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ROUTER LINUX 1.1 |
Router Linux Reference Design
by Tony J. White |
Why is routerlinux here?
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Short Version
I wanted a Linux based replacement for Cisco(tm) routers.
Long Version
The company I work has a wide variety of networking needs. I have to maintain more office-to-office tunnels than I can count on my extremities.
The first factor is that, in the old
days, Cisco(tm) or Lucent(tm) routers were purchased for each and every office and GRE tunnels were set up to link the offices. GRE tunnels are no longer acceptable for my company, and IPSec is the new norm.
Of course every single one of these routers my company owns are NOT capable of 3des IPSec or would require several hundred dollars each in hardware and/or software upgrades in order to become IPSec capable.
Pfft I say!
Another factor is that years ago, I made the mistake of opening my big mouth and suggesting that we were paying way to much for those proprietary solutions and that we could recycle our
old PC's as Linux routers. Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time, but as it turns out, 10 year old PC's just aren't very reliable. I've had more hard drive and fan failures than I care to recall.
These two factors were the driving force behind routerlinux. An article on linuxdevices.com pointed me at the GCT Allwell 1030N
. This machine provided me with the best of both worlds: it has no moving parts (not even a fan) and is built on the same x86 architecture of my beloved flock of 486 junkers. Also, the PCI expansion slot gives the GCT Allwell machines a wealth of flexibility.
I bought my first GCT Allwell 1030N off EBay for $50 and built up a nice linux distribution from scratch to run on its DiskOnChip. It worked great, so I suggested to my company that we buy a bunch of
them and replace all of our incompatable equipment with them. I got 3 more 1030N's and 3 3036N's and when the time came to install Linux on them, I realized what a mess I had made from my first install as I
had kept no notes on how I built things. I said 'screw it' and started all over again using same approach Patrick Volkerding uses to build packages for his Slackware Linux distribution. Routerlinux was born.
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routerlinux
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Routerlinux is a GNU/Linux distribution created specifically for turning the GCT Allwell set top boxes
into multi-purpose IP routers. Designed to be installed on a 16Mb DiskOnChip module, routerlinux and GCT Allwell hardware combine to form a powerful, reliable, and multi-purpose networking tool. Intended
for use by experienced Linux users, routerlinux lacks an easy to use configuration interface. However, in the true Linux tradition, where it lacks in ease of use, it easily makes up for in functionality:
- IPSec tunnels (manual or automatically keyed) to a variety of platforms using freeswan.
- GRE tunnels
- Full Linux 2.4 netfilter support. This includes IP Forwarding, Masquerading (NAT), Firewalling, etc.
- Run an SNMP server for the purpose of remote traffic monitoring.
- Make a PPP dialup connection via a modem.
- Accept incoming phone calls and either serve a PPP link or a terminal login.
- Make a PPPoE connection (required by many DSL providers).
- Serve PPTP (VPN) connections.
- Speak RIP, OSPF, and/or BGP routing protocols via the zebra package.
- Allow for remote administration through SSH
- Serve out IP addresses with DHCP
- Use DHCP to get an address.
- Answer IDENT requests (albeit fraudulently).
- Run a caching DNS nameserver.
- Allow you to set up tasks to run on regular intervals (crond).
- Use a DB9 serial port to connect to another device with a terminal (microcom ).
- Scan a network or host with nmap
- and more
For more information about routerlinux, visit
http://www.routerlinux.com
Contact the author: tony@webteam.net
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 contact: Sales@gctglobal.com
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