Re: [school-discuss] LTSP and school-provided networks on same physical infrastructure

[Don Christensen <djc@xxxxxxxxx>]

> 6) is this a switched environment or do you use hubs?
>
> Switched, and if any hubs exist, we can replace them.  From main router 
> cabinet (there are 3), the connection goes to the class where a switch 
> distributes to the individual PCs.

Look into the capabilities of your switches.  If they support 802.1q VLAN
trunking, then you can create a teacher's VLAN and a thin client VLAN.
(VLAN means Virtual LAN, and is like having a separate subnet.  Packets
sent out over a VLAN trunk have a special tag in front indicating the
VLAN.)

With proper configuration of your router (assuming it also supports VLANs),
it can route between the subnets.  By the way, you could even use a Linux
box as a router between the two VLANs.  Linux has VLAN support, I believe,
or you could use two network cards and not even have to worry about VLANs.

If your switches don't support VLANs, you could look at products such as
the 2940-8TT from Cisco.  It might be a little expensive, but I don't know
what the educational discount is.  (I'm not trying to push Cisco here, I
just haven't research competitive offerings; there are likely less
expensive options--just make sure they fully support 802.1q.)

There may also be ways of having separate subnets carried on the same
physical wire without VLAN tagging, but I'm not aware of how to do that
or if it will work with all clients.  It would be off topic for the
dhcp-server@xxxxxxx mailing list, but I know the topic has been
discussed there.

Good luck.

-Don

--
Don Christensen       Senior Software Development Engineer
djc@xxxxxxxxx         Cisco Systems, Santa Cruz, CA
  "It was a new day yesterday, but it's an old day now."