ubuntu-ca Digest, Vol 45, Issue 9

Mac dhltd at telus.net
Wed Dec 10 16:00:01 UTC 2008


Hi Alfred:

I feel your frustration but I was NOT having fun with you.  The "stupid" 
command is a genuine command and refers to the mode of the modem NOT the 
operator.  I will not bore you with more details about that except to say 
that I certainly did not mean to offend you and everything I advised has 
worked for me. 

I am also a newbie having only used Linux for about 2 years.  There are many 
things that I still do not know. 

It took me three days to get the first modem installation working on my  
laptop because I had to keep searching for help on the Internet and trying 
out suggestions before I could get dial-up to work.  However it took less 
than 1 hour to get it working on my friend's install where I only had a 
dial-Internet connection.  Part of my problem was caused by having tried so 
may suggestions that did not work that I damaged my Ubuntu install at one 
point.   Fortunately for me, I had several other computers at home and an 
ADSL connection so the matter of obtaining assistance was less taxing than in 
your situation.

The point is that dial-up connections are not simple to set up, or at least, 
they were not when I tried with 8.04.  But with each new release of Ubuntu, 
EVERYTHING seems to get easier.

Perhaps another subscriber will offer a more simple, straight forward 
solution.  I hope so.

Almost everyone in the Ubuntu community wants to help but we do not know your 
situation.  Without detailed information about your particular system and 
experience (skills) we just guess as what you may need.  Please keep that in 
mind when you ask for help.

If you do not get better advice within the next few days, please feel free to 
send me a message and I will document a step by step procedure with all the 
terminal commands that I used so you can copy and paste the necessary 
commands into a terminal.

Ubuntu is, in some ways, not yet as easy to use as Windows but in other ways 
it far surpasses Windows.  It is different.  You probably have years of 
experience with some other operating system  and in my experience those of us 
who have many years experience with Windows, have more difficulty adjusting 
to Ubuntu than brand new computer users.  The differences in systems are 
subtle and our brains/hands want to keep using Windows procedures.  We have 
to re-train our brains.

In my own case, though there were several times when I nearly gave up on 
Ubuntu because of my frustration, I stuck with it and both of the people in 
our household are happy I did.  By the way, I am a 66 year old fart who had 
30 years of Microsoft baggage to overcome.

MacDuff

PS  I subscribe to the digest version so I only get forum postings once a day.  
If you want immediate help, feel free to email me directly.  I am recovering 
from surgery so I have lots of time to help you if you want my to help.  But 
perhaps wait another day for a possible reply from someone who has experience 
with 8.10 which is what you are using.  I did not even know that you have a 
DVD with "everything" on it.  It looks like I made a mistake in even 
responding to your message. Sorry for that.

On Wed December 10 2008 04:00:11 am ubuntu-ca-request at lists.ubuntu.com wrote:
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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. Re: ubuntu-ca Digest, Vol 45, Issue 7 (Alfred)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 10 Dec 2008 00:47:18 -0500
> From: Alfred <alfred.s at nexicom.net>
> Subject: Re: ubuntu-ca Digest, Vol 45, Issue 7
> To: The Canadian Ubuntu Users Community <ubuntu-ca at lists.ubuntu.com>
> Message-ID: <1228888039.6747.44.camel at alf-desktop>
> Content-Type: text/plain
>
> Hi:
>
> Often I've noticed that in the Linux Community there are knowledgeable
> people that figure that they are going to have a bit of FUN, with a
> Newbie. I've just played around for 6 hours getting the 8.10
> installation to get on the Internet with Dial-up.
>
> Well, what can happen with this is DELL's INFO DESK gets so overloaded,
> that they drop Ubuntu and go with Vista again. When all their Dial up
> customers, have to spend 6-10 hours trying to get it to work! Very few
> people are on High speed Internet in the World, lots of people are still
> using Dial-up! You that did all this work in making Ubuntu 8.10 a
> reality, may see your Growing user base, also have a Black Friday! Hey I
> know a little bit about Confusers - I played with them, for about 40
> years. Most Newbies have no idea at all. If it Don't work - They use
> that DVD or CD as a Drink Coaster!
>
> In Ubuntu 8.10 32 bit pppconfig comes installed on the DVD edition. So
> there is not much need to try to find Gnome-ppp
>
> wvdial.conf
>
> should read:
> [Dialer Defaults]
> New PPPD = yes
> Stupid Mode = yes                         Is this an actual Command?
> Modem Type = Analog Modem
> ISDN = 0
> Auto DNS = 1
> Auto Reconnect = 0
> Modem = /dev/ttyS0                        /dev/ttyACM0  does not work at
> ALL!
> Baud = 230400                             not sure of this number
> because when it dialed up it was very slow in Baud-rate!
> Init1 = ATZ                               not ATZ4!
> Phone = the IP Phone Number
> Username = Login name for IP
> Password = Login Password
>
> This Connects Confuser to the Internet. This Internet Connection I'm
> using to send you the E-mail is on another Hard Drive, not the 8.10
> Ubuntu, but the 7.10 Ubuntu, so everything has to be written down, or
> transferred to a Thumb Drive, then put on the 7.10 Hard drive. So I can
> send you this Email. Lots of turning off the Power installing a Hard
> Drive, over and over again for many hours to get it all working, not
> very EASY at all! Just in this little part of the World I tried to get
> people to try out Ubuntu, Windows was so troubling for them, and then we
> run into this little bit of FUN! Yah some one was having a little bit of
> fun with a Newbie, but as far as adopters in the Dial up Zone goes- Hey
> you will quite likely LOOSE 150,000 or more people, just in this little
> part of the World! Your expanding user base just got hit with Black
> Friday!
>
> Connecting to the Internet is very Important, and should be very easy,
> and in everything up to 7.10 it was real easy! Why Mess with something
> that worked very very well, hooking up with Dial-up had a very easy to
> use interface. Now it's GONE!
>
> The pppconfig utility asks for info that becomes available when wvdial
> is run.  Yet even having the info after wvdial is run, that info is sort
> of confusing. My IP acts like Linux never existed. I can't go to them
> with the questions that pppconfig asks, the people in the Office don't
> know these things themselves, only billing information, and HYPE!
>
> What are you THINKING!
>
> Alfred!
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mac <dhltd at telus.net>
> Reply-To: The Canadian Ubuntu Users Community
> <ubuntu-ca at lists.ubuntu.com>
> To: ubuntu-ca at lists.ubuntu.com
> Subject: Re: ubuntu-ca Digest, Vol 45, Issue 7
> Date: Tue, 9 Dec 2008 07:14:49 -0800
> Mailer: KMail/1.9.10
>
> On Tue December 9 2008 04:00:10 am ubuntu-ca-request at lists.ubuntu.com wrote:
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 14:57:51 -0500
> > From: Alfred <alfred.s at nexicom.net>
> > Subject: Re: Ubuntu Installation.
> > To: The Canadian Ubuntu Users Community <ubuntu-ca at lists.ubuntu.com>
> > Message-ID: <1228766271.6846.7.camel at alf-desktop>
> > Content-Type: text/plain
> >
> > Hi:
> >
> > Today I installed 8.10 Ubuntu 32 bit on a 250 Gig Partition. It went
> > well in the second time. Just one little problem:
> > Here in Brigadoon :) we still have Dial-up and no access to High Speed
> > Internet. How does one set up the Modem, and the Dial-up with 8.10. I
> > see that there are lots of options in Network Tools, but Dial-up does
> > not seem to be one of them. Is there an option to load Dial-up Tools
> > from the DVD (I bought the DVD Install from Ubuntu in England, and had
> > it shipped here.)
> >
> > Any hints or help would be appreciated
> >
> > Thank you in advance
> >
> > Alfred!
>
> I had to configure a dial-up connection for a friend back in the summer on
> Ubuntu 8.04 and it can be done using wvdial which was packaged with 8.04 to
> make the initial connection using terminal commands.  For a GUI interface,
> after establishing a connection to the Internet, I downloaded and installed
> GNOME PPP which provides a graphics interface that is easy to use.
>
> It took several attempts and was a bit frustrating, but I documented my
> experience and saved it in case I ever needed to re-visit the problem.
> Once gnome ppp was installed and configured everything worked perfectly and
> my friend, who knows absolutely nothing about computers, has no problems
> using it daily.
>
> One comment, we were pressed for time and I could not get the internal
> modem working so to save time I purchased a USRobotics USB modem but
> support for internal modems may have improved so you can try.
>
> To use wvdial, you'll need to edit the file:   /etc/wvdial.conf  as root or
> use the sudo command to open the file.   I assume you are familiar with
> using basic editing but if not and you need some hand holding, please ask.
>
> Here's an example of a configuration in  /etc/wvdial.conf that works using
> a USRobotics USB modem.  Save a copy of your existing /etc/wvdial.conf
> under a different name before you replace its contents with those below so
> if everything goes to H you can get back to your starting point.
> NOTE that "Modem = /dev/ttyACM0" ends with a zero not a capital "O"
>
> Code:	[Dialer Defaults]
> New PPPD = yes
> Stupid Mode = yes
> Modem Type = Analog Modem
> ISDN = 0
> Auto DNS = 1
> Auto Reconnect = 0
> Modem = /dev/ttyACM0
> Baud = 230400
> Init1 = ATZ4
> Phone = {Insert the telephone number of your ISP} eg. 250 123 1234
> Username = {name}  This is the login name to ISP
> Password = {password}  This is the login password to your ISP
>
> After saving the new  /etc/wvdial.conf ,  in a terminal, type:
> sudo wvdial
>
> After entering your UBUNTU root password, your modem should dial & connect.
>
> After making the correction and re-trying the connection you should see a
> terminal display similar to that below which indicates you have a
> connection:
>
> mac at T-61:~$ sudo wvdial
> [sudo] password for mac:
> --> WvDial: Internet dialer version 1.60
> --> Cannot get information for serial port.
> --> Initializing modem.
> --> Sending: ATZ
> ATZ
> OK
> --> Modem initialized.
> --> Sending: ATDT250 388 5747
> --> Waiting for carrier.
> ATDT250 388 5747
> CONNECT 48000/ARQ/V90/LAPM/V42BIS
> --> Carrier detected.  Starting PPP immediately.
> --> Starting pppd at Fri Sep 26 20:53:23 2008
> --> Pid of pppd: 16576
> --> Using interface ppp0
> There should be four more lines which list
> --> local  IP address
> --> remote IP address
> --> primary   DNS address
> --> secondary DNS address
>
> If you get that, you have a connection but then I found that I could not
> connect with Firefox due to a bug in Firefox.  That may have been fixed or
> you may not be using Firefox.  If you have a problem, ask for help with
> that one and I will look up my old notes and dig out the solution.
>
> When you do get a connection, use the Synaptic Package Manager to install
> gnome-ppp to get a GUI modem manager.  If you are using Kubuntu it may have
> kppp installed or you can install it using Synaptic.  Kppp provides
> somewhat more detailed feedback on problems that it encounters but
> gnome-ppp is quicker to download over a dial-up connection, requires fewer
> resources and once configured works a treat.
>
> Good luck
> MacDuff
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------






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