Hello, and thanks in advance for any future help on this. First and foremost please give me your opinions on what I want/should to do for security.

I would like to set up my system sp that the session times out and requires a password to unlock the screen. Also I would like a firewall and maybe virus detection just in case. I want to set up a guest user with minimal to no privileges. How should I go about doing this?

I don't exactly know what I should do for security on my Slackware machine. Please help. Some opinions would be nice.

Go to "Settings," then to "Screensaver" and set it up
as you would like. Simple enough.
You can download and install ClamAV for virus detection.
Check Alien Bob's site,

http://connie.slackware.com/~alien/slackbuilds/

for a recent version.

For various Xfce plugins check Mr. Workman's site,

http://rlworkman.net/pkgs/

Alien Bob has a firewall generator here:

http://connie.slackware.com/~alien/efg/

Follow the steps and save the resulting script to /etc/rc.d/rc.firewall and make it executable:

The firewall will start every time you start your machine. To start it immediately, do this:

Ok I tried it. The firewall generated according to my preferences. The firewall immediately cut off my internet connection and when I started it it gave me an error output as follows:

[code/]
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 9: Linux.: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 32: parameters.: command not found
Loading kernel modules ...
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 167: dhcp).: command not found
net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 188: interface: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 190: single-homed: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 192: configurations: command not found
net.ipv4.conf.all.rp_filter = 1
net.ipv4.icmp_echo_ignore_broadcasts = 1
net.ipv4.conf.all.accept_source_route = 0
net.ipv4.conf.all.secure_redirects = 1
net.ipv4.conf.all.log_martians = 1
Flushing Tables ...
Create and populate custom rule chains ...
iptables v1.4.3.2: option `-j' requires an argument
Try `iptables -h' or 'iptables --help' for more information.
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 398: LOG: command not found
iptables v1.4.3.2: option `-j' requires an argument
Try `iptables -h' or 'iptables --help' for more information.
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 400: DROP: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 492: -j: command not found
Process INPUT chain ...
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 563: -j: command not found
Process FORWARD chain ...
Process OUTPUT chain ...
Load rules for nat table ...
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 649: them: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 651: ability: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 654: another: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 656: host,: command not found
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 658: syntax error near unexpected token `in'
/etc/rc.d/rc.firewall: line 658: `in'
[/code]

In case you haven't noticed, I dont really know much in the way of scripting.

For your firewall, Quicktables still works...


http://qtables.radom.org/

Ok I think the firewall is running and working properly. I don't really know if it is even running. How do I tell whether or not it is actually running?

If you are directly connected to the internet without a gateway then you can try www.grc.com . If you have a router, it will just see what is happening with the router. From a terminal will tell you what ports are open.

It told me which ports are opened and closed but how does that tell me that the firewall is actually working?

It doesn't particularly. As I stated it will tell you which ports are open and closed, it can show you if your firewall IS NOT working.

http://www.howtoforge.com/test_your_...l_with_ftester looks like it has tools to test your firewall a little further.

You could also enable a service like XDMCP listening which the firewall is supposed to block, and then look to see what nmap has to say about the corresponding port.

Just restrict the list of groups that the guest user belongs to.

Did you do a full install of Slackware? This is the recommended method of installation for new users. The script itself is straightforward; I am no expert myself and I find it very easy to use.

If you are behind a router you should be safe to disable the executable bit on rc.firewall again and issue the following command to stop the firewall, if indeed it is running:

I can't help any more than that, unless you need advice on each question the firewall generator asks you, in which case I'd recommend you visit one of the relevant forums - perhaps networking or security.

I had it install everything except KDE and the other stuff that is directly related to KDE(like the multilingual support for it).

That was the previous firewall that was giving me error and stopping access to the internet. The Quick builds one that you gave me seems to be working fine. I followed the instructions and everything is good.

Did you use nano or similar text editor that cuts lines to fit into window? Same thing happened to me when I created my firewall. You just need to copy and paste the whole thing from generator with another editor that doesn't cut lines to fit into window. Or just fix the lines yourself.