Modem users' pain

[Frank Siegert]

This is a call for easing the (K)ubuntu life of modem users.

Many beginners are not on a LAN or WLAN, thus they have to set up some kind of 
dialup connection, which is not achievable by a beginner yet (please correct 
me, if I just did not find the right tool/way). I see the following problems 
and possible solutions (partly for SmartLink modems, which have been what I 
saw most):

1. Many modems can use existing alsa drivers, but are only functional with 
sl-modem-daemon. This is a multiverse package, not included on the 
installation CD. How is somebody on (not yet working) dialup supposed to get 
this package? Is there any way to include it on the CD?

2. Even if they get the hardware part done somehow, they need good guiding on 
the configuration. I assume, this can not be done automatically during 
installation.(?) Modem information on the Wiki is very badly organized, e. g. 
there are three pages about SmartLink modems.
	https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SmartLinkModemDriverHowto
	https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BinaryDriverHowto/SmartLinkModem
	https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Smartlink
If there are no other plans I would start reorganizing the Wiki content that 
concerns modems.

3. There are two related groups, I am not sure, which one the user should be 
added to, and whether it should be done automatically for the first user:
- dip: e. g. pppd is "-rwsr-xr--  1 root dip"
- dialout: the modem device, e. g. /dev/pts/5 is "crw-rw----  1 root dialout"

Any thoughts?