OT: Network Hell

[graham samuel]

Folks, I know this is OT, but I was emboldened by the positive answers 
Sivakatirswami got to his "Mentoring Mac" question.

I am totally fed up with my lack of understanding of TCP/IP networking 
at more or less any level above the purely physical. I am surrounded by 
the wretched things - I  have small LANs in two countries, cable and 
ADSL modems, WiFi access points, you name it. I know what an IP address 
is and I vaguely understand what DNSs do - but the mass of other info 
that one needs to successfully configure even the smallest network is 
just a jumble to me, and the alphabet soup of networking acronyms is 
just indigestible murk. Sometimes I get things working but I hardly 
ever know how I did it. I dread the advice on Windows XP Home Edition 
('Home Edition' - doesn't the very name imply that one is working on 
one's own?) to consult your network administrator - and even Mac OSX 
says things like this nowadays. I ain't got no stinking administrator, 
just me.

Can anyone suggest a way out of this mess? I am quite willing to read a 
lot of material but the kind of starting point I want doesn't seem to 
exist.

TIA

Graham
----------------------------------------
Graham Samuel / The Living Fossil Co. / UK and France