[SWLUG] Network off a network but not a subnet

Sat Apr 5 21:19:04 UTC 2008

Hi Stephen,

On 5 Apr 2008 at 17:13, Stephen Constantinou wrote:

Date sent:      	Sat, 05 Apr 2008 17:13:05 +0100
From:           	Stephen Constantinou 
<stephanos at writeme.com>
Send reply to:  	stephanos at writeme.com
To:             	ajp at princeswalk.fsnet.co.uk
Subject:        	Re: [SWLUG] Network off a network but 
not a subnet

> Tony Pursell wrote:
> > On 2 Apr 2008 at 9:12, Neil Greenwood wrote:
> > 
> >> On Tue, Apr 1, 2008 at 11:25 PM, Stephen Constantinou
> >> <stephanos at writeme.com> wrote:
> >>> Dear All
> >>>
> >>>  I have a networking problem that I have not managed to resolve.
> >>>
> >>>  My Virgin Media cable modem connects to an ethernet card (red) of a
> >>>  Smoothwall Firewall.  It is therefore a router.  The second ethernet
> >>>  (green) card connects to a switch off of which is a PC (Dell dual boot
> >>>  mandriva/XP), a HP printer and a second (wireless) router.  That second
> >>>  router connects wirelessly to a laptop (Kubuntu).  There is reason for
> >>>  this complicated set up.
> >>>
> >>>  The IP range for the Soothwall network is 192.168.1.x.  The PC is static
> >>>  on 192.168.1.2 (The subnet mask is 255.255.255.0), the printer is on
> >>>  192.168.1.198 and the router connects to this network on 192.168.1.175.
> >>>   The range for the router is 192.168.2.x and the laptop connects
> >>>  wirelessly on 192.168.2.4. (The subnet mask is 255.255.255.0)
> >>>
> >>>  The printer is accessible from the laptop and I can print OK.  I can
> >>>  connect to the Internet from the laptop as well.
> >>>
> >>>  When the Dell is booted into XP I want to be able to do two things
> >>>  1) see the XP file system from the Kubuntu laptop.
> >>>  2) from the kunbuntu laptop use VNC to remotely control the XP computer
> >>>  But I have no idea how to achieve this.
> >>>
> >>>  I disabled the firewall (Kaspersky) on the XP machine and tried again.
> >>>  Unfortunately I still could not connect to the XP machine from the
> >>>  laptop.  From the laptop I tried to ping 192.168.1.175, 192.168.1.1,
> >>>  192.168.1.2. but the host is always unreachable.  I canot find a
> >>>  firewall on the Kubuntu laptop.
> >> If you can't ping the printer, it's unlikely to be the firewall on the
> >> Dell machine. It's probably that the wireless router is not forwarding
> >> the packets to the 192.168.1.x subnet from the Kubuntu laptop. I'd
> >> start by looking at the configuration of that router. IIRC you need to
> >> set it up as a bridge.
> >>
> >>>  The XP file system allows sharing and when I put the laptop on the first
> >>>  network, the Smoothwall network, I can ping the XP machine, make a VNC
> >>>  connection to the XP machine from the laptop, and see and write to the
> >>>  XP file system.
> >> This seems to confirm that it's the wireless router that's mis-configured.
> >>
> >> Hwyl,
> >> Neil.
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> SWLUG Discussion List - Discuss at swlug.org
> >> http://swlug.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
> >>
> > 
> > I have Orange Livebox (198.168.1.1) connected to ADSL and 
> > to a Netgear wireless router (198.168.1.2). Livebox handles 
> > DHCP.  Netgear handles wireless (i.e wife's laptop, my PDA 
> > and anything visitors bring with them).  ALL are on the same 
> > 192.168.1.x subnet.  Livebox and Netgear have fixed IP 
> > addresses.  Everything else uses DHCP.  Everything has 
> > 198.168.1.1 as default route and DNS.  
> > 
> > So I suggest you try giving your wireless router a 192.168.1.x 
> > fixed address and make sure all machines have the same 
> > workgroup name.
> > 
> > Tony Pursell
> > 
> > 
> Thanks Tony and Neil
> 
> Thanks for the advice which sounds promising.  That is where I go a bit 
> wobbly.  I tried this at your suggestion and it failed.  I should think 
> I did something wrong and would like to try again.
> 
> I had to reset the router to factory defaults and started again. 
> However, this time I cannot make a connection to the internet when I set 
> the laptop up as static IP.  I can still connect the laptop to the 
> router though.
> 
> When I do the following
> 1) set the Belkin to Dynamic connection type
> 2) go to Wireless Assistant and edit the settings and select Automatic 
> (DHCP)
> 3) In Knetwork Manager, configure the wireless network device.  Put dot 
> in Automatic.  It does not matter what I enter if anything for the 
> Routes and DNS tab the connection to the Internet and router is still 
> made.  Good so far.
> 
> For the moment lets forget about my static IP problem and proceed as 
> though I was trying to follow your advice.
> 
> I turned of the firewall in the Belkin router
> I made the IP of the printer static at 192.168.1.10
> I can log into the router and go to LAN setup > LAN settings where I can 
>   see as default the IP address 192.168.2.1 and can change this to 
> something with my existing range:  but what?  I am not sure of my 
> concept here.  Is the IP I am supposed to enter going to replace the 
> 192.168.1.173 WAN side IP that the Belkin was getting from the 
> Smoothwall network and if so what will the LAN side IP be?
> Or is it something different.
> 
> Is this what Neil meant by making my router a bridge? and is this what 
> you meant by making sure everything is on the same subnet?
> 
> Finaly, how do I change the Workgroup name in Kubuntu?  I have looked at 
> KNetworkmanger and the only thing I can think of is either Host name or 
> Domain Name, there is no label Workgroup.
> 
> The XP machine is in workgroup "Mdkgroup"
> 
> Thanks and hope to hear from you
> 
> Stephen
> 

First, you only replied to me, not to the list....

Second, I'm away on the other side of the world on holiday for a 
while early tomorrow so only a few random observations....

My Netgear doesn't have a WAN side connection. (If it did, it 
would be an ADSL connection). It functions as a four port hub 
and the Livebox goes into one of those ports.  So it is just a hub 
on the network, not a router.  It is also a wireless access point 
(think of this as an extension to the hub ports).

I don't have time to boot into Ubuntu, but I'm sure it asks 
somewhere for the workgroup so Samba can talk to Windows 
systems.  (Do you have Samba configured?)

Finally, you will need to make sure that all the firewalls (and I 
have them on the LIvebox, the Netgear, my XP and the wife's 
XP laptop) allow connections from/to the local network range 
(192.168.1.x).

Off to bed now for an early start tomorrow.  Hope the above 
helps.

Tony