Josh Kendall

Well, I ordered a AirPort Express on Saturday to implement my plan, it arrived today and I proceeded to set it up and move my hard drives and server across the office. There were multiple problems with my original plan and how it gets implemented. The big one being that AirPort Express only supports a printer on the USB port, AirPort Extreme base stations and Time Capsules apparently supported hard drives.

Besides that issue (which is noted on the site) I had issues setting the Express up. To extend your network you’ll need to tell the Express to join your existing network and it’ll restart with that info. I had to reset my Express twice because it wasn’t showing up in AirPort Utility. After I had that setup I needed to get my server accessible remotely; I had this working on Saturday but managed to screw it up somehow.

While messing with the AirPort Express I found I could connect to my server while on the network via SSH, it was just while not on the network that I couldn’t. After some testing I realized I couldn’t ping any sites, while digging through `/etc/network/interfaces` I converted my server back to using DHCP from a static IP. While walking through setting up the static IP again I realized I was missing the broadcast and gateway addresses. The reason `ddclient` couldn’t find any hosts in my DynDNS account was because there was no internet connection to the server.

If you’re setting up an Ubuntu server with DynDNS and `ddclient` your `/etc/network/interfaces` file should look similar to this:

Now my server is accessible remotely and is conveniently across the room away from my desk. I’ve still got to figure out this hard drive situation. I don’t have room on my desk for all 4 of them nor the power outlets necessary, a surge protector would solve that issue, but the goal was to reduce the cables around my desk. I might just pick up a AirPort Extreme at some point and the Express would just come home so my Xbox 360 can connect to the internet or I’m sure I can find a use for it elsewhere in the office.

I’m sitting in my office at 7:50am on a Saturday morning messing with the server trying to get it setup for remote access from home and I realized just how crappy the area I’m working in is network wise. I have internet through a cable provider which means my setup is a Motorola cable modem and a Linksys WRT54G. The wireless works great and everything in general is fine, however since the office space is rented I had no choice in where the was installed at in the room. It’s inconveniently located very close to the phone and fax lines which means there’s a lot of cables in one area. My desk is also in this area and with a monitor, laptop, USB hub and 4 external Iomega Prestige drives means even more cables. Oh, and the new local server is currently sitting on my desk since it doesn’t have wireless and it’s the only place I can put it without running a network cable across the room either around the base board (very long cable) or directly across the floor (foot traffic + cable = tragic early demise).

So I had this thought, actually thoughts; what if I buy a Airport Express Base Station, plug my server into the network port, my USB hub (with hard drives) into the USB port and move the entire thing across the room. It would let me move my desk to anywhere I wanted and I can easily move the server and hard drives to another spot if I need to later. The internet and fax could stay where they are and there would be less cable clutter in one location.

The only problem I have is that I don’t know if I can plug the USB hub into the base station and still access my drives as easily as I was. One is a time machine drive so I know that will work. Does anyone know if this idea of mine will work, or should I look elsewhere for a solution?