[nmglug] mobile phone offering network to laptop?

[Mark Galassi]

Amigos, this is something I've never done, but I will need to do for
some experiments we have.

I need to have a gadget (maybe a mobile phone?) which offers an ethernet
port, preferably with a dhcp server and local subnet, but it's OK if
it's a single address.

In other words, the same kind of router that you typically get with a
DSL modem at home, but small and mobile.

It should allow incoming ssh, possibly via a "port forwarding" setup on
the router's 192.168.0.1 address.

I have heard of people with mobile phones that can surf the web, but
they usually are self-contained and don't have twisted pair ports.

I have heard of pcmcia cards for laptops that are cellular modems.  This
might be the kind of thing, because then the laptop might be configured
to offer the ethernet to other machines, but it would be bulky.  (I also
wonder if nowadays the pcmcia cards are becoming USB cards; this would
help since the equipment we are sending out has rack-mounted computers,
not laptops, hence no pcmcia.)

Are there other gadgets that I have not heard about?  Maybe this biggish
cell-phone with an ethernet port really exists?

And I'll buy a beer if your answer includes information on whether these
mobile phone providers have good coverage of very rural "south coast of
Louisiana" and mississippi delta swamplands.