Media-One Express, IP Masquerading

[Mike Bilow]

John Chambers wrote in a message to Mike Bilow:

 JC> Anyone know a good archive that can actually deliver this
 JC> HOWTO?

Using cable modems with Linux has been an often-discussed topic here.  I
believe that there is a summary on the BLU web site, but I am off-line at the
moment and am unable to check.  I'm sure Jerry Feldman or one of the numerous
others who have actually done it will comment.

 JC> I've been noticing that nowhere in any of the
 JC> install windows have I ever seen any place where I can type
 JC> in the W95  machine's  IP address.   One  of  the  things
 JC> that I (think I) installed was called "Mstcp.ddl", and it
 JC> asked me to reboot the machine  before  it  would work, but
 JC> never did it mention anything so mundane as an IP address. 

Open "Settings," "Control Panel," "Network."  Select "TCP/IP Protocol" and open
its "properties."  This will give you a tabbed dialog.  On the "IP Address"
tabbed page, select manual assignment of an address instead of automatic
assignment by DHCP.  This will ungray the fields where you can input your IP
address and netmask.  You should also disable WINS.  You will need to define at
least one name server and a gateway router.

Note that cable modems expect Windows 95 to get an IP address automatically
with DHCP.

 JC> There's also the general question of  how  do  I  tell  the 
 JC> Mediaone people  I  want  the cable modem installed. 
 JC> Presumably when they see there's a W95 system here, they'll
 JC> insist that they can only  install their  stuff there, but
 JC> I'd like it to talk via the linux machine, of course.  We'd
 JC> rather not have to pay for two cable  modems,  one  for each
 JC>  machine,  though  I get the impression that's what the
 JC> mediaone folks would really like to sell us.

The usual procedure is to let them install onto your Windows 95 machine.  It
will come up and obtain an IP address and similar information by DHCP.  Open
the "Network" object as described above and write down all of these settings. 
Then configure your Linux machine with the same IP address, netmask, name
servers, and gateway as the Windows 95 machine.  Enable IP masquerading on the
Linux machine for a private network using RFC1918 addresses (like 192.168.x.x)
and statically reassign an IP address from that private network to the Windows
machine.  Assuming you have correct routing and so on, this should work.

 JC> Strange.  Does it produce something sensible for anyone?)

I think you will find this entirely characteristic of Mediaone.
 
-- Mike