Randy Switt wrote:
> Honestly, I don't "need" a 24/7 VPN connection at home.  It's just easier to
> leave it on ;-) then connect and disconnect it when needed. Since my screen
> locks (by group policy) after 10 minutes I'm not overly concerned about
> security problems, however if there's a resource problem with my leaving it
> on 24/7, I can modify that.  I do have my computer setup as part of an AD
> domain on campus, and if the VPN is not on, the AD communication is blocked
> as those ports are blocked for off campus links.  This isn't a big deal
> after I've initially logged on however.
>

I'll leave it to the Network Services people to decide whether it's a
problem.  If it were, they probably would have already told you.  I
guess if you want to join your department AD domain you need a tunnel
into campus, and it's probably safer for you to use the central VPN
service than to set up your own.

> One thing I've noticed is that I connect to my on-campus Exchange server
> from home using MS Outlook, and if the VPN is not active it can't connect.
> I assume that one of the ports Exchange uses is blocked.  I can use OWA if
> need be, but performance suffers.
>
> Dyndns.org might work, and Joe's solution looks good as well.  I was curious
> as to whether these applications would pick up the WAN IP or the VPN IP, but
> Joe says he's tested ipmonster and says it picks up the VPN IP.
>

DynDNS will do it either way, your choice.  There are a lot of third
party clients available for it with various features.  It can check your
local IP number, it can query your home gateway box for its IP number
(for many models), or it can ask the DynDNS web site what IP number it
is presenting to the outside world.  I assume that many other dynamic
DNS services have the same options.


- Bob