The Perfect Server - Debian Lenny (Debian 5.0) With BIND & Dovecot [ISPConfig 3]

Version 1.1
Author: Falko Timme <ft [at] falkotimme [dot] com>
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Last edited 01/14/2011

This tutorial shows how to prepare a Debian Lenny (Debian 5.0) server for the installation of ISPConfig 3, and how to install ISPConfig 3. ISPConfig 3 is a webhosting control panel that allows you to configure the following services through a web browser: Apache web server, Postfix mail server, MySQL, BIND nameserver, PureFTPd, SpamAssassin, ClamAV, and many more. This tutorials differs from The Perfect Server - Debian Lenny (Debian 5.0) With MyDNS & Courier [ISPConfig 3] in that I use BIND and Dovecot here instead of MyDNS and Courier (of course, the other two variants - BIND & Courier or MyDNS and Dovecot are possible as well).

Please note that this setup does not work for ISPConfig 2! It is valid for ISPConfig 3 only!

I do not issue any guarantee that this tutorial will work for you!

1 Requirements

To install such a system you will need the following:

• the Debian Lenny network installation CD, available here: http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/5.0.6/i386/iso-cd/debian-506-i386-netinst.iso (i386) or http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/5.0.6/amd64/iso-cd/debian-506-amd64-netinst.iso (x86_64)
• a fast Internet connection.

2 Preliminary Note

In this tutorial I use the hostname server1.example.com with the IP address 192.168.0.100 and the gateway 192.168.0.1. These settings might differ for you, so you have to replace them where appropriate.

3 The Base System

Insert your Debian Lenny network installtion CD into your system and boot from it. Select Install (this will start the text installer - if you prefer a graphical installer, select Graphical install):

Choose your language:

Then select your location:

Choose a keyboard layout:

The installer checks the installation CD, your hardware, and configures the network with DHCP if there is a DHCP server in the network:

Enter the hostname. In this example, my system is called server1.example.com, so I enter server1:

Enter your domain name. In this example, this is example.com:

Now you have to partition your hard disk. For simplicity's sake I will create one big partition (with the mount point /) and a little swap partition so I select Guided - use entire disk (of course, the partitioning is totally up to you - if you like, you can create more than just one big partition, and you can also use LVM):

Select the disk that you want to partition:

Then select the partitioning scheme. As mentioned before, I select All files in one partition (recommended for new users) for simplicity's sake - it's up to your likings what you choose here:

When you're finished, select Finish partitioning and write changes to disk:

Select Yes when you're asked Write changes to disks?: