpful as well.

4. Any other comments or suggestions you can make will be very useful.

Thanks for your help and wish me luck on my new adventure.

jeffrey

1. Red Hat is a good choice, but given that the Web server you use will probably be Apache and that's more or less the same any distro you feel comfortable with will probably do. If you plan to run 3rd party proprietary software on your server, though, check and see if it supports whatever distribution you are planning yo use.

2. Do you mean how do you map foo.example.com to an IP address. You need to do that on your DNS server. If your DNS server runs BIND on some sorm of *nix then there are a ton of guides on the net. If you're using a Windows DNS server or a host like zoneedit there are GUI tools to do it. To set the IP address on a Linux box you use the ifconfig command. To make permanent changes you edit a config file. Unfortunately the config files are somewhat distro specific.

3. You can generally just install PHP via your distro's package manager. That should be fine unless you need some special setup.

4. Think about security! I highly advise running tripwire on publically available servers and that you consult one of the many server hardening guides available.

Another alternative is to use Ubuntu server. I believe it has a option to pick called LAMP Server which is Linux, Apache, PHP, and MySQL.

If you meant IP addresses for domain names to be for example.com (www.example.com, ftp.example.com, MX (ie mail) record), etc.) rather than foo.example.com as suggested by btmiller, you'll need an accepted nameserver. Check out zoneedit.com. They do free nameserving for up (I think) 5 domains.

If you like the idea of RedHat, but don't need [to pay for] their support, try CentOS. It's RedHat without the logos and support (but otherwise the same as I understand it). Visit centos.org.

Also, the following site has some really useful notes/tips on the various components you'll be needing.

http://www.linuxhomenetworking.com/#Linux%20Main


Rgds

http://www.clarkconnect.com/

this might be a good idea for you. Gives you a couple choices. Use the Home 3.2 Revision 1 (R1)ISO.

I was just in your exact same shoes. (still am actually a newbie, big learning curve). But anyway I am a programmer and knew linux commmands from being on the job but never had any experience setting up/administrating a linux server. I needed a server to host 4 of my own websites along with 4 or 5 more of my co-workers websites. I tried Ubuntu, FreeBSD, Debian, Suse, and finally settled on Mandriva 2006. I followed this guide The Perfect Setup - Mandriva 2006 Free Edition and was up and running in two hours. Now granted I have had to come back here and ask/research questions I had from these helpful guys at linuxquestions.org. (Still working on a postfix problem I am having, but everything is working like clockwork except postfix). The server outperforms my other windows server boxes and has been a great experience. Feel free to PM me if you run into any problems following that guide as I might (hopefully) be able to help since I have had to research just about any possible questions someone might have while following it. Mandriva has been a good choice for me.