Proxmox Switch

I have a Mini PC with 2 ethernet ports and a wifi card, In this guide, we'll show how to provide internet to the second ethernet port and create a wifi access point.

graph LR
a[Router] --Ethernet 1--> b[Mini PC] --Ethernet 2--> c[Desktop PC]
b --Hotspot--> e[Phones + Laptops]

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Bridging Ethernet ports

1. Open Web Browser
2. Type Mini PC web Address http://192.168.x.x:8006
3. Select the node (pve)
4. Select Networks. You should see two ethernet devices, enp1s0 and enp3s0 in this case, and 1 wireless device, wlp2s0
5. Select The automatically created Linux Bridge, then Edit
6. In Bridge ports: enp1s0 enp3s0 wlp2s0
7. Or you can select Shell and edit the interfaces file: nano /etc/network/interfaces

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

iface enp1s0 inet manual

iface enp3s0 inet manual

auto vmbr0
iface vmbr0 inet static
        address 192.168.1.110/24
        gateway 192.168.1.1
        bridge-ports enp1s0 enp3s0 wlp2s0
        bridge-stp off
        bridge-fd 0

auto wlp2s0
iface wlp2s0 inet manual

8. Press Apply Configuration or type Systemctl restart networking in the Shell.

This should provide internet to the computer connected through the second ethernet port.

Creating the hotspot

You can use the internal wifi card or a USB card. Make sure it's already bridged too.

1. Select the node, then go to the Shell
2. lspci and lsusb to see list of connected devices, one of them should be a wireless card.
3. apt install iw
4. iw list, under Supported interface modes: the card should show AP. Otherwise you won't be able to create a hotspot
5. apt install hostapd
6. nano /etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf

interface=wlp2s0
channel=6
driver=nl80211
hw_mode=g
ssid=choose_a_hotspot_name
wpa=2
wpa_passphrase=choose_a_hotspot_password
wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
rsn_pairwise=CCMP
auth_algs=1
country_code=US
ap_isolate=0
wpa_group_rekey=0

8. nano /usr/lib/systemd/system/hostapd.service To make the hostapd service start after the network device in the caste of a reboot

Remove:

After=network.target

Add instead:

BindsTo=sys-subsystem-net-devices-wlp2s0.device
After=sys-subsystem-net-devices-wlp2s0.device

9. To start the hostapd service: systemctl unmask hostapd.service
10. systemctl enable --now hostapd
11. systemctl restart networking