On Mon, 8 Oct 2001, Churchill, Dan  (MN65) wrote:
> I would be interested to know what "blown up" means, exactly.  I
> wouldn't expect you to be able to kill a box completely except if you
> were trying to flash the ROM (which I have done with no problems).
> If you're just doing a configuration update, the worst you should have
> to do is put a crossover cable between two of the ethernet ports in a
> loopback type of configuration to default to a basic configuration.

Yeah, blown up meaning killed the config. Not actually destroyed the
hardware. Had to go through the serial port and reconfig from scratch
(when I reloaded the config file that had caused problems, the exact same
thing happened.) I've had this happen on two different locations (both at
client sites with me doing the work remotely, of course); both times the
techs at WG basically said "it happens" and told me to start from scratch.

I also can't stand their GUI configurator.. give me ssh, dang it! :)

> > My recommendation is to avoid them like the plague..
>
> That's fine.  We're all entitled to our opinion.  The only reason I
> mentioned the Firebox was that I've had good experiences with them, and they
> do have an automated method for getting current lists for blocking content
> inappropriate for the kiddies.

Nice to hear that someone's managed to get the darn things working well.

> I also agree with the person who felt that to have someone monitoring
> students at the computer is the only sure way to guarantee that no one is
> spending their class period in playboy or something worse.  However, I am
> also aware that many schools are under the onus of needing to comply with
> state-mandated filtering of web content, and in my experience, the Firebox
> was and continues to be a choice with which the school I worked for is
> pleased.  I cannot say the same for the SonicWall unit we tried.

My personal recommendation would be Squid with the SmartFilter software
from Secure Computing, but that's just because one of my buddies is in
charge of that product. *grin*

-- 
Nate Carlson <natecars at real-time.com>   | Phone : (952)943-8700
http://www.real-time.com                | Fax   : (952)943-8500