Re: About Port Forwarding, Apache and Firewall Rules

[Christopher Hicks <chicks () chicks net>]

[ I know this strays even further from the original topic and I won't be 
offended if its rejected.  But having experienced a number of ISP's (too 
many) from the web serving perspective I hope this will help people avoid 
some hassle. ]

On Tue, 7 Sep 2004, Chuck Vose wrote:
> [Chuck quoted someone else who said:] 
> > There is no God-given, natural law or Constitutional right to Internet
> > access.  What there is are for-profit companies (mostly) that provide
> > various levels of Internet access, for a fee, under contractual
> > agreement.

I agree with you on what we have now, but given that having Internet 
access is becoming as necessary to getting through daily life as the 
telephone is I do think society has a moral obligation to provide cheap or 
free access to individuals who can't afford it.  Libraries have done this 
for years.  Wifi collectives are also making internet access to anyone who 
happens by.  This is good in my opinion.

> > Btw: *Most* DSL and cable broadband providers do have SOHO/business
> > packages that allow the running of services and give one static IP
> > addresses.  Many areas of the country have alternate (usually DSL)
> > broadband providers that can supply business-class connectivity.  Of
> > course: These options all come at a price.

If people are looking for a decent DSL provider that offers business 
quality service I strongly encourage you to consider Megapath.  ( 
http://www.megapath.net/ )  My connection is no longer with Megapath 
because they couldn't offer T1 service here, but all of my clients are 
using them for their SDSL and ADSL.  We were previously on SpeakEasy and 
NAS (Network Access Solutions) and had some rather horrid experiences with 
both.  Our current T1 provider (Cavalier) has decent connectivity, but 
their tech support comes nowhere close to Megapath.  I've called Megapath 
in the wee hours of Sunday morning and talked to clueful people who could 
get things done or find the people to get things done.

> There are even other things that DSL that can also work nicely for remote
> areas. Satelite is the farthest reaching but usually has terrible upload.

The lag caused by the round trip time to the satellite made me wish for a 
modem.  I was stuck in the Mojave desert on a DirecPC connection a few 
years ago and it was very painful.  If you're just browsing the web or 
downloading its not too bad, but ssh/telnet/games were so laggy that it 
was just a joke.  I spend a lot more time in ssh and games than on the web 
so I was very glad to get back on the Right Coast with my own net 
connection.

> ISDN can get rates up to 1.544 Mbps and is very far reaching if I recall 
> correctly.

ISDN is generally capped at 128kbps.  ISDN PRI is 1.544Mbps, but if you're 
doing such a thing you might as well go for a full T1 and not hassle with 
the ISDN complexity.  Back before DSL came along the 128k ISDN circuits 
were awesome if you were on the same CO and could setup Centrex extensions 
- no per minute charges.  My Internet connection for several years was 
over a pair of Netopias on 128k ISDN.  There was much joy.  (The old 
spaceship-looking Netopias had a friendly non command line interface from 
the serial line, but they were rock solid in my experience and they looked 
really really cool.)  If you do want to do ISDN PRI consider using a 
Livingston PM3 as a router.  I really miss Livingston.

--
</chris>

There are two ways of constructing a software design. One way is to make 
it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies. And the other way 
is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.
 -- C.A.R. Hoare

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