Physical connections for hardware-firewall

joel-p2

episode: Configuring a Firewall.

Could you explain exactly how the pfSense firewall-box was connected to Don's laptop? It was mentioned that 3 network cards were being used (i.e., LAN, WAN, DMZ). As I understand this, 3 Network cards were installed in the box that pfSense was installed on. How was this box then connected to Don's laptop? There was some activity where some ?cables? were pulled affecting the LAN, WAN, DMZ connections? Could you explain these hardware connections?

Don Pezet

wvykid,
It's been a while since we filmed that episode so my memory is a little fuzzy but here is how I remember it.

For the initial installation of pfSense we hooked a monitor and keyboard directly to the firewall box and did the local install. Once that was done we switched to my laptop for the rest.
We didn't discuss it on the show, but I had two network adapters on my laptop. One NIC was connected to our studio network so that I could share my desktop with our video switcher. The other NIC was run to a switch which then connected to the LAN interface of the pfSense firewall. That effectively placed me on the inside of the firewall network and allowed me to access the web UI for configuration. Since my laptop had two default gateways, I manipulated my network interface priorities to ensure that my outbound traffic went through the firewall.
I don't remember specifically, but the DMZ interface was either unplugged or we stuck a loopback plug in it to bring the link up without actually plugging it in to a network. Either way, the DMZ interface was not connected to a real network.
The WAN interface was plugged in to our studio network so that the firewall had internet access.
From there we were able to configure firewall rules to block/allow traffic as it passed between the firewall's LAN interface and the studio network.
I think that sums it up, but if you want any other details just let me know.
Don Pezet
Host, ITProTV