[vox-tech] i've lost the ability to compile a kernel/Modem suggestions?

[Jeff Newmiller]

On Wed, 19 Dec 2001, Joey Karalius wrote:

> Questions from a newbie...
> How often should one compile a kernel?

When a security or functional problem is identified that is liable to
affect you.  If you stick with stable kernels, this means not very often.

>  I assume whenever there is a new 
> one out, but would the existing kernel ever need to be recompiled, sans 
> any new changes that might be done?
> (I may have just answered my own question, but any input is appreciated)
> 
> also.....
> I was at Frye's looking for a new dialup modem to use on my Red Hat 
> 7.2/Win98SE dual boot box.  Any suggestions?  Are there internal 
> controller-based models, or are externals the only way to go...  If 
> external, can more than one 'puter work through the same modem?

I don't personally have experience with any internal modems.  The way I
understand it, if the modem emulates a serial port in hardware you should
be able to use it with a minimum of problems (limited to disabling
conflicting ports and irqs).  Unfortunately, the vast majority of internal
modems are "winmodems", and support for these is spotty at best.

As for more than one computer using the modem, the best way for
internetwork sharing is to network them (with ethernet, say) and enable
routing and masquerading in the computer that has the modem.  If you have
custom wire protocols (old bbs connections, for example), there are "A-B"
boxes you can manually switch with or you can ssh into the computer with
the modem and use its software.

There are lots of pages describing how ppp+masquerading can be done... for
example:
http://www.artscilab.org/pppdialout.html
http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/IP-Masquerade-HOWTO/index.html

Beware of running services accessible to the Internet while connected with
PPP... although your IP number typically changes every time you connect,
if a scanner does find you it may only take seconds for it to exploit the
latest weakness.  At a minimum verify your hosts.deny and hosts.allow
("man hosts_access; man inetd"), and preferably install a firewall
package.

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