PPP. Was "Re (2): [Oberon] Multiple incompatibilities with ISPs"

[Peter Easthope]

Chris, Edgar & others,

cg> As I recall you indicated/suspected a 'small incompatability
between n-o PPP and some ISP' ?  This could be a BIG job to
debug.

A good part of two days studying and decoding
the LCP negotiations indicates a difficulty when one
of the servers here acknowledges establishment of
LCP without negotiating authentication.  (Connection to
the other server is OK.)  

cg> In your case if you could investigate the ISP with linux, which
has lots of debugging facilities, you could confirm which 'side' is
out of spec. : ISP or/and n-o ?

The problem appears to be with the server 
rather than with Edgar's automaton.  Resolution 
pending. 

The PPP.Log is really not so difficult to follow;
quite effective and even interesting!
It can be thought of as the transcript of a 
conversation between the two automatons.
In the majority of cases the problem will be 
in the LCP (Link Control Protocol) negotiations
which involve only the first 5 or so frames in 
each direction.

es> Nevertheless RFC 1548 is obsoleted by RFC 1661.
So browsing through my RFC printouts I found the 
following list. ...

Hopefully a nice new update of PPP.Tool can appear.

es> There are means for tracing the stuff. But the main 
point I guess is your familiarity with the protocol so 
you are able to find the point where there is a problem.

Yes, the RFCs are somewhat readable =8~)) although
a reference at the level of the O'Reilly & Associates
books would certainly help.  For example, how do the
Internet layers, LCP, IPCP, correspond to the ISO-OSI
network model?  The RFCs assume knowledge of 
abstract basics which not all novices possess.  
Perhaps this is the realm of Andre (?).

es> Another point is that I would like to collect information 
on problems with PPP on Oberon somewhere. I don't have 
the urge to take every article concerning PPP from
the mailing list and put it somewhere else. 

A by-product of the study of PPP is a collection of 
troubleshooting tips, notes, suggestions and small 
modifications to the PPP*.Mods.  Edgar has first 
refusal on this material and my ego imagines some
of it included in a future release.  Otherwise and, if 
Edgar doesn't object, it could go on my server for 
public access. 

Regards,        Peter E.