Over the years, I’ve used VMware, Virtual PC, ESX, Virtual Server and Hyper-V to do ISA and TMG firewall testing. In some of those test environments, I’ve needed to create a routed environment either in front of the ISA or TMG firewall or behind the ISA or TMG firewall. In order to do this, I used the Windows Server RRAS service to provide basic router features. However, the RRAS router is pretty limited, and only did basic IP routing in these test environments.
What would be nice is to have a more full featured router that could fit into the virtual environments. Up until now, I wasn’t aware of anything that could do this. But today my friend Adrian Dimcev pointed out to me that Vyatta can do just that — provide a virtual router solution that you can use in your ISA and TMG firewall and other virtual network testing. Cool!
Adrian tells me that right now the configuration interface is a bit Neanderthal, but from Adrian’s efforts and those of others, Vyatta is working on a mature user interface that should be available in about a month. At that time I’m going to make it a point to try it out in my virtual test environments.
However, if you want to get started with Vyatta now, check out this blog entry by Stefan Stranger at http://blogs.technet.com/stefan_stranger/archive/2008/08/25/vyatta-virtual-router-on-hyper-v.aspx
For more information about Vyatta, visit their site at:
Make sure to check out their Vyatta vs. Cisco Challenge. It might get you to thinking about how to free yourself from the Cisco “lock box” 🙂
HTH,
Tom
Thomas W Shinder, M.D., MCSE
Sr. Consultant / Technical Writer
Prowess Consulting www.prowessconsulting.com
PROWESS CONSULTING | Microsoft Forefront Security Specialist
Email: [email protected]
MVP — Forefront Edge Security (ISA/TMG/IAG)