what? actual human calling? sounds like something an ai would say.
I could do the various incarnations of the Doctor in Doctor Who. An example info-dump from memory without looking stuff up:
So the first Doctor was played by William Hartnell, and later Richard Hurndall and David Bradley after Hartnell passed away. Second Doctor was Patrick Troughton who (tangent incoming) originally pitched playing the second Doctor in black-face which thankfully got nixed. Third Doctor was Jon Pertwee, Fourth was Tom Baker who is still the longest-running Doctor by episode count, Fifth was Peter Davidson, Sixth was Colin Baker, Seventh was Sylvester McCoy although (tangent 2) he also played the Sixth Doctor for the regeneration because Colin Baker got fired and refused to film his last scene so the Sixth in that scene is just McCoy in a wig. Eight Doctor was Paul McGann who was the longest-running Doctor chronologically even though he’s only been in one full episode (the 1996 TV movie) because the show didn’t come back until 2005. He’s done some cameos in the show since though. Ninth Doctor in canonical order is John Hurt, although he was added in retroactively during the 11th Doctor’s tenure so he’s referred to as the War Doctor instead of the Ninth. Tenth Doctor canonically is Christopher Eccleston, who is referred to as the Ninth Doctor because of the aforementioned retconning. Then it gets complicated. David Tennant is the Eleventh, Twelfth and Sixteenth Doctor because he regenerated into himself and then came back again later on, which we’ll get to in a bit, but he’s referred to as the 10th and 14th Doctor. Thirteenth Doctor is Matt Smith, who’s referred to as the Eleventh. He was also supposed to be the Doctor’s final life because Time Lords are only supposed to have 13 of them, but then he got a new cycle of regenerations because it would be silly to end the show because of some arbitrary plot point from the 1970s. So then Peter Capaldi was the Fourteenth (or First if you want to start counting again from the new cycle, which nobody does) and is called the Twelfth. Fifteenth (or Second) was Jodie Whittaker, who in the show is called the Thirteenth. She then regenerated into David Tennant again (hence him also being the Sixteenth/Fourteenth) for a couple of specials, and then he split into two separate Doctors, the other one being Ncuti Gatwa who is the Seventeenth or maybe co-Sixteenth or maybe Fourth but is referred to as the Fifteenth in the show. He then (SPOILERS if you haven’t caught up to the last episode) regenerated into Billie Piper, who played Rose Tyler previously in the show and also a sort of sentient bomb called The Moment and who might not even be the Doctor at all, we don’t really know yet. There’s also all the Timeless Child stuff which throws off the numbering even further, and Jo Martin who plays the Fugitive Doctor who is possibly some sort of pre-First Doctor Doctor but the show never really explained it. There are also some other pre-First Doctor Doctors shown in flashbacks and things in The Brain of Morbius and The Timeless Child, but who knows if they’re even real or not. There’s also another David Tennant who is a sort of human clone of the Doctor who lives off in some parallel universe, and another Tom Baker who is a character called the Curator who seems to be some far-future retired version of the Doctor who revisits some of his old faces.
I could go on but you get the idea.
I’m sure you were very good, but I doubt that you had that good a name memory as a five-year old.
I taught myself how to read as well, so I ain’t the dullest of pens either but somehow I just doubt you could’ve rattled off that many correct names and titles as a five-year old. Although, it might just be projection from my almost 40-year old weed-smoking soon-to-be-some-serious-memory-problem having ass. If so, apologies.
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I do love weaponized autism.
A drop of water falls in an endless, still lake. The ripple spreads out, leaving a circular wave spreading out endlessly. Tiny disturbances create their own ripples; one side travelling with the main ripple, causing wonderful interactions in the wavefront; but the main ripple grows faster than these disturbances spread across it.
The beings of the ripple look across the main ripple, seeing the disturbances as their interactions propagate across the main ripple. Looking back far enough to the earliest disturbances, one thing becomes clear; the entire ripple comes from one drop, and most of the ripple is moving away faster than a disturbance can propagate.
An expanding universe where every point of the universe started from the middle is pretty easy to conceptualize with the right analogy.
The disturbances propagate at the same speed as the ripple, unless it’s some crazy nonlinear ripple.
It’s the weak point of the analogy, surface gravity waves like you’d get in a shallow lake do have nonlinear behaviour though.
Maybe a more accurate description would be to describe the wavespeed of the medium having tiny variations that cause extremely small, close range kinks where the wavefront crosses past itself, relating speed through time vs speed through space as the radial and tangential propagation of the wavefront. But that’s a less clean analogy, and the lake ripple is still good for describing how an entire universe can appear to be in the middle no matter where you look, despite originating from (suspectedly) a singular point.
Sadly phone scams are the 3rd most profitable bussinesses in the world. They aren’t going anywhere unless we give up having a phone or our phone carriers do their fucking job on actual scam prevention
Just romance scams out of SE asia by chinese gangs using forced labor/slaves lured to their compounds are estimated to bring in 40 billion a year. I got on a dating site, and had 3 of said romance scams on me, the pig butchering ones wasting a significant amount of time as they play a long game and don’t give away their game until a week or so into it, they ease you into how they make money on some investment to get you hooked to milk you and show you fake returns on it but you need money to get your money and more and more and then when you are out of money or refuse to give more fuck you, we scammed you.
It’s mostly dudes they have captive they beat, it’s not even a woman you are talking to in these pig butchering scams. And the migrant laborers that get lured there from other countries oftentimes, like India, if they don’t speak english well enough they might sell them to Palm Oil Plantations, which is another level of slavery hell.
And we keep doing business with those countries.
While they do make a lot of money i dont think they are even close he third most profitable businesses in the world.
I literally would if I could. Text and Internet only. I already never answer my phone because of these fucking people.
Right now they are calling my entire family with their scam lies.
Just wait till they call your family with a AI clone of your voice. “You” are in trouble and need cash now!
I just yell at them in a bizarre mix of English, Latin, and random archaic Germanic words. I’ve been told I sound like a Icelander with issues when I do that.
Well… Are you?
No I’m of Scots, Irish, English, Norwegian, and High German descent. Sure I may share some common ancestoral kinship with some Icelanders but that’s going back a thousand years minimum.
Disclaimer: drinking alone in Reykjavik at the moment
You might be surprised! There is a non-trivial amount of Scottish ancestry in Iceland. When Iceland was being settled by the Norse, they stopped off adding the way in Shetland, Orkney, and Caithness to gather supplies and… Well… Slaves. But there is a lot of cross over between the two areas. I suppose it depends on where in Scotland your ancestry lies.
I’m a Stewart and my ancestors were primarily focused on merchantry before and after leaving Scotland for New Hampshire so… Highland and lowland I guess. It becomes real fucking blurry outside of our oral history that our cadet branch was created by one of the Stewart Kings for merchantry specifically to prevent a stupid succession squabble. Beyond that fuck if I know.
For people who think they’re winning by fucking with scammers, unless you are tying up hours of their time, you are doing the opposite by engaging with them. And even if you tie up hours, they aren’t really losing.
Obviously, falling for the scam is their ideal outcome, but ANY engagement beyond silence, a generic VM, or a disconnected/fax line marks your number as ‘active’ which can then be sold to other scammers.
So they still get a profit, and your number winds up on more scamming lists.
We are also getting close to the point where it won’t even be an actual human you’re talking to, it’ll just be some AI, making engagement even more useless.
If you get a call from an unknown number and you don’t have call screening, answer and SAY NOTHING! Not hello, not “may I ask whose calling”, mute your phone so they don’t even get background noise. The only numbers they can’t get anything out of are the ones that are brick walls.
Surely, if they’re selling your numbers to other scammers, other scammers are losing that same amount of money?
Is this what you say to scammers when they call you?
Then why do scammers get so angry? This doesn’t even make sense, except for the AI part.
As scummy as it is, it’s still how they make their living. Not at all taking their side, but I get pissed when someone wastes my time at work too. No idea how their pay structure is, but if it’s commission based, yea, more anger for having time wasted make sense
Just because tying them up doesn’t hurt or stop the overall operation, you still wasted that one guys time and probably hurt his metrics 🤷♂️
Still not worth it to me
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Answer the phone like you are a business receptionist.
“Hello, this is Fronz Frunickal with Yogurt O’ Try-it Froyo, how can I serve you?”
It’s funny listening to them silently process what they just heard before hanging up.
When I was in graduate school, I used to call the 700 Club’s prayer hotline and talk about my dissertation. To their credit, those people were remarkably patient and would only occasionally attempt to steer the conversation back in the direction of Jesus and his need to have some of my money. “Oh, I don’t have any money. Anyway, it turns out that there’s a perfect correlation between the giving of dowries and engagement in plow-based agriculture.” Completely true but for some reason they didn’t really care.
I want to hear more about relationships in plow-based agriculture.
First you pay the dowry, then you get to plow
You’re thinking of brideprice, which is basically the opposite of dowry.
I do love the idea of educating scammy christians while they’re doing scammy shit.
This would be a great way to learn how to debate as well. The phone people wouldn’t know what hit them.
The only good weaponization of science.
Retired moderator on Encyclopedia Titanica here. Whaddaya wanna know?
click /s
What draws you to the Titanic?
That’s an interesting question! I think it’s a combination of things. Firstly, the ship sank on an even keel, and took 2 hours 40 minutes to sink. Most shipwrecks of the time listed badly and sank quickly: for example, the Empress of Ireland, which sank in 1914 with a greater loss of passenger life, went down on her side in 18 minutes. The Titanic’s stability and longevity allowed many dramas to play out, and the (relatively) large number of survivors allowed the stories to be told.
Then there’s the Greek tragedy element. If only they had have seen the 'berg 30 seconds sooner or 30 seconds later. If only one less watertight compartment had been breached. If only the ‘Mystery Ship’ (likely the SS Californian) had come to their aid - although in all fairness, it may not have made a huge difference. If only the ice field hadn’t have stretched so far south that year. If only the radio messages warning of ice had been heeded. If only the Californian’s radio operator hadn’t switched off his set and gone to bed, just before the collision. If only Captain Smith had turned ‘the Corner’ half an hour later, to put the ship on a more southerly track. If only … you get the idea.
Then there’s the conspiracy theories and the associated mysteries. Was the Mystery Ship really the Californian? Was the Titanic swapped for RMS Olympic and sank in an insurance scam? (No.) Was a cursed Egyptian Mummy in the hold? (No.) Did she hit the ice along the side of the hull or the keel? Or both? What about the book ‘Futility’ published years earlier that seemed to predict the disaster? Did an Officer really shoot a passenger? (Very doubtful.) Why did Lightoller insist on women and children ONLY in the lifeboats rather than woman and children FIRST? Is the the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám on the wreck and can it be retrieved?
Then there’s the historical elements. The Marconi radio set is the only one left in the world - why can’t we be allowed to salvage it? Few photographs were taken of Titanic: most extant photos are of the RMS Olympic, one of her sisters. How many blades are on the central turbine propeller? How does the ship differ in design from her sisters? Why did so few Third Class passengers attempt escape before the lifeboats were launched? What songs did the band actually play? (It probably wasn’t Nearer My God To Thee.) Is the swimming pool still full of water? etc. etc.
Then there’s the people: the last of the Gilded Age billionaires and socialites, thrown together with the Second Class ‘ordinary’ folk and the Third Class immigrants from all of Europe. How did they act and react? Who accepted their fate with dignity and tried to help their fellow passengers? Why did J. Bruce Ismay get into a lifeboat knowing full well how he’d be treated if he survived? Were the crew of Boat #1 actually bribed by the Duff-Gordons not to fish out survivors? And so on.
I’ll stop here before I get carried away.
Edit: typos.
In my home state there is a very small town that supposedly was going to be the recipient of a large investment that sank on the Titanic. Or possibly it was just the investors? Either way, I imagine that there must be a number of such stories of what might have been if it had made it to dock. Do you know of any?
My great grandfather died on the Titannic. He was engine-room crew.
The Engineers were exceptionally heroic that night working to keep the power on, allowing the pumps, lights and radio to function. Their counter-flooding kept the ship on a fairly even keel, allowing the lifeboats to be launched from both sides of the ship. Joseph Bell was the Chief Engineer Officer on the ship, along with 24 engineers, 6 electrical engineers, two boilermakers, a plumber and a clerk. None survived. They have a memorial in Southampton.

My great grandfather’s body was recovered and is buried at the Fairview Lawn Cemetery in Halifax, Novia Scotia. His wife was never told his body had been recovered and my sister was the first member of the family to ever visit his grave.
Was the Titanic pretty cool?
In all senses, yes. The water temperature was -2°C or 28°F and she was a triumph of design and aesthetics.
Is this the weaponized autism I keep hearing about?
It is weaponized autism (positive). Weaponized autism (negative) is like charlie kirk shit.
I can only info dump when I’m prompted to start talking about something now. I have special interests, but I have no interest in talking about them with people that I can feel aren’t really engaged. And the only people who ever engage eventually do get worn down after a while, or they’re more knowledgeable than me about something and that makes me fall in infatuation with them.
So if anyone wants to talk about modding video games and get married, hmu. Modding specifically is my special interest, and the games I mod include:
Elder Scrolls series (primarily Oblivion/ Skyrim but I have played some modded morrowind within the last 5 years)
Fallout series (all of them! Ok, I haven’t played 2 or the offshoots, but… shut up. New Vegas is my favorite :3)
Stardew Valley (I have 2700 hours in stardew :3 burnt out rn tho lowkey)
Dark Souls 1/3, Elden Ring
Baldurs Gate 3
Dragon Age (mostly origins, it continuously went downhill from there for me. I have done a couple modded replays of inquistion tho)
Minecraft
If you were to ask me what I could go on for the longest about? Probably New Vegas? Especially since I recently put in a fresh 200 hours. I finally got into TTW (a mod for new vegas that utilizes your copy of Fallout 3 goty to combine both games into a single experience) and installed it alongside some modernization modlists and HOLY SHIT.
I hadn’t played since 2021, an era that seemed like New Vegas was dying. People had long moved onto Fallout 4, quest mods weren’t coming out at the same frequency, etc
There was a total renaissance right after I left. If you haven’t played new vegas in a while: consider coming back and finding a guide or using a program like wabbajack to mod your game.
I personally followed the Viva New Vegas guide, then after deciding to jump into TTW, I found that the VNV people have a guide for a TTW list called TBoT (The Best of Times). Both of these lists are,'in my experience, more stable than the base game. A lot of important performance and configuration mods came out.
Then, there’s another list called WSG that I followed (wasteland survival guide), which added new content to the game and made it more hardcore.
If you made it this far and you really want to hear more, ask me a question. :3
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Sir, this is a Burger King.
Can I get uh… chimken numget?
Go for the chicken fries, my dude!
Have you dabbled in game design of your own?
I have! Another interest of mine is TTRPG, specifically I am a frequent DM. I love designing custom encounters with unique mechanics to engage my players.
I have also dabbled in coding. I started with HTML and BYOND (I never made anything beyond a 2d tile map of grass, an icon to move around on it, and a “hello world” message).
When I was a teenager, I tried to get into modding New Vegas via the GECK, but it was complicated and tedious looking. I wonder if I could go back now, as an adult, and make something I’m really proud of.
More recently, I got into making a mod for Stardew Valley. Idk what the code language would be called, but it’s an extremely simple text-based system. I was making a mod to add a pop media character to the game because my close friend really likes him. It was going pretty well and honestly the scope creep got big, I was really fleshing the character’s custom story out. Until I realized I had missed something in my testing, and noticed that certain triggers weren’t working, and realized there were character limits for triggers. Which meant that I couldn’t set up events with complex enough decisions to meet the goal I wanted to reach.
So I’ve taken a step back from that for awhile.
I did want to design video games as a kid, but it seemed like such a lofty goal that I never even tried pursuing it.
If you like modding new Vegas, you should totally get into CP2077.
I also want to get into fallout 3. I’m so very tempted to set up ttw but my copy of 3 is on EGS and fnv is on steam.
Yeah man, I know I need to give cyberpunk a try sometime, but there is truly such a back log! On your recc, I’ll definitely move it up in priority tho.
TTW has been so good because Fallout 3 was my first Fallout game and New Vegas is my favorite.
It’s awesome. But yeah, the installation I think is more complex when you have it like that.
Something I noticed after replaying Fallout 3 for the first time in like 10 years, also, was how bad the voice direction in the game was. Like it isn’t always bad but it is obvious that the voice actors weren’t given much to work with at all.
There was a huge mod release the other day called DLC 2. It has so much stuff now.
I’m playing the game for the 4th time.
I took a look! Hell yeah, I will get on it… as soon as I put down No Man’s Sky, which I picked up recently.
Shit. That’s a game I want to play. Once I finish space engineers
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One of the 5 animals believed to have the capacity for sentience? I think you mean consciousness?
The entire mammal kingdom is widely considered sentient. As are many other groups like fish and insects.
Even with consciousness it’s stretching it is very conservative to estimate just 5 species.
Afaik the terms are sentience vs sapience, which get constantly confused by everyone including me.
My brain came to a full stop here. One of those “have I ever seen these two in the same room” moments.
For anyone else like me: Sentience is the ability to feel and perceive things. Sentient is the adjective form.
Sapience is the ability to think and acquire wisdom, and the capacity for intelligence. Sapient is the adjective form.
Sentient is often misused for any living creature that thinks, when sapient would be the correct word.
Modern humans are classified as homo sapiens.
I think the confusion is summed up by a quote by a park ranger talking about the design of trash cans in National Parks: (paraphrased) There’s a lot of overlap between the smartest bear and the dumbest human.
So if I understand, both are sentient. But they vary widely on sapience.
Sentience is recognizing the trash can is there. Sapience is being able to figure out how to open the lid to access the trash and keeping the wisdom to open the next one easily. Sentience is feeling either frustrated or happy based on the level of success.
Unless I messed it up.
“Sentience has broader and narrower senses. In a broad sense, it refers to any capacity for conscious experience. […] In a narrower sense, it refers to the capacity to have valenced experiences: experiences that feel bad or feel good to the subject, such as experiences of pain and pleasure”.
Taken from https://academic.oup.com/book/57949/chapter/475703402
Also, here is an article about the Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness that strongly supports the claim that sentience is a trait shared by most, if not all, of the animal kingdom.
https://www.animal-ethics.org/10th-anniversary-of-the-cambridge-declaration-on-consciousness/
one of the 5 animals believed to have the capacity for sentience
I’m taking a guess and saying Dogs, dolphins, an great apes… No idea that the last one could be.
Am I on the right track?
Close! They are chimps, elephants, dolphins, octopus, and crows
First of all parrots are smarter than the lot, orcas, some dogs like border collies too, it’s a lot bigger than you are giving it credit for.
What, why dogs? They are dumber than cats, just good at understanding humans.
You forgot corvids.
I’d put Octopuses way higher on the list than a dog.
Dogs aren’t more intelligent than cats or cows.
My list would be great apes, octopuses, dolphins, corvids, elephantsOctopuses are right next to God on the list.
Border collies have made the list of the smartest animals before. There are different types of intelligence too, national geographic had dolphins, orcas, ravens/crows, parrots, border collies/dogs, chimpanzees. I feel like I’m forgetting one too.
Orca, corvid, octopus, apes, elephant?
I’d guess parrots or crows over dogs.
Ravens
capacity for sentience
Aren’t most animals sentient? Wiktionary says that it means “Experiencing sensation, thought, or feeling”. Even simple animals like flies are capable of “sensation”, and most complex animals experience all three. I would say “sapient” (“possessing intelligence or a high degree of self-awareness”) in this context.
You’re the scientist, what is the scientifically correct/used/accepted meaning of “sentient”? Or has it been found that most animals do not, or at least do not consciously in the way humans do, sense, think, or feel? Correct me if any of what I’m saying is wrong.
Of course animals are sentient. The arrogance of people to think we are the only animal capable of sentience, or intelligence of any kind. We have evolved to be better at some things than other animals, but they are all smarter than we are in ways. Dogs know more about smells than we do, remember a smell for life. They have a better sense of direction, as many wild animals do, and are better at remembering landscapes and vast wild areas.
You get into cold blooded animals and it changes somewhat, but all warm blooded animals are capable of more than we give them credit for. Cold blooded probably too but in a different way.
Nobody wants my info dump. I know way too much about networking and computers. The topics are massively deep, like iceberg levels of deep. One for each topic.
I could lecture for an entire day on the nuance and considerations of picking a Wi-Fi channel, or you can ignore me and just hit “auto” which may or may not take some, or all, of my considerations into account when selecting a channel.
If anyone is keen to hear some generally good advice about home networking, here’s my elevator speech:
Wire when you can, wireless when you have to. Wi-Fi is shared and half duplex, every wired connection is exclusive to the device and full duplex. If you can’t Ethernet, use MoCA, or powerline (depending on what internal power structures you have, this can be excellent or unusable, keep your receipts). Mesh is best with a dedicated backhaul, better with a wired backhaul. Demand it from any system you consider. The latest and greatest Wi-Fi technology probably won’t fix whatever problem you’re having, it will only temporarily reduce the symptoms and you won’t notice it for a while. Be weary about upgrading and ask yourself why you require the upgrade. Newer wireless won’t fix bad signal, or dropouts.
For everything else, Google. That’s how I find most of the information I know.
Good luck.
I’ll be around in case anyone has questions. No promises on when I’ll be able to reply tho.
If you can’t run cables through your walls you could look into fiber that hides in plain sight https://youtu.be/Z2FbzCyiNr4
Would like to ask, is it worth entering networking as a career right now? I’ve been of the belief that it’ll be necessary as long as the internet is around, so certainly within my lifetime, but the current AI bubble and the direction it’s taking is making me think otherwise.
Networking is a pretty specific niche, the biggest challenge I’ve faced in my career is that I can’t find any local jobs, or remote work positions that are networking focused. It’s still a passion of mine, but I tend to be stuck in sysadmin type roles.
As far as I’m concerned, until AI can plug itself in and fix it’s own servers, humans will always need to be involved in the setup and maintenance of the hardware that connects our world. I don’t think it’s practical or realistic for AI to put satellites in orbit or run intercontinental fiber along the ocean floor. Not anytime soon and not in our lifetimes.
The thing about computers is that they’re not very adaptable to their environment, so the environment needs to be adapted to computers. We, as humans, are extremely adaptable to our environment. This is very slowly shifting that computers are starting to be able to adapt to different working environments; but I don’t think that will happen in fully within our lifetimes.
Programming can be a minefield right now, but that shouldn’t dissuade you if that’s your interest/passion. Networking will be required, and tech jobs are some of the most recession proof, though not completely recession proof. Tech fields have slowed but it’s extremely rare that we see negative growth in tech. The players might change but the jobs are there and need people in chairs to fulfill them.
My advice is to pursue what interests you, and adapt to whatever life throws at you. Maybe you’ll start with cybersecurity and move into a coding role, or like me, study networking and then work as a generalist. When you get to that point, when interviewing for jobs, make sure you know what the job is, review the job posting with your interviewer if you are uncertain at all. The job should fit you as much as you fit it. I didn’t do that for one job and it was one of the most unpleasant years of my life working there. I got on the job and discovered that what I thought I’d be doing, was not what I was going to be doing.
Good luck.
What are the nuances between APs and how they handle choosing a channel? Also, I was told at one point it’s better to “stack” on top of other SSIDs using the same channel than to go one channel higher (assuming there isn’t room higher up in the spectrum).
Thank you for your time and expertise!
I can answer the second thing quickly, “stacking” the ssids as you say, makes the inference into what we call “co-channel” interference. Most of the wireless headers are unencrypted, though your payload is encrypted (the data being transferred) but not so much for the headers. Because of this, and the fact that each ap is talking on the same frequency, there’s a small amount of collaboration that can occur between wireless networks. If someone starts a wireless multimedia (WMM) session that will last 8.2ms, then all radios on channel will know that the channel is occupied for the next 8.2ms, and basically go idle for that much time. If you’re on differing channels, but still interfering, aka adjacent channel interference, then those messages may not be understood, causing a lot more collisions. Collisions being when two radios transmit at the same time and the channel needs to clear and everyone backs off, and you try again (usually happening on the order of milliseconds, and possibly several times per second). Collisions will negatively impact your performance more than the channel simply being busy. The protocol in use for wireless collision avoidance is CSMA/CA or carrier sense multi access with collision avoidance, which is an amended version of CSMA/CD (collision detection) used in half duplex wired communication.
How’s that for a “short” answer?
For channel conditions, I’m looking at walls, building materials, open air distances, appliances, furniture… Anything that may attenuate, reflect, refract, or otherwise degrade signal strength whenever I start to assess an area for wireless. This is important so I know how many access points I need and how close together they need to be to overcome the obstacles placed in the environment. Once I have a rough idea of how many access points I need and how close together they should be, my next consideration is the expected client density and the objectives of the network. Something made for a busy stadium will have more access points than something made for a local cafe. If I’m doing a large number of access points my focus will be on maximizing how many clients can be connected, and driving that number as far down per access point/radio, as possible. Fewer people on a channel means more free airtime for their traffic, which equates to faster speeds. I’d be looking at using most of the 5ghz spectrum on the smallest channel width and have each radio be on its lowest power setting. You’ll have clients moving between access points a lot, but you won’t end up with more than a couple dozen per radio. I’d look into directional antennas, to minimize the broadcast range so I can reuse channels closer together. In such a high density space I would want to have some kind of Wi-Fi blocking or attenuation tech installed in the exterior of the building to prevent outside signals from coming in and inside signals from going out. Both for security and control over the airspace. Fewer things to interfere with; you only have to worry about what’s inside that perimeter. Then it’s a matter of setting up the channels for use in accordance with local laws, and letting the system handle channel assignment. With a huge number of access points, manually setting the channels is impractical. So everything I’ve said about it until now isn’t even for channel selection, it’s all things that support channel selection.
For small networks, especially in high density scenarios where the density is due to neighbors, whether that’s commercial neighbors in a plaza or mall, or residential neighbors if you’re in a suburb, an apartment, or a condo; for this, you want to pay careful attention to not only what other networks are around, checking from multiple points not only inside but outside of the premise as well, but what channels they’re on and what their relative signal strength is. If signal strength is low then not a lot to think about. Avoid the channel if you can, but if you can’t, there are worse selections. I’m also looking at the attenuation obstacles here, environments with large obstacles will benefit from lower band channels, either 2.4ghz or UNII 1 for 5ghz, and environments with a lot of radios on the 5ghz spectrum, may benefit from enabling the UNII 2 DFS channels (dynamic frequency selection). A lot of cheaper gear can’t operate in the UNII 2 DFS space because they haven’t bothered to implement DFS, which is a legal requirement for anything operating in that band. So the guys in the apartment next door that are using an off the shelf, cheapo router on sale from best buy probably won’t have the ability to even select those channels for use, and you’ll be free to use them with little to no interference… Unless the DFS triggers that is… For less dense areas I want to tend towards UNII 1 and 3 for stability, and only have enough 2.4ghz to cover the area. 20 MHz wide channels on 2.4ghz, 40 wide on 5/6Ghz. Should net about 400mbps or so per radio, and unless you have gigabit + Internet, with everything on Wi-Fi, some remarkably clear airspace, and only a single access point, going to 80mhz channel width is usually unhelpful. I’m looking at not only the channels with low/no occupancy, but I also want to look at how busy those channels are, but this aspect usually requires monitoring over a duration of time, with specialized hardware. I would choose to overlap with a dormant network with a stronger signal, than overlap with a network that is much weaker in signal strength, but very busy all the time. I also prefer channels 1/6 on 2.4 GHz because channel 11 is near the upper limit of 2.4ghz, and just above that limit is the frequency used by microwave ovens. If any microwave ovens don’t have perfect shielding and you’re on channel 11, you’re going to have a bad time. In environments with more than one access point on 2.4ghz, I don’t worry too much about it since any affected client can hop to another access point when interference ramps up.
There’s more but my brain is tired today.
Dude these type of replies are what had made reddit such a great time sink, even random browsing you may find something incredible in the comments. Thank you
Thanks. I’ve been on hiatus for a bit. I’m around.
I still won’t go back to that place either way
5 or 6Ghz backhaul on the mesh?
Should I buy consumer or small business hardware?
Recommended brand(s)?
High end consumer aka prosumer, which is only really one brand, ubiquiti. Specifically their unifi stuff.
Or used mid range business stuff, Cisco, Aruba, juniper. The pinch here is that you usually need specialized knowledge to configure this class of device. I’ve also used Cisco, watchguard, Fortinet, Sophos, sonicwall, and probably others for firewalls. I prefer Sonicwall for some very specific reasons about how they structure their configuration, but for anyone who isn’t a certified sonicwall tech, I’d point at Sophos. Their stuff seems to be a fair balance of configurability and user friendliness. If you’re instant on new business stuff and you have the money for it, Sophos for the firewall, Aruba instanton for switching and Wi-Fi.
The benefit to unifi is user friendliness and a unified control console. If you’re not an IT professional or a similar technical job, unifi will provide plenty of what you need and leave out the unnecessary knobs that needs like me want to see.
Be prepared to spend several hundred on the networking if you’re going to do it right, there are some places you can trim some costs, but before you nope it from sticker shock, consider how much you spend per year on Internet service, and then consider how much the router/firewall + switch + access points are in comparison… And those are things you don’t need to buy every year.
Edit: I forgot to mention the backhaul. The decision will depend on the wireless environment. You might be able to save some cash having 5ghz backhaul, but it’s going to struggle in dense environments, so consider spending some extra on 6ghz if you’re in a medium to high density housing situation. Good luck
Tell Me everything you want about MAC addresses
Is this a kink?
The first six hexadecimal digits of the Mac address are referred to as the oui, or organizationally unique identifier. They are supposed to all be registered, but with modern systems, mac address randomization is common, so the Mac address in use can be little better than nonsense.
I have a theory that some of the more budget oriented manufacturers (think Ali express), just don’t bother using a registered mac address at all.
This all makes my job harder as a network admin, I usually need to look up what a device is by mac address to help identify what it is and what it’s doing. I need to make sure everything is on the right network, and I can’t do that if I don’t know what anything is.
The last six hexadecimal digits of the Mac are simply to uniquely identify the interface that the Mac is burned into. This also means that any systems with multiple network ports, have different mac address on each port. Some things are exempt, like network switches, but for the most part, every interface has, or is supposed to have, a unique mac address.
Also, the mac isn’t hex, it’s binary. Hex is just how we’ve decided to present it to users. The switches, routers, and interfaces don’t work with the hex, only the binary. Same for IP addresses, which normal are shown in “dotted decimal notation”, but are just binary. But you didn’t ask about IP.
Did you need me to whisper ouis into your ear and you can guess what company is registered to that oui?
Fun fact, when I worked for Alstom and programmed their electric substations, they had a 10bit network and proprietary network cards, and the prototypes sometimes had the same MAC address 😁😅
Nothing sexier than someone who knows what they’re talking about.
Sorry, I’m married.
:p
My wife doesn’t think it’s sexy, she usually just falls asleep whenever I get into a topic I’m passionate about. Oh well.
So if you plug the same device into a different network using the same port, it’s the same MAC?
The MAC, at least as it was conceptualised (as they said, MAC randomisation etc. mess with this), is a unique identifier for that specific device. It doesn’t change, and only one device has that specific MAC.
Or more specifically, that specific network adaptor, the hardware responsible for connecting to networks. So one computer might have multiple MACs if, for example, it has an Ethernet port and a wifi card.
The device mac doesn’t change unless mac randomization is on.
I hate that, as far as I know, on Android you can’t choose the “randomized” MAC
You want to pick your own MAC? At least you can set it to not be random for a specific network.
Yes, by picking my own MAC as with my linux laptop I could share pre approved network access on both devices (although not at the same time)
I wired my house with cat6 when I moved in. The overall setup looks like 10G fiber to the house -> 2.5G capable router -> 2.5G capable NAS running *arr stack. Also off the router is a single cat6 run downstairs -> 8 port 1G unmanaged switch, which is connected to my desktop, work dock, parters dock, TV, and backhaul run to the back of house wifi extender. The desktop, both docks and wifi extender are 2.5G capable. The TV is 100M. This has been extremely reliable. I plan on upgrading the switch to a 10g capable one at some point, and then the router. Since the switch is unmanaged, is there a good way to know when it is the limiting factor and I should update it?
How would I setup MoCA in a house when it has a really large splitter?
The size of the splitter isn’t super important, though if there’s enough branches the signal may degrade to the point of not working, so it can be a problem. I would break out the splitter, as in, buy a couple of new splitters, MoCA compatible, and put half the connections on one, half on the other, then use a MoCA blocking splitter to join them to the upstream coax. This will prevent the two halves from talking to eachother and from talking to anyone outside your home. Then use two MoCA connections, one on each coax “segment”.
It will cost more to do it this way, but you’ll get a better, more reliable connection, no matter where you connect.
Since you would need all the gear for the split that you would for the single node, I would say, buy one node for the “head” end first and test if it works, if not, plan for the split idea. Also be mindful that MoCA is a different frequency than cable TV, so not all TV splitters will bridge MoCA connections. You can look up the frequencies in use, they’re all published on Wikipedia. There’s also different coax splitters for cable vs satellite, etc so it gets a bit nuanced. The supported frequencies should be on the label of any coax splitters. Make sure they all include the MoCA frequencies.
Good luck.
Will keep that in mind. The original application was for my friends place but they’re moving. Lease ends next month and they’re not renewing. My moca setup was for my router and now it’s a cat 8 cable. (I have fiber).
I never really got a straight answer regarding splitters and moca. That’s super cool
What about the SNMP protocol? And is ARP level 1 or 2?
I love low level network stuff, but nowadays nobody needs that anymore.
Well, SNMP is pretty great. There’s three variants in common use, v1, v2c, and v3. I’m a big fan of v2c, because I usually run SNMP over my trusted LAN, and read only, so there’s little or no risks there. I just want all the information! Haha I would consider v3 if I was doing any kind of read/write work with SNMP. To date, I’ve never had to, so I just don’t bother with it. It’s a bear to set up compared to v2c.
ARP is on layer 2/3 of both the OSI model and the 5 layer TCP model. The OSI model has never been implemented in a production network, it’s just a reference to visualize how things operate. TCP/IP and ipv6 generally stop around the OSI model layer 5. 6/7 is handled by the software, in theory, and layer 8 is where you get the most problems, by far.
ARP is considered to be both layer 2 and layer 3, sometimes noted as layer 2.5, because it’s bridging layer 2, which is Ethernet Mac addressing in most networks, and layer 3 which is IP addressing. It almost entirely operates on layer 2 however.
There’s a new, revised version of the TCP model that I’m aware of that blurs the line between what is known as layer 1 and 2 in the OSI model, kind of bundling them together. It’s weird, but something I’ve seen around.
The question I never got an answer to was about Ethernet. I have searched the internet high and low and have yet to find a credible reference that indicates what the real answer is. There’s a white paper but you have to pay to see it, I’m pretty sure the answer is in there, obfuscated by some fancy math algorithm… The question is: how much voltage is used for Ethernet baseband signaling when PoE is not used? What constitutes a “high” signal, and what is a “low” signal? A lot of sources seem to point to 5v and 1v, but never have any references to back up the claim. There are other sites that provide different voltages for high and low too. 5/1 is just the most common that I’ve seen mentioned.
Also, don’t use the wifi routers provided by Cocmast. Cocmast uses them to provide their xfinity-branded wifi, so as their customer you are literally sacrificing bandwidth and paying their electric bill. I assume all cable companies do this but Cocmast is the only one I know about for sure.
ISP provider doesn’t matter. Put your ISP modem into bridged mode and get your own router.
ISPs usually don’t buy good, or reliable stuff for their clients, they buy whatever gives them the marketing buzzwords and costs them the least. Usually, they’re great at doing modem things, not so good at anything else. Bridged mode just limits them to just doing what they’re good at.
Thanks a lot for sharing you experience! I recently saw some people I follow on youtube talk about fibre as an alternative for ethernet cables, do you have an any experience with that?
Alternative? Sure. Though why?
If ethernet works, you’re just using a more expensive option to go with fiber.
Unless you need something unique about fiber, like distance (which can still be dubious for consumer grade hardware), or a non-electrical based signal (dubious requirement in most cases), then you’re just throwing money at being able to say you use fiber.
Additionally, fiber is more fragile than a copper cable. One bad hit with a vacuum cleaner and it’s toast
Maybe you shouldn’t vacuum your cables?
I don’t vacuum them, I vacuum near it. But you can always accidentally go too far and bump the cable
I feel like fiber only makes sense for long runs or extremely high bandwidth needs. For a typical home network, I don’t see any benefits for fiber over ethernet.
Yes. Fiber is great but extremely nuanced. SMF, MMF, UPC, APC, OM3, OM4, OS2… All different parts of just the cabling… Not to mention the connectors, LC, SC… You get the idea.
Everyone I tend to talk to about it seem to think multi-mode is cheaper, and it can be, but in my experience, single mode is usually the better choice and usually not much of a price uplift if you’re buying from a good company. Look at FS.com and do some comparison shopping against them. They make some high quality stuff, and it’s at pretty incredible pricing for what you get, but the equipment can add up fast.
Multi mode can only really carry one connection per fiber and usually needs to be duplexed (two strands per link) while single mode can leverage WDM to carry multiple independent signals on different wavelengths. This can be leveraged for bi-directional single strand links, multiple links that are aggregated into a single connection in hardware (this is how 40Gbit works, it’s actually 4x10G connections on different wavelengths)…
It’s still more costly and requires more specialized equipment and training to work with, compared to copper Ethernet, so it’s pretty uncommon to see in residential or home networks.
YMMV. Good luck.
Fiber is complete overkill for home networking. Also, POE is very nice to have for things like WAPs or cameras.
I’m planning on setting up a NAS, so I will be reading into networking aswell. Hopefully I won’t get to frustrated lol
Good luck.
Basic configurations shouldn’t be too stressful. When you get into large segmented networks that use routing protocols, then you’ll have some headaches. I think you’ll be fine.
I’ve been switching a lot of my devices to ESP-NOW instead of WiFi so that they can just fart out their data to anyone who can hear it and then go back to sleep, no connecting or handshaking or authenticating or overhead. Should clear up my wifi network I think.
If I’m not mistaken, they still use 2.4 GHz, which is also used by wifi, Bluetooth, ZigBee, a bunch of other stuff… Microwave ovens…
And anything operating on a frequency, regardless of protocol, will interfere with eachother. I think the main benefit for you would be the brief amount of active time, could reduce the airtime being used by the devices.
I hope it works out for you and your wifi works excellently. Just be aware that it could still interfere. Use 5ghz when possible.
The elevator pitch is wonderful and I’m glad to be following your recommendations already. Wired everything is not practical for me without drilling through the floor, so a mesh router with dedicated backhaul and a wired connection to the downstairs node is working like a charm.
They mentioned MoCa. If you have cable (like for the tv) you can probably use MoCa. It’s fantastic.
And if you can’t use MoCa - say, bc the cable installers cut all the other coax cords on the house (true story!) - you can also consider powerline adapters to send Ethernet over your electrical wiring. It’s a crapshoot depending on the quality of your wiring but I can usually get at least the same speed as my wifi with it.
Just read up on that, seems very interesting. I don’t think it’s a great option for my setup since there’s only one coax port in the house, but I learned something new today.
Awesome. That’s good to hear.
I know not everyone can run Ethernet. Whether it’s because you’re in a rental, or you simply don’t have the budget for it, the reason doesn’t matter all that much. There’s plenty of good reasons not to.
Usually mesh nodes have Ethernet on them as well and it just bridges into the LAN. Using that can actually cut down on wireless traffic overall. Maybe something to look at which could help if you have any troubles.
Good luck friend.
Sorry, I know there was more, but all wireless is half-duplex!? I never knew…
It’s a single frequency for all people, including those that are on the same or adjacent/overlapping channels. If you ever used walkie talkies, they don’t work so well when more than one person is talking.
Same idea.
Wi-Fi 7 is introducing multi link, which could improve the duplex operation, but it’s far from perfect. Even if you use one channel for download and one for upload, you’re still competing with everyone else on the channel - whether they’re connected to your network or not. They can still interfere with you if you’re on the same channel but different networks.
Odd that my router has zero problem with seeding torrents, but at a friend’s place, downloads get clobbered whenever anything is uploading.
Doesn’t MIMO help with duplexing? Which was around since 802.11n.
Yes but also no. Originally MIMO, or multi-in, multi-out, was what is now called SU-MIMO, or single user MIMO. In wireless AC, they did multi-user MIMO on the access point transmission side, then AC wave2 brought it to the client as well. Wi-Fi 6 should have MU-MIMO supported on all points, but I forget if it’s a requirement of the spec or just a feature. In the later case, manufacturers would not have a requirement to include it.
The difference is in how many nodes are “talking” at once. They use beam forming to enhance signal strength where the recipient node is, which sacrifices signal strength everywhere else. That’s SU-MIMO. This came with the promise of MU-MIMO, which is using beam forming to transmit different messages to multiple nodes at the same time. Which effectively doubles throughput for that duration, but also requires very specific conditions in an environment that’s constantly changing, especially for mobile phones. Tapping the screen or rotating the device slightly could put your device into a situation where MU-MIMO may start or stop working. Millimeters of travel can be the difference here. Even a laptop slightly shaking from someone bumping the surface it’s on, or someone typing on the keyboard could affect it. It also may not.
The point is, MU-MIMO is great when it works, but you have no reasonable promise that you’ll get any benefit from having it. It’s especially useless in areas with a lot of reflections. But I digress.
The game changer tech is coming with WiFi 7 and multi link operation, we can basically go to a pseudo full duplex operation on Wi-Fi using it, which would be a huge boost for overall speed.
I’m side tracked. The issue you have on your friends network has nothing to do with the wifi. It is a matter of contention. Your upload usage is basically causing drops, or at least significant delays, for other traffic going up to the Internet. So when the client device requests to download a file, or a webpage, or a document, or start a media stream or whatever, the request can’t go out, and every so often the downloading client needs to tell the server “I have this data, send me more” and those messages (called acknowledgments) are not going through.
Two options to fix this. The easiest is to turn off your torrent software. If you must have it on, when the network is dormant, do a speed test, and set an upload limit in your software for less than the upload of the connection. 75% is probably a good place to be, so if they have 10mbps upload, set your software to 7.5mbps. (be weary of Mbps vs MBps) The other option is going to be a bit more involved and depending on what hardware your friend has, may not be possible at all. This will, however, permanently fix the problem moving forward, both with your computer on his network, but also with everyone else’s. Implement QoS. Some routers can fall over in terms of performance with QoS on, so your mileage may vary, and there’s no guarantee that QoS is even available on their router. If it is, you need some basic settings in place for it to work correctly, most importantly, it needs to know how fast the upload and download are for the WAN. I would also build in a margin here, and only enter about 90% of the actual speed of the connection, the overhead will be used for high priority traffic when the link is otherwise fully occupied. My recommendation, if you have the option, is to set QoS to drop instead of buffer. This reduces buffer bloat, and the information that’s getting dropped can and will be retransmitted (calling back to those acknowledgments I mentioned earlier).
QoS if implemented correctly will prevent the connection from being over saturated by any one thing, and traffic will continue in a high bandwidth use situation. It will still be impacted by how much is going on, but it should at least function. Acknowledgments usually have a slightly higher priority than other traffic, so those should be sent before other traffic.
Good luck.
This is also why its generally better to turn your wifi signal power down to a low or middle power as long as all your devices can still connect.
Less range, less overlap, less competition for shared bandwidth between different access points. The more people that do it, the better the wifi gets for everyone.
Hallelujah.
Preach it!
It’s okay to message you?
I suppose, but I usually don’t check my messages on Lemmy very often, I look at my comment replies, but not my messages. I should have Matrix connected, if you use that… I have no idea if I set up Matrix right, or if I linked it correctly… I haven’t looked at it since I did the setup.
I’m curious why you would want to DM rather than discuss it publicly where the information might help others?
You don’t need to justify yourself to me. That question is intended for you to answer it for yourself, and if that doesn’t change that you would rather do the discussion over DM, then I won’t hold that against you.
Be well.
It was more of a general question if you’re open to that. I’m unaware if there is a profile section on Lemmy to know if people consent to being message directly. So, I just ask if it’s cool.
You seems really knowledgeable so I’m imagining someone might want to ask sensitive questions.
The general rule I’ve read for wifi is to use channels 1,6 and 11 for 2.4 GHz as those do not interfere with each other. So I use a wifi scanner on my phone at the furthest point in my home from the router and check which is the least busy from the surrounding neighbors. Do you think that’s a good technique to use?
For 5GHz, I try to pick between 36,48,149,161 and pick by the same rules as above. I also keep my channel size at 20Mhz for both.
There’s some nuance with 5ghz, let’s talk 2.4 GHz first.
You’ve heard correctly, 1, 6, and 11 are the “non overlapping” channels, if anyone is on, say, channel 9, then everyone on 6 and 11 are going to have a bad time. But this is entirely based on everyone using 20mhz wide channels. Anyone using 40mhz wide channels are just going to fuck up the airspace. 40mhz wide channels basically occupy two of the three non-overlapping channels on 2.4ghz. never use 40mhz wide on 2.4 GHz. IMO, it shouldn’t have ever been an option.
5ghz is a UNII band, and there’s three, technically four or five, main sections of the band that are relevant UNIi 1 is the low end of 5ghz, I don’t have the channel numbers off the top of my head, but I know it ends at or around channel 90 or so? I’m tired and I’ve been ill today, so please forgive me. Some of the specifics are slipping away right now and I don’t have the brain power to cross reference it. You can look all this up anyways.
UNII 1 is pretty typical, very similar to how 2.4 GHz works, just on a different band.
I’ll circle back on UNII 2
UNII 3 is the high part of the band and the only nuance here is that the 5.8 GHz ISM channels overlap with a lot of this, so any consumer electronics like cordless phones that use 5.8 GHz, might cause problems with some of these channels. Use of the ISM band here has been on the decline for a while, so it’s probably not an issue, but something to be mindful of.
UNII 2 is a whole thing. You’ll need to look up what is allowed for your country, but some channels are off limits and this band actually interferes with radar operations, so anything operating UNII 2 channels needs to have radar avoidance built in. That’s pretty much automatic, or it should be. The key take away with these channels is that you need to let the system pick the channel or will use in the band, so that it can change the channel to avoid radar if needed. Setting a static channel on your Wi-Fi in the UNII 2 band might land you in hot water.
Some 5ghz channels can only be used indoors, some can only be used in specific countries, so look it up for your situation. Wikipedia has a comprehensive article on it, and I would encourage you to familiarize yourself with it.
6ghz regulation is starting to settle down but it’s looking to be a bit more open and consistent between countries which would be a nice change.
Also, there are different power restrictions on different channels, don’t worry yourself too much with that since most consumer access points and Wi-Fi routers don’t push enough power to exceed even the lowest restriction.
Feel free to move to 40mhz for 5ghz, there’s a lot more channels and 40mhz wide can really enhance your speeds. Stick to 20 for 2.4 GHz; but don’t feel limited for 5 or 6ghz.
Your methodology is good. But please understand that the graphs are an estimation, a real waterfall examination with an SDR that’s capable of observing the channel would be the only way to really know what’s happening in the airspace. Generally that’s overkill for residential installations. Just bear in mind, those scanner apps will only show other Wi-Fi networks. Non-Wi-Fi interference will not be shown. Don’t hesitate to try a different channel if one isn’t working great for you. Might just be alien interference (in this context, alien means non-Wi-Fi).
Thanks for the long reply. I was using 20 for 5GHz for the range as on the other side of my home, the signal is quite weak. So I figure its more stable at 20 than using 40, even if 40 would be faster. Actually reading up on it more, the lower bands would be better in my case as they offer better wall penetration, which I think is my problem. I’m currently set to 161, let me try to swap to 36 and see if my signal improves. And I’ll test it out to 40MHz, might as well go for broke.
The difference between high and low ranges in the 5 GHz band shouldn’t be significant. My understanding of the rule with penetration is that the signal will be attenuated by something that is half of the wavelength in thickness. Which for 5 GHz frequencies with a wavelength between 50 and 60 mm. Anything thicker than 25mm will impact performance. The lower end, channel 36 will be closer to 30mm
5mm isn’t significant enough to worry too much about. Certainly worth testing either way.
By comparison 2.4ghz has a wavelength of ~125mm.
For wall penetration 2.4 GHz is better, but you’ll suffer on speed. I think the phy rate caps out around 150mbps on 20mhz wide channels. I can double check that, but I don’t think it’s far off. I think you could get up to ~300mbps? But I’m pretty sure that was 40mhz wide… So as far as I’m concerned that’s not valid.
Good luck. Test, document it, see what’s what. Remember, the difference between science and fucking around is writing it down.
Just adding my 2p, when it comes to cabling, unless you have a specific need (or anticipate one) for a specific connection to need more than 1gbps, CAT5e is plenty good enough for 99% of domestic usage. CAT6 maybe a good idea to anticipate future demands going up dramatically on your home network but anything more is just exponentially more expensive overkill.
I always recommend Cat6, mainly because it can carry 10G up to 55m, which is basically your entire house, unless you live in a mansion or something.
10G might work on 5e, but it won’t be reliable.
Even if you’re not planning to go for 10G any time soon, do yourself a favor and run Cat6. In 5 or 10 years when you want 10G for any reason, you can just upgrade the equipment on both ends and it will just work.
The cost difference isn’t significant enough for cat5e to make any sense for new installs.
CAT6 is so cheap you might as well get that by default now. 7/8 is where it gets expensive.
But if you can’t find 6 for a good price, 5e will do everything you need it to.
what i’ve done is simply lower the power of my 2.4GHz network so i have reliable coverage in my apartment, but by the time i’ve walked 2 floors down my phone is utterly unable to even see the network.
super simple way to avoid polluting the local airwaves, though i presume it’s not really something you can do on most standard router interfaces…
Yay!
Should I learn iptables or is it more sane to use a front end like ufw?
I have an RPI with dual Ethernet between my modem and consumer router so I don’t have to depend on the obsolete and limited consumer router software. I’m using OpenWRT at the moment but curious if you have other recommendations. I like the Luci gui so if I switched to headless Debian or something then I’d still want a luci equivalent.
I’m self hosting with docker and I want to set up a wireguard vpn container that joins a network with a select set of containers. So I’d have containers that are accessible only by actual LAN users and then others that are in this isolated group that only the VPN (i.e. WAN people) can access. I thought that’s what docker was all about! But by default it seems all authenticated VPN peers just get to be on the LAN. Sure, they can’t get at containers on a different docker bridge network, but they get to access the host itself! This is why I asked about iptables above, but it’s daunting. Any ideas on how to achieve “two levels of trust” for self hosted services?




















