Any Linux gurus out there? Pls suggest best Linux distro for IP routing tasks?

Greets,

My client installed a new firewall, that has no x64 VPN client software available. (It's proprietary, PPTP/L2TP won't cut it.)

Since I'm running an x64 system, this is problematic at minimum. So I'm thinking I can install Linux onto a virtual, install the 'nix VPN client onto it, configure 'nix to route packets addressed to the remote net, and then add a static route to my system. (I tried ICS in Windows, it broke the VPN connection.)

So my questions are: what's the easiest distribution of Linux to get up and running, and bi-directionally forwarding IP packets from one interface to another?

And also, what are the config script lines to make it happen?

Assume: My local net is 192.168.10.0/24; when connecting to the VPN, pretend it always assigns this IP to the VPN client: 192.168.14.100; the remote LAN is 192.168.15.0/24. I use a static route on my system:

route add 192.168.15.0 mask 255.255.255.0 192.168.14.100

Josh,
Thanks! There was a log of great info in that post on the unbuntu site -- possibly of most use to me, the part about getting XP to forward packets. (The stuff the OP of that thread is doing, is almost infinitely more complex than what I had in mind, which gives me hope -- I'd love to see his route traces!) :-)

I couldn't quite get it all to fly, but I'm thinking I need two *physical* interfaces for it to work (I was hoping the virtual interface created by the VPN would be enough to count as the second interface.)

I'll have to pull a NIC from my old server -- it lost it's job to cheap, fast hosting last year.

Anyways, thanks again for the answer, this project is definitely further along than it was before.

What firewall system are you using? You might find some third party tools to use.

Anyways... the only thing I can think of to do that would be Hamachi. It would take some real clever thinking to do it... What I imagine you can do is make a Linux machine host a Hamachi network. Set the machine up with either VPN capability or a proxy. Then, when people wanted to VPN into it, they would VPN or set proxy settings to the Hamachi IP of that machine.

I can't give you much specific advice, just generalized ideas as I have never encountered such a problem. This post on UbuntuForums may be valuable:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t...

Also, if you ask something like this on Ubuntu Forums, they would gladly help you.

Edit:
Glad to hear I could help a little bit. Yes, physical interfaces are much easier to work with than virtual ones. I hope everything works out for the best!