Puppy for USB mobile modems

Using applications, configuring, problems
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nic007
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Puppy for USB mobile modems

#1 Post by nic007 »

Which of the newer, more streamlined puppies have good support for these usb mobile modems (modeswitch needs to work well)? Connection via dialup. Want to use it on an older machine though (pentium 4, 1.7, 256Mb RAM Wary Puppy is a bit hefty

watchdog
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#2 Post by watchdog »

Both precise and slacko have built-in usb-modeswitch. I use pupdial to connect. You can compile usb-modeswitch for wary:

http://www.draisberghof.de/usb_modeswitch/#download

http://www.draisberghof.de/usb_modeswit ... erence.txt

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 4faeafbf65

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nic007
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#3 Post by nic007 »

watchdog wrote:Both precise and slacko have built-in usb-modeswitch. I use pupdial to connect. You can compile usb-modeswitch for wary:

http://www.draisberghof.de/usb_modeswitch/#download

http://www.draisberghof.de/usb_modeswit ... erence.txt

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 4faeafbf65
Thanks, Wary works perfectly but I was looking for a more streamlined modern distro that will be able to work with that kind of machine specs.

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mikeb
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#4 Post by mikeb »

Lucid has usb modeswitch iirc... but before that its not to hairy to add it...there is a thread on the subject from the puppy 4 era.
The core function is simply to eject /dev/blah then it appears as a modem...usb modeswitch just does it for you based on the device id. I expect a udev rule could do the job if you use the same device all the time.

I did test out such modems even on puppy 2 so the actual driver needed may well be present even in puppy 4.xx

mike

watchdog
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#5 Post by watchdog »

nic007 wrote: Thanks, Wary works perfectly but I was looking for a more streamlined modern distro that will be able to work with that kind of machine specs.
I think that precise should work on that machine. BK, before announcing retiring, said that wary's development was closed. Now is precise the main choice for all hardware. Try a live of precise.

tempestuous
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#6 Post by tempestuous »

When you say "mobile" modem most of us assume you're referring to wireless modems, and yes, under Linux these devices usually requires the usbmodeswitch function.
nic007 wrote:Connection via dialup.
Dialup? So the modem(s) you're referring to is USB dialup? If so, I don't believe that usbmodeswitch is even relevant.

We really need more information/clarification from you - it would be helpful if you could tell us the exact brand/model of modem you're talking about.

tempestuous
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#7 Post by tempestuous »

nic007 wrote:Want to use it on an older machine though (pentium 4, 1.7, 256Mb RAM Wary Puppy is a bit hefty
The "Pentium4, 1.7" specification is fanciful guesswork on the part of whoever specified it. Wary ran fast and well on my (now dead) Pentium2-350.
The 256MB RAM requirement is determined by the size of the compressed filesystem (sfs), and I don't think you will find many other Puppies post-2.x series which can manage with any less RAM ... however ...
this applies only to frugal installations - where the entire filesystem is loaded into RAM.
But if you are "RAM-challenged" you could consider doing a full HD installation of Wary, and then you could get by with as little as 64MB RAM.

tempestuous
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#8 Post by tempestuous »

mikeb wrote:I did test out such modems even on puppy 2 so the actual driver needed may well be present even in puppy 4.xx
Bearing in mind that we're still talking about wireless modems here, not dialup modems, the "actual driver"s are, indeed, present in Puppies right back to the early 2-series, namely: usbserial, option, hso, and cdc_acm. Getting them to work, however, requires the usbmodeswitch utility, which I first contributed for Puppy 4.1 in 2008 -
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 448#254448
along with updated udev logic contributed by rerwin in 2009 -
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=37828

All modern Puppies now contain these components as standard.

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nic007
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#9 Post by nic007 »

Wireless USB modems using dialup to connect, yes.. For instance Huawei 170 which will require the modeswitch to work properly, works perfectly with Wary Puppy 5.3. In Puppy 412 that modem is not detected but I'm sure one can get it working. Anyways, I normally use my mobile phone (with built-in 3 G modem) to connect. No problems connecting that phone to internet with Puppy 412 or Wary Puppy. Strange thing however is that when switching that phone to it's saved files setting (to transfer files) to hard drive, Wary generally does not detect the phone as storage medium but Puppy 412 does. On a few occasions I got Wary to detect the phone as a camera but the filesystem of the phone does not show so no good. But to come back to which puppy will be best. I find that puppy 412 runs lighter/swifter on that older machine than wary. As everything is working on 412 for day to day setup and the performance seems to be better, think I'll stick with it for now. BTW. It also seems as if the later puppies (Wary I've tried) have issues with typing fonts. With 412 I can link my windows TTF fonts on my windows partition and it works a charm. Do that with Wary and it turns out to be a mess.

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mikeb
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#10 Post by mikeb »

Just to clarify on puppy 2 i used eject /dev/sr0 (pretty sure it was that device)...then it loaded the modem driver and I ran wvdial and connected dial up style..... some phones have some interesting quirks as mentioned.
Usbmodeswitch just automates the device detection and ejection.

4.12 was lacking the bitmap font fix... thats what I used to get things smooth and the original dejavu fonts were then used to good effect (as they are supposed to be...I found this fix originally in slax and it eventually trickled through into puppy land but still seems to be disabled by default causing users to run off and grab a pile of windows fonts.). A few lines of config can transform at times.

rhubarb

Mike

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