Re: Re:What version of Linux?

Christian Reiniger <creinig@mayn.de> wrote: > > On Friday 02 February 2001 05:32, John Hinsley wrote: > > > > I want to install my personal server on a old Intel 486 machine, 36 > > > Mb RAM, 2 Gb HardDisk, VGA, to develop in PHP. What version of Linux > > > do I need to install? > > > But I'm unsure of what you "really" intend using this machine for. Do > > you really want a home network (in which case conventional wisdom > > suggests that the server should be the most powerful box on site) or > > Well, you'll have great trouble getting several 100k hits per day on a > home server, so a small machine completely suffices :) Yes, yes. But you assume that our friend wants to use the 486 box as an Intranet server, to run cgi and php scripts on, and punt out HTML documents to the rest of his network, and pretty much that alone. I simply was _not_ prepared to make that assumption, which is why I asked for more detail :-0 Let me elaborate a little: Unless you have existing Win or Mac boxes (I omit Sun workstations and Ataris only because not many folk have them at home) that you want to pick up all this HTML stuff which Apache or whatever_your_choice_of_web_server is dishes out, it probably makes sense not to build a little 486 server, but to use the hard drive to put into a (more powerful) dual boot box: you can then run all your HTML stuff as localhost (and use a gui too!). You could then use your 486 as a firewall. If you're going to the hastle of building a home network, you might consider using the more powerful machine as an all singing, all dancing fileserver, application server and intranet server (pick your choice)! The 486 could be used as a Windows box connected to the server and/or as an X client (in which case 32Mb of RAM would be just fine). None of these solutions is "right" per se, but they do bear thinking about! Hence, again, the call for more detail. -- ****************************************************************************** Marx: "Why do Anarchists only drink herbal tea?" Proudhon: "Because all proper tea is theft." ******************************************************************************