Super_Pollos Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 Ok, Ill be blunt, im a n00b, I freely admit it and want to gain knowledge(if you all dont flame me b4 you even read teh rest). I'm thinking of taking my old computer(Pentium ~233 w/MMX, 256mb PC133 RAM, 2 D-link 530 TX REV C NIC's, 2 6gb seagate PATA HDD's) Ive read about using an old comp as a firewall/proxy by installing a linux distro.( Plz dotn flame me, ive never used linux b4, as i only have really any experience on a windows only environment) What would be the best linux distro for a beginner and for a firewall? and dont tell me to look on google, ive tried that and teh usefull pages go way over my head as they expect previous knowlegde on linux. if you have any suggestions on the questions above please dont hesitate to tell me, and if you happen to find a good "Linux for N00bs" per say, website, inculde that too. Thnx for your time, Super_Pollos Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomeoneE1se Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 Noobs only get flamed for being stupid and asking for help to HAXZOR their school and friends and what not, but you asked a smart question and used grammar so you're good. my suggestion would be http://www.xubuntu.org/ and http://sourceforge.net/projects/php-proxy/ edit: Sorry I only read that you wanted a proxy. You might want to take a look at dd-wrt http://www.dd-wrt.org and http://www.graynetwork.org/ddwrtx86/ it runs on x86 now, so that would be a good one because it's very easy to manage with its web GUI. Or m0n0wall I've never used it but everyone says its really good. I know someone else can help out too. edit2: added dd-wrt on x86 tutorial link Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super_Pollos Posted December 30, 2006 Author Share Posted December 30, 2006 Ive heard about Ubuntu and its variants, i tried downloading that distro. but didn have time to and VM 2004 wont work on Xp home. Also, as a sidenote, i dont exactly want to haxor my schools network as the admin knows me and is my Computer science teacher next semester (Im Canadian) although i have scanned the NW on several occasions( just curious as to what ports are open, and wow there are a lot(even NetBios, eeep) I haven't done any thing malicious or blatantly violate the ToS and arouse suspicion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super_Pollos Posted December 30, 2006 Author Share Posted December 30, 2006 Anyone else have any suggestions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deveant Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 hmm ive got two. dont double post, just edit ur last. there is no need to talk about being a n00b unless being a n00b (in the OP, ur not being a n00b) oh shit better make that 3 suggestions. Check out: http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/Firewall-HOWTO Its rather good, and i have used it b4. Also it has all the config there so u can pretty much download what he tells u to then copy and past the configs and commands. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VaKo Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 You might want to look at debian or freebsd, not as easy as ubuntu by a long shot but far far better for this type of server work (plus i think Ubuntu is a bit crappy in general but this is MHO). And will probally work better on your hardware. As its a server you don't need a gui, just a SSH connection. Yes, your going to go "oh fuckit!" and reinstall about 30 times, but it will teach you more about unix style OS's than Ubuntu. And most importantly it will work perfectly as a proxy server/firewall. If your just looking for a simple firewall OS, then have a look at m0n0wall, smothwall, IPcop, PFsense etc. There specific *nix distro's tailored for firewall duties and once installed function pretty much like a regular router. Just a lot more noisy. Aside from monowall, which only uses a tiny amount of your HD, you should be able to find a proxy server addon for 1 of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super_Pollos Posted December 30, 2006 Author Share Posted December 30, 2006 thnx Vako, ill try smoothwall, and since i have another HDD to play with maybe ill put ubuntu 6.1 on it and learn more about linux. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nickisgod1 Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 if you are only using it for a firewall/proxy you may want to look into IPCOP or smoothwall. both have webgui config options and you will probably never neew to see a command line to get it running, both will run on old hardware quite well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SomeoneE1se Posted December 30, 2006 Share Posted December 30, 2006 ...your going to go "oh fuckit!" and reinstall about 30 times, but it will teach you more... I'm glad I'm not the only one who does this... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super_Pollos Posted December 31, 2006 Author Share Posted December 31, 2006 I installed smoothwall earlier it works great!, thnx for all the help, im gonna get that proxy add on to turn it into a proxy so i can use it at my friends house and have a secure connection. goodbye ~:> I should go and find another HDD to test M0n0wall on and to use as a temp area for my windows disk i have in my closet. Again, thnx for teh help, Andrew Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ain_Soph_Aur Posted January 10, 2007 Share Posted January 10, 2007 ...your going to go "oh fuckit!" and reinstall about 30 times, but it will teach you more... I'm glad I'm not the only one who does this... Hehe, I got about 7 distro installed in VMware, and even deleted some.... So, you'r not alone :p Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MojoD Posted January 11, 2007 Share Posted January 11, 2007 I installed smoothwall earlier it works great!, thnx for all the help, im gonna get that proxy add on to turn it into a proxy so i can use it at my friends house and have a secure connection. goodbye ~:> I should go and find another HDD to test M0n0wall on and to use as a temp area for my windows disk i have in my closet.Again, thnx for teh help, Andrew M0n0wall doesnt actually need a hard drive, just a cd drive and a floppy disk. Maybe its just me Ive had trouble getting Smoothwall to work consistently particularly the proxy, sometimes the browsers would use it, other times it would behave like it wasn't there and the rest of the time nothing worked. I'm fairly sure its the hardware though, old hardware only works to an extent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Famicoman Posted January 11, 2007 Share Posted January 11, 2007 As for the proxy, XAMPP and a PHP proxy will work on any distro. If anyone wants to delve into this further, submit it to Analog5 ;P Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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