On 02/28/2004 09:04 AM, gchris@bellsouth.net wrote:
Paul, I originally posted the question and I'm here to tell you that XP ICS has faultlessly delivered internet access to five other Windows boxes for over a year.
Haven't you ever rebooted that machine? Haven't you installed all the latest critical updates that require a reboot. Just for that reason alone, it has not faultlessly delivered internet access to your network. If you mean when it worked, this would be the same with Linux or a router. Which of the 3 would be more 'faultless'?
With Windows, adding another box is as simple as giving it the gateway address 192.168.0.1 period.
IIRC, even this is not neccessary. By default it is configured for DHCP, which auto assigns the gateway, when it works correctly.
If Linux desktops are going to replace Windows desktops they need to be just as easy to configure, and my goal is to find out how to do that correctly.
A fair question. Since Windows ICS sets up a DHCP server, it should be the same for all clients, setup the internally networked NICs to DHCP (maybe not automatic in Linux but not hard either). I have had some weird problems at times with dhcpcd and have by course always replaced it with dhclient. I don't know if that is your problem, but I haven't had a problem with dhclient for years. In that case, it would be the same for the Linux client or the Windows client, with only 1 possible problem, a Microsoft closed source DHCP server which could actually be programmed to look only for a Windows client and reject all others. For that reason alone I would at least use the Linux DHCP server, but I would have put the higher security Linux box on the internet and made it the router over XP.
BTW, XP ICS can use two NICs or one NIC and a dialup modem or one NIC and a USB connection to a cable/DSL modem.
Correct.
Now tell me why I need a $50 router to fix something that isn't broken? ;)
It isn't a need, just another possible fix for your problem. If you manually setup your usually dynamically assigned network settings (IP, netmask, DNS, gateway, etc.) in Linux it would work through Windows. -- Joe Morris New Tribes Mission Email Address: Joe_Morris@ntm.org Web Address: http://www.mydestiny.net/~joe_morris Registered Linux user 231871 God said, I AM that I AM. I say, by the grace of God, I am what I am.