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by whalesalad 2958 days ago
It's a bummer that this looks to be a turnkey kit that does exactly what I would imagine is the most fun part of building an ISP: network engineering, building routing hardware, etc...

I see that your own ISP relies on PPPoE... is that a decision you intend to rely on for the necto lab customers (other ISPs) or was that something you had to do specifically in your own case? Have you seen any downsides to that? I know as a consumer PPPoE is kind of a pain in the butt.
2 comments
montasaurus 2958 days ago
Working on all the networking & routing was definitely the most fun part for me. Unfortunately, not everyone finds it nearly as interesting. We just don't feel that a distaste for the OSI model should preclude someone from running a great business.

Nice catch on the PPPoE. Our gear didn't support Option 82 at the time, but now that it does, we're switching to DHCP. PPPoE is definitely a pain in the butt.

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rjsw 2958 days ago
What don't you like about PPPoE ?
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montasaurus 2958 days ago
When someone resets their router, it clears the auth details and their internet stops working. With DHCP, it'll "just work" when the device comes back up. You just need to be a bit smart about figuring out which device belongs to who. DHCP Option 82 is a tagging mechanism that allows you to do this without creating a hard dependency on the physical address of the customer's router.
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