> <Yeah, I know - me again. But bear with me; if you're confused still,
> this sorts it out, I think :) >

Heh.  I'm patient.  After all, I'm the one asking the questions.


> > > > > > One machine in my LAN:
 [...]
> > > Right, these addresses are all on the same /29 network
> > > (i.e. 255.255.255.248 subnet mask) - so they're only valid there.
> >
> > I do not understand what you mean by "they're only valid there".  They are
> > globally valid addresses.  (Or should be.)
>
> I meant if these are all on the same subnet, the DSL router (i.e. BSD gateway machine)
> should only have 1 interface on this network - but see below.

Hm.  It still seems like the route man-page is half-way telling me
"there's a way to specify *particular* IP numbers to be routed through
*particular* interfaces, regardless of the subnetting and interface
addresses..."  But if it's really telling me that, I haven't figured out
how I'm supposed to accomplish it.

I can believe that no one intended this when the protocols were hammered
out.  Maybe NetBSD doesn't support it.  Maybe it's non-trivial to support
it.  But it seems like a reasonable thing to do, to me (speaking from the
vantage point of someone who doesn't understand how routes are maintained
and managed; *grin*).


> > > The 6 valid addresses are from 66.136.7.249 ->  66.136.7.254
> >
> > Of which .254 is taken up by a gateway on the other end of the DSL modem.
>
> I think I've sussed it.
> If you're saying that the ISP end if the link has one of these IPs, then
> tha ISP end of the link and hermes (say) are both on the same network, and
> prometheus shouldn't be routing at all. hermes is directly connected to the net just
> as prometheus is.
>
> Plug all your machines and the modem into a hub and point them all at .254 as a gateway.
> This'll work:

Yes, this works.  (Except that the modem is designed to be connected via a
normal ethernet cable directly to an ethernet card.  But, that's a small
thing.)


 [...]
> echo 'auto_ifconfig=YES' >> /etc/rc.conf

(This is set in /etc/defaults/rc.conf, as it turns out.  I don't remember
if I've ever needed it, but certainly for 1.6 and I think as far back as
1.4, this is the default.  I dunno about 1.3, as I know I didn't have any
kind of networking (other than SLIP/PPP manually invoked) when I was
running 1.3.)


> Slap in /etc/resolv.conf and you're off.

(FWIW, resolv.conf stays the same as when I had my dynamic IP numbers.)


> At the moment prometheus is trying to route between two interfaces which are
> both on the same LAN, like this:
>
>    ISP  ----  < 66.136.7.248/29 network > -- prometheus --- <66.136.7.248/29> --- hermes
>
> which makes no sense - that's why my last post was gibberish :).

*grin*

I was originally hoping that it *did* make sense.  Now it's just a matter
of ``I don't understand why it *can't* be that way.''  It might all be
paintfully clear if I had a proper understanding of how the routing
mechanisms must work in TCP/IP networks, though.

Oh well.


There is a final advantage to setting up my machine as a router: I can
honestly claim to be using a router.  This seems to make a signficant
difference in how customer support responds.  If you just say "I'm running
a UNIX OS", they say, "We don't support that."  But if you say, "I'm doing
this with my router", then even though your router *is* a UNIX system,
they seem less inclined to tell you that they won't give you any support.
This helps when you're trying to report, say, DSL service no longer being
present.  (^&

Oh well, I guess my machines are still routing (even if they aren't acting
as a gateway to route for other machines).  (^&  I suppose I could keep at
least one machine configured as a gateway and set it as my defaultroute.
The fact that my router may be running an X server or bosts a ssh login
to ksh instead of a web-based interface, is just a little quirk.  (^&


> [ This also explains why your DHCP requests fail: there isn't a DHCP server on
> the 66.137...  network. ]

Um, I don't understand: Why can't my ISP's gateway machine (66.136.7.254;
clearly in the same subnet) be a DHCP server?

Bear in mind that they *did* tell me to use DHCP.  Presumably they have a
DHCP server *somewhere*.  Also, while they might cater to a weird DHCP
implementation in BillOS, they also support the Mac, so they can't get too
silly.  (Assuming that they tell their Mac customers to use DHCP too.)


(Sorry for the long ramble.  (^&)


  ``I probably don't know what I'm talking about.'' --rauch@math.rice.edu