Ipcop/smoothwall/firewall Wifi Client Suggestions

[imported_spankdidly]

I am trying to get one of these types of distros to work wirelessly. So the red interface would connect to a wifi hotspot and then the green interface would share out to the rest of the LAN.

I want to have a computer in between me and the wifi hotspot I am using. However, I dont want to add ANOTHER machine. Right now it's XP connects wifi to my room-mate's wifi then is ICS to my smoothwall box, then out to the rest of my lan.

I'd like to simplifiy this by having a machine that connects to the wifi and then acts as a firewall and provides squid and all that jazz as well. I realize this is the BT forum, but I know several of you that use IPCOP and Smoothie. Thanks guys.

[imported_wyze]

I am trying to get one of these types of distros to work wirelessly. So the red interface would connect to a wifi hotspot and then the green interface would share out to the rest of the LAN.

I want to have a computer in between me and the wifi hotspot I am using. However, I dont want to add ANOTHER machine. Right now it's XP connects wifi to my room-mate's wifi then is ICS to my smoothwall box, then out to the rest of my lan.

I'd like to simplifiy this by having a machine that connects to the wifi and then acts as a firewall and provides squid and all that jazz as well. I realize this is the BT forum, but I know several of you that use IPCOP and Smoothie. Thanks guys.

IPCop Orange or Blue interface rings a bell...

[imported_spankdidly]

IPCop Orange or Blue interface rings a bell...

isn't that for access point mode, not client mode??

[Barry]

The only "easy" way I can think of is adding a wifi router in bridge mode in front of the red interface. As far as I know, you can't have a wireless red interface. Though, I suppose you could edit the config files by hand, probably wouldn't be easy though.

Well a quick look over at ipcops.org and the smoothwall.org forums, says no. There were a couple suggestions of a dd-wrt in bridge mode though.

[imported_wyze]

To clarify, you want it set up like this:

WAN > Wifi > Firewall > LAN ... where the Wifi AP would be in between the firewall and WAN?

[Barry]

To clarify, you want it set up like this:

WAN > Wifi > Firewall > LAN ... where the Wifi AP would be in between the firewall and WAN?

The way I read it was,

Wifi > Firewall > LAN.

The way you have it set is how I have mine set up, sorta. WIFI is on Blue, which is on the lan side of the firewall, but separated by the firewall.

[ghaze]

dd-wrt in client mode will do what you're looking for.

Client mode – The radio interface is used to connect the internet-facing side of the router (i.e., the WAN) as a client to a remote accesspoint. NAT or routing are performed between WAN and LAN, like in "normal" gateway or router mode. Use this mode, e.g., if your internet connection is provided by a remote accesspoint, and you want to connect a subnet of your own to it.

If smoothwall won't do what you want it to, roll your own. You could setup your smoothwall box with a wireless nic and run a stripped down slackware on it. Use your wifi card to access the hotspot and run a switch off your nic. Install webmin for a web interface and run it on the internal nic. You can configure the firewall, squid and a host of other services from webmin.

I think a stand alone, hardened firewall is pretty important in a business context, but for a home network a regular linux box running iptables is much more versatile. I set up mine on an old laptop (pentium 2, 128mb ram). I even used to run a jukebox lan server on my internal interface, as well as dnsmasq, apache and a ntp server. You'll learn more building your own, anyway.

Good Luck

[Blindbat]

May not help but didnt want ipcop and smoothwall to have all the fun

http://www.untangle.com

[imported_spankdidly]

Thanks for the replies. Yes, My internet connection IS connecting to an AP. So I'd like to put a firewall between it and my Lan. I just want to simplify it. I've already tried DD-WRT and it's not reliable enough to do. I have 2 of the newer wrt54g models and it runs like crap. I basically want to add something between me and the AP that logs any traffic/sites/IMs/etc going through. Which smoothwall does greatly, however I would need another damned box just to connect to the AP.

[Barry]

May not help but didnt want ipcop and smoothwall to have all the fun

http://www.untangle.com

The problem with untangle is it requires a beefier machine to run it. It also won't separate wired and wireless connections as easily. I looked into it a while back. It's pretty, but I don't really see what it can do that the other two can't.