I have two computers at home. My flatmates' computer connects direct to the internet (trough the hub), my computer gets the internet from his (also trough the hub). After I installed salckware, it auto recognizes the network connection when the other computer connects. No problem there. But, when my friend disconnects...
1- I want to be able to directly connect to our internet provider with our username, password, etc.
2-Also, if possible, to confiure my slackware so when I am connected, my flatmates' computer (windows xp) will be a client of my linux and get the internet from me.

Any ideas?

Thanks!

Ivan

I am guessing you mean a cable modem?, and your friends xp box is the gateway.
Of course you will go down, you've lost your tcp/ip connection.
IMHO, I would get a router, or hub(a little cheaper but not as good as a router)then there is no worries about when someone will be disconnecting.
Yes this is possible. You will be the gateway instead of him. I would still suggest investing in a hub or router but still having fun with trying things out.
Hope that helps some.

Hummm, sorry, it was late at night and now I can see it's hard to understand what's going on from what I wrote.
I'll try again:
1- Flatmates' computer is connected to the hub
2- My computer is connected to the hub
3- The ADSL ethernet modem is connected to the hub

I configured a network between my friends computer and mine, so I use the internet as a client of his computer. I did my computer as a client because I do go offline sometimes, but my friend is a lazy bum and rarely goes offline, as he has nothing else to do. I know that me, being a client of his computer, will loose my connection when he goes offline. I understand that... no problems... What I want is to have something similar to what I had in windows:

When I turn my computer on, it automatically detects the network connection and (assuming my friends' pc is connected to the net) my computer is connected to the internet. If my friend do happend to be offline, I can click on "My network connections" icon, and there is my ADSL connection where I can type my user name and password and... I'm online. I wanted to have this option using slackware, if it is possible.
My second question is: Assuming I configured my computer to have this two options (connect as a client of the network, or directly with my username and password), is it possible to be the client of my friends computer when he is on the net, and my friends computer be the client when I am on the net? I think this is probably something I should post in the "Network" forum, so if anyone knows how to configure the internet to have the two options is already GREAT!

Thanks!

Configure the "normal" connection with netconfig and the other with pppoe-setup (use pppoe-start to connect). That should do it.

Ok, I did that. But the problem is after I configured the pppoe the netconfig (network connection) doesn't work anymore... DO I have to reboot the computer to change from one connection to the other or is there somenthing else I am missing? Maybe something in the configuration of pppoe? When it asked me for the 'iddle' time I seected 'no', could that be the problem? I didn't really understad what's with the 'iddle' option. The man pppoe didn't cover that too good!

You could try instead of rebooting, shutdown pppoe with pppoe-stop and then restarting inet1: /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1 restart
It's ok to select no there, dialing on demand connects to pppoe when you try to reach something that's not on your LAN, the dialer dials automatically for you and tries to reach it. The idle time it asks about is the time of inactive connection to the outside before it drops the automatic connection.

Humm, I see! Thanks for the tips! I'l give it a go!