Distro/release for combined web filtering and fileserver

[OutToLunch]

At the moment I have our webfiltering running through the last free version of Censornet on an old Athlon 1Ghz desktop machine and have an extra fileserver (Ubunutu, was CentOS) set up for lunchtime games, digital photos, CD serving etc running also running on a desktop machine... I've just inherited some decent server hardware and would like to can both of these machines and combine the function into the one server.

Do any of the 'instant filter' type distros - e.g untangle/schoolguardian/smoothwall express etc provide the same functionality in web filtering terms (or better ideally!) as Censornet but also offer basic Samba shares with integration into AD?

This would be the ideal solution for me as although I'm comfortable hacking around in Linux, I'm nowhere near an expert. I'm assuming the last freebie version of Censornet may struggle to run on newer (SATA raid) hardware and as far as I know it doesn't support file serving hence looking around first...

If that's not an option, can anyone recommend a good distro + walkthrough for setting up a webfilter which can double as a fileserver?

Cheers.

[ahuxham]

eBox Platform

Perfect, modularized system, has AD/Samba/Shares/Dansguardian/Squid plugins.

Centrally managed

No need for a walkthrough, just follow instructions in the central panel.

http://ebox-platform.com/download/latest Download link, Ubuntu 8.04 + All Dependancies + Ebox Modules = ISO Image, and is installable

[OutToLunch]

That looks fantastic - thanks! Don't think I've ever seen it mentioned here at all... Cheers! Will definitely be giving it a whirl.

[ahuxham]

It is, its perfect for that it is, its complete for want of another word, if it weren't for already having a Debian Etch Squid Proxy server and it working, configured and going. I'd sooner move over.

Allows alot more control, and allows a better understanding, as there are no long hours reading guides, tutorials or man pages.

[Ric_]

If more flexibility were required, the other option would be to use VMWare or Xen and create two virtual servers on your box.

[OutToLunch]

Just digging through the users guide before downloading - do you have any idea if the web filtering is at user level or just a general web filter? As I'm reading it it seems to be the latter which would mean not being able to ban students from the net/unfilter for only teachers etc.

[ahuxham]

Originally Posted by OutToLunch

Just digging through the users guide before downloading - do you have any idea if the web filtering is at user level or just a general web filter? As I'm reading it it seems to be the latter which would mean not being able to ban students from the net/unfilter for only teachers etc.

As it runs Squid the above is possible, it may not have a front-end for unfiltering certain groups, but its only a simple ACL bypass you require in either dansguardian.conf or squid.conf.

Saying that, its not 100% foolproof, there are limitations, and you may have to get your hands dirty for it too work, but not by much saying that.

[ahuxham]

Just noted the user guide, and indeed it has limited options regarding group bypass and denying access, however as stated above, you can manually add these features, and they are thoroughly documented.

Or give it time to mature a bit more, new features and modules for Squid are being requested and more than likely implemented over time.

Add-on: Squid Module Filter Control Request