Since I settled on Ubuntu for my laptop, I haven't been paying a lot of attention to the various distros. And even when I was looking for that one, I didn't really look much at the server oriented distros. So I need a little help picking a server distro.

I've come across a couple mini-itx motherboards and will be making them into servers at home. I intend to do the normal server stuff, Apache, MySQL, etc. Since I'm trying to keep up my programming skills, Perl, Python and Java need support.

Now my limits. Like most people in today's economy, I don't have a lot of cash. I'm limited to 512 Meg of memory. I'm also limited to an 8 gig drive since I want it silent and will be using a CF card through an IDE adapter in these. If I require additional storage space, I'd like to make use of USB flash drives.

As for my experience. I've played around a bit with various distros. I've installed lots of distros on some home PCs, from Slackware to SimplyMEPIS to Debian. I've also installed Vector and Ubuntu on my laptop. I do a little bit of Linux administration at work, we use Red Hat.

So, what distros should I look into for this little project?

Thanks
F_M

I recommend CentOS. CentOS is a Red Hat clone. I run it on 512 meg of RAM and never have any memory problems. However I run it as a desktop and not a server so my experience is not exactly applicable to what you want to do.

My CentOS system takes up 3 gig of disk space without counting any user data or the swap partition (1 gig).

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Steve Stites

I recommend Gentoo [www.gentoo.org].

You pick exactly which features you want in the packages you want, and the Portage manager compiles them for you at install time. Easy to weed out programs and feature sets you don't need.

Thanks for the quick replies. I've thought about CentOS since I am more familiar with the Red Hat based distros than others. I'm not overly crazy about the rpm thing, but it isn't a deal breaker.

As for Gentoo. I know that many of the Gentoo folks are fanatics for that distro. I'm not completely sold on it, but I will look into Gentoo.

I don't have the compact flash cards yet, but it looks like my maximum drive size could end up being 4 gig. That's based on cost alone. I need to keep it pretty cheap. But I could stumble upon a great deal on CF cards.

Ubuntu-Server is an SELinux implementation and it is quite easy to install and configure. It is very secure and I have 6 servers running it now. I also have 4 servers running Slackware, 3 running Gentoo, 2 running Red Hat. Ubuntu-Server (AMD64) is now my preferred server.

You can set up and configure an Ubuntu-Server installation in about an hour.

One vote for AuroraCA's post. I use Ubuntu's server install on my server as well.

I do recall hearing that there was a server edition of Ubuntu. Can I run it without X? I seem to recall that I didn't have a choice when installing Ubuntu on my laptop. I'll do a little more digging on Ubuntu server.

Thanks

Ubuntu-Server is a separate download from the Desktop verison. It does not load or install any GUI interface by default. You can install a GUI interface over the Server edition and have both the dedicated server and a GUI Desktop but the GUI is not needed or desirable for a server from my point of view.

The installation of the Ubuntu-Server is via a text based menu program so it is easily set up. You have multiple options to set up a LAMP server, Mail server, OpenSSH server, etc.

For a walk thru of the install process see the HowToForge tutorial here:

http://www.howtoforge.com/perfect-server-ubuntu-8.10

Cool, thanks for that link. I'll make sure I take a good look at Ubuntu.

I still have a hurdle. The mini-ITX board has a CD connector, but it's a tiny little thing. I have to come up with a way to install. Wonder if I could burn to a flash drive and install from there.

You didn't say if you *want* a GUI or not. All of my servers are text mode only, to save resources.

I would normally say CentOS, but to better fit your requirements more flexibly, I'd suggest going with Debian. Normally, I'd say go with the STABLE version, currently Etch, but it's over a year old. Lenny was supposed to go STABLE a few months ago. Hopefully, it will in the next few. Our servers are a mix of Debian Etch, Debian Lenny and CentOS. Lenny is pretty much done IMHO... you should go with it.

If you want a super slim version of Debian, the Mepis people make a super-light version called AntiX. It's extremely light, but I'm not sure how fat it will get as you add services. Worth a look though.

http://www.mepiscommunity.org/en/node/64

Let us know what you decide on, I'd be curious to hear.

Thanks for that suggestion. I'll take a look at AntiX.

I won't really need a GUI once things are up and running. But it's not a deal killer. CentOS is a good idea since I work on Red Hat at work. I'll get a bit more practice.