Linux Enterprise Computing

Anyone new to Linux should visit www.linux.org. A general survey of commercial (as opposed to "free") applications for Linux can be found in the Linux Commercial-HOWTO; see also the Commercial Products page. The Linux Applications and Utilities Page is an excellent reference. A listing of visual apps & applets can be found at X: End of Story. Non-business-oriented applications can be found on the Scientific Applications on Linux page. General Linux documentation can be found at the Linux Documentation Project page. Finally, for completeness, see my raw, unedited list of Linux Bookmarks.

Commercial Listings

There are several lists of commercial establishments using and marketing Linux. If you are uncertain about the commercial viability of Linux, check these out.

• A rather decent-sized ( 133 branches) Korean Bank, Kwangju Bank, seems to have a massive Linux Electronic Commerce site.
• Linux Business Applications, a listing of companies using Linux.
• Powered by Linux!, a listing of companies using Linux.
• Linux Consultants
• Linux VAR's (Value-Added Resellers)
• The Linux Mall provides listings and sells a variety of products and services.

Databases

A good industrial-strength database server should offer transaction support, two-phase commit and rollback, automatic check-pointing, hardware and/or power-failure recovery, hot backups and replication, just for starters. But to put these features to use, one needs Report Generators, Query Tools, Web-to-Database Gateways, and sophisticated Administration Interfaces. Yes, there is a wide variety of such products for Linux.

Bug Tracking, Project Management, Help-Desk Automation

A list of project management and bug tracking tools for Linux.

Network Management

Linux Network Management Systems; primarily focused on SNMP based tools.

Clusters and SMP

Clustering interfaces -- a way of hooking up multiple CPU's for single-system login, load-balanced web-serving, load-balanced database queries. I have begun to collect available information on SMP and clustering. See also the Linux Threads FAQ. Some comments pertaining to load-balanced IP routing lie here.

LAN Networking

Any realistic deployment of Linux on the LAN requires peaceful co-existence of Linux with Windows (SMB/LanManager, Netware 3.x and Netware NDS) and Macintosh boxes (Appletalk). A variety of well-known tools are available: see the KKI Reference and the Linux Services for Mac and Windows Users page.

Configuration Management and Version Control

Version control and configuration management is one of the many hard parts of enterprise-wide computing.

• RCS is the default low-level version-locking tool in Linux. CVS is on of the more popular multi-user, distributed client-server version control tools. These are but two on the list of Linux Version Control Tools
• Cloning! Creating multiple, identical copies of a system can be hard work; it becomes even harder if patches and diffs need to be maintained. Multiply this by hundreds of computers ... and Unix sysadmins go crazy. The Working Version company has created a system version control and distribution mechanism to manage entire installed system versions. In particular, their version-controlled file system (yes, literally, a file system ...) caught my technical eye. Pretty amazing!

RAID

There are several options for RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) for Linux, from pure-software disk striping and mirroring, to RAID-capable SCSI controllers and outboard boxes. Storage management software is another issue. I've slapped together a quick survey. See also the CDFile CDROM Jukebox manager for the Kubik, Pioneer, Grundig and NSM jukeboxes.

Accounting, Electronic Commerce, Office Utilities

• C. Browne's List of Word Processors for Linux
• C. Browne's List of Spreadsheets for Linux
• C. Browne's List of Financial Software for Linux
• InfoFlex offers several Linux products; although it is not clear if theier General Ledger System has been ported to Linux.
• Credit Card Processing ... such as that from CCVS (Credit Card Verication System.
• Credit Card Processing ... such as that from BCSI.
• For Point-of-Sale accounting,invoicing & inventory management, see Qba (Qddb Business Application).
• Info-Power International offers a manufacturing/shop-floor and a general-ledger/accounting system for Linux, although the fact that it runs on Linux is not well-advertised on their web pages.
• The BATS ISP Billing and Tracking System from AstroArch
• A rather decent-sized ( 133 branches) Korean Bank, Kwangju Bank, Seems to have a massive Linux Electronic Commerce site.

LDAP

A Linux port of the standard LDAP Lightweight Directory Access Protocol can be down-loaded from:
ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/RPMS/ldap-3.3-1.i386.rpm
ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/RPMS/ldap-devel-3.3-1.i386.rpm
ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/SRPMS/ldap-3.3-1.src.rpm

Graphical System Management

Graphical/menu-driven system management tools -- configure disks, add devices, configure modems, SLIP/PPP, set up IP, mbone, firewalls, etc. from a menu.

• Red Hat's glint is one of the favorites ...
• Linuxconf
• The Offix project defines a drag-n-drop infrastructure for such tools.
• Figurine Configuration Modeler
• InfoMagic offers their Work-Group Server, a file/print server for $500 (this includes support), with a graphical management tool.

WAN Inter-Networking

Large companies with deep pockets buy expensive routers and switches to fill their WAN inter-networking needs. However, small enterprises, with 5-50 employees, might blanch at the thought of spending $20K or more for one of these boxes. For these folks, Linux needs a HOWTO for WAN Inter-networking which discusses X.25, Frame Relay, ISDN and ATM technologies and solutions.

• An over-view & pointers to Linux X.25 and Frame Relay resources.
• An extremely, very, very out-of-date Linux ISDN reference.
• Build a Linux VPN (Virtual Private Network) with SKIP, and the Linux implementation of SKIP, ENSKIP. The ENSKIP kernel module and encryption daemon build on top of the Linux firewall/masquerade technology to provide a WAN bridge between LAN segments.
• VPN's can also be built by combining firewalls with IPSEC.
• For airline host connectivity, including ALC, AX.25, P1024B, etc. the Northrop-Grumman line of products are recommended.

RAS - Reliability, Availability, Serviceability

A RAS-HOWTO is needed, that describes the tricks and techniques for maintaining a high-reliability, high-availability, easily serviceable and manageable system.

• The Linux High-Availability HOWTO describes a new project to add high-availability features to Linux.
• Please note the rapid response available from the linux security mailing list, and Linux CERT.
• Fault Tolerance, incl. redundant processor support, including redundant NFS, high-availability disks, disk mirroring, various RAID levels.
• Anecdotes about the largest linux installations around in terms of RAM, disk, network, cluster.

Please note Caldera is pursuing X/Open UNIX 95 (Spec 1170) branding for Linux. This includes POSIX.1 (FIPS 151-2) and XPG4 Base 95 (POSIX.2, FIPS 186).

Persistent Storage

Persistent Storage for Linux. A good persistent storage implementation would allow the computer to be powered off, and then powered back on, without interrupting the execution of programs.

Encryption

There is a European version of SKIP for Linux called ENSKIP. USA versions require an RSA license or a non-RSA algorithm. SKIP is a secure IP-level encryption scheme with some very nice high-availability features.

There is an implementation of the IPSEC standard for Linux by the University of Arizona. Currently, this implementation lacks automatic key management tools.

The more well-known, widely available Linux encryption packages listed below can be found on many Linux sites.

• PGP -- Pretty Good Privacy -- public key encryption.
• SSH -- secure shell, useful for point-to-point TCPIP encryption.
• SSL -- secure sockets layer. Non-USA users should look for SSLeay.

Large File support

Currently linux supports up to 4 terabytes of disk; but large file support is limited. But there is an upcoming standard for large files.

Performance

A need for accredited performance benchmarks is needed. Until then we will have to live with claims that Linux provides the fastest Ethernet on planet Earth, period, or that Linux beats SunOS(tm) and Solaris(tm) in performance, running natively on Sparc(tm) hardware. Data on the BYTE Magazine UNIX Benchmark is available from Silkroad. It would be nice to see TPM-A B and C figures ...

Graphing Tools

(OK this has nothing to do with enterprise computing, but this page is still under construction).

A simple yet powerful plotting/graphing API that could be embedded in cgi-bin scripts and/or X11 clients and/or /tcl/tk scripts and/or Java scripts. The goal such an API is to provide an infrastructure for all of the 2D graphing/plotting needs of (for example) a network-management package.

The Linux Graphics Mini-HOWTO lists the different packages available for plotting, graphing, 2D, 3D, etc. See also the faq from comp.graphics, or http://wusarchive.wustl.edu/graphics/graphics/

• YADE Yet Another Diagram Editor

Odds & Ends

An assortment of stuff that caught my eye:

• Software UNO provides a variety of tools for porting Windows applications to Linux.
• VBIX allows your Visual Basic programs to be easily ported to Linux.
• Scientific Applications on Linux
• The Silent Messenger is a paging gateway, ideal for high noise areas where an intercom does not work.
• A Linux wish-list of kernel enhancements is kept by Albert Cahalan. The list of Operating System Research Projects can be construed to be another sort of a wish-list for Linux.

Well Known References

• The Commercial HOWTO is a listing of commercial Linux applications.
• The DNS HOWTO describes how to configure Linux for DNS (Domain Name Services).
• The DOS Emu HOWTO describes the Linux MS-DOS emulator.
• The Firewall HOWTO describes how to set up a Linux firewall.
• The IPX HOWTO covers how to install and configure IPX, including the Novell Netware(tm) client and server.
• The SMB HOWTO describes how to configure the SMB (Session Message Block) protocol, also know as the NetBios or LanManager protocol. It allows a Linux box to act as a file and print server for Windows 3.11, Windows NT (tm) and Windows 95 (tm).
• The UPS HOWTO describes how to hook an UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) to a linux box.

The following lists relevant Mini-HOWTO's (shorter, less formal documents).

• The ADSM Backup Mini-HOWTO describes installing and configuring ADSM (IBM Adstar Distributed Storage Manager) client for Linux.
• The Large Disk Mini-HOWTO describes how to overcome BIOS limitations for large disks.
• The Multiple Disk Layout Mini-HOWTO describes considerations for multiple disk configurations.
• The Multiple Ethernet Card Mini-HOWTO describes how to plug in and configure more than one Ethernet card.

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