Our Linux Systems

I've used and administered UNIX for years (in various flavours) on small and medium/large sized systems but never installed it from scratch.

It was therefore a very pleasant surprise just how easy it was to install. The target machine was an old Compaq 486/66 PC with 8MB and 60 Mb disk. Using (Caldera Open Linux) which came on a CD (free with a book on Linux) the installation, including planning the disk partitioning, took only about 30 minutes. Then I installed Informix Standard Engine (see Informix on Linux, below)

Our other system is running S.u.S.E 6.0 Linux, having been upgraded from the version 5.3 initially installed. The machine originally had Windows98 - low level formatting soon sorted that out ! The setup took longer overall than for the first system, mostly repartitioning the disk to get the usage right and install as much of the software as possible, especially X-windows and KDE.

This machine is also dual boot with NT4. LiLo, the Linux Loader, does a good job of controlling this.

It took me some time to get my 3-Com network card (3C509B) running on this configuration, the solution was to disable plug-and-play at the bios level. HTH

All this talk of Linux being a possible replacement to Windows seemed a little unlikely to me until I started using KDE, the desktop environment. I'll let you know how I get on but after many years of using telnet sessions It's a bit of a change and do I really need a full text editor for cutting code ?

The next project is to put on an old IBM 701 laptop (486, Butterfly Keyboard - no CD drive !) I'm encouraged by the web site I found about this.

For general information about Linux on Laptops this Texan site is a good resource.

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Informix on Linux

I currently have Informix Standard Engine on Linux (with ESQL/C) running on Caldera Open Linux and Informix OnLine Dynamic Server, version 7.3 on a Panrix (Pentium Celeron 333) using S.u.S.E 6.0 Linux

Informix, one of the major database suppliers, was an early adopter of Linux. The porting effort was strongly supported, some would say driven by, the user group. The latest version of Informix Foundation.2000 is available now on Linux, this provides object extensions and the 'datablades' with the traditional fast transaction processing engine.

You can get information straight from Informix plus some very useful configuration information at the International Informix Users Group Linux pages.

Performance is very good even with cooked files rather than raw disks. Due to lack of a tape drive I'm doing the database and logs backup to disk (although it's not my preferred method !!) Client server connectivity is fine using i-net and/or ODBC - don't forget the hosts & services file on the PC must have the same bits as on the server.

The multiple telnet sessions via ALT+F(N) are a most useful feature. I frequently use 1 to login as Informix (don't like to auto-start the engine as it's not always used) and the others as personal accounts or for an X-windows session.

Where are the Linux versions of OnPerf & OnCockpit ?

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Links to Linux Groups & Organisations

A good source of up-to-the minute news and views on Linux is www.linux.org. Also check out the Linux distributors own sites.

You may even be eligable for a refund on the cost of Windows, even if it was pre-installed.

Good technical books can be found at the O'Reilly Web Site Other technical areas covered are UNIX, Java, NT, HTML..... The list goes on.

It's hard to know just how many people are using Linux, the Linux Counter tries to do just that.

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What's the significance of the Penguin ?

The pengiun is recognised internationally as a logo for Linux

Information about the Linux penguin mascot can be found at PenguinPower !

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