ralph-hogaboom
12-09-2002, 02:54 PM
Hello all;
I've been using Windows 2000 as a router on my network for a while now, and it has significant management overhead, as well as security vulnerabilities. It's also not doing any firewall or proxying, and I'd like for my router to do those things.
So here's my question.
What *nix distro / configuration is best for a small network router? Here's what I want it to do:
* Handle dynamic public IP address - My ISP changes my IP address every week ( to stop us from running web servers, I think ). Anyway, whatever I use really needs to not be restarted (services or OS) to get a new connection. It should be dynamic, i.e. as little admin overhead as possible. This is crucial.
* DHCP Server - to any clients on the network that boot up, give them an IP address
* Internet connection sharing - this machine would have two ethernet jacks, one to the network, and the other to the cable modem.
* Proxy (optional) - I'd like more control / monitoring of the network, and as I understand it a proxy server would let me control what clients get internet access and what ones don't. Obviously, I might need to drop DHCP support for this (to restrict via IP address). I understand squid does this very well.
* Firewall - firewall support would be greatly appreciated. Unfortunately, my previous firewall experience is limited to ZoneAlarm Pro 3 - but I'm eager to learn about ipchains.
If you tell me NetBSD, or RedHat, or whatever can handle this fine, and point me to some howtos, I'd be happy to educate myself. I'm not sure which distro to start with, however, and I'd like a slim (no GUI) install that will work good on low-end hardware.
Thanks SO MUCH in advance for your time, and thanks for reading my post!
Ralph Hogaboom
I've been using Windows 2000 as a router on my network for a while now, and it has significant management overhead, as well as security vulnerabilities. It's also not doing any firewall or proxying, and I'd like for my router to do those things.
So here's my question.
What *nix distro / configuration is best for a small network router? Here's what I want it to do:
* Handle dynamic public IP address - My ISP changes my IP address every week ( to stop us from running web servers, I think ). Anyway, whatever I use really needs to not be restarted (services or OS) to get a new connection. It should be dynamic, i.e. as little admin overhead as possible. This is crucial.
* DHCP Server - to any clients on the network that boot up, give them an IP address
* Internet connection sharing - this machine would have two ethernet jacks, one to the network, and the other to the cable modem.
* Proxy (optional) - I'd like more control / monitoring of the network, and as I understand it a proxy server would let me control what clients get internet access and what ones don't. Obviously, I might need to drop DHCP support for this (to restrict via IP address). I understand squid does this very well.
* Firewall - firewall support would be greatly appreciated. Unfortunately, my previous firewall experience is limited to ZoneAlarm Pro 3 - but I'm eager to learn about ipchains.
If you tell me NetBSD, or RedHat, or whatever can handle this fine, and point me to some howtos, I'd be happy to educate myself. I'm not sure which distro to start with, however, and I'd like a slim (no GUI) install that will work good on low-end hardware.
Thanks SO MUCH in advance for your time, and thanks for reading my post!
Ralph Hogaboom