Lindesk

The latest version of the popular Fedora Distribution was released today. From this release onwards, the word ‘Core’ is taken out of the name. Take the Fedora 7 Tour for more information about the latest release.

Fedora is a Linux-based operating system that showcases the latest in free and open source software. Fedora is always free for anyone to use, modify, and distribute. It is built by people across the globe who work together as a community: the Fedora Project.

Some Stats

• Linux kernel 2.6.21
• GNOME 2.18
• KDE 3.5.6
• Xorg 7.3

Download

• Torrents
• Mirrors

I would recommend that you use the torrent for downloading it. When Fedora 6 was released, the servers became inaccessible due to heavy traffic.

Links

• Fedora 7 released
• Release Notes
• Release Announcement

It is very easy to setup an internet connection sharing in Linux system using iptables. This method can be used to share an internet connection from a Linux system(I used Fedora Core 6, but it should work on other distributions that support iptables). Another method of doing this is using a proxy server like squid.

Enable IP forwarding

Run as root

sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1

To enable it in system startup, edit the file /etc/sysctl.conf and set

net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1

iptables

Run command as root

iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE
service iptables save

Configuration

The configuration should be like this

Router

Connected to the internet provider
IP : 192.168.1.1

Internet Connected System

eth0 (LAN Card 1)

Connected to router

• IP : 192.168.1.10
• Netmask : 255.255.255.0
• Gateway : 192.168.1.1 (IP of the router)

eth1 (LAN Card 2)

Connected to the other system

• IP : 192.168.0.20 (Not the same network as the first card)
• Netmask : 255.255.255.0
• Gateway : 192.168.1.1 (IP of the router)

Second System

LAN Card connected to the first system

• IP : 192.168.0.30
• Netmask : 255.255.255.0
• Gateway : 192.168.0.20 (IP of the second Card in the first system)

Disclaimer

Linux networks is not a subject I am an expert on. So take my advice with a pinch of salt. The above procedure worked for me. YMMV.

Status

Some results of various commands are shown here. Check to see if it matches the result on your system.

# iptables -t nat -L POSTROUTING
Chain POSTROUTING (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination
MASQUERADE  all  --  anywhere             anywhere

# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
1

# iptables -L
Chain INPUT (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain FORWARD (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination

Chain OUTPUT (policy ACCEPT)
target     prot opt source               destination

After a long delay and many problems, the debian team has finally released the fourth version of this very popular distro. Named Debian Etch, this new release will have a lot of new features like a new Graphical Installer, many new applications, etc.

Using a now fully integrated installation process, Debian GNU/Linux 4.0 comes with out-of-the-box support for encrypted partitions. This release introduces a newly developed graphical frontend to the installation system supporting scripts using composed characters and complex languages; the installation system for Debian GNU/Linux has now been translated to 58 languages.

I have been waiting for this for some time. I will review this distro as soon as I get my hands on it – that is after we have downloaded it. The guys in my local LUG group(ILug-Cochin) are going to be very exited