I have a form like this I do regularly for work. I actually fax the form, I don’t even send it electronically. But I like to fill it electronically so I have my records on the computer. Because it is 2023. I had to use my home computer (linux) to generate a copy of the form, then use a floss editor I managed to get working on windows work computer to annotate on top of the form fields. For some reason it’s really hard to get the annotations to line up with the form fields. So sometimes I have to correct it by hand after printing to clarify.

It is a zero security form, there is no need to have all this rigamarole. The form is freely available on the internet and anyone with a fucking fax machine could fill it in and send it on behalf of anyone else. Fax machine is the biggest hurdle; who the hell has one of those.

just to check my understanding: a 4 port card provides different capability than a 1 or 2 port card with a switch attached, yes?

thanks for all the info!

i am definitely a person who will always change the defaults for no particular reason. so I appreciate the warning. except I don’t quite know what you mean by “assignments”. do you mean like the names? eth0? or their functions? I do like the idea of having a physical jack that’s always guaranteed to allow access no matter what I foul up otherwise.

all these years I have been running my home network with a collection of routers just kind of attached together in a way that shouldn’t work due to “double nat” according to everything I ever read, but it is pretty much functional if not at all optimized. maybe if you don’t believe in double nat it won’t happen to you.

thanks! so for example: Intel Gigabit Dual PORT GIGABIT ETHERNET PCIe NIC Card EXPI9402PT NC360T which is CA$30. Does that sound right?

What’s a server card?

I’d prefer to avoid VMs if possible I never had much luck with them.

that sounds useful.

i like to keep things separate when plausible.

I was hoping to make use of one of the various computers I have cluttering this place up so I could justify continuing the collection. ;)

Do you know how to determine suitability of an existing card, or how to correctly purchase a replacement?

Does “interface” mean you need separate cards? Or you have a single card with multiple interfaces?

Is DMZ like a guest network?

I looked up “IDS/IPS” and it wounds like something I would prefer to avoid doing if I can.

The best internet I could subscribe to where I’m at is 1024 Mbps down, 50 Mbps up. I’ll add that to the post I guess it is relevant since so many people have fibre. (sigh)