web 101

[Federico Voges]

Roger Oberholtzer wrote:
> I am setting up a bugzilla on an internal server. I want to access it
> from an external machine. I can open a port between the outside and this
> machine. My question is: what is the current smartest way to connect
> this external port to the internal one? In the past, I used an httpd
> proxy. That seems a bit dated. The external client is always unknown.
Well, that will depend on what you're using at the gateway. If you're 
using linux, you problably want to setup DNAT to forward all traffic on 
the external port (80, 443 or whatever you want) from your public IP to 
the IP/port of your internal server.

If you're using apache, make sure you disable UseCanonicalName in 
httpd.conf or you'll external clients might get redirected to the 
internal hostname/port (which, of course, won't be accessible from the 
outside).
>  It is, of course, important that the connection will only connect to a
> single specific internal port. Any passwords would be those maintained
> by Bugzilla. Perhaps this should be an https connection?
>   
Yes, I'd definitely recommend HTTPS. At least for external access.

Cheers,

-- 
Federico Voges.

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