internet connectivity

[curt larson_1]

I have my own little network of unix systems at home that i'm looking to connect to the internet to do some collaborative work with a colleague. I'm sure a few of you have already done this and might provide some suggestions to help me.

internet connect is via cable modem with comcast.

no, i don't have a internet network assignment or domain. So, i'm sure my network address is a duplicate of someone's.

my network is 10/100 hubs/switches. I have my own dns setup.

I'm looking to give access/login to only specific persons via the internet. This isn't a business so security isn't a big consideration, but I'd rather be safe then sorry. And, of course, price is going to be a big factor.

So, anyone wanting to give a suggestion for doing this? or sharing possible pitfalls to avoid?

thanks

[Ron Kinner · Accepted solution]

Assuming you don't mind changing your addresses to something in the 192.168 range or using DHCP you can just pick up a cheap Linksys cable/dsl router (or equivalent) which connects via CAT5 to your existing cable router and via CAT5 to your LAN (some of them have up to 8 ports so you can do without a hub/switch if you want to). The router will then take care of NAT (changing the 192.168 addresses to legal addresses) and can do some filtering to keep out the bad guys. You can tell it that a certain host will act as a server and also what ports to open up on it so it can be reached from the internet. You might want to look into ssh to avoid sending your passwords in clear text.

If you are not using DHCP you will need to setup the hosts to use the correct addresses with a 255.255.255.0 mask and a default gateway set to that of the router (usually 192.168.1.1 tho I have seen some where they used 192.168.0.1). If using static addresses instead of DHCP make sure you assign addresses outside of the range used by the dhcp. (Usually the higher end addresses are reserved for static but some will let you push the starting range too so you can use low numbers like 2,3 etc.) It's pretty clear in their manual.

Ron