Reference Configuration

The reference networking configuration consists of an Intel NUC, communicating over Wi-Fi to a Ubiquiti NanoStation M2, but of course the Buendia platform should be flexible enough to be readily configured for any reasonable combination of Linux computing and networking hardware.

The buendia-networking package assumes that the server hardware has two network connections: one wireless, the other wired.

Currently, the primary assumption is that Buendia server will communicate with clients over a Wi-Fi network hosted by a dedicated access point.

DHCP and DNS can be provided either by the wireless AP or by the Buendia server.

Network design

Our reference network design makes two assumptions:

1. Using a Nanostation as the network router will provide better wireless connectivity to clients than using the internal Wi-Fi card on a NUC in combination with hostapd.
2. The NUC should provide DNS, so that clients can be configured simply to connect to the buendia hostname on the local network.

Therefore the NUC could be configured with a file in e.g. /usr/share/buendia/site/70-networking-nuc as follows

# Join the existing "buendia" network as provided by the Nanostation
NETWORKING_AP=0
NETWORKING_SSID=buendia
NETWORKING_PASSWORD=plumpynut

# Get a static address on the network and provide DNS but not DHCP.
NETWORKING_WIFI_ADDRESS=10.0.0.2
NETWORKING_DHCP_DNS_SERVER=1
NETWORKING_DHCP_RANGE=

Router configuration

Details on configuring the NanoStation M3 can be found under Setting Up an Access Point.

The Nanostation should be configured as 10.0.0.1 on the WLAN and deliver DHCP on the 10.0.0.x network, with the DNS address hardcoded to 10.0.0.2. (Alternately, the DHCP server could be disabled on the Nanostation and enabled on the NUC as documented below.)

The Nanostation Ethernet address can be left set to the default 192.168.1.20 to permit maintenance access. The default admin username and password for the Nanostation is ubnt. The Nanostation Quick Start Guide (PDF) provides additional detail.

Critical note: The default settings on the Nanostation make it impossible to connect to the Wi-Fi network from some devices. You must make the following changes from the factory default settings.

1. Disable "AirMAX"
2. Set channel width to 20 MHz
3. Select a specific Wi-Fi channel -- don't use auto

The Ubiquiti user forums hint at this a bit, and this blog post contains some additional detail.

Site settings

NETWORKING_WIFI_INTERFACE

The Linux device name for the wireless interface.

NETWORKING_SSID

The SSID for the wireless network. Required if NETWORKING_WIFI_INTERFACE is set.

NETWORKING_PASSWORD

The WPA2 password for the wireless network. Required if NETWORKING_WIFI_INTERFACE is set.

NETWORKING_WIFI_ADDRESS

The IP address for the Wi-Fi interface. If this is left blank, then the deprecated setting NETWORKING_IP_ADDRESS is used. If both are blank, then the Wi-Fi device is configured to use DHCP to find an IP address.

NETWORKING_ETHERNET_INTERFACE

The Linux device name for the Ethernet interface.

NETWORKING_ETHERNET_ADDRESS

The IP address for the Ethernet interface. If this is left blank, then the deprecated setting NETWORKING_IP_ADDRESS is used. If both are blank, then the Ethernet device is configured to use DHCP to find an IP address.

NETWORKING_DHCP_DNS_SERVER

A boolean setting determining whether or not the Buendia server provides DNS and/or DHCP on its subnet. Defaults to off. If this is set, then NETWORKING_IP_ADDRESS is required.

NETWORKING_DHCP_RANGE

The DHCP assignment range passed to dnsmasq. Must be in the form <start IP>, <end IP>, <lease time>, e.g. 192.168.10.10,192.168.10.50,12h. If left unset, then the Buendia server will not provide DHCP. Ignored if NETWORKING_DHCP_DNS_SERVER is unset.