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Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.mel.connect.com.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.hawaii.edu!ames!enews.sgi.com!sgigate.sgi.com!swrinde!newsfeed.internetmci.com!news.sprintlink.net!helena.MT.net!nate From: nate@trout.sri.MT.net (Nate Williams) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc Subject: Re: PPP and SLIP: ISP Quality? Date: 29 Jan 1996 16:48:22 GMT Organization: SRI Intl. - Montana Operations Lines: 61 Message-ID: <4eitom$ap2@helena.MT.net> References: <4eevr4$7no@news.voicenet.com> Reply-To: "Nate Williams" <nate@sneezy.sri.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: trout.sri.mt.net In article <4eevr4$7no@news.voicenet.com>, 5150 <5150> wrote: [ Please fix your news software. It's broken since you don't have a valid email address ] >people seem to be reporting lots of problems with PPP in FreeBSD. People seems to be having problems setting up PPP in FreeBSD. I should know since I've been doing my best to answer a large portion of the request both here and on the mailing lists. >my question is whether or not the current implemenations are of >suitable quality for running an ISP (or remote dialup access to a >LAN). There are currently 5 or 6 well known ISP's running on FreeBSD hardware. One of them uses *only* FreeBSD machines for all of their hardware needs, including PPP & SLIP dialup lines. I'd say it's pretty 'suitable' of running an ISP. >are the Linux versions any better? The kernel stuff in FreeBSD and Linux based on the same code, so I suspect they are almost the same in terms of stability, although the code originated in BSD and was ported to Linux, so there is the chance that the Linux code contains more 'bugs' than the BSD version. Given the frequency that the ppp stuff in Linux has been updated in the last 2 months, I'd say that the PPP code in FreeBSD is *much* more stable. >i like FreeBSD a lot, but this is one area that seems to get a lot of >bad press. I think it just that most folks don't understand all of the issues. The most common problem folks have with PPP has *nothing* to do with it, but has to do with routing. Everyone assumes that if you make a PPP connection, the entire world should send packets to you. So, if you have a PPP connection to your ISP via your workstation, you should be able to become your own ISP and have a couple dozen folks connect to your box and have them be 'On the Internet'. It doesn't work that way, and folks aren't taking the time to understand the issues. I'm hoping to remedy at least some of the load by re-writing the handbook entries for Dialup (done, in review), SLIP, and PPP so that folks will have a better idea what's needed. If you look in the Linux newsgroups, a large portion of the networking questions are PPP related as well, so one could argue that PPP in itself is a mis-understood technology. :) PPP works pretty well for most folks who want a single-line dial-up, but gets *much* more complicated once you have more than one machine at the remote end. Nate -- nate@sneezy.sri.com | Research Engineer, SRI Intl. - Montana Operations nate@trout.sri.MT.net | Loving life in God's country, the great state of work #: (406) 449-7662 | Montana. home #: (406) 443-7063 | A fly pole and a 4x4 Chevy truck = Heaven on Earth