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Can I use a Linux laptop to connect a Mac to wifi through an Ethernet cable? (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 8 months ago by to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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I suddenly need a wired connection for a job starting very soon but it won't be hooked up for quite some time. I have my neighborswifi password though. Iknow this is a longshot, but would I be able to use my laptop to change a wireless connection into a wired connection?

It's an older desktop Mac managed by the company. My laptop is an HP omen 15 with arch Linux on it

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[–] 13 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

Assuming that:

  • your Linux Laptop uses wlan0 for its wireless connection and your home network uses 192.168.1.x for IP space.

On the Linux laptop:

  • as root or with sudo -- enable IP forwarding and load the change with sysctl -p.

sudo sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward=1 ## updated edit thanks to folks pointing out my typo.
sudo sysctl -p

  • if you have ufw installed and running -- setup a NAT masquerading rule for any hosts forwarding IPv4 traffic to it.
    add this line to /etc/ufw/before.rules file right after the "*nat" line

:POSTROUTING ACCEPT [0:0]

-A POSTROUTING -s 192.168.1.1/24 -o wlan0 -j MASQUERADE

On the mac:

  • set your IP address manually to be on the same LAN as the Linux laptop, but for the gateway address... point that at the IP for the Linux Laptop.
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  • [–] 10 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    sudo sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward

    sudo sysctl -p

    Those do not enable forwarding. One prints the value of forwarding and the other loads the config file.

    To set it temporarily

    sudo sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward=1

    To set it permanantly, edit /etc/sysctl.conf (or add a config file to /etc/sysctl.d/). You only need to add one line that reads 'net.ipv4.ip_forward=1'

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