i had installed red hat 8 but when i see under /etc/sysconfig i don't see iptables files what must the problem be??

What kernel version are you running? Being an older version of redhat you may have ipchains instead....

the kernel is default that comes in RH-8

Looking around it appears that redhat 8 shipped with kernel 2.4.18 which should support iptables (FYI kernel 2.0.X=ipfwadm, 2.2.X=ipchains, 2.4.X=iptables)...perhaps you don't have it installed? Try: # /sbin/iptables or # find / -name iptables

My guess is, as 3Dave suggests, that it isn't installed. I'm using Redhat 8, and have the file /etc/sysconfig/iptables: # Firewall configuration written by lokkit # Manual customization of this file is not recommended. # Note: ifup-post will punch the current nameservers through the # firewall; such entries will *not* be listed here. *filter :INPUT ACCEPT [0:0] :FORWARD ACCEPT [0:0] :OUTPUT ACCEPT [0:0] :RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT - [0:0] -A INPUT -j RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p tcp -m tcp --dport 22 --syn -j ACCEPT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p udp -m udp --dport 123 -j ACCEPT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -i lo -j ACCEPT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p udp -m udp -s 162.130.128.97 --sport 53 -d 0/0 -j ACCEPT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p udp -m udp -s 162.130.10.9 --sport 53 -d 0/0 -j ACCEPT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p tcp -m tcp --syn -j REJECT -A RH-Lokkit-0-50-INPUT -p udp -m udp -j REJECT COMMIT (beware of above lines wrapping) Enter this at a command prompt to see if you have iptables installed: # rpm -q iptables If it returns "package iptables is not installed", then you need to install it (rpm -i). Good luck.

in which of the red hat(8) cd has the ip tables.

Mount one of the CDs, then: $ find /mnt/cdrom -name "iptables*.rpm" If it doesn't come back with a result, unmount it and try with another CD.