This is the README file for PPP.preferences version 1.2 -- November 98. PPP.preferences is yet another front-end for Stephen Perkins' PPP deamon. I have found it inconvenient to use a full fledged application for controlling the PPP deamon, so I have built this front-end as a module for the NeXTSTEP Preferences application. Also, I have tried to simplify the configuration and scripting which you have to do before using the PPP deamon, so this module provide an (hopefully) intuitive and easy-to-use interface for configuring the numerous parameters and options for pppd and chat. This module supports configuration of: - The parameters of the serial port: speed, flow control, locking, etc. - The modem initialization and dialup sequence. - The login conversation (expect/send pairs). - The network parameters: addresses, netmask, MTU/MRU, etc. - The authentication protocol: PAP and/or CHAP. - The compression options for the PPP protocol. It displays speed and compression statistics on the current connection. Configurations can be saved and reloaded quickly, which is useful if you are connecting to several service providers. There is plenty of online help that details all the nice things you can do with this module. This software is packaged as an Installer package. Because it's a Preferences module, you must install it in /NextLibrary/Preferences, /LocalLibrary/Preferences, or ~/Library/Preferences. Also note that you must be root to install it. Disclaimer: This package has been developed and tested on NEXTSTEP 3.3 running on black hardware, with version 2.3.3-0.5.1 of the PPP daemon. It may or may not work on other versions or other hardware. Changes since version 1.1: - Fixed a bug that prevented the connection status from being correctly displayed with version 2.3.3-0.5.1 of the PPP daemon. The status was only correct with older versions of the daemon. - Added a Statistics panel to display speed and compression statistics on the current connection. This panel provides roughly the same information as pppstats. - Faster start-up. Changes between versions 1.0 and 1.1: - Fixed a bug that prevented newly created configuration files from showing up in the configuration files pop-up. - Fixed a bug that caused the value of the login sequence timeout to be lost when exiting Preferences. - Fixed a bug that caused Preferences to crash when pressing the Connect button if the login sequence was empty. - Added support for serial ports other than cufa and cufb. - The Preferences executable doesn't need to have the SUID bit anymore. As part of installation, version 1.1 removes the SUID bit from Preferences, if it had been set by version 1.0. - SIGTERM used instead of SIGTERM to terminate the daemon. This makes it possible to execute the ip-down script. - The connection duration may be displayed in the Preferences icon (next to the system clock). - Entries in the login sequence may now be encrypted. This is useful for information like passwords and account names. - Added defaults to control: the PPP deamon syslog facility; the AT dial commands; and the paths for chat and pppd. This is Mailware. If you like it send me any mail (no NeXTmail please!). You're also welcome to send comments, suggestions and bug reports. Pascal Leroy pleroy@rational.com