IP Aliases

[leomylonas]

Hi All,
This is my first post on this forum. I did search for this topic, but i didn't find anything, so I apologize if it has already been talked about.

I have set up my computer with several IP aliases. Ultimately what I would like to achieve is to have each user of the computer sending packets on a separate IP alias. The reason i would like to do this is because our web gateway logs data usage and filtering breaches per IP. We are using software that allows us to Windows 7 computer as a Terminal Services server. Since all the staff are technically logging on to the one computer (and thus all having the same IP), is is difficult to track usage or breeches per individual user.

Is this possible to achieve? I have gone down just about every road I can think of.

Oh and one last thing - due to limitations on our network, i am unable to set up a proxy server.

Thanks in advance.

-Leo

 

[WindowsStar]

Your best bet is to turn on auditing and track everyone by their user account that is if you are making everyone log in with their OWN user account.

 

[leomylonas]

Yes, all users are logging in with their own account. How do i enable/turn on auditing, and what are it's capabilities?

-Leo

 

[zzz2496]

What do you mean by "alias"? If the HTTP request is sent from one single computer, it will show as such... You can always use W7 as a virtual machine server, install individual clients in it, and have your clients connect to each of those VMs. That way the webserver will see different IPs connecting to it...

Auditing the user connection is at W7's, not at your webserver...

zzz2496

 

[leomylonas]

There are two main reasons i moved to terminal services.
1) Locally stored files - Faster access to programs and files
2) Only one computer to maintain

Using the windows 7 computer as a VM host elimiates both of these reasons.

To answer the question, by IP Aliases i mean where you can assign multiple IP addresses to a network adapted.

What I am after is the same feature that Server 2008 R2 has, but for Win 7. It is called it "IP Virtualization"

I have looked as serveral 'Virtual IP' style products, but only found one that would work in my environment. After testing however, it didnt work properly.

There has to be some way to achieve this... Any other ideas from anyone?

-Leo

 

[zzz2496]

Hmm, I don't see why using a VM eliminates both reasons...

1. Locally stored files: If you have large enough HDD (or preferably a large RAID-5 array), you can always use one VM image (put it in a SAN VM so that you can share access on it) to use. Only one image you need to maintain... As for different IP address for different VMs, easy - assign a static DHCP IP assignment to each VM.
2. You can lock down the Windows 7 installation, don't perform any system update if need be as it is only needed to run the VM server software. And since the VM disk image is only one, you essentially only have one "computer" to maintain.

As for having multiple IP address on a single host, it's called binding IP addresses to an interface (or an interface bridge). But frankly, I don't see how you can "bind" each different IP addresses to different user sessions...

Or maybe this is what you're looking for: Deploying Remote Desktop IP Virtualization Step-by-Step Guide

zzz2496

 

[leomylonas]

Hmm... I'll look into the VM option as a last resort... That guid you showed me is exactly what i want, but it requires Server 2008 R2.
1) We currently have SBS 2008, which doesnt have this feature
2) We dont want the server to be the "terminal services" server. That role is for the windows 7 computer.

I might have found a client-server style program (which is fine) that will do per-user bandwidth monitoring (which is really all i care about atm - we got a shock bill from our isp with over $2000 of excess usage charges) I'm gonna try it out within the next few hours and test it in our configuration.

-Leo

 

[zzz2496]

If what you want was to have a Terminal Server in the first place, I think you bought the wrong OS... Windows 7 does have TS service in it, but it's limited in many ways compared to a server edition OS. From my point of view, the most viable solution is to use VMs, it's predictable, less complicated, and a lot easier to deploy, but the cost is quite high (large volume to store the image, high performance computer to handle many VMs, large RAM to maintain all of those VMs). Or, you can use Bare Metal Virtualization products, the OS it self have a very small foot print (only consumes 200-300MB RAM, less than 5% CPU time), no monitor, deploy your VM there. VMware ESXi and ProxMox Linux are few free products that are in this nature.

Good luck with your experimentation...

zzz2496

Ps. I have one ProxMox server running in my production environment, it's performing handsomely. As for VMware ESXi, I have that one on one of my IBM x3650 M2 installed as server option (VMware ESXi Embedded), so far it performs well, but I haven't got time to play around with it...