Foot-wetting project (newbie question)

["Brian N. Larson" <blarson@rmls-mn.com>]

No, this has nothing to do with incontinence!

I'm a Linux pre-newbie -- I haven't installed it anywhere yet.  For me to
get into it, I need a project to get my feet wet.  I've been lurking here
for a couple weeks and you folks seem downright helpful to each other --
contrast Windorks' so-called "technical support".

The project I'm thinking of is this:  My company is small, seven employees.
We live by e-mail.  Currently, however, we get our e-mail through our ISP.
Office computers are networked together via Windows networking; Cisco router
and 2Ch ISDN connect us to the ISP.  To send or receive mail, we log onto
ISP's POP server.  Everyone uses MSOutlook as EM client.

Problem:  When the ISP is down we are not only unable to get email from the
outside (BAD), we can't get it from each other (VERY BAD).  Now, I could buy
MSExchange Server, but from what I've read, I could configure a spare box
here as a mail server using Linux.

My questions:
Is the declarative statement in the last clause of the last sentence above
true?
Do I just configure the Linux box with a static IP address (which all our
PCs have anyway), point the office computers to log into it for mail
delivery, and have our ISP change the DNS entries for mail for our company
to the new server?
Do I need any software that I won't find on the RH6.0 distribution CDs?
Any tips for going about this?
Any pitfalls I should be prepared for?

If I've missed a FAQ online somewhere, point it out and verbally spank me.

Thanks for the help!
_____________________________
Brian Larson
Regional Multiple Listing Service of Minnesota, Inc.
blarson@rmls-mn.com