Linux is the perfect operating system to deploy in a hostile
environment, the built in security features combined with the
customization most window managers allow make Linux ideally
suited to this task. Recently a local career planning agency
wanted to deploy a dozen public access Internet workstations at
various locations in the community including libraries and
hospitals. Linux was chosen as the operating system for the
task. This article provides details about how to setup Linux so
that it can safely be deployed as a public access workstation.
When it came time to decide on how to setup the workstations
various solutions were considered. It was decided before hand
that the hardware would be Intel-based PC's. That essentially
left us to consider the various Microsoft offerings or Unix. The
licensing costs for NT would have added significantly to the
projects budget. Even after buying NT licenses for each
workstation, an experienced administrator would have had to
spend time configuring and securing each NT