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Users / LinuxMCE DHCP only, external gateway

« on: April 25, 2009, 05:10:53 am »

Ok here is where we are, the last topic that got started went off into a tangent in a completely different sector of networking discussion.

Original Thread:
http://forum.linuxmce.org/index.php?topic=7743.0

This is a quote from Oatz (Hope you don't mind Oatz) in wanting to setup linuxmce as a routing device (still using both NIC ports!) and having a router before acting as a gateway.

So I have an issue with LinuxMCE and my network design and here is my "so-far" working solution.
Perhaps someone could let me know if I have broken anything I don't know about, let me know how nutty I am, etc.
First off, I'm a DD-WRT junkie. I love this tight little linux package on my routers and the way it turns all the iptables, OpenVPN, QOS, etc. linux complexity (and goodness!!!) into a easy to use web GUI.

At first I installed LinuxMCE 710 and turned my DDWRT router into a stupid switch, letting LinuxMCE handle all the dhcpd, DNS, gateway, etc. But I'm seriously missing a ton of things that were configured in my DDWRT router:
- QOS
- WAN thoughput and statistics (in colorful little pngs!)
- OpenVPN
- Much more

Now sure you can do ALL of this stuff in Kubuntu + a degree in Linux networking. But DDWRT gives me all this without said degree and leaves my Linux brain to worry about other more interesting things, like media scripts and flickr photos syncing Wink

Sure the ideal solution for me would be to have the DD-WRT super awesome WebGUI merged with LinuxMCE (*cough*), but until that great day.....

I decided enough was enough, the simple port forwarding thingy in the LinuxMCE admin tool was not going to cut it as my DDWRT replacement. So here it goes:

Project LinuxMCE as DHCPD (192.168.80.1) and DDWRT Router (Netgear 834Bv2 192.168.80.150) as DNS, GATEWAY + all the other DDWRT goodies! YAY!

1) sudo su

2) Edited 1 line in /etc/resolv.conf to add my DDWRT router as DNS resolver
Code:

nameserver 192.168.80.150


3) Edited /etc/network/interfaces and added the gateway (FYI eth1 now is disconnected, would like to remove this interface completely!)
Code:

auto lo
        iface lo inet loopback

auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp
auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
        address 192.168.80.1
        netmask 255.255.255.0
        gateway 192.168.80.150


4) Edited /etc/dhcp3/dhcpd.conf and changed the routers line
Code:

option routers 192.168.80.150;


5) Restarted the involved daemons:
/etc/init.d/./networking restart
/etc/init.d/./dhcp3-server restart
/etc/init.d/./dhcdbd restart

Now I have my cake and I'm eating it. Perhaps this cake is not as good as I think it is, perhaps this cake smells funny? But so far ignorance is bliss.

The big question here is: Does LinuxMCE really need to serve any core network role beyond a DHCP server?

Ok so you read it? Good.

What I was wanting to do was disable linuxmce's firewall and enable the firewall on the gateway device. Before the other thread unfortunately and inevitably got locked Colinjones was telling me by turning off linuxmce's firewall it will disable QoS for VoIP, which I don't plan on using, and NAT'ing to the internal network.

Network Setup:
ISP ----->Gateway Device(Firewall)----->LinuxMCE(No firewall)----->Switch----->Internal Clients

So I did some reading and found an article regarding NAT'ing between two different subnets. I will be using a DDWRT equipped router to perform these functions as it is the only way to do Advanced Routing in the cheapest manner. Advanced routing on the DDWRT firmware basically forwards all the outside requests to the inside designated subnet.

The article I found regarding this is here:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=46262&highlight=&sid=02f79e5068c5331dd996995e1cd414c8

Now, I was just wanting to know if this would work as laid out?