On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 6:23 PM, Mathieu Jourdan <[email protected]>wrote:
> Hi Alistair, > > Le 15 février 2012 15:06, Alistair Davidson > <[email protected]> a écrit : > > So, let's move towards some user stories. > > > > I'm a coder but not so hot at routing etc, so I'm going to act like a > dumb > > designer who is ignorant of technical limitations ;) Here are a few of my > > ideal stories, and some technical questions: > > > > Alice is concerned about privacy. She wants to buy a device that will > > automatically manage this for her. She buys a Freedombox, and following > the > > instruction sticker on the plug, she plugs an ethernet cable from her > modem > > to the freedombox, which then acts as a router using sensible default > > settings. (is this the correct process?) > > She also has to plug one more cable to link her freedombox to her > personal computer, in order to configure it. > > But other people may have multiple computers directly connected to a > switch-router-modem appliance, then routing may not be needed and DHCP > may be pointless. > Could you describe the planned network topology a bit more? Does freedombox sit 'between' me and my router? Physically or just virtually? :) Does the computer need configured to proxy through freedombox or can we force that? > Bob is like Alice, but has a USB-only ADSL modem his ISP gave him. How is > > Linux USB modem driver coverage looking these days? > > > > Carol wants fine-grained control of her privacy. Following instructions > on > > the sticker, she types "freedombox" into the address bar of her browser > ( do > > we have control of DNS at this point?) This takes her to a top-level > page. > > She clicks the "Privacy" button and is presented with a simple interface > for > > controlling privoxy etc. An "Advanced" button allows her to access more > > complicated features when needed. > > If Carol's network topology is the same as Alice, I would say > freedombox could answer DNS requests in most cases. But for having > properly configured DNS resolution, Alice's computer may get network > parameters from freedombox DHCP, meaning she may have to (re)boot her > computer after plugging it. > > Anyway, having to configure privoxy is a pain. Configuring freedombox > shouldn't be more complicated than creating an account on any service > provider. I think Carol just wants to tell her box who she is, get her > data back from service providers and enjoy. > > Personnaly, I know lot of people having access to the Internet through > « a box », but no one except computer engineers having tried to > configure anything on it. Most people never heard about IP address or > domain name, while using it every day. Maybe freedombox could teach > them, I don't know, but it can't ask them anything about network or > security if we truly aim to rule the world. > Progessive disclosure :) For example, if I click the wireless icon on my PC, I see a very simple list of networks to connect to. If I click on the network configuration option, I see a list of devices, and if I click to configure one I can force an IP or DNS server if I really want to. But the proverbial non-technical user never sees that in ordinary circumstances, and a modem-router their ISP gave them handles it all. I completely agree that our routing functions should Just Work (tm) with as close to zero configuration as possible.
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