Hello all... new guy here

My physical home 'server' (old PC) finally croaked, so my Linuxing is going 'virtual' until I find some new hardware.  I figured this would be a good excuse to try something different, so besides my Ubuntu 9.10 desktop that I have running in Virtualbox on my Vista PC, I'm starting a small internal network with some TurnKey Linux appliances. 

So far everything looks pretty good... I am kind of curious how with TKL supposedly being based heavily off Ubuntu 8.04.3 LTS, then why does the installer say 'Debian'?  I know Ubuntu draws from Debian, but I don't think I've ever seen an Ubuntu installer say 'Debian'.   Just funnin' ya, mostly.  I am kind of curious, though...

And more seriously... why does it apparently dispense with setting up a user and sudo in favor of a system with no users but root?

Finally... are there any plans for making a firewall/gateway appliance?  Something to plunk in between an internal 'virtual' network and the external network, with a bridged interface on one side and an internal nic on the other (to use Virtualbox terminology).

Thanks,

Monte