If you wanted to get on to the net with Linux then you had to write scripts and

mess around with various files and options there. WvDial is the answer to all

all your connection problems. Connecting with WvDial is a short and pleasant

process. WvDial is an intelligent dialer so you don't have to waste your time

debugging chat scripts for various ISPs. If like me, you are on more than one

ISP, then you will appreciate this feature.

In typical Linux fashion, it is a command line program but in atypical

fashion, it is rather user-friendly. With WvDial, I was on to the Internet

in 5 mins. No scripts. The username, password and phone number are all you

need.

You can get WvDial from http://www.worldvisions.ca/wvdial/. This is the

source code which you will have to compile. Compiling is a short, painless

process.

make

make install ( Need to be root for this )

Most newer distributions of Linux now carry binaries of WvDial, which are

installed at setup along with the other network tools. SuSE and Red Hat

both carry WvDial. They also provide GUI frontends to WvDial. Red Hat's

tool is rp3 and SuSE's is wvdial.tcl. Both will need to be run in X and

will take you right from configuration to dial-out. Another GUI frontend to

WvDial is the cleverly titled KDE frontend KWvDial. I haven't tried this one

out. If you have then tell me.

You will also need to have pppd installed along with the usual suite of

gcc and make tools. These tools should be a permanent fixture on your

hard drive anyway.

WvDial should have been installed in /usr/local/bin.

The first step after installing WvDial is to make the default config

file. WvDial comes with the wvdialconf, which you can use to setup a base

configuration.

wvdialconf /etc/wvdial.conf

Wvdialconf will detect your modem type and setup the init strings and

the port your modem is located on. The file /etc/wvdial.conf is the

default configuration file that WvDial looks for. WvDialconf has to be run

the first time and which point it will create a new wvdial.conf. You can

safely run it after you have added your own setting because it only

modifies the Init strings and the port to which the modem is connected.

Everything else is left untouched.

Open /etc/wvdial.conf in your favourite text editor. Your default username