I want to start a webserver...where to start?

This is what I envision: My computer at home hooked to a static IP (which I have already). I want to create a website that only invited members have access too (login/password). Once in, you have your own space within which you may store photos, music, and even movies for others in the family to view/download.

What tools do I need to start this project?

Thanks in advance,

Rind

[Jason425]

that kind of sounds like an FTP Server, no?

when I hear "share with family" i immediately assume it has to be accessible via a webbrowser. That kind of negates ftp, which is also very insecure and I wouldn't use on a server open to the web. Plus, most ftp servers have a 2GB file limit, which if you are sharing home movies, might prove problematic (kill me if you ever send me a home movie that long).

You basically need 4 things.
1) a router that will setup either a) a DMZ or b) forward ports to the computer you are doing this on. (the former is more secure, but depending on your internal network, the latter might be more convenient).

2) Server Software/ Operating system. Can windows do this? yes, but it's expensive and since this is for the family, it's not like you'll recoup your losses. I therefore suggest linux. I learned on debian pretty quickly. It's not so hard. However ubuntu is being suggested by many in the *nix as being very noob friendly. Don't use something like Fedora Core or Gentoo, which have serious problems still with upgrading properly.

3) a computer. The number of users and the rate of flow of data will determine the specs, but I suspect for your purposes, anything with 256 (512 if you decide to install a GUI environment) MB of memory and a 1.5 GHz processor will do just fine. make sure to buy a reliable hard drive though. scsi is preferred for servers but can be quite expensive. I run a server with IDE without problems.

4) dns. no one really remembers IP addresses. If you have a static IP, your ISP may be able to provide you with this for a low cost. Websites like no-ip.com and dyndns.org also do well, and are free, in this area.

For more specific instructions on what to do, decide on a software platform, and then there will be plenty of help from google.

[Omega]

This is kind of an interesting question (though, perhaps on a different level than you were originally thinking). James did a pretty good job explaining the preliminary requirements.

Past that, things get trickier (but more interesting). Assuming you can get Linux and Apache up and running, the actual infrastructure for the implementaiton you described is a big question. I think that you could use something like a Wiki, Blog, or Gallery to avoid having to do too much work yourself in creating these userspaces. While I haven't personally configured a wiki, I know they provide provisions for setting permissions, and posting/editing content. A blog (or individual blogs) would do something similar. Lastly, a gallery might be the best suited (see http://www.p14nd4.com/gallery/ for mine), as it allows for web-based uploads of photos and movies, and possibly other files (I haven't tried). This, specifically, also has user and album-level permission sets, and can show/hide various albums based on anonymous vs user vs user1 vs user2 (etc) login. These things can generally be obtained along the lines of apt-get install gallery in debian. Gallery probably took me ~45 minutes to configure everything, but was well worth it. I can't specifically vouch for how well the first two handle file uploads, but I know that some blogs/wikis have provisions for files/attachments.

I'd be interested in seeing what you come up with.