Re: wvdial problems

On Wed, 15 Aug 2007, in the Usenet newsgroup comp.os.linux.misc, in article
<5ifvq6F3pks4fU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Gretch wrote:

Igmar Palsenberg <igmar@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

]Is there any way to solve this problem please? The username and password in
]/etc/wvdial.conf are correct:
]
] [Dialer Defaults]
] Modem = /dev/ttyS1
] Baud = 57600

57600 was OK for a 14.4 modem from the early 1990s and the "free" driver
for some Conexant Loosemodems, but if your modem is faster than a 19.2,
and the serial port on the motherboard (or internal modem) was built
after about 1992, 115200 would be a more suitable speed.

] Init = ATZ

You may want to look at the documentation for your modem to see what the
manufacturer recommends for an init-string. AT&F0 or AT&F1 is usually
more suitable. What you show are the defaults from WvDial, and no one
knows where they found these values - they never were recommended by any
modem manufacturer. Neither of these items, however, it the primary
problem you are having.

"Login Prompt - If your ISP has an unusual login procedure that
wvdial is unable to figure out, you can use this option to
specify a login prompt. When this prompt is received from your
ISP, wvdial will send the Login string."

ISPs haven't been configuring Login Prompt since the mid-1990s when
microsoft invented the telephone. The authors of WvDial haven't learned
this yet.

but I can't see any login prompt or procedure as echoed.

Yes, they are expecting a PAP or CHAP authentication, just like windoze
uses.

The use of "Stupid Mode" has no effect on the failure to
authenticate the connection.

It should change the error messages in the log. What is the exact
error message this "helper" provides?

ISP's who only use PAP / CHAP authentication don't have a login
prompt. In that case you're forced to use pppd to handle this.

Actually, this piece of crap "helper" can often be kicked into working
with an ISP who knows it's later than 1996 - the 'Stupid Mode' and
/etc/ppp/(p|ch)ap-secrets file (which can be identical) is about all
that is needed, but I'll agree that this "Helper" program is less than
helpful most of the time.

Thank you. Will you provide instructions on how to use the pppd solution you
suggest, please? I have identical lines in /etc/ppp/{pap,chap}-secrets:

myID@xxxxxxxxxxxx * myPassword

OK - two things: 1. Are you absolutely positive that the ISP wants
the '@starband.net' part of the username? A lot of them want the part
left of the '@' character only. 2. The password may need to be quoted
if it has anything other than the characters A-Za-z0-9 (alphanumerics
only).

but using the following is apparently the wrong syntax, gleaned from
pppd --help (no man page is available on this machine):

Hmmm, wonder why no man page?

pppd /dev/ttyS1 connect xxx-xxxx

Yeah - that's wrong. The 'connect' wants a script, or the command
sequence for the modem in quotes. Let's assume your username at the
ISP is 'gretchen' as you are posting, and what I can glean from your
original post. You would want

[compton ~]$ cat /usr/local/bin/dialin
#!/bin/bash
exec /usr/sbin/pppd connect "/usr/sbin/chat -f /etc/ppp/dialscript" lock \
defaultroute noipdefault nodetach /dev/ttyS1 115200 crtscts user gretchen
[compton ~]$

There must not be anything after the \ in that line. It's actually
trying to act as one long line from 'exec' to 'gretchen'.

[compton ~]$ cat /etc/ppp/dialscript
ABORT BUSY ABORT 'NO CARRIER' "" AT&F0 OK ATDT2662902 CONNECT \d\c
[compton ~]$

AT&F0 is most modems - USRs (and some others) want AT&F1. Oh, put in
the correct phone number.

[compton ~]$ cat /etc/ppp/*ab-secrets
gretchen * myPassword
[compton ~]$ cat /etc/resolv.conf
nameserver 148.78.254.200
nameserver 148.78.254.201
nameserver 148.78.249.200
[compton ~]$

Obviously, you might have corrections for these last two files. The
nameserver data is from their Whois registration. Note that nearly
all of the OPTIONS I show in /usr/local/bin/dialin (everything from
the 'connect' to the 'user gretchen') could be in /etc/ppp/options
if needed. Otherwise, /etc/ppp/options should be empty or have every
line commented out (begins with a # character).

Old guy
.

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