From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Jun 9 23:54:06 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F1F03106564A for ; Thu, 9 Jun 2011 23:54:06 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from feenberg@nber.org) Received: from mail2.nber.org (mail2.nber.org [66.251.72.79]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A639B8FC08 for ; Thu, 9 Jun 2011 23:54:06 +0000 (UTC) Received: from nber7.nber.org (nber7.nber.org [66.251.72.41]) by mail2.nber.org (8.14.4/8.14.4) with ESMTP id p59Ns02B082896 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NOT); Thu, 9 Jun 2011 19:54:01 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from feenberg@nber.org) Received: from localhost (feenberg@localhost) by nber7.nber.org (8.14.4/8.14.4/Submit) with ESMTP id p59Ns0il014361; Thu, 9 Jun 2011 19:54:00 -0400 X-Authentication-Warning: nber7.nber.org: feenberg owned process doing -bs Date: Thu, 9 Jun 2011 19:54:00 -0400 (EDT) From: Daniel Feenberg To: Chad Perrin In-Reply-To: <20110609222807.GA34570@guilt.hydra> Message-ID: References: <20110609005656.GA9183@thought.org> <15630_1307624948_4DF0C5F4_15630_82_1_D9B37353831173459FDAA836D3B43499BF89C4A2@WADPMBXV0.waddell.com> <20110609184829.GC33714@guilt.hydra> <20110609222807.GA34570@guilt.hydra> User-Agent: Alpine 2.00 (LFD 1167 2008-08-23) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed X-Anti-Virus: Kaspersky Anti-Virus for Linux Mail Server 5.6.39/RELEASE, bases: 20110609 #5481753, check: 20110609 clean Cc: FreeBSD Questions Subject: Re: Long Day's Journey into X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 09 Jun 2011 23:54:07 -0000 On Thu, 9 Jun 2011, Chad Perrin wrote: > On Thu, Jun 09, 2011 at 06:01:03PM -0400, Daniel Staal wrote: >> >> Depending on your needs, Soekris, ALIX, or Netgate products could all work. >> Most don't have large numbers of ports (2-5 built in are standard, and some >> have expansion capability), but can run some higher-level processing while >> doing switching work. > > I appreciate the information. Unfortunately, while I can find products > offered under these brands for sale on the Internet, this is not (as I > mentioned) within my areas of expertise, so I'm finding the information > about the products somewhat opaque. In many cases, it's not even obvious > which of the products I find are suitable for building various types of > network switches. Do you know of any Webpages that might help me rectify > my dearth of understanding in this area? > > Thanks to the completeness of documentation such as the FreeBSD Handbook, > learning how to build firewalls and routers is a relatively trivial > exercise. Switches are another matter entirely. . . . A switch can also be called a bridge. FreeBSD seems to have built-in facility for bridging. See: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/filtering-bridges/index.html It isn't something I have any experience with, though. Daniel Feenberg > > -- > Chad Perrin [ original content licensed OWL: http://owl.apotheon.org ] >