I’ve been slowly working my way though a list of skills to learn, both to put on my resume and as personal growth. Networking is the next thing on this list. I am not sure what I am looking for, but I want to start another project. I have built many a personal computer, but the world of networking is a pretty foreign concept to me.

I have experience with building computers and a minor glance at the network-side of things. I’ve set up a Pi-Hole or two and set a basic CUPS server up on a RPi0w, but beyond that, I have no idea what I’m doing, or even what the possibilities are. I just see posts like this and think that it’s a pretty cool hardware project.

Is there any resources you recommend to start learning, maybe what the hardware does? From my outsider’s perspective, I see a lot of people’s racks have at least a router, switch, and firewall, along with various other machines.

E: thank you all for the suggestions! I’ll have to take some time to figure out what to do first

  • Snot FlickermanEnglish
    24•11 months ago

    Not necessarily in this order:

    1. Learn the OSI and TCP/IP layer models.

    2. Learn the fundamentals of IPv4 and IPv6. (Absolutely learn to count bits for IPv4)

    3. Learn and understand the use-cases for routers, switches, and firewalls.

    4. Learn about DNS. (Domain Name System)

    5. Learn about DHCP. (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol)

    6. Learn important Port Numbers for important Services. (SSH is Port 22, for example. The range of port numbers from 1024 to 49151 are “registered ports” that are generally always the same)

    7. Learn about address classes. (A, B, C are the main ones)

    8. Learn about hardware addresses (MAC address) and how to use ARP to find them.

    And more! This is just off the top of my head. Until you’ve studied a lot more, please, for your own sake, don’t open your selfhosted ervices to the wider internet and just keep them local.

    And just for fun, a poem:

    The inventor of the spanning tree protocol, Radia Perlman, wrote a poem to describe how it works. When reading the poem it helps to know that in math terms, a network can be represented as a type of graph called a mesh, and that the goal of the spanning tree protocol is to turn any given network mesh into a tree structure with no loops that spans the entire set of network segments.

    I think that I shall never see

    A graph more lovely than a tree.

    A tree whose crucial property

    Is loop-free connectivity.

    A tree that must be sure to span

    So packets can reach every LAN.

    First, the root must be selected.

    By ID, it is elected.

    Least cost paths from root are traced.

    In the tree, these paths are placed.

    A mesh is made by folks like me,

    Then bridges find a spanning tree.

    — Radia Perlman Algorhyme

    • @gramathy@lemmy.mlEnglish
      5•11 months ago

      Classful networking is well past dead, that’s kinda pointless. Learn VLSM and general subnetting basics instead.

      • Snot FlickermanEnglish
        2•11 months ago

        I mean, isn’t it important to understand the fundamentals so you can understand VLSM better?

        Like math, a lot of this knowledge works better when you know the fundamentals and basics, which help you conceptualize the bigger ideas.

        On a personal level, I would have had a lot harder time understanding VLSM if I hadn’t had the basic fundamentals of traditional subnetting and classful networking under my belt.

        • @gramathy@lemmy.mlEnglish
          4•11 months ago

          There’s nothing inherently important to classful networking you learn that’s necessary for VLSM. They amount to common convention based on subnet size, and even then nearly nobody actually uses A or B sized subnets except as summary routes, which again, is not inherent to classful networking.

          Classful networking has been obsolete for thirty years for good reason, you gain nothing from restricting yourself in that way.

          • Snot FlickermanEnglish
            2•11 months ago

            How are you “restricting” yourself by learning that it exists? Nobody is saying “learn about it and use it and never consider anything else.” They asked what fundamentals they should know for networking, and I dumped what I considered the “fundamentals.”

            • @gramathy@lemmy.mlEnglish
              1•11 months ago

              Nothing actually uses classful networking anymore. Any situation where classful network concepts are implemented is necessarily limiting the capabilities of the network. As such it’s completely useless to bother spending time learning it.

  • @Hotzilla@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    14•11 months ago

    I would suggest more learn by doing approach. Learning OSI model etc is nice, but it is quite jargon :)

    Use some old PC as a server, and get some network cards into it, and use it as firewall/router. Route your home network/NAT/DNS/DCHP through it. Raspberry Pi’s are nice, but their hw is still bit limited.

    OPNSense is quite nice and easy free and open source firewall/router solution.

    If you want to add bit of flexibility, you can use some virtualization platform like VMware in to the machine, so that you can run OPNSense in it, with some other virtual servers.

    Then when you get things working, you can start looking in to VLAN’s, because they are quite important part of enterprise networking. Most cheap switches nowadays support VLAN’s out of the box.

  • @hungover_pilot@lemmy.worldEnglish
    10•11 months ago

    A custom router + managed switch is a great way to learn. Studying the fundamentals is also good, but in my opinion it’s not as fun as setting up your own network and learning hands-on.

    If you decide to go this route I highly reccomend taking regular backups of your config (and backup again before you change stuff). Part of learning involves breaking things - trust me you will break your network - and in networking that’s one of the best ways to learn. Backups will give you an easy way to restore to a known working configuration.

    • @BearOfaTime@lemm.eeEnglish
      8•11 months ago

      I’d start with a second router added to the current network, use it to segment a “lab” network. Then, when it breaks you break it, it breaks the lab stuff and not your house stuff.

  • @swampdownloader@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    7•11 months ago

    You already have a pihole. I assume you like it. You could buy a cheap minipc/NUC and set up proxmox on it and learn to set up and configure a second pihole as a virtual machine. Then you’ll have a server running with the ability to expand as needed. You could look into setting up new network gear (like tp-link’s omada) and run the software controller in a VM. Or you could dabble with HomeAssistant and get into smarthome. Or set up a photo management tool like Immich. Like others have said, find a problem you want to solve and use these tools!

  • @lautan@lemmy.caEnglish
    6•11 months ago

    I recommend an Orange pi 5 with Armbian installed. Raspberry pi is under powered and it’s a pain getting compatible software for the arch.

    • RBGEnglish
      0•11 months ago

      I am not sure I understand what you refer too? I have a small rpi server running at home and so far no issues installing various things on it.

      Very “specialized” software, yeah ok, maybe thats what you mean.

      • @lautan@lemmy.caEnglish
        1•11 months ago

        Many docker images are not built for the raspberry pi arch. Maybe the newer models don’t have the issue but installing anything like Nextcloud or Seafile was a pain.

  • @NightAuthor@lemmy.worldEnglish
    5•11 months ago

    For project ideas, I think most of us start with a problem and learn how to solve it. But without some foundational knowledge, you may struggle to even realize what’s a solvable problem.

    You should maybe start with something like Linus Tech Tips “techquickie” content. Look at tutorials for home servers and home labs.

    Or just spin around with your eyes closed, and point at a random tech object in your home, then start searching for info on how that works. How you can customize it, fix it, break it, make your own.

    Not sure how else to help you jumpstart what many of us have just been naturally doing our whole lives. Like… be curious. That’s the key actually. Curiosity.

  • @Decronym@lemmy.decronym.xyzBEnglish
    4•11 months ago

    Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:

    Fewer Letters More Letters
    DNS Domain Name Service/System
    IP Internet Protocol
    NUC Next Unit of Computing brand of Intel small computers
    SSH Secure Shell for remote terminal access
    TCP Transmission Control Protocol, most often over IP
    VPN Virtual Private Network

    6 acronyms in this thread; the most compressed thread commented on today has 5 acronyms.

    [Thread #400 for this sub, first seen 4th Jan 2024, 05:55] [FAQ] [Full list] [Contact] [Source code]

  • @Crack0n7uesday@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4•11 months ago

    Networking will take you from being “they guy that fixes computers” to full blown Telco engineer. It’s a lot though, more than I can explain. Get managed switch and start having LAN parties.

  • Possibly linuxEnglish
    3•11 months ago

    I learned most of what I know though network my services and locking them down.

  • @brewery@lemmy.mlEnglish
    1•11 months ago

    Cisco do free networking courses which teach the fundamentals. The one I did was more theoretical than practical but it really helped me think of what Im really trying to achieve and learning the terminology was really helpful, especially later when trying to troubleshoot and finding help online that was a struggle before the course.

    There are assessments as you progress and a certificate at the end.

    They also have virtual software you can play around with for different potential configurations. Thats much cheaper than buying lots of hardware!