Help!

[lilmansplace]

Here is how my setup goes.
I have my main ap:
StarOS 2.10
WRAP 2 mobo
NL2511 card
11DB Omni antenna
with the public IP on it.

Then I have 3 other AP's:

StarOS 2.10
WRAP 2 mobo
Two NL2511 cards
11DB Omni to broadcast
14DB Mesh directional to connect back to the main AP
Private IP on these recieved by the main AP's DHCP.

I'm covering an entire campsite with wireless coverage with this setup.
The problem i'm running into is that I use the starutil to pull the association information from the main ap.
I want to be able to also pull the association information from the other AP's on the private IP ranges.

I know I could accomplish this if the starutil would allow use of different ports in it's syntax.
i.e. (normal syntax) starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX password -ai -wpci1
(desired syntax) starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX:port password -ai -wpci1

If this were possible then I could simply port forward the request on the main ap for th ports I chose to use.
Then I could setup scripts to pull all of the parks associations at once.

i.e. batch:
starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX password -ai -wpci1
starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX:888 password -ai -wpci1
starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX:889 password -ai -wpci1
starutil XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX:890 password -ai -wpci1

I think it wouldn't be hard to allow for this syntax rather then just a permanent use of port 856.

Is there a way to do what I need any other way?

or is this something that I can't do with out this change to starutil.

[tog]

The only solution I can think of is a VDS tunnel over to the WRAP with the public IP to get you access to its private network and that will require a StarOS system attached to your "monitoring station" (the PC running starutil) to provide the "near end" of the VDS tunnel.

[lilmansplace]

So what purpose is the VDS then?
How is this my fix?
Please educate me a little on how this would setup.

My monitoring PC is a box running centos and yes starutil is installed.

Doesn't a VDS type setup seem really complicated for the need of a simple addition to the syntax of the starutil program?

I have more than one location where the public IP is on a router and a private IP is on the StarOS AP.

If I understand what your mentioning as a suggestion that means I would have to have an additional AP running staros hooked up to my centos machine to with the VDS setup on that AP and the remote AP to get this to work.

I have more than one place setup like this and that would mean I would almost have to have 1 AP per location at my place to make the VDS to work.

Maybe I'm just confused.

Please someone shine a little light on me :) !

[WifiToaster]

Why are you suggesting to run a local box and create a VDS tunnel rather than just offering an option to specify a particualr port?

Wouldn't it make more sense to be able to just specify the port to connect to? If I'm running 5 StarOS boxes behind a router at a location, and I forwarded each box's starutil port to a different one on the router, I could simply have a script run the starutil command as lilmansplace said, and be done with it.

I fail to see how you can say it's better to set up another StarOS unit locally and have to create a VDS tunnel instead of just allowing us to use a different port for starutil. What if I want to prevent public access to port 856 for security reasons? Do I need a VDS tunnel for that, because I can't just tell starutil "hey, use this port instead"?

You guys turn to the VDS tunnel answer far too often, when it would take all of 2 minutes to change a hard coded port number in the starutil code to a variable, and then allow that variable to be set via command line. Since you have made the decision not to opensource the starutil package (for valid reasons, I might add), the least you could do is add such a trivial option as to accomodate differing network setups.

[tog]

VDS provides an IP tunnel between two StarOS systems. It is one way to remotely get in to a private network attached to a StarOS system. Think of it as a sort of VPN.

Sorry, short answer, I have a high fever and my mind isn't functioning 100% at the moment.

[lonnie]

Calm down. You are not talking to me and I do NOT allow ANY flaming of people who are helping me out. Nothing but TOTAL respect and appreciation, please.

The port change will be considered for startutil but we will not change the port that it runs on any specific system. This will allow you to do port forwarding.

Why are you suggesting to run a local box and create a VDS tunnel rather than just offering an option to specify a particualr port?

Wouldn't it make more sense to be able to just specify the port to connect to? If I'm running 5 StarOS boxes behind a router at a location, and I forwarded each box's starutil port to a different one on the router, I could simply have a script run the starutil command as lilmansplace said, and be done with it.

I fail to see how you can say it's better to set up another StarOS unit locally and have to create a VDS tunnel instead of just allowing us to use a different port for starutil. What if I want to prevent public access to port 856 for security reasons? Do I need a VDS tunnel for that, because I can't just tell starutil "hey, use this port instead"?

You guys turn to the VDS tunnel answer far too often, when it would take all of 2 minutes to change a hard coded port number in the starutil code to a variable, and then allow that variable to be set via command line. Since you have made the decision not to opensource the starutil package (for valid reasons, I might add), the least you could do is add such a trivial option as to accomodate differing network setups.

[WifiToaster]

Calm down. You are not talking to me and I do NOT allow ANY flaming of people who are helping me out. Nothing but TOTAL respect and appreciation, please.

Sorry, but my intent was to understand why it keeps being suggested to use a VDS tunnel as opposed to focusing on whether or not it would be possible to impliment an option into starutil.

lilmansplace (http://forums.star-os.com/member.php?u=3058) has posted elsewhere on these forums asking about this before, and was told to use VDS there as well... http://forums.star-os.com/showthread.php?t=5922

Don't get me wrong, VDS is a great feature... but is clearly not the answer when you are talking about something as simple as the option of which port to connect to.

The port change will be considered for startutil but we will not change the port that it runs on any specific system. This will allow you to do port forwarding.

I believe this is exactly what the OP was asking for... as it appears his intent is not to change the port that StarUtil is running on in the AP but just to be able to specify what port the StarUtil client connects to. He was simply asking if you might consider adding the ability to select ports into the starutil client.

[tog]

I suggest VDS because it's the only immediate solution and I'm not Valemount so I don't have the starutil source code.

The port forwarding available in StarOS/StarV3 has the ability to forward one port number to a different port number so simply adding a port number switch to starutil would be a good solution.

But, that solution requires that Valemount code, compile and package something which probably wont happen today.

[lonnie]

VDS allows the remote traffic to be brought to your local segment so you can use your magic tools available. Since most people have a full Linux or BSD box on the local LAN it is easy to port forward or anything else you want to do. It makes the remote into a local unit and we feel can be used to solve almost any problem.

[lilmansplace]

I'm glad to hear some others out there with similar concerns. I don't want to change the port on the staros AP that starutil uses. I really don't mind using port forwards.

It's just the starutil that I would like the change the port on. Lonnie if you could add this feature I would be overly greatful. :D

While VDS tunnel's are super cool, they would complicated my needs for this particular problem.

I don't need a today fix but if it's something that will happen, then I'll be happy to wait. Just play it straight with me and be honest good or bad. If it's just not going to happen i'll find means to do what I need, but if it will happen and isn't your biggest priority I can also understand. Either way thanks for responding and I really hope to hear good things.

[tony]

We will provide an updated starutil with an option to select an optional port this week, most likely to coincide with the upcoming 1.1.10 release.

This starutil release will be compatible with both StarOS and StarV3.

[lilmansplace]

:D
Lonnie, Tony, and everyone involved

Thank you so much for the support I look forward to the new release.

[tog]

A good feature. That reminds me, we should have a starutil article in the wiki. Duh.

[oscarBravo]

We will provide an updated starutil with an option to select an optional port this week, most likely to coincide with the upcoming 1.1.10 release.

This starutil release will be compatible with both StarOS and StarV3. I'm probably pushing my luck here, but is there any chance that release could incorporate a means of interactively prompting for a password instead of having to include it on the command line?

[tony]

consider it done

[tony]

The new starutil client has been released (v1.15), and has the addition of a -p command-line switch to select an optional port number.

Interactive passwords are also supported.

[oscarBravo]

Excellent! Thanks a mill, Tony.