Baslinux mailing list

["Carl Reaburn" <carlreaburn AT attech.net.au>]

> On Wed, 23 Feb 2005, Carl Reaburn wrote:
>
> > network.  This also makes XP safe from attack as it will not respond to 
> > any
> > packets sent to it, not even a ping!
> >
> > If all works according to plan I will be able to feed a live IP into BL3
> > running on Virtual PC.  BL3 will forward ports to other linux machines.
> > The other linux machines will also be running in Virtual PCs.  By 
> > enabling
> > the virtual switch on the second network card I should be able to share 
> > the
> > routed packets among the Virtual machines on the same NIC.  While turning
> > off the virtual switch on the network card containing the live IP, should
> > force all data through the firewall BL3 machine.
> >
> > this would be a lot easier to explain with a picture. are attachments
> > permitted?
> >
> > When I am finished I should have one windows XP machine running:-  a
> > router/firewall,  and several different domain names (each with a 
> > different
> > live IP).  Each domain will have it's own virtual machine to run it's
> > software.  Mostly synchronet bbs packages.  So I'll have several domains,
> > web servers, mail servers, etc all running on the one machine.
> > The bonus of using virtual PC is that I can use ANY windows XP machine to
> > boot up and run the servers.  No need to reinstall and configure for
> > different hardware.
> >
> > It also seemed like a cool idea to try out.  I wanted to do it years ago 
> > but
> > Virtual PC would not support a second network card, which was a 
> > requirement
> > for making a firewall.
>
> This is all so fascinating and grandiose that it boggles the mind. I
> happen to love mind boggling schemes though, and the less I understand
> about them the more inspiring they can seem. I'll have to try and digest
> this all some more. But one question arises: why on XP? This is not asked
> in an open sourcish, puritanical sort of way, but pragmatic as well. Were
> I you, my reason for using XP would be because its virtual machine app
> comes sort of preconfigured and could save me some labor and headaches
> ascending the learning curve. You know, rather than trying to set up Bochs
> or Xen or Colinux or one of the other Linux virtual machine setups. But
> since I'd wimp out like that, it means I'm probably not much like you. So,
> what is your motivation for using XP? In any case, it's sort of
> interesting to see XP acting as a kind of boot manager for BL, and not
> being allowed to play on the network. This has gotta be one of the more
> interesting BL projects we've seen on this list for a long time . . .
> maybe ever!

Why Xp?  Well it was already loaded on my test machine.  When I have 
everything working I will switch to a stripped down version of windows 2000. 
Basically I just need a platform that supports my real hardware to run the 
virtual pc program from.  I would run it all from windows 95, but I don't 
think virtual pc works in anything older than windows 2000.  Having a fully 
functional operating system over seeing the virtual machines is also handy.

I was not aware there were virtual linux machines capable of doing this.  I 
may look at them later on.  Having a familiar operating system in the 
control roll suites me right now.  I may not know how to get myself out of 
trouble under Linux yet, but I know windows inside out.

When I have everything up and running I'll post a diagram or something of 
how it is all working.  I'm sure my descriptions do not do the configuration 
justice.