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Re: is iptables enough?



Hello,

On Wednesday 19 March 2003 11:44 am, Jones wrote:
> I am planning to replace a (dead) Windows 2000 computer that was used
> as a web server and email server with a Debian Linux solution.  This
> machine is connected to the net via DSL and would run apache and
> exim/qpopper and sshd.  Everything else would be turned off.  It is a
> small church and their current site is not very busy, but she says
> they do get a lot of email.

I would imagine that their 'lot of email' will be quite negligible to whatever 
server you can come up with.

> Am I right in assuming that iptabes is enough as a firewall solution
> and that I would not need to buy any additional software.  That is
> what I understand from my past experience with Debian/iptables as a
> server and from the files at debian.org security howto at
> (http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/securing-debian-howto/index.en.html)

Absolutely.  Dedicated firewall hardware in such a small installation would 
seem ridiculously paranoid, to me.  I'm not even sure what "additional 
software" you could consider.

> On a less related note, what hardware config would you recommend for
> such a system?  She has a number of machines that I could choose
> from.  Most of them are 1.x Ghz Pentium systems with 256MB RAM and 10
> GB IDE hard drives.  After increasing the RAM to 512MB, I think this
> should more than adequate for a system doing nothing but HTTP and
> SMTP/POP requests.

I'd say even without any additional RAM, you will be home free.  Doubling it 
will make it fly, but I strongly doubt you will see any noticeable swapping 
at 256.  The actual requirements of the installation you're describing are 
ridiculously small.

Good luck, and happy Debian-ing!

 - Keegan



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