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Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP

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Up until a month or so ago, I had a working dialup account with
Ca.Inter.Net.  Their dialup phone numbers and machines -- Network
Access Servers or NASs -- were provided by Telus and the account
worked fine. 

Now Fibernetics.ca has taken over Ca.Inter.Net. The Telus phone
numbers stopped working without warning.  The account still exists,
mail server works fine but not dialup PPP.  After some weeks,
Fibernetics provided a toll-free 844 number for dialup access to their
own new server.

Nothing I can do will establish a PPP connection at that number.

  + The number answers and modem hardware handshake complete
    successfully.

  + The NAS then presents a banner and a prompt:

       Username: Login:

  + After submitting a valid username, there's another prompt:

      Password:

    which responds to the password with "% Authentication failed"

But there's a potential gotcha:

Up until Fibernetics took over last month, the Telus NAS presented a
banner and the "Login: " prompt but did not, in fact, expect the
calling user to authenticate that way and would not accept
authentication that way. [1] Instead, it expected Link Control
Protocol (LCP) to begin negotiations immediately.  So I had a
login/authentication configuration that worked that way.  All good.
Worked on my Linux box, worked on my wife's Win-XP system.

No longer.

The support guys at Fibernetics [2] say that:

  + They have installed the dialup software with "out of the box"
    configuration but can't say explicitly what that configuration
    is.

  + Above notwithstanding, they say that I have to implement the ASCII
    7-bit Username: and Password: authentication before beginning
    LCP/PPP.  That authentication fails as described above, whether
    done manually in Minicon or in a script run by pppd.

  + The method of ignoring the ASCII prompt and commencing LCP
    immediately (then depending for authentication on negotiating PAP
    and submitting PAP credentials) also fails.  When I try that, it
    appears [3] that the NAS responds with octet strings similar to
    LCP ConfReq packets but all with bit 7 == 0.  If the NAS is trying
    to send ConfReq packets but they're being reduced to 7-bit, my
    pppd client would correctly drop them.

  + The two "Escalation specialist" support guys both say that I know
    more about this stuff than they do.  I don't think they've read
    the RFCs or even the manual for the dialup software.

In further support of the notion that it's their config, not mine,

  + The system worked flawlessly for both Linux and WIn-XP until
    these guys at Fibernetics took over and put their server in place,
    and 

  + Both the Linux and Win-XP boxen continue to work fine on the same
    phone line when using our other dialup ISP (the one from which I'm
    posting this.)

  + The Fibernetics dialup NAS fails in exactly the same way if I take
    a laptop to a different phoneline, different exchange.

Does anyone know enough about configuring the ISP end of dialup to
tell me what I need to tell the Fibernetics guys so that they can get
their house in order? [4]  I am seriously vexed at this point.

I've had Linux on the desktop for 15 years, Unix user for 25 years,
can read RFCs but I'm not an IT professional, have never run a NOC,
know nothing about analog or digital telecom, Cisco admin or that
level of tech.

Help?  

- Mike

[1] This is, I think, called "Stupid mode" elsewhere on the net.

[2] http://www.fibernetics.ca/team/
    Scroll down to Neil C. or David M.

[3] Appears: From running slsnif to sniff the serial port.  But I'm
    not totally confident in that program so I say "appears".

[4] Alternatively, does anybody have a personal contact inside
    Fibernetics in Ontario whom they (or I) could persuade, bribe or
    prod into getting his fixed? FOAF who knows the CEO?  Live next
    door to the FIbernetics NOC and can walk ovr there and fix them
    up?

-- 
Michael Spencer                  Nova Scotia, Canada

mspencer (at-thing) tallships (dot) ca
http://home.tallships.ca/mspencer/    

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Thread

Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-08 22:46 -0400
  Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-09 18:08 +0000
    Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-11 04:07 -0400
      Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-11 18:55 +0000
        Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-12 22:34 -0400
          Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-13 22:49 +0000
            Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-15 03:44 -0400
              Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-15 21:55 +0000
                Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-17 04:44 -0400
                Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-17 18:43 +0000
                Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Mike Spencer <mds@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> - 2014-12-21 03:26 -0400
                Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-21 19:19 +0000
  Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Michael Black <et472@ncf.ca> - 2014-12-11 15:01 -0500
    Re: Dialup PPP fails after new server, admins at ISP Moe Trin <ibuprofin@painkiller.example.tld.invalid> - 2014-12-12 02:02 +0000

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