Hi Herbert,

Monday, June 26, 2006, 3:10:38 PM, you wrote:

> How important is bandwidth?

I don't know - I assume if the colonies could have a connection that
doesn't drop below, say, three to four times as fast as Dial-up, they
would be satisfied for now.

> If sacrificing bandwidth is an "OK" solution, perhaps something like
> this is an option:

> Colony:
> Internet Connection -> router -> router with VPN client -> clients

> Base:
> Internet Connection -> VPN server -> Filter computer -> Internet
> Connection

> I hope this makes sense. Basically every colony doesn't get a connection
> to the internet, their VPN client connects to the "Base" VPN server.
> This VPN server could then block out whatever you'd like.

> The benefit is it's relatively plug and play for the colonies, you set
> up each box and mail it to them. They can set up their networks any way
> they want, wired or WiFi. Since the router with VPN is their only
> connection to the rest of the internet only physical access can bypass
> it (unless they manage to hack the VPN router, possible, but easy enough
> to secure).

> At the base you can use a computer to act as the VPN server, or just buy
> one. The whitelist filtering can then be done with a Linux or Windows
> box. Since it's the only point that goes to the rest of the internet
> it's the only point that needs configuring. You can also reconfigure it
> remotely if you wish.

> The bad side of this idea is the all the internet traffic from the
> colonies will come through the "Base's" internet connection. If you're
> dealing with just a few emails and web pages that's probably OK. If
> you're dealing with streaming video or thousands of clients, that won't
> be OK.

I don't think streaming video is currently desired - just basic email,
access to on-line banking, and business-related web sites. This will
likely expand greatly as the colonies become more familiar with the new
options that the Internet will provide.

I assume the base computer's connection to the Internet should be
faster than any other colony's connection - how much improvement
might extra bandwith give? I assume bandwith is more a bottleneck than
the VPN hardware?

> Basically you are creating a pseudo ISP that the clients connect to
> through VPN.

> Costs shouldn't be too bad. The VPN client routers are getting pretty
> cheap (since they are in the consumer space now), VPN servers are a
> little more expensive, but you only need one.

-- 
Best regards,
Patrick Murphy
James Valley Colony
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