I finally got my internet back today. And I have a computer that nobody is using. It's an old piece of shit, that is 7 years old this christmas. I already deleted everything and erased the harddrive. It's one of those big giant iMac's that are colored and have a handle to throw it around. OS 9.2.2 it was. I'm thinking of making it my server, and Linux caught my eye. I heard Ubuntu is pretty nice, and they have a free server to use, so I think I'll give that a try. The harddrive is about 60GB.
I came here to ask for what you guys have done for home servers, and tips of what to do, and what not to do. I'm completely new to Linux. I've never even seen a computer with Linux installed on it before. I heard from a friend of mine that it is better than mac (He used windows all his life, and switched to mac 2 years ago, and just recently switched to Linux), well he likes it more because it is user friendly, so I'm giving it a try.
Any type of information about Linux or Ubuntu would be greatly appreciated.

Ubuntu will not run on the CPU in that system. I'm not 100% sure, but I think you would probably be looking for a Linux distribution that has a PPC (PowerPC) version of it.

Why would you even use a shitty computer as a home brewed server in the first place?

Because we are poor and can

well...jw what ur setting up on the comp

It doesn't matter why I'm using it, and it doesn't matter what I'm using it for. What does matter is what works and what doesn't. If Ubuntu Server might not work, what would? I don't feel like burning a disk to install Ubuntu on it, and find out it doesn't even work.

It's good to hear that you got your internet back! Ubuntu Server does have a PPC distro, but they are no longer maintaining it. As for compatibility, I would check that out a bit more. It's hard to imagine, but one of those old iMacs is one of the main computers in my residence, running OS 10.4. I believe this is the latest Ubuntu Server for PPC Mac.

Hope we are still on for that website.

Yup, it's G3. The version there says G3, so I'll try that. I'll burn the disk tomorrow, and install it. Then play around with it until I get it to work.

There aren't really a whole lot of Linux distributions I see listed anywhere that support PowerPC and are still maintained. I did see a few listed somewhere, though. Here's a few from the list that would work with your system and would suit what you want to do, some of which may suit your level of experience. (not listed in any particular order)

Debian - http://www.debian.org/
Fedora - http://fedoraproject.org/
openSUSE - http://en.opensuse.org/
Yellow Dog Linux (based on Fedora) - http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/products/ydl/

I have personally tried out those first two I listed, but not the others. I've been using Debian for my server I have over here.

I actually found a really nice free host. With PHP, MySQL, Files, E-mails, no ads, and almost everything you could ask for. I'm slowly moving all my files into it. Progress is moving pretty good. I'll give you a link to it when you are on MSN. All we would need to buy is a domain name, for about $5.00/year. Cheap eh?

The forums is almost done. That only took about a week or so. All I really need to do is make it all look nice.

www.hostmonster.com is badass.

300 gigs of file storage
300 gigs of bandwidth per month.
5000 email accounts
999 subdomains
999 parked domains
999 addon domains
9999 FTP accounts
100 SQL Databases
999 mailing lists


Schweet. Only about $120 for two-years of having it.

Re-register for like $10 a year afterwards.