Iptables-tutorial work
Filed under: Development, Frozentux.net, Iptables, Linux, Netfilter
It’s been a while since I looked at the iptables-tutorial to say the least. The last real commits where 9 years ago and the last proper release is closer to 13 years ago….
The last two three days I kind of picked it up again, for fun mostly. In the end of my maintenance of the project I kind of burnt myself out on the whole topic, I just did not want to do the whole thing anymore. I’ve grown and changed as a person since then. I don’t have the same spare time for one.
My first order of business, The build system was always a mess and I started cleaning out stuff that shouldn’t be there. A bunch of old scripts have been removed, I managed to remove the dependency on the fabpdf backend for jade and also the eps_to_png script with that, and almost all of the changes.sh scripts where removed. The Spanish and Portuguese builds where similarly cleaned up. Finally a Travis file was added to get automated builds running on Travis, and this actually works now!
I’m getting close to making a 1.2.3 release imho to get something new out there. The actual content has barely changed to be honest, maybe a few words at the most, but it feels like something that would be nice to get out there.
The task of getting this documentation up to par is a tremendous effort to be honest, and I’d be really interested in getting help from anyone who reads this. If you feel like contributing, contact me, check the code out on github, add bugs/tasks on stuff you find that is wrong, or provide pull requests. I would be thrilled to have other people working on this as well so it becomes more vibrant again and don’t stagnate as it has done over time.
Iptables-tutorial and ipsysctl-tutorial on github
Filed under: Configuration Management, Frozentux.net, Ipsysctl, Iptables, Linux, Netfilter
I guess I should have done this a long long time ago. Both the iptables-tutorial and the ipsysctl-tutorial source code are now available on github. Many many years ago I had an idea of putting the version control system out there for use, but I never realized it for various reasons. Both these documents are old by today, but the basic information is still valid and will likely be for a long time to come it seems.
I apologize for the version history, I moved from CVS in a rather rude way to SVN without keeping the history, which was what I used back in those days.
I invite anyone and everyone to do edits if they wish to and send me pull requests to fix the issues they find, or to add the documentation they’d like to add.
The iptables tutorial is available at:
https://github.com/frznlogic/iptables-tutorial
The ipsysctl tutorial is available at:
https://github.com/frznlogic/ipsysctl-tutorial
Iptables-tutorial explained
Filed under: Frozentux.net, Iptables, Linux, Netfilter
So, time to explain whats happened to the iptables-tutorial, it’s been rather dead for a long time now. This is kind of meant as an explanation on what and why things has gone downhill with it, but also kind of a try to define for myself what went wrong back then.
By now, it’s almost 8 years since I started writing on it. It all started as a short term project, a real tutorial if you wish. Due to the demand, I was rather amused at keeping it up, writing more material and so forth, but with time it took more and more effort to keep up to date and to add all the material I wanted in it. While the tutorial was at it’s high, I had 25 000 unique visitors per month on the main iptables-tutorial site alone, and all that traffic generated questions, and lots of them. At times, I received 70+ e-mails with questions per week, which required hours of attention. Also, Apress contacted me at this time asking me to write a book on iptables for them.
Having that burden on top of a project that was originally intended to have fun, learn and to get more experience makes a project much less appealing. Also, at the same time, me and my then girlfriend broke up, leaving me in devastation. In a sense, I lost my muse at the same time as I was the least interested in writing. I spent several weeks trying to get somewhere, but didn’t manage to get 2 pages out of me. This is where I dropped the tutorial the first time. I pretty much went MIA.
Either way, after a while (a bit over 2 years to be precise), I decided to give it another try. I had for a long time wanted to start writing again, and got around to it as I had the time and will. To make a long story short, I got too much to do with school and work and life in general for a while, but managed to get version 1.2.0 out before this happened. Another year later, I managed to get 1.2.1 out, and finally 1.2.2 which was the first printed version at lulu.com. Due to several minor problems, which turned out to become pretty large problems imho, I later decided to pull down the print version while getting my life together again so that I could focus on what needed doing again.
This is where the iptables tutorial is at this time and date. I’m not really sure what I’m hoping to accomplish with this post really, more than generally give people an idea what’s been going on around the iptables-tutorial and try to explain why it’s been … well, not keeping up with developments in iptables and netfilter.
I’m not exactly certain what will happen in the close future with the iptables tutorial. I’m currently working on a few other projects which are better defined and that should hopefully be possible to “finish” properly.. Ie, once I’ve done them, they should stay done. Once those projects are done, I might get back to the whole iptables-tutorial.
Iptables-tutorial 1.2.1 released
It’s time again for a second release of the iptables-tutorial. This consists mostly of bug fixes, updated/improved images, and improved printable formats and rewritten introduction to the tutorial. A lot of work has been done to the print quality of the tutorial since I am planning a release of the tutorial in bookform. The current version is at a major print on demand site right now, and I have ordered a first copy for proofreading. Once this is done, I am planning version 1.2.2 to be released. This should be in 2-3 weeks, maximum. Once this is done, I will contact everyone who has signed an interest in the bookformat. I'm sorry for delaying this for such a long time, but now it is finally happening!
Iptables-tutorial 1.2.0 released
The iptables-tutorial was previously released on the 20th of July for beta testing. Since no mayor objections has been raised, here is the final version! I hope that people will enjoy reading this version containing
100+ new A4 pages, 5 new chapters, and humonguous amounts of uPdates and fixes. Please take the time to report any rough edges that you find!
Netfilter workshop 2003, Budapest
Just got back from the netfilter workshop in Budapest, and there is most definitely a lot of interesting things going on right now. In short, <A
HREF="http://sourceforge.net/projects/nf-hipac/">nf-hipac/hipac</A> looks extremely interesting, so does pkttables and the current development on the connection tracking systems. It was a couple of days filled with information. Hopefully there will be a protocol of some kind up at <A
HREF="http://www.netfilter.org">netfilter.org</A> soon with more details.
Nebraska CERT conf 2003 presentation
I attended the Nebraska CERT conference 2003 after a lot of troubles getting there. The presentation has been added under the presentation tab. Overall, the conference was really good, and if nothing else, it was worth attending only for the excellent food they served. My only resignation must have been the troubles I had with security while entering the states, and with United Airlines. United Airlines kept delaying the flight from Chicago to Omaha for 10-15 minutes during 7 hours, and finally cancelled it. They where unable to get me another seat for 2 days, so I winded up driving by car together with 12 others for 8 hours through the night. Big kudos to the people I went with! Of course, a big military boot to UA for being a nightmare.
Updated Ipsysctl-tutorial
Updated version of the ipsysctl-tutorial released. For further information about what has happened, look at the ChangeLog. The biggest changes are fixed PDF and PS versions of the document, fixed some static links in the chunky.tgz and html.tgz packages and added proper ID tags to all sections in the document.
Updated iptables-tutorial
A new version of the iptables-tutorial has been released. This version has moved most, if not all, external links to the other resources chapter, as well as all links to scripts to the example scripts chapter. This was done for cleanliness of the tutorial. It also contains a lot of updates to some of the matches and target explanations, and the .tgz packets have been improved for the downloaders.
Modified/added stuff on iptables-tutorial frontpage
Filed under: Frozentux.net, Iptables, Linux, Netfilter
The iptables-tutorial frontpage has been modified to some extent. Mainly added upcoming translations, and translations already available. If anyone would be interested to make a translation, they are more than welcome to contact me. Also, I would like to thank everyone who has signed up their interest/non-interest in a printed copy of a book of the iptables-tutorial. Everyone who has signed their interest, and e-mail address will shortly receive a mail letting them know more about this. Everyone who has signed up a non-interest and e-mail address will receive a thank you mail for their participation. I will however, continue to keep the interest page open.