RJL,

I had the exact same problem with Mandrake and RedHat. After 2 weeks of wasting time with both distros I finally gave up.

The GUI's in both RH and MD just DON'T work correctly especially if you install a third party application like a firewall. I got the ICS working in MD and then turned on the firewall with one of the MD control panels and it killed my ICS.

These type of behaviors were totally unacceptable to me. I wasn't trying to do anything fancy. I just needed a print/file/web/mail server with ICS and a firewall. I was trying to replace an MS server in a running business.

I built a new box and was ready to give Linux a try. What a disappointment and a huge waste of time. I don't have time to continually tweak things (I don't understand most of it anyway). I just need to load and go.

Then I found a miracle.....The MS server replacement....Simple....Easy to configure....One easy to use configuration console...No frills distro called SME/e-smith.

I was loaded and configured in 30 minutes. Added users and transfered files in another 30 minutes. The server has been running flawlessly for over 6 weeks now. When I make a configuration change it actually works the first time. WOW what a concept.

If you need the linux box for more than just server purposes then this won't work. it has NO GUI's what so ever. You manage the server from a client hooked to the network with a web browser. But the server manager works very well. It even configures samba and works the first time.

Some people scoff at e-smith because nowhere does it mention the word Linux on boot or in the manager panel. But it works and I am happy to have found it. It's a TRUE replacement for MS Server and I can't complain about the price...

Thanks for your reply pfloor!!
I already came to the exact same conclusions as you did, but right now I'm out of the country for work....like you said, I needed it to install and run!

I might go for clarkconnect though, since it uses webmin, which is what I'm used to, but will definately try sme if I need it. (they are supposed to be simular in strenght)

Thanks again, sounds like you made the right choice

bbiagent all the way!

http://www.bbiagent.net

check it out: also do me a favor as a suggestion email to them that they should provide printer sharing

I've wasted the past two evenings on the same problem; one on Mandrake 9.1 and one on 9.0. I would have thought that there would be a fix for this by now...

My home server is on a dial-up and I share the connection with two other pc's, so it is a similar setup. I set my server up with Mandrake 8.2 about a year ago with shorewall, but the harddrive recently crashed, so I am now forced to re-install. When I setup my server with 8.2, I also had the same problem. After about a week of messing with it, I found this worked:

1. Install Mandrake 8.2 with only iproute and iptables under the fire wall section. I had to do a fresh install, I had no luck with uninstalling packages and reconfiguring stuff that was already there.
2. Download and install the current version of shorewall (it was 1.3.11 then).
3. Configure shorewall manually using the two-interfaces sample and shorewall documentation.
4. Whatever you do, DON'T USE THE INTERNET CONNECTION SHARING WIZARD. It not only will change the ip address, but will also mess up the shorewall configuration.

Devoid of the details, which I really don't remember from a year ago, this worked then on Mandrake 8.2. I was hoping that things had improved with a newer release, but I guess not. Since I have not found any other solution, I am going to attempt this with 9.0. (9.1 seems to have too much overhead and seriously affects perfomance on my old 200mhz server when KDE is running.)

I will post back with a detailed how-to if it is successful.

As I see it, Mandrake defaults to 192.168.1.1 and Windows insists on using 192.168.0.1 as the gateway. In my two Windows 2000 PCs, I changed the default gateway to 192.168.1.1

192.168.1 and 192.168.0 are two different subnets. They won't even see each other.

One way you could keep the two different defaults would be to change both subnet masks to 255.255.0.0 Then they would both be on the same subnet...otherwise, try changing the default gateway in Windoze to match that of the Linux box.

I'm failry new to Linux as well, but I know a teensie little bit about TCP/IP (and I DO mean a little bit)!

Hope this helps

erics

I have found that the only way to get the internet connection sharing is to go to mandrake control center and go through the internet connection sharing wizzard (reconfigure) every time I reboot. It tells me it finds a conflict in eth0.bak (i only have 1 lan card ..i use dial up:P ) and then it reconfigures a few scripts and dials my default connection. (as i like to see all the stats and have a visible gui i have the modem powerd up but disconnected from the phone line at this stage.) after it goes through all the setups it all works perfectly...untill i power down again.
its a pain in the butt but i live with it for the time being.
MrMagoo

MrMagoo,

Check this thread out. It is how I got my internet connection sharing working persistently on my Mandrake gateway.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...threadid=59434

Maybe it will help