* Stephen Walsh writes to Rowan_Crowe, on Saturday October 11 1997
   at 17:27:

 SW>>> I've since had to re-install the hole os (operator stuff up on a
 SW>>> major scale, seing how i'm new to freebsd [and totaly lost]).
 SW>>> Now the system won't even make a call out with ppp..

 R>> What happened?

 SW> I tryed chaging the logon shell and managed to not be able to logon at
 SW> all. As i don't yet know enough about freebsd, i re-installd the os
 SW> again...

Hmm, if it happens again (or try this anyway), try the following...

When you boot, at the FreeBSD prompt specify "-s" instead of just
hitting enter. This boots you into single user mode. I *think* you get a
straight shell prompt and you don't have to log in.

Things are fairly limited because you don't have a path, and only / is
mounted. You can use mount to mount your other partitions from /etc/fstab,
eg

mount /dev/wd0s2f

...which on one of my boxes mounts /dev/wd0s2f on /usr.

This is from memory, I haven't booted single user for a while...

 SW> I've now got it to dial and connect, now the pppd is giving me this:

 SW> Oct 11 17:22:43 bsd pppd: Warning - secret file /etc/ppp/pap-secrets
 SW> has world and/or group access

careful of this...! If anyone has shell access, or FTP access (including
anonymous) they can see your ISP password.

chmod go-rw /etc/ppp/pap-secrets

 SW> Oct 11 17:22:43 bsd pppd[333]: pppd 2.2.0 started by root, uid 0
 SW> Oct 11 17:23:08 bsd pppd[333]: Connect: ppp0  /dev/cuaa0
 SW> Oct 11 17:23:08 bsd pppd[333]: Serial line is looped back.
 SW> Oct 11 17:23:08 bsd pppd[333]: Connection terminated.


 SW> at wich point the modem hangs up.

I've seen this problem too. I don't know how to solve it, but a redial
cured it. Did you try more than once?

From the pppd man page:

       -mn    Disable   magic   number  negotiation.   With  this
              option, pppd cannot detect a looped-back line.

The way I read this, specifying -mn will simply stop it reporting what is
an error, rather than fixing it, but you could give it a go.

Cheers.


... rowan{at}sensation.net.au  |  http://www.rowan.sensation.net.au/
---