Hi everyone. I’ve been thinking about how I map my network according to how many devices I currently have.
I mapped my network as follows:
- 172.20.0.0/27: Home Server, pfSense, Fedora VM running FreeIPA with DNS server, UniFi Controller, and UniFi APs
- 172.20.0.32/27: My main computer, laptop, and smartphone. I have a tablet but it’s not used.
- 172.20.0.64/27: Home Assistant (LXC), Insteon Hub, my Denon receiver (no default gateway), and NVIDIA Shield
- 172.20.1.0/24: Home Assistant (LXC), Google Home, Mr.Coffee Wemo Coffee Maker (for brewing tea)
- 172.20.2.0/24: Home Assistant (LXC), Asterisk, SMTP/IMAP server, Prosody (XMPP Server
Although the /24 is convenient, I’m thinking of keeping the number of hosts down as I don’t need that many in the IPv4 space although it does not make sense in the IPv6 space as I can have as many devices as I want; however, I don’t think my Wemo coffee maker speaks IPv6.
And why do I list Home Assistant 3 times? So the devices in the local subnet does not have to traverse through the default gateway in order to talk to Home Assistant. So I can take out the default gateway from Mr.Coffee Wemo Coffee Maker as it does not need to be connecting to the Internet. I can do the same for LIFX. Of course, I won’t be able to control my coffee maker and light bulbs but that’s fine with me as communication will be done with Home Assistant. Besides, I can create interfaces in LXC with ease:
lxc.net.0.type = veth
lxc.net.0.link = br20
lxc.net.0.flags = up
lxc.net.0.hwaddr = 00:16:3e:[redacted]
lxc.net.1.type = veth
lxc.net.1.link = br30
lxc.net.1.flags = up
lxc.net.1.hwaddr = 00:16:3e:[redacted]
lxc.net.2.type = veth
lxc.net.2.link = br_private1
lxc.net.2.flags = up
lxc.net.2.hwaddr = 02:16:3e:[redacted]
So that’s why I segregate my whole network into multiple smaller networks in order to maximize networking performance (reduce broadcast domain) even if network devices do not talk to each other that much. That’s why I like to manage my networks using Ubuntu Server. Netplan is a very useful feature of Ubuntu Server.
bridges:
br0: # Home Server, pfSense, Zentyal, UniFi
interfaces:
- enp18s0f1
dhcp4: false
addresses:
- 172.20.0.1/27
- [redacted IPV6 ULA address]
gateway4: 172.20.0.2
gateway6: [ULA Prefix]::2
nameservers:
addresses:
- 172.20.0.3
- [ULA Prefix]:3
search:
- graysonpeddie.lan
br10: # Computers, mobile devices
interfaces:
- enp19s0f0
- vlan10
dhcp4: false
addresses:
- 172.20.0.33/27
- [redacted IPV6 ULA address]
br20: # Wired Home Automation Devices and Entertainment
interfaces:
- enp19s0f1
dhcp4: false
addresses:
- 172.20.0.65/27
- [redacted IPV6 ULA address]
Now my question as the subject says, how many devices do you currently have? You don’t have to list the devices you have, but I want to figure out whether it makes sense to only go with 126 hosts instead of 254 for wireless devices (including LIFX). The reason why I ask is to get a general idea of how I would structure my network. For example, I plan to buy a small house with only 1 or 2 bedrooms and a basement home theater, so I don’t have plans for having so many Wi-Fi devices (except wired, whenever possible).
PS: It would be nice if Konnected could have RJ45 connectors so I can minimize the use of Wi-Fi for stationary devices. I’m not that anti-Wi-Fi, but it would be nice to keep Wi-Fi use to a minimum.