Home lab setup

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ipbug

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Topic # 138463 5-Jan-2014 15:38

Hi Folks.

Wants to develop home lab. Having a DSL connection with static IP, Dell Server and Cisco routers, firewall and switches. Have configured port forwarding on modem to access virtual servers from outside network but the limitation is needed to assign individual ports for every service.

Does anyone have ideas that how to configure network with domain (without using paid DNS services) where I can configure manually/auto subdomain to my each appliance. do I required any kind of server to assign names to each server or else ?

Would appreciate it if anyone has any ideas to achieve this goal.

Many Thanks.

charsleysa

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Reply # 961569 5-Jan-2014 16:41

Well it seems your knowledge of networks may be a little lacking.

What you're after is a DNS server sitting inside your network with your domain as one of the zones. Then inside that zone you add A records of each subdomain with the IP of the machine that has the same hostname (can be different but it's easier for small quick setups).

Regards
Stefan Andres Charsley

chevrolux

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Reply # 961840 6-Jan-2014 12:42

What's on your server?

If it's something Linux based just install Bind9.

Or if there isn't anything on there yet put Ubuntu 12.04 Server edition on it. Installs a whole bunch of things you can play with. I think it installs Bind from the initial set up.
If not just simply do 'apt-get install bind9' and and also maybe it would be helpful to download the documentation with 'apt-get install bind9-docs'.

nathan

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Reply # 961847 6-Jan-2014 13:09

VPN into your home network?

onebytemike

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Reply # 962586 7-Jan-2014 17:26

Assuming you're just creating records for each device, eg myciscorouter.mydomain.co.nz and given you've only got a single IP, just create a wildcard A record for your entire domain. Something like *.mydomain.co.nz and point it to your static IP.

But then, for access I like Nathan's approach. VPN in and access your private IP addresses/DNS.

ipbug

14 posts

Geek

Reply # 972096 22-Jan-2014 10:24

nathan: VPN into your home network?

not at the moment but going to have vpn soon. just wants to build virtual servers for experiment and want to play with. But lacking somewhere how to access network from outside ?

Just need subdomains for each appliance so I can access from outside or than bind vpn with to make it secure.

Please some one guide how to archive this.. any guidance and help much appreciated.

Many Thanks,

geekiegeek

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Reply # 972122 22-Jan-2014 11:13

Use a jump box. remote desktop to one box in your set-up and access everything from there.

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lyonrouge

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Reply # 977048 30-Jan-2014 08:31

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Assuming you are on a budget, not an MSDN subscriber, and looking at "web" applications, I would look at putting a lightweight Linux distro on a VM, port forward your encrypted traffic (443) to the VM, and have it process your requests based on URL. If you are using a free DNS service, you probably don't want to buy your certificate, so you OpenSSL to generate a wildcard certificate for your use. This will mean that you need to install the public side of the certificate on each end point you want to use it from, but for a Lab setup, that should be sufficient.

Start your searching with

1. A hyperviser suitable for you server
2. A suitable Linux distribution (CentOS would be a good start)
3. Creating a SSL CA, requesting a certificate and issuing a certificate (self-signed won't cut it, because you want to issue a custom request for *.mydomain.wherever)
4. Squid, installing and configuring as a reverse proxy

lyonrouge

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Reply # 977085 30-Jan-2014 09:29

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From my interpretation of the equipment you have available, you may want to look at a lab topology like this

Edit: changed image to larger version

ipbug

14 posts

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Reply # 979003 2-Feb-2014 19:07

lyonrouge: From my interpretation of the equipment you have available, you may want to look at a lab topology like this

Edit: changed image to larger version

Hi lyonrouge,

Thank you very much for details message. Appreciated. Let me try with scenario and hopes it works out !!

Thank you all for your replies.

Regards

TwoSeven

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Reply # 979220 3-Feb-2014 09:31

It is also worth taking a look at potentially using Direct Access with server 2012. Not suggesting you use it, but it provides an alternative architecture to draw solution ideas out of.

Software Engineer

nathan

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Reply # 979259 3-Feb-2014 10:54

or 2012 R2 even, much simpler to setup, no need for IPv6 etc

lyonrouge

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Reply # 983506 10-Feb-2014 17:44

ipbug: Hi Folks.

Wants to develop home lab. Having a DSL connection with static IP, Dell Server and Cisco routers, firewall and switches. Have configured port forwarding on modem to access virtual servers from outside network but the limitation is needed to assign individual ports for every service.

Does anyone have ideas that how to configure network with domain (without using paid DNS services) where I can configure manually/auto subdomain to my each appliance. do I required any kind of server to assign names to each server or else ?

To clarify, the architecture I described was to support URL routing to your appliances and not a remote management solution (although, it does not exclude remote management facilitation).

Edit: if you go MS, then the architecture would remain similar, but the products would change.