Re: PPTP Support

[Antony J Mee <A J Mee ncl ac uk>]

Hi Robert,

Thanks for the response.  I do want it to "just work".  But "minor edits 
then just works" seems to be better than "doesn't work"; if only a step 
in the right direction.

This means for me that I can now run NM in one important location 
(office) and gives me more motivation to get it working in the other 
important place (home requires WPA-PSK).

Robert Love wrote:

> The need to edit the secrets file is one thing, but requiring the user
> edit the ppp ifup script is quite another.  We really need stuff to
> "just work" and I understand that PPTP and PPP are heavily interwoven,
> and this sucks, but is there any way to work around this?
>  
So. I have attempted to start a discussion on the linux-ppp and 
pptp-client-devel lists to sniff out solutions to precisely these 
issues.  I didn't want to fill everyones mail boxes with it but you can 
find it archived here:

 http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-ppp&m=113267583227164&w=2

That discusses the two issues mentioned already.  And a third, more 
annoying one that I only discovered on connecting to a different network 
today.  This is related to the lack of a way to get the VPN server's IP 
which is needed for adjusting the routing tables.  I think I have a work 
around for that now though by getting NetworkManager to resolve the IP 
of the VPN server before spawning pptp.

> In the case of the secrets file, I suppose you could write that data out
> yourself, no?
>  
That I have considered, but was unsure how to proceed.  If I were to do 
so how would people like to see it done?
  a) NM maintains lines in chap-secrets
  b) before connecting backup chap-secrets, and replace it with an NM 
generated file
       and replace the original when the connection has been established
  c) other

> Editing the ifup script seems harder, to be sure ...
I agree of course, but this appears to be the only interface provided by ppp for getting the tunnel and dns properties. I hope the pppd list will provide me an answer there.


tOnY