Seminars and Workshops
REPORT ON BELIZE SCHOOLS INTERNET WORKSHOP
March 31st-April 5th, 1997 Corozal Community College, Belize
Prepared by Brian Candler (B.Candler@pobox.com)
OVERALL
My overall impression of the workshop was that it was very successful.
Although no formal evaluation was made at the time, informal feedback has been very
positive. The Belize Internet Task Force (BITF) plans to send out evaluation forms which
will not only provide feedback from the workshop itself, but also determine what
additional assistance schools feel they will need to complete their Internet connections.
PREPARATION
I was at the CCC lab from Tuesday to Thursday of the preceeding week.
This allowed us to set up the workstations for TCP/IP, set up the main Linux gateway/mail
server box, and install the PABX and telephone cables (for which I gratefully acknowledge
the assistance of Anwar Charaf from BTL).
TEACHING
The course covered the following materials, dividing the day into four
sessions of just under 2 hours each:
Mon: Course started at 1pm with an introductory address from Mr Kenrick
Texel, director of the Belize office of the OAS .
Afternoon session: introduction to Internet services (web browsing,
E-mail, ftp, telnet) using Windows 95 workstations connected to Internet via Linux
gateway.
Evening: configuration of hardware
Tue: Morning: introduction to Unix, contrasting with MS-DOS.
Installation of Red Hat Linux.
Afternoon: introduction to IP (datagrams, IP numbers, prefixes, network
number allocation). Initial static routing exercise using ethernet.
Evening: fixing hardware problems.
Wed: Morning: Continuation of static routing exercise; default route.
Ethernet encapsulation, ARP Serial links, PPP. Establishing PPP links over fixed lines.
Afternoon: complex static route exercise combining ethernet and fixed
PPP links.
Evening: introduction to HTML [Jan Wilson].
Thur: Morning: Modems, modulation, Hayes commands, modem configuration.
Dial-up PPP exercise.
Afternoon: Dial-up PPP with RFC1918 and IP masquerading. Reconfigure
lab to flat network; storing IP parameters in Red Hat configuration files. TCP and UDP;
the TCP/IP stack. Application protocols exercise (SMTP and POP3). Introduction to DNS.
Fri: Morning: DNS structure and delgation. E-mail routing. UUCP
structure, configuration files. Dial-up UUCP exercise.
Afternoon: sendmail configuration. Connecting schools to BTL.NET [Sean
Fuller, BTL] Integrating Novell into TCP/IP networks.
Sat: Morning: security overview. Host based access controls. Firewalls,
packet filters and proxy servers, packet filter design examples.
Afternoon: cryptographic methods and tools. Lab teardown. All sessions
apart from two were run by myself. This did result in rather a high stress level; however
the assistance of Jan Wilson with the setup of the CCC lab, and Mike Gundy and Gina
Kisling with hardware setup and Linux practical sessions, was invaluable and made the
whole thing possible.
LABORATORY FACILITIES
The workshop was located in the computer lab of Corozal Community
College. The room is conveniently laid out and had sufficient space, despite the
unexpectedly large number of both computers and students. It is air conditioned, and
although this resulted in a high level of noise, we were provided with a P.A. system which
helped to compensate for this.
It was envisaged that most students would be using CCC computers, with
a few bringing their own PCs to use. In the end it turned out that almost all students
brought PCs, meaning that they had to all be squeezed in where possible. Most didn't have
network cards, so the CCC computers had to be dismantled to borrow the net cards; some
needed to borrow extra RAM to bring them up from 4MB to 8MB. This was quite a chaotic
situation on the first evening (although not the complete disaster it could have been);
and hardware problems remained for the second day, such as IRQ and base address clashes on
network cards, which was a particular problem for the four machines which had two network
cards so they could act as ethernet routers. It wasn't until the evening of the second day
that these problems were finally ironed out. Additionally, most people did not want to
erase their hard drives to install Linux, so we ended up using FIPS in many cases to
shrink existing DOS/Windows partitions.
In retrospect, this was not a good way to run the workshop - although
it did work out OK in the end, it caused many headaches. People should only have been
allowed to bring their own machines IF: (1) they were ready to dedicate this machine to
being a Linux workstation, and (2) they had their own network card and modem.
In this case, the benefits of helping them set up their machine in its
final permanent configuration might outweigh the hassles involved in reconfiguring their
machine specially for the workshop.
EQUIPMENT
As stated above, PCs were provided by participants, and network cards
by CCC. Additional equipment was supplied as follows:
- 2 extra hubs from BTL (in addition to 3 from CCC)
- 16 line PABX and cabling from BTL
- 8 modems from UCB
- 4 modems from BTL
- 2 modems from CCC
- RS232 9w-25w modem cables from BTL
- Ethernet crimp tools and testers from BTL and UCB
- I brought ethernet cables, RJ45 connectors, cable and D connectors
for making 9w-9w RS232 cables, and overhead transparancies/pens/flip chart
- Overhead projector from UCB (unfortunately arrived a day late, and
the LCD display panel did not have the correct cables to work)
- whiteboard and markers from CCC
A flip chart stand would have been a useful addition. The central NOC
Linux PC had only two modems (one for dialing to the Internet and one for receiving
incoming calls from the PABX) which meant that the dial-up exercises went very slowly;
only one student could dial in at a time. In retrospect it would have been nice to set up
a terminal server, even with only 4 or 6 lines.
However otherwise the level of equipment was good, and I was most
impressed by the level of support from BTL, UCB and CCC in this regard.
INTERNET CONNECTIVITY
Internet connectivity for the workshop took the form of a 28.8 dial-up
link to BTL, where we had a static IP number and a /25 network routed through to us. This
link worked well once we had a Telebit Fastblazer modem loaned from BTL. Our previous
attempts had used USR Sportster modems, and they dropped the link after only a minute or
two on line. This emphasises the importance of high-quality modems in an developing
country environment where the telcommunications links may not be of the highest quality.
The NOC Linux PC was set up running a caching proxy web server (squid)
which gave a faster response time for web access during the Internet usage practical on
the first day.
SOFTWARE PLATFORM
The software platform for the workshop was Red Hat Linux 4.1 for i386.
This is a very well put together distribution of Linux; its key advantage is easy package
upgradeability.
The NOC consisted of a 486/100 PC with 16MB of RAM, acting as DNS
server, web server, web cache, FTP and NFS server, mail server, and dial-up PPP and UUCP
terminal server. It is a clear demonstration of how a fairly robust package of Internet
services can be put together using basic hardware. It served us well for the week.
Although most participants had no experience of any flavour of Unix
before the workshop, they seemed to pick it up readily. Linux is easy to use in comparison
with other version of Unix (for example it has the 'bash' shell) which may partially
account for this; the similarities to DOS were also stressed, to draw on students'
previous experience.
Software was to be distributed to participants on CD-ROM, including Red
Hat ready to install. Discs were copied locally but unfortunately the filenames were
truncated and lowercased during the copying process, making them useless for installing
Linux. I will copy additional disks on my own system when I return to the UK, and mail
them to Belize.
DOCUMENTATION
I prepared documentation culled from previous workshops, and some
prepared specially for this one; photocopying was very generously provided by BTL. Not
quite enough copies were printed to go round - future workshops should print at least
10-15 copies more than the expected number of participants. However the documents are all
on the CD-ROM.
To provide a greater depth of information, four copies of a small
library of 10 key reference books have been purchased by the OAS. This will be housed in
different areas of Belize (North, Central, South and West) to be accessible by computer
teachers and students in their respective areas.
FUNDING
The majority of funding for the workshop was provided by the
Organisation of American States, following on from their support of the CUNET node at UCB.
I would like to thank Saul Hahn for being able to provide this level of funding and at
very short notice indeed. However it should be noted that significant donations were also
received from local companies and individuals, and from Belizeans living abroad. The
degree of support shown was very pleasing indeed.
Budgets were set for accomodation, food, travel, and other categories.
Although a few reimbursements remain to be made, it appears that everything has come in
within budget, and including the additional donations there will be US$1000 or more
remaining which can be put towards future workshops.
FUTURE PROJECTS
A great deal of enthusiasm has been generated by this workshop, and it
is likely that future events will stem from it. A web-design workshop has already been
proposed, as there was very little time in this workshop to cover HTML at all (only one
brief evening session).
It became clear also that a key stumbling block to Internet
connectivity for many schools is the cost of the modem. Schools in Belize City will need a
modem with leased line capability; schools outside Belize City will need a high-quality
dial-up modem. The Telebit Fastblazer we used for the workshop would suit both roles
perfectly, but the cost of around US$600 is prohibitive for most schools. It may therefore
be worthwhile putting together a project for a donor agency to provide a pool of such
modems (one for each school with a computer lab capable of being connected to Internet,
plus some spares to cater for equipment failures over time).
This, and other projects, are areas that the Belize Internet Task Force
may wish to work on over the coming months, to help maintain the momentum created for this
workshop.
Brian Candler
9 April 1997 |
