[colug-432] splatWRT

[Rob Funk]

Rick Troth wrote:
> Had not previously paid attention to the firmware replacements and have
> used a "real" Linux box as my router/gateway for most of the past 10 or
> 15 years. But now am looking for something more appliance like, and
> looking to consolidate some functions for simplicity. [Scott has
> discussed simplicity with me off-list several times.] For example, DHCP
> is handled by a separate box ostensibly for security. But when things go
> blink in the night, there are two (at least) independent systems which
> need to come back to life.

I think it's good to have things separated to some extent. The more
you combine onto one box, the more complexity you end up with, and the
harder it gets to debug or upgrade. And different hardware/OS solutions
have different strengths and weaknesses.

Of course, I also reduce the blinks in the night by putting all those
boxes on uninterruptible power supplies, and making them low-power
boxes with no moving parts. And if they do lose power, the only harm
done is having to wait a minute for a bootup.

> Polled COLUG mostly to hear stories. Of the three you mention (Scott),
> what interface do/did you use most often? web? shell? other? (possible
> TUI or non-web GUI) How is performance? reliability? (both long running
> and for power down/up events) Did you find or hear about any security
> issues? (embedded systems is the new hot potato for both reliability and
> security) Have you tried VPN on them?

Personally I have a Buffalo WZR-HP-G300NH running OpenWRT as my border
router (with DHCP but no wifi), and a NetGear WNDR4300 running DD-WRT
for my wifi. (DD-WRT is friendlier for wifi than OpenWRT is, while
OpenWRT gives me more control for the border.) I also have a spare
Buffalo (and some old Linksys WRT54GLs) lying around in case my active
boxes die. I usually use the web interfaces, but I sometimes use the
SSH interface and like having that available. I started trying to set
up a VPN on OpenWRT at one point, but ran into client-side problems so
I went with a different solution.

My only reliability problem is Time-Warner Cable. :-)