Another new server, Days 1 and 2

So I was recently contacted by a client to come in and install a server for them. Requirements:

• Repurpose existing hardware (i.e. no new hardware purchasing)
• File Server
• Program Versioning System
• Customer Relation Management

Gee, this is sounding familiar, and I wish I had checked here before starting the install, as I could have save myself some headaches from the perspective of Day 2. Since I am a day late in updating for this, I’ll recap Day 1 of this build.

After some consulting with the client, it was decided to use a net-top (micro-sized pc, Atom processor, limited memory and hard-drive) and an external 1TB hard drive. Only problem here, no internal or external CDROM drive, so took about an hour to figure how to put ubuntu-server on a jump drive for installation AND get the net-top to boot from USB. For the File Server, requirements were: a shared-folder/drive type setup, all employees have same access, so single-user account in Samba should do fine here. For the Program Versioning for their programming work, decided to use Subversion, and found a decent gui management tool for later. For the CRM, vtiger of course, since I’ve had previous experience with it. At the end of Day 1, here’s what I accomplished:

• Installed Ubuntu Server 10.04.1 i386
• Installed LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySql, Php), Samba, and OpenSSH
• Updated all the packages
• Fleshed out user requirements to plan on package installation
• Started Server Documentation

And now for Day 2:

“The essence of stupidity is performing the same action repeatedly, and expecting different results.” – author unknown

That pretty much describes the end of Day 2, in a nutshell. What I got accomplished:

• Installed the desktop packages for easy user performed administration
• Configured SSH
• Installed Webmin for easy administration
• Configured basic User Accounts
• Attempted both the binary and source installation for vtiger

The last bullet is the inspiration for the quote above, instead of referencing back to the previous posts of mine, I tried the same steps over again, expecting it to work nicely, and was met with the same problems just on the installation. Also side note: when I performed the earlier server install, I could have sworn I had seen an easy-to-use tool for administering and configuring Apache in Gnome; but for the life of me, I cannot remember the tool or location for it to try to use it again. Really made virtual hosts and apache2 configuring REALLY easy. Tried finding in Google searches and in Synaptic, but no such luck. Ah well, back to command line and Midnight Commander for me. Hmmm… wonder if Webmin is easy to configure Apache? Will see tomorrow.