Setting up a network and sharing internet

[Henry Spencer]

On Thu, 18 Aug 2005, Steve wrote:
> 1. Do I require a "crossover" ethernet cable to connect BOX#2 to BOX#1?

Generally, yes.  Some network interfaces are now smart enough to deal with
this internally, so they'll work with either crossover or straight cables,
but that's not yet widespread.

> 2. What is the best (most secure) way to share internet? NAT? DHCP?

Neither NAT nor DHCP is something you have much choice about.

DHCP is for dynamically configuring (among other things) host addresses;
you use it if your ISP does things that way, and not otherwise.  If memory
serves, PPP has its own facilities for that and DHCP would not be involved.

NAT is for making several machines look like one.  If your ISP is
supplying you with only one network address -- which is most assuredly the
case unless you negotiated a special (more expensive) deal -- then you must
use NAT to get two machines onto the net.

Generally, the best way to get one or more machines onto the net is to
have a dedicated firewall box between them and the outside world.  (Note,
the dedicated firewall box *can* be a carefully-configured Linux machine; 
the point is that it shouldn't be doing anything else.)  Then you can have
your own private internal network, with any number of machines on it,
behind the firewall, and all of them can reach the Internet via the
firewall. 

                                                          Henry Spencer
                                                       henry-lqW1N6Cllo0sV2N9l4h3zg at public.gmane.org

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