Re: [9fans] NAT implementation

[blstuart@bellsouth.net]

> i think it's a *great* idea, but it doesn't give you the same things
> nat does and isn't useful in the same cases. but i'd love to be able
> to import my plan9 /net from my OS X box.

It seems a pretty universal opinion that were other OSs
capable of importing a Plan9 /net, their _functioning_ that
way would be much more elegant than NAT.  On the other
hand, having to _implement_ that capability on every OS
we might have on our internal networks and keeping them
up to date as they evolve (for a suitable definition of evolve)
would be much less elegant.

Ideally, there would be one implementation of importing
that would magically work everywhere.  But in the absence
of that, the most useful solution seems to be to implement
NAT on Plan9 (or Inferno).  Machines on the local network
that can import /net will and those than can't will fall back
on NAT.

So I'd love to see an implementation of NAT on Plan9 or
Inferno.  I plan to make use of it on a gateway that lets
me get to the outside world in either mode.

BLS