Re:VyOS From Scratch – Edition 1 (set up your own router)
by solarkraft on Friday July 28, 2023 @08:48AM
(#36906040)
This is probably the best explanation I've seen.
Do you have an idea why the CLI tools aren't distributed independently? Why shouldn't I be able to run it on a Debian system I already have (and understand)?
Running an entire new distro just seems like overkill for what it actually does over a normal Linux system. It's just a configuration manager!
Re:VyOS From Scratch – Edition 1 (set up your own router)
by dgroshev on Friday July 28, 2023 @11:21AM
(#36908174)
I don't know, but I imagine it would make testing substantially more difficult (right now they have fully tested images available), and it would be impossible to implement their distro update thing (you can update the entire .iso backwards and forwards, the config will be reapplied).
It's debian plus some shell trickery and CLI tools that let you configure debian and debian packages as a router from one large config tree using neat CLI tools (that support commit/rollback).
Normally you'd need iptables, a separate DNS package, DHCP server, etc etc to set up a router, with VyOS you just change VyOS config and it configures normal debian packages for you.
Plus everything is exhaustively tested and configs are reverse compatible, hiding all breaking changes underneath.
It's super neat and it works perfectly on a £100 fanless Celeron J4125 box from Aliexpress as a home router, routing and shaping 1gbit without breaking a sweat and with deeply sub-ms delay.