The future of NM : Bridging... scope for squid?

[Richard Braddock <rbraddock gmail com>]

I read with interest one of Dan's blogs where he mentions getting connection bridging integrated in a seamless fashion within future NM releases.

I happen to be working on a project at the moment that required something similar to this. Basically at the moment we're using HSPA adapters to provide net access via a small server & wireless AP.

Why don't we just use one of the many 3G Routers out there I hear you ask? Well, the server is used to establish the WAN connection, and share this out to the connected clients connected to the Wireless AP. The Wireless AP simply redirects all requests to the gateway server which then uses iptables to shift them from port 80 to 3128 where we run a squid server. Bandwidth is so previous these days what with the new tariff business model, and some areas are still languishing in GPRS so having a transparent caching proxy is a pretty damn useful thing. Also, having a small server (we're talking Atom powered goodness) allows us to add other cool hosted features like an Intranet/CMS, offline wikipedia, etc. This simply can't be done with the 3G APs out there.

Having bridging + proxy integration in NM (might be too far beyond scope I know) would mean a use case like this wouldn't need to use a separate AP, and could possibly consolidate everything into one unit.

Also, why you're there, if you could get some adaptive weight round robin multipath routing going to allow me to use multiple cellular adapters on a single unit, that would be awesome. </headexplodes>

Just thought I'd throw it out there. Keep up the good work everyone. NM 0.7.0.1 was a welcome shot in the arm.

Richard Braddock