Could it be related to the OS security settings?
Unlikely. Insofar as Mandrake
is a Red Hat Linux derivative, by HIGH security settings they
probably mean that most ports on the system are blocked.
I am not a Mandrake user. If Mandrake has the lokkit
utility as Red Hat does, you can use it to inspect your "security
settings". On Red Hat Linux, it is installed at
/usr/sbin/lokkit
.
Alternatively, you can go for the real thing and inspect your
firewall settings directly with ipchains
(/sbin/ipchains
on Red Hat) like so:
bash$ su - -c "ipchains -L"
Password:
Chain input (policy ACCEPT):
target prot opt source destination ports
ACCEPT udp ------ someplace.redhat.com anywhere domain -> 1025:65535
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> netbios-ns
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> netbios-dgm
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> netbios-ssn
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> 1025
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> ssh
ACCEPT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> http
ACCEPT udp ------ anywhere anywhere bootps:bootpc -> bootps:bootpc
ACCEPT udp ------ anywhere anywhere bootps:bootpc -> bootps:bootpc
ACCEPT all ------ anywhere anywhere n/a
REJECT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> 0:1023
REJECT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> nfs
REJECT udp ------ anywhere anywhere any -> 0:1023
REJECT udp ------ anywhere anywhere any -> nfs
REJECT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> x11:6009
REJECT tcp -y---- anywhere anywhere any -> xfs
Chain forward (policy ACCEPT):
Chain output (policy ACCEPT):
These are slightly modified MEDIUM security settings in Red
Hat. For example, this box accepts connections to ports 22 (ssh) and
80 (http), and rejects connections to all ports in the 0-1023 range
that do not have an explicit ACCEPT policy. Your setup should be
similar.
In any case, if you say you can serve static pages when server is
running on port 8000, that means your box IS accepting connections on
that port. When you try telnetting into the port on which your webserver
is listening, does it look like this:
bash$ telnet www.yahoo.com 80
Trying 64.58.76.224...
Connected to www.yahoo.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
If telnet says, Connected to localhost, then your security
settings are fine. You shouldn't waste your time reinstalling the
system with MEDIUM security settings.