NOS End-semester lab, need help/pointers/advice

Eulogy

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Back story:
I'm in an Operating Systems/Administrating class this semester. We pretty much didn't use the book, as the professor didn't like it. So we've just been doing mini-projects all semester. So, now with two classes to go, we have a big project to do, and no one is sure of how to do it. It's a "final project", and it involves everyone working on the same project.
So what is the project?
We've all been given a PC and we've loaded it with an OS. Here's the break down:
2x Fedora Core 1
2x Novell Netware 6.0
3x Win 2k3 server

The goal of the project is to get "as far as possible." in three classes. Seriously, that's what we were told, and the professor walked out, said she'd be back next week to see what we did and give us grades accordingly :eek:.
So, we're all pretty much lost. There's 7 of us in the class (one person per computer). So far, what we have done was installed the OSes and setup our IP scheme; that's it.
We have _no_ clue really where to go from here. Being that we've had only one other actual grade in the course, I believe this project is going to be a signifigant portion of it.
What do you guys suggest we do? Also, none of us have any real background with Netware, so anything we want to do we'll need help with :(. I've looked through our book, but I can pretty easily see why she doesn't like it - seems like it was written for a 6 year old.

So, I decided I'd write to you guys to see if any gurus out there can point us in a right direction with ideas, and if possible, links for help ;). I have the class again tonight at 1630 EST, then only one more next wednesday same time. Any help before then would be greatly appreciated.
 
i suggest asking her what "as far as possible" means. hope it isnt too late to ask, since your project is due soon.
 
santaliqueur said:
i suggest asking her what "as far as possible" means. hope it isnt too late to ask, since your project is due soon.
We have asked her several times... that's where the real brick wall is, since we don't have a direction to take.
She literally says "get as complex as you can in three classes."
It's pretty shitty, and she's normally a cool prof., but she's being crappy about this project. I know as long as we all look "busy" for the next couple of classes and get an A, but I'm actually interested in getting somewhere with it, and I'm not sure how busy I can look for the remaining 7 hours of class.
 
Hmm...does seem pretty vague. Just go ahead and have fun with it. Setup DHCP on a 2K3 box, do web on the FC, AD, eDirectory - theres tons of things you could do - printer queues, lots of stuff...
 
VeeDubbs said:
Hmm...does seem pretty vague. Just go ahead and have fun with it. Setup DHCP on a 2K3 box, do web on the FC, AD, eDirectory - theres tons of things you could do - printer queues, lots of stuff...
Well, we're doing a static IP scheme since it's all of 7 boxes with no path of growing ;).
Mostly I guess what I need help with is an idea of where to take this project - detailed idea. Should we setup a Novell box as a domain controller? Should we have everything authenticate to a win2k3 box? AD on the same box? DNS? I don't know :(.
 
Sounds like she wants to see a seven computer server farm. Setup failover, directory services, print services, file services, etc and integrate them across the whole spectrum. If you want complex, integrate the linux boxes with the windows boxes running as domain controllers, roaming accounts, etc.
 
Eulogy said:
What do you guys suggest we do?

Honestly? Before you finish the project and get a grade, write a letter to the head of the department and the dean of your school. Explain the overall structure of the course work and the lack of direction from the professor.

Be polite but try to explain your disappointment at having paid a considerable sum of money to be told "figure it out" and left to your own devices.

--

Now as to the actual systems, you could start by locking them down.
NSA Security Configuration Guides
http://www.nsa.gov/snac/downloads_all.cfm

Down near the bottom you'll find the:
The Windows Server 2003 - Security Guide, v2.1*

Since you're running three different OSes, consider setting up syslogging on all of them and dumping the info to one box. Stream lining some of your administration tasks by having all the information in one place.

Lastly - Fedora core 1? Really? I don't suppose there was a reason given for that, being that core 6 is the current version... heck, even 4 would have been stable.
 
Malk-a-mite said:
Honestly? Before you finish the project and get a grade, write a letter to the head of the department and the dean of your school. Explain the overall structure of the course work and the lack of direction from the professor.

Be polite but try to explain your disappointment at having paid a considerable sum of money to be told "figure it out" and left to your own devices.

--

Now as to the actual systems, you could start by locking them down.
NSA Security Configuration Guides
http://www.nsa.gov/snac/downloads_all.cfm

Down near the bottom you'll find the:
The Windows Server 2003 - Security Guide, v2.1*

Since you're running three different OSes, consider setting up syslogging on all of them and dumping the info to one box. Stream lining some of your administration tasks by having all the information in one place.

Lastly - Fedora core 1? Really? I don't suppose there was a reason given for that, being that core 6 is the current version... heck, even 4 would have been stable.
Sadly, we're using Core 1 because, get this, it's the one that came with the books, which were published in 2006!. Pretty sad huh? That, and Netware 6.0 make for some outdated OSes we're running.
That's not so bad though... we had to install win95 earlier in the course :eek:.

I've e-mailed my teacher one last time about getting an end-goal or direction. If she gives me the same thing, then letters will start pouring out. Until then though, I'm stuck with a shitty project :(.
 
Allllllllllrighty. Bit of an update from class last night.

Other Linux guy and myself decide to get Core 6. We told the teacher we were changing this and gave our reasons why, and she went along with it.
Spent all of 25 mins, ish, installing it on the two PCs, but that's neither here nor there.
With an hour left to go in the course, she tells us all that our end goal should be to get access to each "server" with authentication. That's pretty much the base goal, and anything beyond that is extra goodness.
So we setup samba and kerberos on the linux boxes and got that working for windows (both ways).

So, my questions are now these:

1) How to get Linux (Fedora Core 6) to connect to, and authenticate on Netware 6.0?
2) How to do the reversal of #1.
3) How to get Windows 2003 Server to connect to, and authenticate on Netware 6.0?
4) How to do the reversal of #3.

We'll have ~2.5 hours to implement all solutions needed, so ease and speed are priorty here. Doesn't need to be perfect, just needs to work when the class is all over.

I was thinking of looking for some LDAP (kerberos?) for Netware, but I don't know if that's a good direction to take?

Hopefully you guys can all help :cool: Thanks much.
 
yeah, i mean it's fine if she wants you to figure out HOW to do something on your own, but she's asking you to figure out WHAT to do. seems idiotic.

i would look at basic network services first. DCHP and DNS. choose one machine to set those up on. create a domain, and join the other machines to it. i imagine that's what she wants you to do- get as complex as you have time for deploying some standard network services. so start with DNS and move towards deploying a mail server and/or VPN.

Malk-a-mite said:
Honestly? Before you finish the project and get a grade, write a letter to the head of the department and the dean of your school. Explain the overall structure of the course work and the lack of direction from the professor.

Be polite but try to explain your disappointment at having paid a considerable sum of money to be told "figure it out" and left to your own devices.

--

Now as to the actual systems, you could start by locking them down.
NSA Security Configuration Guides
http://www.nsa.gov/snac/downloads_all.cfm

Down near the bottom you'll find the:
The Windows Server 2003 - Security Guide, v2.1*

Since you're running three different OSes, consider setting up syslogging on all of them and dumping the info to one box. Stream lining some of your administration tasks by having all the information in one place.

Lastly - Fedora core 1? Really? I don't suppose there was a reason given for that, being that core 6 is the current version... heck, even 4 would have been stable.
 
little late i know but, why didnt you just setup edir on the nw6 boxes with ldap. then setup ldap on the other os (linux, w2k3) and get communications working that way. You could have gone even further and setup dirxml for a complete communication interconnect. Hell you could have ran edir on each platform and been golden in about an hour.
 
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