Re: tlug: Internet connections from Linux

[Scott Stone <sstone@example.com>]

On Tue, 13 Oct 1998, Karl-Max Wagner wrote:

> > Bought a modem yesterday; to my surprise with help from HOWTOs I've
> > managed to connect to the internet and browse the web with Netscape. I
> > can also receive mail with Netscape without a problem.
> 
> Good !
> 
> > However, I'm unable to configure Netscape to send mail, because when I
> > put "mail.iname.com" as my outgoing mail server and press OK, it
> > complains about the host not being found.
> 
> Must be a Netscape bug. Anyway, there is no need to use a
> smarthost. You can also have your mail delivered directly.
>  
> IMHO using Netscape as a MUA isn't a good idea anyway. Set up
> your sendmail ( or better qmail ) as your MTA and use a simple MUA
> like elm to do the mail. This allows you to do your mail in
> console mode without X ( more convenient ).

some people like Netscape mail, though.  One weird thing about Netscape is
that it doesn't seem to use gethostbyname() for name lookups, it queries
DNS directly.  As such, make sure you have at least one nameserver
properly defined in /etc/resolv.conf, like this:

nameserver 154.33.63.210

(that is actually a real nameserver at PSINet, which will work if you
don't know of a closer DNS to you).

> Should work under Linux, too. Netscape problem, I guess.

"It's a feature, not a bug", I think :)

> 
> > Also, I have permission problems when trying to dial my ISP as a
> > non-root user. Could someone tell me how they approach this (in terms of
> > permissioning?) As I'm just a home user, I'd like to configure it so
> 

Is this (Redhat or TurboLinux) [1]?  If so, there's a 'usernetctl' program
which is a setuid wrapper for pppd that lets you do it.  Under TL, use
'ppp-on ppp0' or 'ppp-off ppp0'.  If you're using RH, grab the turbopppcfg
RPM from ftp.pht.co.jp or ftp.pht.com, install that, and then you can use
those scripts as well - they're compatible with Redhat, and maybe with
Suse, too, I don't know if they have usernetctl or not.  I think
usernetctl may have actually been written by someone at Redhat. 


> If you work with a chat script there is no problem. It's
> different when you use minicom because /dev/ttyS? normally only
> allows root to access it. You could change it ( simply by
> chmod'ing the device file ), but that is not a good idea for
> security reasons.

pppd also needs root permissions to start the interface and let the kernel
see it, I believe.

--------------------------------------------------
Scott M. Stone <sstone@example.com, sstone@example.com>
               <sstone@example.com>
Head of TurboLinux Development/Systems Administrator
Pacific HiTech, Inc (USA) / Pacific HiTech, KK (Japan)
http://www.pht.com		http://armadillo.pht.co.jp
http://www.pht.co.jp	        http://www.turbolinux.com


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