What is a router?

Really, do they have a definition?

Device that connects multiple networks? Layer 3 of the OSI model? Consumer ones tend to have more than that, but the more specific definition would work fine.

Yeah conceivably you could use this to ban any network device that is capable of routing between interfaces, so lots of switches with new firmware could do it, often terribly, as well as PCs with multiple interfaces. But its probably going to involve intention.

Any PC with a NIC is one VLAN and masquerade rule away from being a router

That is true, but you can also add USB Ethernet interfaces to any PC, which is even simpler.

For example, my router/firewall, which also implements various other network services, e.g. hosting my own e-mail server, is an old Intel NUC with 5 Ethernet ports, 4 of which are made with USB Ethernet interfaces.

The definition is at the bottom of this document https://www.fcc.gov/sites/default/files/NSD-Routers0326.pdf

...which in turn refers to https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ir/2024/NIST.IR.8425A.pdf

Good question for devices that ship with multiple network interfaces, multiple video outputs, no RAM and no software.

If multiple network interfaces defines a router, then every cell phone is one, because every cell phone has a cellular and Wifi interface, and is a router in hotspot mode. Three interfaces if you count USB which can also be a network interface (hotspot works over USB in both Windows and Linux) and four if Bluetooth PAN is still a thing.

Speaking of phone companies, Apple will be manufacturing Mac Mini in USA.

If Apple can make a Neo laptop out of phone parts, they could make a US Airport router out of US mini PC parts.

x86 multi NIC barebone fanless PC is not for routing, nope.

It definitely could be! And some people do use it for that!

(edit: but it's not considered a consumer grade router, that's for sure!)

Who said anything about multiple NICs? Ethernet port and Wifi modem in AP mode are more than enough

Even if all my apps were from Google Play, it's not up to Google to remotely decide what code I can and cannot run on my device. Especially important when talking about whole population.

> You may not charge users money for Your Program, and Your Source must contain the monetization systems, including the licensing, trial period tracking, and payment system, present in the MMF Source without an alterations, and all of these systems must be active and working as intended in Your Program.

License is not Open Source.

- having sensible and very useful system files structure - centralized package management - instant full-disk snapshots and rollback - remote windows (Waypipe) - declarative configurations (NixOS) - FUSE - chroot

It is for their online service, not the editor software.

For connecting two devices I already pay for a service allowing that, it's called ISP (Internet Service Provider).

I wish.

Free personal tier is basically a cheap advertisement for them. You try Tailscale personally and get used to it, then it is very likely you would want to deploy it at your work seeing the benefits scaling even more with more people. And then they make money.

1000%. Tailscale is the first VPN I've used that makes my life easier, and I'm using it for personal access to my selfhosted servers at home. I will definitely recommend it to companies I work for in the future.

Some regulation yes, throwing information agnostic universal global packet switching network in the trash bin is not the way.