11.16. SAME target
The SAME target works almost in the same fashion as the SNAT target, but it still differs. Basically, the SAME target will try to always use the same outgoing IP address for all connections initiated by a single host on your network. For example, say you have one /24 network (192.168.1.0) and 3 IP addresses (10.5.6.7-9). Now, if 192.168.1.20 went out through the .7 address the first time, the firewall will try to keep that machine always going out through that IP address.
Table 11-11. SAME target options
| Option | --to |
| Example | iptables -t mangle -A PREROUTING -s 192.168.1.0/24 -j SAME --to 10.5.6.7-10.5.6.9 |
| Explanation | As you can see, the --to argument takes 2 IP addresses bound together by a - sign. These IP addresses, and all in between, are the IP addresses that we NAT to using the SAME algorithm. |
| Option | --nodst |
| Example | iptables -t mangle -A PREROUTING -s 192.168.1.0/24 -j SAME --to 10.5.6.7-10.5.6.9 --nodst |
| Explanation | Under normal action, the SAME target is calculating the followup connections based on both destination and source IP addresses. Using the --nodst option, it uses only the source IP address to find out which outgoing IP the NAT function should use for the specific connection. Without this argument, it uses a combination of the destination and source IP address. |
 | Works under Linux kernel 2.5 and 2.6. |