Welcome to CellStream’s Networking and Computing Tips resource center, where technology professionals, students, and enthusiasts can find practical guidance, troubleshooting techniques, and real-world solutions for today’s networking and computing challenges. Our goal is to help you work smarter, solve problems faster, and build a stronger foundation of technical knowledge.
Whether you’re configuring a network, optimizing system performance, learning a new technology, or troubleshooting a difficult issue, you’ll find valuable insights drawn from decades of industry experience. From Wireshark packet analysis and broadband technologies to Windows, Linux, cybersecurity, Wi-Fi, and Internet protocols, our tips are designed to be practical, actionable, and immediately useful.
• Step-by-step technical guides and how-to articles
• Networking troubleshooting techniques and best practices
• Wireshark tips, packet analysis workflows, and protocol insights
• Windows, Linux, and computing optimization recommendations
• Cybersecurity awareness and protection strategies
• Broadband, Wi-Fi, Ethernet, TCP/IP, and Internet technology guidance
• Productivity tips and tools for network engineers and IT professionals
• Improving network troubleshooting efficiency
• Optimizing computer and operating system performance
• Securing devices, accounts, and data
• Capturing and analyzing packets with Wireshark
• Understanding TCP/IP, DNS, DHCP, Ethernet, and Wi-Fi technologies
• Using industry tools more effectively
We’re always looking for new ideas, questions, and topics to explore. If there’s a networking or computing subject you’d like us to cover, or if you need help solving a technical challenge, connect with us through our Discord community or contact us directly.
Please note that not all tips, procedures, and configuration examples apply to every operating system, network device, software version, or vendor platform. Always verify compatibility and test changes in a controlled environment before implementing them in production networks.
Post Views: 1,981 As a follow on to our DNS In Depth article, we wanted to provide a reference to a great tool. One of the important impacts to how fast the Internet works for users is how fast the Domain Name Service responds to database requests. For example, if you type www.cellstream.com into your URL […]
Testing/Baselining DNS Server Performance Read More »
Post Views: 1,896 Ansible is an open-source automation tool primarily used for configuration management, application deployment, and task automation. In network automation, Ansible enables IT teams to manage and configure network devices in a consistent, repeatable, and agentless manner. Ansible is a tool used to automate Server provisioning and network provisioning. Ansible is completely free!
Using Ansible for Network Automation Read More »
Post Views: 1,948 Have you noticed a lot of QUIC protocol in your packet captures? I certainly have, and we had better talk about what this is. What is QUIC (now more recently called gQUIC)? QUIC is a new protocol created by the fine folks at Google. It stands for Google Quick UDP Internet Connections.
Is there a lot of QUIC in your Packet Captures? Read More »
Post Views: 11,129 As explained in our prior article on QUIC, you may be seeing a lot of QUIC traffic in your packet captures. Assuming you have read that article, and understand that all QUIC traffic is encrypted, you know the only way was to see some of the details is using Chrome itself. Today
Using Wireshark to Analyze QUIC Traffic Read More »
Post Views: 1,888 Check out these great references as well: Our custom profiles repository for Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireless Packet capture As those who have studied our Wireless Profile (available from the Profile Repository) know, there are a number of great display filters used to hunt down issues
tshark Use in Wireless Networking Read More »
Post Views: 4,374 Check out these great references as well: Our custom profiles repository for Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireless Packet capture Perhaps…. Of course you can edit these with appropriate addresses and numbers. The ones used are just examples. Unlike Wireshark’s Display Filter syntax, Capture filters use Berkley
Perhaps a top 15 Wireshark Capture Filter List Read More »
Post Views: 2,207 Check out these additional Routing Resources: Our IP Routing course at Udemy Our Custom Profiles for Wireshark Classes at the Online School This is commonly asked question from our routing courses and routing discussions in other courses. Let’s explain this command in this article. To start, you have to know that OSPF
What is the ‘area range’ command in OSPF? Read More »
Post Views: 2,109 Check out these additional Routing Resources: Our IP Routing course at Udemy Our Custom Profiles for Wireshark Classes at the Online School In a recent course on IPv6, one of my students asked what the “network” command did as we were beginning to study the routing commands used in Cisco IOS when
What is the “network” Command in OSPF and BGP? Read More »
Post Views: 2,999 If you attend our WLAN Operations course, one of the things we discuss is Active Scanning. Your system uses your saved Wi-Fi networks to actively scan for those networks (probing). There are potential security risks in this, especially with free networks. Most students conclude they should not remember networks in this way.
Deleting Remembered Wi-Fi Networks in Windows, MacOS, and Linux (Debian) Read More »
Post Views: 1,366 Sometimes troubleshooting in Wireshark is easy-ish, you find a misbehaving protocol behavior or pattern or even a bad packet, sometimes it is tricky and takes a while to find something, and sometimes it is as clear as mud. Check out these great references as well: Our custom profiles repository for Wireshark Our
Real-life Wireless Wireshark Troubleshooting Example Read More »
Post Views: 1,400 The following is a must have reference for Linux systems networking operations. We will be using the two basic commands: ‘ifconfig’, ‘iwconfig’, and ‘ip’. If you are the rtoot or administrator you should have no issues using the commands as shown. If you do not, you may want to use ‘sudo’ in
Linux Networking Commands Read More »
Post Views: 2,473 How can you verify your Wi-Fi is on the right channel, who else is interfering? We wish that was easy. And at a normal user level it is. First you need a Wi-Fi scanner. The following is a growing list of Wi-Fi Scanning Utilities for various platforms. Most all are free,
Wi-Fi Scanning Tools List Read More »
Post Views: 23,081 You have to think of and understand the Internet’s Domain Name Service -DNS- as a System. The DNS is the system which, in its primary function, converts Internet domain names that you type into URL bars, or hyperlinks that you click on a web page into numeric IPv4 and/or IPv6 addresses. In
The DNS System In Depth Read More »
Post Views: 2,027 Check out these great references as well: Our custom profiles repository for Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireshark Our Udemy course on Wireless Packet capture I am often asked how SSL and TLS can be decrypted in Wireshark captures. I have written a separate article on HTTPS Decryption in Wireshark here. NOTE:
Leveraging SSL and TLS Decryption in Wireshark Read More »
Post Views: 7,651 Hi everyone! Being able to decrypt the encrypted contents of packet captures is very important if you want to troubleshoot anything above Layer 4. This is even more important today as the network is evolving to QUIC where everything is encrypted. Check out these great references as well: Our custom profiles repository
TLS Decryption in Wireshark Using Key Log Files in Windows, MAC, and Linux Read More »
