Linux for Small Business (SmallBiz) SIG

The SmallBiz SIG focuses on how to make small businesses happy by installing Linux file, web, DNS, e-mail, and/or Internet sharing servers. Anyone who is installing or running Linux servers, or who wants to learn how, is welcome. Meetings are free, although a small donation may be requested to help pay for the space.

The next meeting will take place on Tuesday November 9th from 7:00pm to 9:00pm in the Screening Room at Digital Domain in Venice. Thanks to Digital Domain for providing this great space!

The agenda will be:

Introduce a typical customer: Chris Spencer. This is the fellow who would like to replace the win98-based webserver, fileserver, and Internet gateway his company uses. He has purchased one of those $200 Celeron boxes at Fry's, and is happily running Red Hat 6.1 on it. He'll bring the box in for this meeting.
Demonstration of installation and configuration of internet connection sharing with IP Masq.

If you have a laptop or fairly portable computer, we could use two to help with the IP Masq demonstration. If you want to bring your computer in, plan to show up early (6:00pm) if possible, so we can set them up properly. Bring your monitor, keyboard, and mouse, as there are no spares.

Directions:
Digital Domain is directly across Hampton Drive from the Rose Cafe, 220 Rose Ave, Venice, CA. The gate is on Hampton Drive, and there is a lighted blue sign saying "Digital Domain" right above the gate. The screening room is the large building just inside this gate to the right (south).

Parking may be available through the gate if it's open; otherwise, you'll have to fight for street parking. We will have a sign or a person posted at the gate to give you directions to the screening room. If a guard asks, say you're there for the Linux meeting.

If you get lost, the phone number in the screening room is 310-314-2973; you can call from the payphones in the parking lot of the Rose Cafe if you can't find the gate.

Mailing List

SmallBiz has a mailing list; visit http://onelist.com/community/lalugs-smallbiz to view the archives or join the list.

Resources

Samba Home Page
IP Chains HOWTO - how to set up a firewall. Here's the quick answer.
Usenet. The granddaddy of all bulletin boards. 25,000 newsgroups strong and growing. Your ISP should run an NNTP server you can connect to using the newsreader functionality built into Netscape's email client, or many other newsreaders, such as the news client that comes with KDE.
Deja.com - THE place to search Usenet for answers to odd questions. For Linux questions, use their power search page, and specify "*linux*" for the newsgroup (aka forum).
Running Linux -- Third Edition of the book by Matt Welsh et al. (Slashdot review)
Other Linux books from O'Reilly; "Learning Debian GNU/Linux" and "Learning Red Hat Linux" look promising.
Red Hat Linux 6 in Small Business -- new book by Paul Sery

Past Meetings

Thursday October 14th, Digital Domain

Thanks to Digital Domain for providing this great space at the last minute, and Kevin Cohen for helping set it up. The agenda was:

A short case study of one company which would like to replace a small win98-based webserver, fileserver, and Internet gateway with Linux.
Demonstration of installation and configuration of some of the services needed by that company (probably IP Masq and Samba, possibly Apache).

We successfully set up Samba, and demonstrated accessing the Samba server from a Windows box. Five or so people in the audience were experienced with Samba, and there was a lively exchange of tips. Ted from VA Linux came by and showed off one of their new 2U rack-mount systems, which looked really nice. Afterwards, a few of us went over to the ice cream place and then Koo-Koo-Roo's to chat. A good time was had by all.

Last change: 2 November 1999
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