In a message to K. Lindholm, Paul Hildebrandt wrote re: OS/2 friendly ISP

PH> I'm a little confused about this at&t -> ibm.net changeover. How does the
fial
PH> up account know which dialer you are using and why would it care? As long
as
PH> your dialer can send your username and password when needed and negociate
a
PH> tcpip protocol what difference does it make?
 
Ibm.net dial-up connections are initiated in a manner very unlike
those of other ISP's I've used.  Most other ISP's will give you a
"login:" prompt when the connection comes up and after you enter 
your password it fires up ppp and you're off.  Ibm.net, OTOH, 
send a string of characters which the dialer responds to; 
different depending on what the response is very different things 
can happen.  The ibm.net dialer then sends your accound type (eg 
"usinet" in the USA, different in other countires), your username
and password, all on a single line.  If you're using ppp it will 
also use encrypted authentication.

Although this stuff can be scripted (all except for the encrypted
authentication, anyway), the dialer does it all transparently.


 * KWQ/2 1.2i * Internet: John.Thompson@ibm.net


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