Setting up ADSL?

[Zach <netrek@gmail.com>]

I am getting ADSL (728/128) next week and have some questions.

I run Debian lenny with a 2.6.18 kernel.

The DSL connection will use PPPoE and I'll be getting a static IP.

I guess I just need 1 ethernet cable to connect the DSL modem to my NIC right?

How do I setup the PPPoE account (username, password)?

The modem also has a built in 4 port router so how can I setup NAT (I
only have 1 machine now but plan to add more in the future)?

How do I setup DHCP for my private addresses which NAT will use?

Anyone have a good basic firewall (especially example rules scripts!)
that I can put up?

Besides a plain firewall what else can I do to make my machine more
secure since it will be connected to the outside world nearly 24x7
from now on.

Last week one of my friends had their machine ping flooded, they
couldn't get any packets out and the attacker only stopped after he
unplugged his router and waited a few hours before reconnecting.
Questions:

1) If this happens to me what should I do to stop the attacker and get
back online?
(A quick way to ignore their IP would be good for starters.)

2) Why didn't his ISP or even the ISP's upstream provider catch this
and automatically null route the offender?

Also how can I manually bring my connection up and down?

Anyone know some good packages for logging network trafficing,
deciphering logs, getting useful reports etc?
If you log a lot I suppose there is no way to get around having to
read many log mails every day, the price of security eh?

Thanks,
Zach