802.11x pioritize packets, free wi-fi

The thought accured to me to open up my wi-fi for anyone to use, but
have it setup so my computers get highest priority.

Ideally, the connections that get the "priority handling" are the ones
that are connected securely via vpn connections. The freeloaders would
not have a secure connection, but would be able to get free net that
would slow down when ever I got on.

I assume it would have to run on a seperate linux machine, to do the
vpn'ing and packet priority-izing, unless your router is hackable
(like the Linksys WRT54G).

It would seem this is good for everyone, more open access points is
good for roaming people, and I don't have to sacrifice security or
performance. If this was brain dead easy to setup maybe it would get
wide spread use.

Is there any projects already doing something like this? Any one
interested in starting it up?

On 6 Nov 2004 22:14:00 -0800, (E-Mail Removed) (Ryan Christianson)
wrote:

>The thought accured to me to open up my wi-fi for anyone to use, but
>have it setup so my computers get highest priority.
>
>Ideally, the connections that get the "priority handling" are the ones
>that are connected securely via vpn connections. The freeloaders would
>not have a secure connection, but would be able to get free net that
>would slow down when ever I got on.
>
>I assume it would have to run on a seperate linux machine, to do the
>vpn'ing and packet priority-izing, unless your router is hackable
>(like the Linksys WRT54G).
>
>It would seem this is good for everyone, more open access points is
>good for roaming people, and I don't have to sacrifice security or
>performance. If this was brain dead easy to setup maybe it would get
>wide spread use.
>
>Is there any projects already doing something like this? Any one
>interested in starting it up?

Yes. What you're looking for is "bandwidth management" or QoS
(Quality of Service) features. I use a stand-alone SBC with a CF card
boot, running DummyNet on the ethernet backhaul:
http://info.iet.unipi.it/~luigi/ip_dummynet/
It wasn't intended for this purpose, is rather crude, but works well
enough. My guess is that you want to have it dynamically reconfigure
itself depending on which users are connected. I'm not sure exactly
how to do this (but have some ideas).

Linux traffic shaping FAQ:
http://lartc.org/lartc.html

Various WRT54G hacks also include some form of bandwidth management.
However, since you're also going to terminiate the VPN, methinks
you'll be out of RAM for the WRT54G and will need to do such things
externally.

If you go to the Sourceforge search page at:
http://sourceforge.net/search/
and use "bandwidth manager" or "QoS" as a keyword, you'll find quite a
few open source projects.


--
Jeff Liebermann (E-Mail Removed)
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 AE6KS 831-336-2558