Creating a linux based lan?

Energize

Energize

Energize

Caporegime
Joined
12 Mar 2004
Posts
29,952
Location
England
At a local charity I volunteer at, the network is in a bit of a disarray; currently I've got a Centos 6.4 box running as a file, web and database server for the lan, which mainly run windows XP. However users continue to save files to my documents or the desktop etc instead of the encrypted staff file share on the server, and recently there has been a spate of spyware infecting some of the PC's which I had to clear up. Not to mention how slow the xp machines have become over time...

So I thought maybe a good solution would be to switch the client PC's to a Linux OS and setup the server as a domain so that each user can have their own desktop mirrored onto whatever machine they go on?

They use Microsoft exchange I believe as an email client, would it be possible to setup an exchange server (or similar) on the Centos box so that users could access their email through their client as usual once they've logged on?
 
Good god man - do you have a death wish? You will be in a world of pain trying to get users to adapt to a linux-based desktop experience.

Just set up a Windows AD server, join the clients to the domain, and use group policy to redirect my docs/ desktop to an encrypted file share.

If they're that slow, just build a base image and deploy via WDS. Linux is not the silver bullet you're looking for in this case.
 
The problem is windows server costs money and I don't have another physical server to put it on.

They only use the internet browser, email client and basic office software, I'm sure even they can manage to use a distribution that mirrors the look of windows xp. :p

Never mind the malware issues that are so prevalent with Windows that I want to prevent, and the lack of os updates.
 
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Do they need Microsoft Office installed locally?

If they are a registered charity, you may be eligible for a free Office 365 subscription: http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/n...ice-365-for-nonprofits-plans-FX104081605.aspx

You could then connect to it using thunderbird and either use libre office or if they need MS office, there is an online version included in the Office 365 E1 subscription. It saves on server setup costs and admin overheads.
 
Yes, all software needs to be local as the internet connection is not reliable being on a farm pretty much in the middle of nowhere. I even installed a UPS on the server because of power cuts.
 
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