SCO PPP from Morning Star Release and Installation Notes
SCO PPP from Morning Star Release and Installation Notes

SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.3 notes

SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.3 notes

These notes cover important information for running SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.3 on SCO OpenServer.

Panic bug fixed
On SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.2 and earlier, systems under heavy load would occasionally panic in the PPP tunnel driver. This has been corrected in 2.1.3.

Improved modem support
In this release of SCO PPP from Morning Star, any modem type listed in /usr/lib/uucp/defaults can now be used as the dialer field in /usr/lib/mstppp/Devices.

Improved multiport serial card support
On SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.2 and earlier, some serial devices were incorrectly locked. This has been corrected.

Log file readability improved
The Morning Star PPP log file normally contains timestamp information in a format that is difficult to read. This release of Morning Star PPP includes a script, /usr/lib/mstppp/readlog, that converts timestamp information into readable dates and times.

The command uses the syntax readlog filename, where filename is the name of the log file to view. When no filename is specified, the command defaults to /usr/adm/pppd.log. To read from the standard input, specify the filename as ``-''. For example, to view the log file as it is being written, enter:

tail -f /usr/adm/pppd.log | /usr/lib/mstppp/readlog -

Installing SCO PPP from Morning Star on SCO OpenServer 5.0.0
If you install SCO PPP from Morning Star on SCO OpenServer 5.0.0, you see an error at the end of the installation regarding not being able to find the add_setmember_libstz.sh file. Ignore this error as the product will fully install and run fine. The only result from this error is that you cannot search the MST_PPP manual pages from within SCOhelp.

Installing SCO PPP from Morning Star as a layered product
No graphical configuration utility is available if SCO PPP is installed as a layered product. However, if SCO PPP is installed as part of SCO Internet FastStart, the graphical Internet Manager is available.

Locating the local IP address of each PPP connection
The local IP address of each PPP connection must be on a different subnet number than the Ethernet IP address (if there is one).

Using dialback
Dialback is only supported for clients calling back servers (\M in Systems chat script); SCO PPP from Morning Star does not support servers calling back clients.

Connecting at baud rates of 115200
Connections made using SCO PPP from Morning Star will reach baud rates of 115200.

Running up to 250 concurrent sessions
Up to 250 concurrent sessions are supported.

To run 250 PPP concurrent connections:

  1. Tune the kernel by running the following command:

    /etc/conf/bin/idtune NMUXLINKS 320

  2. Relink the kernel.


NOTE: Even after tuning the kernel, not every system will be able to support 250 connections, because pppd consumes system resources, such as memory, swap space, and CPU time.

PPP sessions do not count as logins
PPP sessions do not consume user licenses on SCO OpenServer and SCO Internet FastStart systems. Thus, for example, a system with a two-user UNIX license still supports up to 250 incoming PPP sessions.

Assigning IP addresses from a pool
To configure the system to automatically select an IP address for inbound PPP connections from a pool of addresses, first define the pool and then activate IP address pool selection:

  1. Create the file /usr/lib/mstppp/IPPool with one line for each IP address you want to include in the pool of addresses.

    On each line, include three fields: local IP address, remote IP address that may connect to the local address, and netmask. For example:

    154.227.87.98   145.127.182.124   255.255.255.0
    

  2. Configure the inbound PPP connection:

    • If you have the Internet Manager installed, on the Internet Services page, click on the Network button, then click on PPP Connections. Click on Add New Dial-in PPP Connection or select an existing dial-in connection to modify.

      When the /usr/lib/mstppp/IPPool file exists, the inbound PPP connection configuration page displays a ``Use IP Address Pool'' checkbox. If you check this box, an IP address for the inbound connection will be chosen from available addresses listed in the IPPool file.

    • If you do not have the Internet Manager installed, use the word ``POOL'' as the first argument after the login name in the Accounts file. Do not specify IP addresses or a netmask on this line. For example, Accounts contains a line like the following (presented here on two lines for clarity):
         ppp1  121.201.37.5:121.201.37.6
         exec /usr/lib/mstppp/exec.dialin netmask 255.255.255.0
      
      Change this line to:
         ppp1    POOL exec /usr/lib/mstppp/exec.dialin
      

  3. Make sure dynamic reassignment of IP addresses is enabled on the system dialing in. If the dialing system is also running SCO PPP from MorningStar, do this by performing either of the following actions:

    • If the dialing system has an Internet Manager, select the ``Dynamic'' checkbox when configuring the dial-out connection.

    • If the dialing system does not have the Internet Manager, add a tilde (``~'') after each of the IP addresses specified in the Autostart file:
         /usr/lib/mstppp/dialout 127.0.0.2~:127.0.0.3~ auto exec
         /usr/lib/mstppp/exec.dialout netmask 255.255.255.0
      
    If the dialing system is not running SCO PPP from MorningStar, see the documentation for that PPP software.

Line not dropped when active inbound PPP connection deleted
If you delete a PPP connection (with the Internet Manager) while that connection is active, the line will not be dropped, the pppd daemon will not be killed, and the /dev/tty* file will still be owned by the UID of the deleted user. To correct this, the system administrator must kill the orphaned pppd process (or reboot).

How the pppd daemon writes to the log file
The log file now records the time as the number of seconds since the UNIX epoch (January 1, 1970). This permits SCO Doctor to monitor and respond to PPP problems.

PPP dialin failure during initialization
PPP dial-in connections sometimes fail during initialization, logging this error message to /usr/adm/pppd.log:
pppd: Fatal system error: Can't ifconfig du1 (SIOCSIFADDR): File exists
Repeating the dial-in attempt should be successful.

Using dynamically assigned remote IP address as primary connection
On SCO systems other than SCO Internet FastStart systems, if you use a PPP connection with a dynamically assigned remote IP address as your primary connection to the Internet, you must edit /etc/tcp to add the default boot-time route.

File ownership of ttys
/usr/bin/enable and /usr/bin/disable change the file owner for the specified tty to bin. This might cause the following error even if /usr/lib/uucp/Devices is properly configured:
Connect failed: CAN'T ACCESS DEVICE 
To fix this problem, run chmod 666 on the tty device.

Using hardware handshaking on modems
When using hardware handshaking on modems, rtscts-crtsfl is the pppd option you should use with the SCO serial driver. When needed, this option should be added to the entry in the /usr/lib/mstppp/Autostart file for outgoing connections, and the /usr/lib/mstppp/Accounts file for incoming connections.

For a list of all the options available with PPP, enter:

/usr/lib/mstppp/pppd help | more

Supported data speeds on COM1 and COM2
An enhanced serial driver is incorporated the SCO Internet Supplement for SCO OpenServer 5.0.0 and 5.0.2, and is a standard feature of SCO OpenServer 5.0.4. (See ``Installing and removing SCO PPP from Morning Star 2.1.3'' for information on these supplements.) This serial driver provides data speeds up to and including 115200bps on your standard COM1 and COM2 ports, as well as other non-intelligent serial boards listed by the mkdev serial command. However, these high serial speeds are subject to the following hardware limitations:

For more information:

SCO PPP from Morning Star User's Guide
Online:
http://osr5doc.sco.com:1996/Internet/PPP/ug211/ppp1_2.html
PostScript (on the WWW):
http://www.sco.com/documentation/postscript/mst/ppp/
See ``Documentation notes'' for notes on the Morning Star documentation.