Can I use static NAT to merge different networks together?

[mikejr]

Lets say I have 4 branch stores, including the main store which has the network ID I want to use. The main store has a net ID of 192.163.123.0. The branch stores are, 192.163.124.0, 192.163.125.0 and 192.163.126.0. Lets say I have a machine at the address of 192.163.124.2 that I want to be on the main store net ID. So I setup a static NAT at the main store 192.163.124.2 -> 192.163.123.102. Would this work?

The main problem I'm questioning myself on -- what ports have to be inside or outside? It seems to me that static nat should be translated no matter how it came in or went out; correct?

The reason for this wierd setup is a crappy software program that requires the terminals to all be on the same network. Well, until recently I was unaware of this, so I had them all on different net IDs. Since I have all the other net IDs already setup, I figured static NAT could merge all the other net IDs onto one..

Let me know if I'm crazy here =)

Thanks in advance.

[velimirmkd]

Hi,

Yes you can join multiple networks into one using NAT, acutally that is one of the most important uses of NAT. Static NAT does 1-1 translation of addreses unless you use overload! So one way (the long way) is to have every machine that needs NAT assign staticly one address, the other way is to use dynamic NAT. In that case every machine gets whichever address is available in the NAT pool on the router.

When asking about the way NAT works with the ports here is the answer:

If it is a NAT overlad than all the machines that need NAT use one address and different ports are maped to their local IP in the NAT table on the router.

If it is static or dynamic NAT without overload then the port is not changed, stays the same as the port from the sourcing IP.

Hope this helps

Velimir