Is it worth trying to use a Netbook as a firewall?
 

Hi LQ,

I'm a newbie to the forums and to Linux in general. I've had a lok on the forum and on the net in general, and I'm hoping someone can give me some advice.
I have a netbook at home that I've been using purely for practicing with Linux, and I was wondering if it is worthwhile or even possible to have it configured as a firewall for the rest of my network? I realize that the single ethernet port will be an issue, but besides this is there any reason it wouldn't be possible? From my surfing the distro I've seen mentioned most often related to anything I'm looking for is openBSD - is this the best solution?

Many thanks!

Hmm, you already realized that having only one ethernet port will be a problem, why do you need other reasons?

You could probably use the ethernet port to connect to WAN and get the wifi adapter to work as an access point, but it would be a rather cumbersome way to achieve something that other devices are simply better suited for.

If you want a linux based and flexible / configurable firewall consider looking into OpenWRT. Have a look at their wiki and find a recommended router to buy and put OpenWRT on it.

It will come with a preconfigured firewall that you can adapt to your needs. The configuration language is simpler than iptables, but you can also get it to include iptables scripts.

And guess what, it will have more than one ethernet port... ;-)

Some of the firewall distro's run on almost no resources. Some would let you use a single nic. A usb nic wouldn't be much either. I think it would be at least a good experiment and learning lesson if not a good way to protect your lan.

Thanks for the advice folks. Obviously I have some more research to do, but it's maybe still worth trying as a purely educational project.

Thanks!

Welcome aboard.

Oh, yes. Welcome to LQ.

There are a number of choices in firewalls that use BSD as a base. It is sound and well tested in my opinion.

Joe_2000 points out a few good things too. I just bought a cheapo DD-WRT new router for $11.
The second idea is the use of a second nic. That is where I meant you could buy a $8 usb nic adapter and run two nics. Many of the distro's have a red and green type nic where green is lan and red is wan. Most can use a single nic but some can't easily.

Research pays off. Good luck-:)

https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/artic.../firewall.html
https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook...alls-ipfw.html
http://www.bsdnow.tv/tutorials/pf

http://arstechnica.com/civis/viewtop...f=10&t=1242829
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/...ll-bridge.html
http://www.wilderssecurity.com/threa...rewall.321402/