Ingmar Hupp's questions

I have a Cisco 877 configured to bridge ADSL with PPPoA to PPPoE on Vlan1. This works fine, but in this mode the only way I can configure the Cisco is via the serial console. I'd like to have the Cisco also listen on an IP address so I can telnet/ssh into it. I think the right way to go about this would be via bridge irb, but I'm not sure exactly how (or if that's even the right direction). IOS is 12.4T and my current config (cut down to essentials) is:

no ip routing
no ip cef
!
!
interface ATM0
 no ip address
 no ip route-cache
 no atm ilmi-keepalive
 pvc 0/38 
  encapsulation aal5snap
 !
 dsl operating-mode auto 
 bridge-group 1
!
!
interface Vlan1
 no ip address
 no ip route-cache
 bridge-group 1

Just setting an IP address on Vlan1 didn't have the desired effect, but surely this must be possible somehow (the Draytek Vigor 120 even does it by default).

Cage nuts can be inserted (in square holes) either with the flaps horizontal or vertical. I've seen and used both methods, but am still not sure which is best. Is there a recommended way of inserting them? If so, why is it the best way?

From my own experience, the horizontal way (on the left) seems slightly better for no other reason than making it easier to insert or pry out the cage nut in a full rack (with the units above and below being populated), for example when replacing cage nuts with a snap-in rail.

Edit: Major vendors each seem to have their own preference too:

Horizontal: IBM, Cisco, APC

Vertical: HP (and Compaq), Sun/Oracle, Dell

I want to give our Windows guy a way of easily PXE booting machines for deployment by plugging his laptop into one of our site networks. I've set up a TFTPD32 configuration which does just that, and our normal DHCP server ignores the PXE DHCP requests due to them having some magic flag, so this part works as desired. However I'm not sure how to configure TFTPD32 to only respond to PXE DHCP requests (the ones with the magic flag) and ignore all normal DHCP requests (so that the production machines don't get a non-routed address from the PXE server).

How do I configure TFTPD32 to ignore these non-PXE DHCP requests? I know this is possible with ISC DHCPD (by allowing only requests from PXEClient vendor ids), but a nice windows GUI would be preferred.

Or if TFTPD32 can't do this, is there another equally easy to use piece of software that he can run on his Windows laptop? Since the TFTPD part is working fine, a DHCP server with the ability to serve PXE only would do.

Worst case I'll have to set up a virtual machine with ISC DHCPD, but I'd much prefer a small, simple solution.

I'm not interested in solutions that involve using the existing DHCP servers or separating machines on the network for deployment, the whole point is to be simple and stand-alone.