OK - The questions you asked could take months to answer and debate. The
critical question you did not ask is:
What services (especially email) are they running?
If they are running something that is Netware only you will have to deal
with the possibility of retraining them. If they are running something that
will run well under Linux (ie Lotus Notes) then you are OK. This is one of
the biggest problems you will have in doing any type of migration. People
get used to an email system and getting them to change is a nightmare.
As for the answers to your questions:
Is Netware stable? Yes. It is stable in exactly the way that Windoze is
not.
Move to Linux? That depends on how much of Netware are they actually using.
If they have this whole big NDS setup it might be a pain. If they are using
it for simple file and print services, then no biggie. You might want to
take a look at the way that files are shared on the server system and see if
you can do the same thing under Linux. Netware has some extremely flexible
permissions and you might have to take a while to duplicate this.
Also realize that if they are running a NetWare network, there is a good
chance that they not running TCP/IP on their workstations, but rather
running the Novell protocols and using boundry services (or whatever it is
called these days) to translate to IP on the way out. It's like DHCP for
the TCP-impared.
Gateway and firewall? Plenty of Linux choices there. I would advise
setting aside a single machine just to do that however. Look in other posts
for setting up DMZs, etc. IT Management in a medium-sized corporation is a
lot different than in your own business. Trust me - been there, done that!
Also, before you recommend a jump to Linux, sound out the owner of the
company that is buying you out and the other IT managers there. If they are
not familiar with Linux then they probably are against it, and you will most
likely have to go through an education period before you can start bringing
it in.
Good Luck!
--------------------------
Warren Melnick
Director, Research & Development
Astata Corporation
(212) 584-5523
Fax: (212) 584-5580
"I worry about my child and the Internet all the time, even though she's too
young to have logged on yet. Here's what I worry about. I worry that 10 or
15 years from now, she will come to me and say 'Daddy, where were you when
they took freedom of the press away from the Internet?' " -Mike Godwin
Plan:
> cd /pub
> more beer
-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Horth [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Tuesday, October 31, 2000 3:41 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Kind of OT: (Redhat) Linux vs NetWare?
Hiya - pretty long posting for which I hope I won't get too flamed -
but I'm about to embark on a new employment venture and I need some
advice from all sides of the fence... please have a read if you've
got 5 minutes or so and are feeling charitable, curious or bored! :)
I've been a Linux sysadmin (not my main position description though -
I'm a computer graphics and visualisation person most of the time)
for approximately five years now - although it has been a fairly
casual affair as I own my own business and as such don't have the
pressure of being a sysadmin for a corporation. I feel that I'm
fairly experienced (I've managed to bring the systems to their knees
enough times by doing stupid rm -rf type tricks) with Linux / UNIX
administration and can handle most eventualities... sometimes with
the gracious help of our friends at [EMAIL PROTECTED]! :)
My experiences with UNIX to date have been approximately 0.9%
SGI/IRIX 0.1% Slackware and 99.0% Redhat Linux... I also have *very*
strong Macintosh system administration and moderate Windows 95/98
experience, and minimal 2000/NT experience. I feel that I'm able to
pick up new computer administration and operation concepts quite
rapidly and could most likely bluff my way through any situations I
don't really understand 100% by learning on the fly - as I have done
with most of my computer knowledge to date.
So... I've been plodding along happily running my own business (with
business partner - but he does mainly graphics stuff, I do more
business management and systems administration stuff) for a while now
- and a client that we've been doing about 75% of our work for over
the last year has proposed that they buy us out and that we go work
for them. This is kind of an interesting proposition for me as I have
never been "employed" by anyone as such before... Anyway - My
position is going to be "Manager - Technical Systems" and falling
under the banner of that title I'll be responsible for the management
of the company's IT needs, web site development, and other such
technical issues.
Now - finally - here comes the question! :) - I have gone in to
evaluate their setup and discovered that most of the workstations are
running windows NT, with a couple running 2000, and the file & print
server / internet gateway & firewall is running Novell NetWare. I've
heard of NetWare before - but never had the (dis?)pleasure of meeting
such a beast in the wild. One of my first tasks as we start
negotiating business takeover deals and employment contracts is to
take over responsibility for the IT management.
What I'm hoping you helpful folk will be able to help me with is:
1) Is NetWare a reasonable beast to administer, they have the license
already,
the setup is pretty stable (after 10 months of screwups & problems!) and
I'm
thinking that there is no point going in there and changing everything.
Will
I be able to us my prior sysadmin knowledge to guess how to do most
stuff?
Should I let the sleeping dog lie? Or should I try to teach it new
tricks?:)
2) I have to write a recommendation as to what we're going to do with
the LAN. I
really enjoy administering Linux. Are there better arguments as to why I
should migrate the services being provided to Linux? Can someone provide
me
with reference as to how NetWare performs vs Linux on the same hardware?
Oh
yeah - the server is a Compaq Proliant 1600 R so I'm pretty happy
that I will
be able to run Redhat on it with minimal fuss.
3) My gut feeling is that I should use the server as is, then gradually
migrate
the services over to a Linux box (one of our spare servers) one by
one, until
I can reformat the Proliant and set up a Redhat based server that I can
be
proud of! I was also thinking of improving redundancy by setting up a
separate firewall / dial-in Linux server, and a separate mail / web
server
from the SAMBA file server. Is this what you would do? Can NetWare do
appletalk or will I need to keep our Linux server running for that?
4) Can you point me in the direction of *any* documents dealing with NetWare
vs Linux, or any other information that will help me with this quest?
5) Are there any other questions I should have asked? :)
Thanks loads for reading this far, and thanks in advance for any info
anyone has to offer...
- dan.
--
Nitro - 3D Visualisation, Graphics & Animation
Ph (+61 2) 9810 5177 - Fx (+61 2) 9810 0199
http://www.nitro.com.au/
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