UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

I work as the Systems Administrator for a reasonably large Company. We have just started setting up a WAN. Before this WAN setup started it was a tedious job to admin all our servers all over the country. Before I was officialy the "Systems Administrator" our previous guy setup our new SCO Box to serve all 116 users country wide. There is a big problem with this server. He has set it to Traditional security and it doesn't refresh the Logged in users tables. I know exaclty how to set up a decent system which will do more than just work, I have proved myself in the past by removing NT from this network and providing a smaller more capable Linux Fileserver.

I was woundering if anyone could give me a few ideas on how they set up their Unix servers to see if my plan is perfect or to see how crudy it is. I want to use /dev/u as the Rascal devision, /dev/cs3 as the CS3 division and /dev/home as a userbase directory. I also want to put samba on and use my fileserver as a Domain host. I will be implenting things like kerbos realms and the likes in the future. Does anyone have a fantastic way to set up a good clean, fast Unix Server that can beat my plans. Like for example what you do in your kernel performance tuning and directory structures, managing users etc...

Thanks

Building commerical IT architectures is not something that can be done in a forum. Your question "can you beat this or that" is impossible to answer because companies have so many resource factor that effect the architecture.

For example, two companies with the same basic mission, size, etc. may have different expertise or an invested training program with a strategic partner. In the same way, IT services are not purely technical, but a combination of technical requirements, business needs, existing resources, strategic partners, vendor relationship, local support based on geography. The list goes on forever.

To anwer a generic question about architecture without a complete architectural understanding of the organization is just a guess and could lead you down the wrong path because of unique constraints, requirements ......

Converting NT fileservers to samba may be a great idea; but when you leave the company, if they hire an NT expert, then the process may be repeated and the samba server will be moved to NT.

OK sure. I know what you mean completely. I was just after an idea or two so I may use it on my server. The plan so far is to build samba on to it and develop the directory structure to match my Linux box. SCO's directory structure quite frankly is not all that logical and not that easy to track.

I was hoping that someone that works for a much bigger company would be able to give me an idea or two on what they would use to set up thier servers, or how they would set it up to fit a WANs demands. We have a reasonably good server, not as big as I think we need but it will do the job. 1GB Ram, 2 833 P III CPUS and the Adaptec Ultra 160 SSCI Card. It does a fair amount of labour but our previous guy made a huge mess in the last build. I want to be able to leave for the UK with everything running smooth and with my admin assistant ready to take up the challenge of Systems Administrator.

Mashco are so impressed they don't even want to hear the name Windows NT or 2000, we had to reboot that damned NT box every couple days and all it was doing was servering email. MY linux box which serves 50 users email, files, intranet and even an accounting package runs with a 9Gig SSCI and 128MB Ram, an AMD k6 II 500 (Only machine I could get for it). Has performed so well, Mashco will not move back on to NT at all. It has tuned itself so well to the users even I am impressed.