hello, everyone, i am a Linux newbie, just two month in, and love it so far.....I installed redhat 9 with the server option, and installed all the servers in the package just for learning purposes...so far i setup up the HTTP, the vsftp, and the named.....all with problems!!!!, but thats where you guys come in

ok, so http is up and running, i can bring up my index.php page from my windows machine by ip only, and from the redhat box, in mozilla, i can type in my domain name in my address bar, and it will work......i think thats because i set up the BIND.....i think??......BUT WHY CAN'T I PING MY SERVER NAME..........my ServerName being www.(mydomain).com.....should i change that, is that the correct fromat for a server name.......i did alot of yahoo search before this!!!

ok, so ftp, i just need to be able to change a local user's permission to write to /var/www/html folder, and i don't know how to do that, and i can't seem to figure that one out either.....

and the BIND, all i did was setup the redhat 9 GUI....and i added the nameserver ns.(mydomain).com in the add nameserver section........but i can't ping my name server either.....

PLEASE HELP, OR LET ME KNOW WHERE I CAN GO TO READ AND LEARN MORE....I AM A CIS MAJOR ON BREAK FROM SCHOOL

thanks a lot

Hello semsem. Welcome to GIDForums.

This is more of a bind (linux) problem and this probably isn't the proper forum (we have a linux forum as well - I hang out there all the time ).

Anyway, I think the root of your problem is with bind. How many computers do you have running? Is www.(mydomain).com a public address or is it what you have named your linux box? If private, do you have an entry in your lookup for (mydomain).com?

As for changing priveleges on files. if this is what you are asking, use the chmod command. Make sure that your directories have the world executable bit shown as well or else ftp won't be able to access them. If you need more explanation with this let me know.

HTH,
d

thanks

i think the problem with the ping is that my linux box is not set to respond to them....i think the bind is configured properly, becaues in mozilla on my linux server box, if i type in my domain name (public domain by the way,i know i have to set the nameserver to point to mine, which is why i need to be able to ping it by servername), it brings up my index.php page.....from my windows box i have to use (http://24.117.xxx.xx), and it works...

i think i have to figure out how to set my linux box to listen for ping....

and i don't know any CHMOD commands!!!!! but i will now look it up, that i know where to start....thanks again

sam

Hi Sam. Just because your computer doesn't ping doesn't respond to pings doesn't mean that it should not be able to resolve the address from your windows box. Have you tried to ping by the ip address? Ping is disabled by alot of firewall settings by default. You need to set a rule to allow ICMP traffic from anywhere in your ruleset in order to allow a ping. If you are using iptables, I can give you the command to run for that.

How long ago did you set up your public ip address? Has it had time to propagate yet (about 24 hours)? Have you set your windows box to use your linux box as a name server?

chmod is fairly straight forward to use:

Mode is most easily remembered in most cases as a three digit number for:
Owner permissions
Group permissions
World permissions.

These numbers are generally from 0 to 7 consisting of the bit values:
4: Readable
2: Writeable
1: Executable
0: No permisions.

In your case if you want to open a folder wide open for the world to see and write to:

If you want to limit world access to read/execute then:

HTH,
d

thank you so much for the all the info.....you have no idea how greatfull...

i can ping my linux box only by IP from the windows box...i have only two machines....i decided not to network them yet......i have a cable internet connection that is split into two connections......the IP address of my linux box is really just an assigned IP address from the ISP's dhcp server....i can ping that IP with no problem....i also use that same IP in Internet Explorer to bring up my (index.php) page.....i still have to go into my domain managment and put in my nameserver's name.....and there is where the problem began to show its self....i CAN'T ping my Apache server name, or my DNS server name (ns.mydomain.com)......i set it up in the BINDconf GUI of redhat 9......

i went ahead and used chmod 777 /var/www/html....., so is there a way to make that folder read/write for just one specific user, or group??

thanks a million

sam

Since you can ping by IP address, then it is definitely resolution. When you say that you are assigned a IP address by DHCP that raises a red flag. Have you registered a domain name? Also, what nameserver is your windows box pointing to? Is this your ISP's name server or your own name server?


Okay, the other command is chown. There is also a chgrp command, but I use chown as it will allow you to specify both a owner (user) and a group at the same time.


Most users on your machine belong to a group called "users". So to change the folder to be owned by a user named my_name:


A neat little switch for both chown and chmod is -R. This will recursively change the owner or modes respectively for an entire directory tree, so


will change all of the contents of my_folder to be owned by "myuser" and set access privileges only for this user.

One last comment, if you have linux up and running don't forget about the man pages. You can man about any command in linux and get pretty detailed info about it.


HTH,
d

cool......i didn't know about the man pages, thank you very much for that

as far as the windows box, it is configured to detect settings auto....so it's nameserver is probably the ISP's.......

i do have a registered domain......and i know how to go and change the nameserver option........however, when i try to put in my nameserver (ns.mydomain.com), it says can't verify the existence of that nameserver...and that began this whole search......i tried to ping my nameserver, with no luck....then i tried to ping Apache by name, and also no luck......its very strange, because like i said.....Apache is up and running, and is set to (Listen *:80).....and does, i wrote a PHP/mysql script.....and it works with no problems from the windows machine, and a friend's machine...but like i said, only with http://24.117.xxx.xx

again, thanks you so much for your help

sam

Okay, is ns.mydomain.com a registered name as well? Or at least have you had your ISP add this entry to their name servers? I assume that ns.mydomain.com is supposed to point to your new linux machine?

Also, are you sure that your ISP has added www.mydomain.com to there nameservers? Generally, you will want a static IP address to do this and if they are using dynamic addressing they may not realize that you want to have a public address. They could do dynamic bind updating but that would be silly because it does take time for nameserver updates to propagate to the web. The other thing the may be doing is bootp to assign your MAC address the same IP address every time?

Does any of this make sense? I really think that the problem has got to be with the www.mydomain.com not resolving publicly. This points back to your ISP.

Sorry I can't give you clear answers on this. If you are going to set up a nameserver and have specific questions on that, I may be able to help you out with that.

Cheers,
d

[quote=dsmith]Also, are you sure that your ISP has added http://www.mydomain.com to there nameservers?

i don't think that http://www.mydomain.com has anything to do with this..because i used to host it on a virtual web server for $5 a month, and it worked fine.......actually, at the moment, http://www.mydomain.com is set to (ns.0101studentasp.com) nameserver..............that company however, is no longer in business, and their servers are all down......and i thought i might as well learn how to setup a web/nameservers because i have to learn it sooner or later!!!


like i said, its redhat 9 box, laptop actually!!!......i am planning to fool around on the laptop, and then build a dedicated server once i know all the ins and outs of it........ok, so again, i setup Apache server name to be (http://www.mydomain.com), and i can't ping that, or even use host command from the redhat terminal......i can't ping (ns.mydomain.com), i can't ping just mydomain.com either......however, i think BIND is setup correctly, because on the linux laptop, when open mozilla, and put it url http://mydomain.com, it brings up my index.php page......so the linux box knows that (mydomain.com) is handeled by nameserver (ns.mydomain.com)........the problem once again is that i can't change my domain managment to point to my nameserver (ns.mydomain.com), because it can't verify exsitance of nameserver


thanks again

sam

Sam. I am curious. Have you tried dig on your linux box?

This will give you results that may tell you what your problem is.

Here is sample output using J's site (gidforums.com).


I have added comments starting with <---

Basically, I run a private name server that can look up queries through the internet root servers. So if it does not find an entry in for a query in there, then it will go to the root servers, that then know how to direct a query. The only reason that you would run a public name server is if you are an ISP. You could probably register one but I have no idea of the process.

Again, based on the results of the dig, you may be able to find where your breakdown is.

I am thinking a tutorial on Bind and name servers may be nice here. What do you think?

Cheers,
d