[NBLUG/talk] Networking question

[Andrew]

augie wrote on Mon, 29 Sep 2003 11:18:17 -0700:

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> Dave Sisley wrote:
> > Thanks for the replies.  I need to read the HOW-TOs, but
> > those and the other tips will keep me busy for a while. I'll
> > post again if I run into any trouble.
> 
> follow everything kyle and coy say to do it yourself, however
> some distributions come with a pre-packaged solution to this
> problem. i know mandrake comes with something called DrakGw
> whose description is 'to help you share your Internet
> connection.'. your distribution may have something similar.
> i've never used it, but i imagine it does the same thing as is
> described in those how-to's only it does it for you.

The Debian equivalent is a package called "ipmasq"
(http://packages.debian.org/stable/net/ipmasq.html). It's a nice
little package which, when installed on your gateway machine,
automatically sets up masquerading for your internal network,
along with a reasonable firewall to protect it. The package
creator developed it with ppp connections in mind and has even
included the capability of re-evaluating the firewall rules
whenever the ppp connection is brought up or down. Once ipmasq is
installed (on the gateway machine *only*), you simply tell the
other machines on your internal network to use the gateway
machine's _internal_ interface address as their gateway.

And in case any newbies who happen upon this message thread are
wondering, masquerading (and NAT in general) is platform
agnostic. I have Linux, Windows, and Mac boxes all surfing the
Internet through my Linux gateway.

Good luck!

A.