[Wylug-help] Server Support

[Roger Greenwood]

> If you are thinking of installing an Apache server make sure it's on a
> different box. Firewall ? Wot's one of those ? Don't worry about that.
> Point and click configuration in fifteen minutes....
>
> http://www.pfsense.org/
>
> This is used by a lot of Government departments and big commercial
> organisation to keep out the nasties. My own contribution to the project
> was to write about it for IT magazines.
>
> --
>
> Richard
>
Thanks for the comments. Looks like pfsense needs to be on its own 
hardware, so not an option for me at the moment. I do have apache 
installed, but it will not be for external use.
Here is an update :-
As it turns out Ubuntu server includes postfix. I have since also 
installed dovecot and fetchmail (as this is a test and I need to get 
some mail from somewhere without affecting the existing system).
I have installed gnome, and used evolution locally to test sending 
(works). I can also collect mail using another machine using 
thunderbird. I installed webmin to help me get my head around all the 
different settings. I have ssh access from the lan and remotely, which I 
am trying to use for most of the time (using vi is not my kind of fun, 
but I am getting better).
I can access the machine desktop using vnc, if I have to.
Samba is now installed, but I have not yet worked out how to share the 
disk with a windows user. Also I can get at the existing windows box 
from the gnome desktop, but have not yet found the secret incantation 
that gets me a permanent mountpoint.
This is taking longer than it should, I know, but I am only able to play 
in my spare time.
I would appreciate any tips on the best methods of sharing a disk (now 
resized with gparted) with windows users, and how to set up a backup 
email system without getting into changing any MX records. I guess my 
problem is I need a deeper understanding of so many things at once.

Here are a few more things I currently take for granted with FTGate that 
I need to find solutions for :-

Easy additions to blacklist & whitelist
Safeword filtering bypass
Email archives (incl. retrieval/forwarding)
Email message logs (daily)
Spam filtering and quarantine system (Spamassassin ?)
Virus checking
Live monitoring (tail -F ?)

I have seen some attempts to package all of the above in a linux system, 
but would anyone recommend them or should I continue to roll my own?