What You Will Need

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To use this book and benefit from its examples, you'll need a computer with a Linux distribution installed on it. You'll be able to use this book no matter which distribution you have, but you will have to handle the installation yourself. See the chapters in Part Two for information on several common, popular distributions.

As for the computer hardware itself, almost any configuration will suffice; one of the beauties of Linux is that it will run on relatively modest hardware configurations. With one exception, every distribution, software package, and case study discussed in this book was installed and run on a system consisting of a middle-of-the-road processor, 128MB of memory, and a 30GB hard drive; this entire system (including a high-quality monitor!) was purchased for less than $1,000. While you wouldn't want to use this configuration for a production-level, enterprise-class server, it more than suffices for most uses—and it was even used exclusively to write this book. Oh, and the exception? Well, that was the firewall case study in Chapter 16, which was run on even more modest hardware.

Linux systems can unchain you from your PC and let you focus on actually making your computer solve your problems. Like all freedoms, though, this one is sometimes easy and sometimes challenging, but it's always exciting. This book will help you along that path. Congratulations on taking the Linux plunge; good luck, good reading, and happy computing! Try not to have too much fun along the way … .

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