> > A question, to clarify my fuzzy thinking about such things: > > Can a business have a server connected to the Internet but limit access to > just their employees? I don't mean a password protected scheme, but rather > the server being totally closed to the outside world other than to their > internal employees? Or is this something that can only be provided by a LAN > with no Internet connection? > > Cheers, > > tedd Hey, one I can answer! The short answer is "Yes". It can be done in a firewall: for instance, take the following network setups. 1) Internal machines on a single range (10.10.0.1-10.10.0-254), gateway machine at 10.10.0.1, web server at 10.10.0.2. In this situation, the gateway passes traffic web traffic from outside to 10.10.0.2/80 (destination NATing, in linux's iptables), and traffic from inside to 10.10.0.2/8880. There's no reasonable way for outside traffic to reach the web server, but the web server can still reach the outside world. If you don't want to have ANYONE outside the private network reach the web server, you can eliminate the dnat rule so port 80 traffic isn't forwarded. If the employees need access from outside, a VPN would work best, as Ash suggested, but there are other options. The catch is that you need to either use virtual hosts, which brings one set of problems, or two pieces of web-server software (two instances of apache, for instance), which brings a different set of problems. 2) All systems on publicly reachable addresses (230.54.8.0-230.54.8.254, to pick at random). The web server is at 230.54.8.2, there is no gateway. The firewall here needs to be on the web server, since there is no gateway, and it only allows port 8880 traffic in if it's from the range 230.54.8.0/24. Again, if no external access is necessary, it can be simplified somewhat. In either instance, employees with permanent IP addresses at home can be allowed in via the firewall. -Alex 3) -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
