Dial-up Modems no longer supported???

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre]

On Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 10:38 AM, komputes <komputes at gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
> It is not because a certain technology is not used by the majority that
> it should be removed all together. I think we have made it especially
> hard on people who only have access to telephone to use ubuntuas a
> method of accessing the internet.
>
> Here is the third world use case:
> - User gets CD and installs
> - User tries to connect to the internet via telephone line
> - User hits speed bump

But it's not removed; it's still available, just in an alternate
method given that supporting dial-up modems was complex and taking a
lot of space compared the the relatively low benefit. I think this is
reasonable in the vast majority of cases.

I agree it's possibly tough for third-world countries, but I'm not
convinced pure dial-up it's as ubiquitous as you think it is.
Land-lines aren't laid everywhere. In many countries (e.g. India), it
makes a lot more sense to install long-haul wireless antennas or use
satellite rather than expect land-lines to be installed (and for them
to last).

>
> At this point the user learns one of the following:
> - You must learn to use command line (and config files) to connect using
> pppconfig
> - You need access to the internet to download a graphical tool that
> allows simple PPP connection
> - You have a soft modem and require drivers (linuxant and such) that may
> have to be downloaded/purchased

You don't need config files. pppconfig does everything for you. Plus
you'll never be able to work around requiring drivers. Most modem
drivers can't be redistributed for a variety of reasons (including
being in binary format, different for each device, and more), MM was
rewritten to support many other connection options, etc. Although I
agree it's not the best experience that could be given, there still
are choices that need to be made to support a great experience for the
vast majority of users, and that's what I think we achieve with the CD
in its current shape. I don't think the situation is that unrealistic
and desperate.

Note, that's just my 0.02$. I certainly won't complain if someone
shows up with a nice patch to re-implement dial-up in modemmanager.

Regards,

Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre <mathieu.tl at gmail.com>
Freenode: cyphermox, Jabber: mathieu.tl at gmail.com
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