A Comparison of Proprietary and Open Source Software as a Way to Maintain Availability in an Open Access Environment
A Technology Integration Project
Presented to
The Faculty of the Department of Information & Logistics Technology
University of Houston
In Partial Fulfillment
Of the Requirements for the Degree
Masters of Science
In Technology Project Management with a specialization in Information Systems Security
By
Robert Kieth Hiltbrand
May 4, 2006
TABLE OF CONTENTS
OVERVIEW 5
CHAPTER 1 – INTRODUCTION 6
Background 6
Academics 10
CHAPTER 2 – LITERATURE REVIEW 12
Computer Forensics and Incident Response 12
Common Threats and Vulnerabilities 13
Public Access Computers 16
Support Costs for PCs 17
The General Public License 20
Windows Server vs. Linux Server 21
CHAPTER 3 – PROJECT METHODOLOGY 23
Experimentation Process 23
Windows vs. Linux on the desktop 27
LiveCD for the Desktop 28
LiveCD Distributions 30
Project Sponsorship 30
Project Charter 31
Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) for the Experiment: 35
Risk Matrix 39
CHAPTER 4 – PROJECT EXECUTION and ANALYSIS of FINDINGS 41
Experiment Software 41
Experiment Equipment 43
End User Tasks & Activities 43
Open Access Environment 44
The Process 44
The Test PC in the Field 45
Findings 46
Windows 2000 Issues Matrix 52
Knoppix Linux LiveCD Issues Matrix 53
Issues Common to both Windows & Linux Matrix 54
What does it all mean? 54
Summary of the Windows 2000 Professional Architecture 58
Summary of the Knoppix 4.0.2 Debian-based Linux LiveCD Architecture 59
CHAPTER 5 – SUMMARY and CONCLUSION 62
APPENDIX A 72
APPENDIX B 77
APPENDIX C 82
APPENDIX D 83
APPENDIX E 84
APPENDIX F 89
APPENDIX G 96
APPENDIX I 99
Network Configuration 99
Audit Policy 99
Event Log configuration 100
Services 100
Applications 102
Hotfixes 102
Ports open 102
Hardware 103
Mixed checkpoints 104
APPENDIX J 105
APPENDIX K 108
APPENDIX L 119
Appendix M 121
Appendix N 123
Figure N-1: Disk cache device (Mozilla Firefox) 123
Figure N-2: Memory cache device (Mozilla Firefox) 164
Acknowledgements 197
REFERENCES 198
A Comparison of Proprietary and Open Source Software as a Way to Maintain Availability in an Open Access Environment
OVERVIEW
This project will compare proprietary and open source software in an open access environment. To this end, the concept of the LiveCD versus a standard Microsoft Windows architecture as a desktop platform for general-purpose computing needs within a public access computer lab will be explored.
Personal computers (PCs) face threats when connected to the Internet from hackers, viruses, worms, and other malicious code. Complex hardware & software configurations, coupled with aging hardware, contribute to increased IT-related support costs for a PC environment. These factors, along with the similarities and differences between open and proprietary systems will be examined.
The project will include a review of the relevant literature and experimentation in a public access computer lab. After experimentation, data will be analyzed and presented with conclusions about open source and proprietary software and the availability of systems within an open access environment.
|
