"diald" help needed (fwd)

[mikebw at bilow.bilow.uu.ids.net (Mike Bilow)]

John Abreau wrote in a message to Mike Bilow:

 JA> I am a new user to Red Hat 4.2 and have also just installed
 JA> Netscape 4.0  to the system with the help of my LUG. I am
 JA> truly hoping to find a way to "login" to my provider which
 JA> is Netcom (random IP) the way I do with my winDOZE,
 JA> swindles95 machine. Netcom of course provides one with the
 JA> usual info only: 1-primary, 1-secondary DNS numbers (&)
 JA> smtp.ix.netcom.com (&) wiliweld at popd.ix.netcom.com, (for the
 JA> mail) plus the 33.6 & 56k phone numbers.

The diald software is intended to automatically dial on demand, providing an
illusion of a transparent link.  Most of the configuration info you are looking
for is related to pppd, not diald.  In fact, diald just calls pppd.

There are FAQ and HOWTO documents about all of this stuff in the LDP.  Start
with "http://www.ssc.com/linux"; for links to those docuements.  Don't overlook
the ovbious: "man pppd".

The only unusual thing about Netcom PPP is that they require you to preface
your username with a '#' character for standad PPP login; otherwise they will
set up a CSLIP connection for their proprietary Netcruiser software.  This is
documented on the Netcom web site, assuming you can get to it somehow.
 
-- Mike