Messages

1

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 30, 2023, 12:19:30 pm »

Because:

1 - I know what I want, but I don't know how to specify it. I want a firewall providing vlans to a wired house network, a guest wi-fi, and a web server in a dmz, with some slight variation - eg guests to use the printer on the wired system.

2 - I also want to understand what I have set up, so I can troubleshoot and change as required, which means that I don't want someone to just give me a script.

Pursuing my Chinese analogy. it's as if I am buying from a shop where I don't speak the language. You have suggested that I point at the shelves for the item I want. But I can't buy lots of items that way and discuss their properties, including items which are not on display.

It's not a problem with OPNsense. It's a problems with the language used to administer it. A GUI is a universal language most people speak - the Linux command line and O/S structure is an excessive learning requirement when all you want is an application....

2

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 29, 2023, 12:56:28 pm »

Thanks for the approach. That would do it. Though my NICs are all the same and don't have the address printed on them, which means another step of determining each one...

I think at this point it is time to call a halt and go back to using Smoothwall - which at least has a simple understandable interface. It won't do all that I want, while OPNsense will, but I am defeated once again by the insistence of open source in building and controlling software using a low level command structure which requires a lot of background knowledge.

For an outside who did not grow up with the development of Linux, it feels rather like trying to buy items from a country like China, where there are all sorts of products at low prices. But in order to buy them, you must first learn Chinese, and then address Chinese commercial law, with all negotiations conducted in that language. Great if you know how - impossible if you don't....

3

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 28, 2023, 05:32:37 pm »

Well, I've got to the position where I can boot into root, and obtain a table of commands - asign interfaces and set up IP addresses, and so forth.

But what is happening seems meaningless to me. I can assign the various NICs to the system as 1, 2. 3, etc, but there is no command for specifying the details of each connection - dhcp range, gateway, dns service, etc.

There are just two commands to help here - assign NICS and set ip addresses/ I set the WAN NIC TO dhcp, and OPT1 to dhcp, connected the WAN to my router and OPT1 to a workstation, and got no joy.

Isn't there some kind of GUI where all the required connection data is displayed?

4

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 10:14:35 pm »

Well, I ssemto have loaded something!

It took me time to find out how to make a bootable USB stick, and when I did booting the machine was complex, since the names of all teh drives were technical. And then, as I wen through the build process, I kept having halts with various error messages. Eventually, I found that just hitting return continued the process....

During the command-line build it asks for 'cards to be aggregated' (I think) and then wants to know something about 'LARGS'?  I just clicked through this, hoping to find a GUI which would let me set things up.

I think there is one in there, but I have not got anything set up yet. It's much more complicated than Smoothwall, where you just get a graphics page for each card.  Still, I will persevere/ It's bed time now, perhaps I will try goingthrough the instructions again...

Thanks to everyone who got me this far...!

5

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 04:45:36 pm »

Thanks for coming in!

I usually hold all my software on DVD - this gives me an easy rebuild procedure should I ever need it. So I am not used to either using or booting from a USB - I see these as strictly transfer media.  If you think that would be a better approach, however, I shall dig one out and have a go....

6

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 04:05:13 pm »

Well, that worked. I understand that took out the first 3mb of my HD, so I can't boot into Smoothwall any more.

But I still have a failure when I try to boot from the DVD. Looking at the errors, I get:

g_dev_taste: make_dev_p() failed (gp-)name=gpt//. error=22
mountroot: waiting for device /dev/iso9660/OPNSENSE_INSTALL.....
Mounting from cd9660:/dev/iso9660/OPNSENSE_INSTALL failed with error 19

This looks as if the DVD can't be read - but all the code running just before has come from the DVD....

7

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 02:10:36 pm »

Would a simple format suffice? Or do I need to have an operating system on the disk?

8

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 12:20:27 pm »

It's just struck me - are you saying that the machine I am tryiing to load OPNsense on should already have a working standard O/S on the hard drive before the install is started?

Because I am trying to load over a currently installed copy of Smoothwall, which is a firewall build and will be a very cut-down O/S. Should I first build the machine with a copy of Ubuntu or some such O/S before attempting the OPNsense install?

9

Tutorials and FAQs / Re: Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 12:13:33 pm »

Many thanks for the rapid reply!

It does seem to be something to do with thE hard drive - I have a standard 500Gb SATA in there. and the old Smothwall is not being overwritten, as I would expect.  The BIOS settings for the drive give options for RAID, IDE, Legacy IDE and AHCI (which last is what it was on). Changing to Legacy caused the loading to fail differently....

The download, unzip and burn all went fine, so I don't think there was any corruption of the image, but I could check, of course. Perhaps I should try a different release?

10

Tutorials and FAQs / Complete Newbie having install problems...

« on: May 26, 2023, 10:35:34 am »

Hi - I used to run Smoothwall on an HP Compaq Pro 6503 (3.4Ghz, 4Gb ram) but am trying to upgrade to an OPNsense installation. And I am having trouble even understanding the installation process!

For Smoothwall it was simple, you downloaded an iso, burnt it, booted from the DVD and there was your system.  OPNsense seems to have a 2-stage process, where you bring up a 'live environment' and then run an installer.

I have downloaded the OPNsense dvd iso, burnt it and tried to boot from it. The installation says that I should stop the process at some point and run the install - but the build just runs straight through until it stops at a prompt 'mountroot', with an 'error 19' several lines higher up.  I don't seem to be able to get any further than this - can someone please suggest what I might be doing wrong?