Re: Modem support under Suse Linux

On Mon, 10 Apr 2006, in the Usenet newsgroup comp.os.linux.hardware, in article
<d_B_f.15321$_26.5279@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Leslie Rhorer wrote:

You'll have to be more specific than that. The (quite dated) winmodem
web page lists

I tired to look these up, but most of the URLs point to targets which no
longer exist. If I could get a URL to an up-to-date list, it would be very
helpful.

Knowing good search terms goes a long way.

Web Results 1 - 10 of about 150,000 for Winmodems are not modems. (0.54
seconds)

Winmodems are not modems; Linux information page
Winmodems are not modems. The purpose of this page is to identify
consumer-grade ... If Winmodems are not really modems, why do
manufacturers make them? ...
freewebhosting.hostdepartment.com/ g/gromitkc/winmodem.html - 27k -
Cached - Similar pages

However as mentioned, that page is quite dated. The link above shows
that the page was last updated in 2002. I can't remember when it started
(back in the late 1990s), but it did raise awareness of what to look for.
Under another username, I'm listed on those pages for help on five different
modems. (The names at the end of each entry were mail-links to contact the
person who had reported on that model. I doubt many of the names are still
working - mine certainly isn't - but I used to get several appeals a week for
help. I had seven 'canned' responses that included step-by-step instructions
for those specific modems, and I wasn't alone doing so.)

So - what does your brother have to do? Well, the simple solution I've
been using for several years is to look at the specific piece of hardware
and then hit google looking for the specific make/model along with the
keyword Linux. (For example "USR 3CP5610 Linux") That usually provides the
clues in the first screen of results.

A frequent problem is using poorly designed tools.

Suse has YAST. What other tool do you suggest?

To identify the modem? A screw driver - or looking at the box the modem
came in. That provides the clues. For example, the USBs try
http://www.qbik.ch/usb/devices/showdevcat.php?id=14&w=t&s=s&d=a
That's a list of all "communication devices", so not all are phone-line
modems (some are ISDN adapters, some are for DSL, some are other
communication devices). That list is sorted to show working devices
first. For the internal modem if it's a PCI device, looking at the
boot messages (/var/log/messages) should show the devices that are
found - whether usable or not. There is a list of PCI ID numbers at
http://pciids.sourceforge.net/ that helps to identify what PCI hardware
is what, but it has no clues of "working" vs. "non-working". This is a
problem with volunteer maintained data.

Get to the point where the system can talk to the modem, and get a
dial-tone.

That is where he is trying to get. He is not terribly familiar with
*nix, and I am not at all familiar with Suse, and only slightly familiar
with the Debian distro of Linux.

From a hardware USE standpoint, there is very little difference between
the distributions. Identifying hardware automagically is another matter.

Mostly I use Solaris, SunOS, and HP-UX.

OK - I've got this 19" Sun monitor I can't get working.... See the
similarity? Sun has at least 56 different 19 inch monitors from the
365-1000 through the 365-1381 - color, hi-rez, grayscale, mono, using
BNC connectors, 13W3 connector, DB9 connector... You have to identify
which one you are talking about so that someone even has a chance to
figure out which video cable is used - if any, never mind which driver.

It doesn't help that I am in San Antonio, he is in Houston, and he has no
way to go online. I tried creating character mode device files for his USB,
and the system has not created anything like /dev/modem.

I can see that might be a problem ;-) /dev/modem is merely a soft link,
and is not a requirement unless the actual modem device is something
strange - like /dev/ttyLT14. (the "device" created by a Lucent LT
winmodem driver). Most pppd helper programs (wvdial, kppp, and so on)
expect /dev/ttyS0 through /dev/ttyS3 and /dev/modem. If the modem winds
up elsewhere such as /dev/ttyS62 (exaggeration, but possible), then the
/dev/modem link is required.

Old guy
.

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