Sponsored By
Efika 5200B Project
OpenSolaris/Polaris-based router/gateway/NASin category Applications & Software
proposed by mrbill on 14th November 2006 (accepted on 15th November 2006)
Project Summary
Everyone else is doing Linux, why not something different?There are a few other \"router/gateway\" projects already:
Martin Lundvall has his \"Advanced Linux Based Router\"
cforkin has his \"EFIKA-m0n0wall\"
Konrad Kierzkowski has his \"Efika SOHO router\"
However, I\'d like to work on bringing OpenSolaris up on the EFIKA (or work with Noah Yan\'s \"Embedded OpenSolaris\" project), and once that\'s done duplicate as much of the DD-WRT feature set as is possible.
DD-WRT (www.dd-wrt.com) is one of the most popular implementations of a Linux-based router/gateway/wireless access point, running on the Linksys WRT54G, Buffalo WBR-G54, Magicbox, Routerboard, and now also x86 hardware.
However, in addition to DD-WRT, the system is more than powerful enough for it to function as a network storage device and remote backup hub as well without affecting network throughput.
Wired and wireless Ethernet interfaces can be added via the USB ports, while attached storage will have to be via a PCI controller (SATA or a multi-port USB2.0 card).
Sun\'s ZFS file system can be used for redundancy (mirroring, RAID 0+1, RAID-Z, etc). Primary system boot storage should be via flash (on an IDE adapter) for speed.
NFS will be native, and CIFS can be easily provided via Samba.
FTP storage can be any of a number of open-source FTP daemons.
Once the storage portion of the system is working, remote backup server functionality can be added simply by setting up SSH, rsync (rsync.samba.org), and rsnapshot (www.rsnapshot.org).
GUI interfaces for all system functions will be available if possible.
Project Blog Entries
I recently returned from spending almost an entire week in the hospital due to exhaustion, which led to a sinus infection and then the worst asthma attack I've had in my life.
On doctor's orders and encouragement from my family, I'm having to cut down on a lot of my extracurricular work and community involvement - I can't continue working myself into the ground on things to the point where I end up in the ICU again.
Unfortunately, this means that I no longer have time to work on the EFIKA, and so I'll be contacting R&B to either return the board to them or send it directly onto someone else who has a project idea and needs a board.
I appreciate the chance to work with an EFIKA, and will watch and continue to monitor the progress of the PowerDeveloper projects.
My EFIKA arrived today! Thanks to BB&RV for FedExing it to me yesterday.
I pulled up the tracking number, it said "Delivered". I asked my wife, "Honey, did I get a package today?" "Oh yeah, you did.. its over there..."
Hopefully I can get a consulting project wrapped up in the next few days, then I'll get my workspace back and can assemble the EFIKA along with a (huge) ATX power supply, Radeon 9250 AGP video card, laptop hard drive, and use one of my KVM inputs...