I've read all the posts about getting wvdial to work, and I have done it with a previous version of mandrake, but I'm just unable to get wvdial to work with a normal user. Of course it works fine with root, but when i try with a user i get this error;
WvDial: Internet dialer version 1.42
--> Cannot open /dev/ttyS0: Device or resource busy
I know this has to be a permissions error, and I've tried chown on
wvdial, wvdial.conf, chap-secrets, pppd but it still won't work. Is there something missing, or am I getting at the security wrong?
Thanks

Hi, I, as I keep telling people, am no expert, but I HAD EXACTLY this problem. Kinternet calls wvdial, and nothing happens. I can't remember what I did exactly, but i moved myself, dad, into various groups, and changed permissions, still wouldn't work.
But, now I call wvdial from a console, and it connects straight away, well, asks for my password, but I don't have any probs. Kinternet still won't work, and another dialler under Internet in the start menu works sometimes, but often causes errors.
Try wvdial from a console, let me know if that helps

I am using wvdial from the console.
It works when I use root, not normal user.
I've never used anything else to call it. KPPP works ok, so I'd have thought permissions on pppd must be ok?

You need rw permissions to /dev/ttyS0 (or whatever is the device your modem's connected to) and possibly to /var/lock. You should never run wvdial or pppd as root, because that means you're logged in as root, which isn't recommendable especially when connected to the net, IMHO.

You may want to create a group (e.g. 'dialout') to grant rw permission, rather than making everything world readable.
That worked for me, anyway.

Heinz

I'm unable to change the permissions of /dev/ttyS0 to anything other than this
lr-xr-xr-x 1 root root 5 Apr 11 21:47 /dev/ttyS0 -> tts/0
Yes, I am using root to do it.
There must be something other than this that needs to be altered though?

I guess by looking at the file, that mandrake uses the ttySx files as symlinks to another file in this case tts/0. So change the symlink ttyS0 back to rwxrwxrwx (777) and chmod the tts/0 file instead to edit the actual device that is called.

crwxr-xr-x 1 at tty 4, 64 Apr 12 20:05 0
That's the actual device, as you can see its already 755.
I can't chmod the symlink as I mentioned in the last post. Also, there is a link from /dev/modem to /dev/ttyS0 and shows as:
lr-xr-xr-x 1 root root 5 Apr 12 19:37 /dev/modem -> ttyS0

Another way to get wvdial running I guess would be to suid root (chmod u+s /usr/bin/wvdial). This is not good practice, I admit, but AFAIK wvdial has no known vulnerabities that could be exploited this way (correct me if I'm wrong!).

You may want to restrict rw acces to /etc/wvdial.conf though, as your dial-up password is stored here in unencrypted form. wvdial sets the permissions to world readible by default...

God, I can sympathise with you.
I just checked the groups that I (dad) am in:
dad is in bin,tty, disk,wwwadmin,mail,news,dialout,audio, firewall,video, trusted,modem,maildrop,users,cdrusers.

I think you understand a lot more about this than I do, but just thought I'd chuck in my idea.

As I said, I had exactly that problem, but it works now. If only I could remember what I did.
Hope you get it going!!
Peter

I've tried a+s on wvdial, wvdial.conf and pppd, but still no luck.
I've got no idea what else I can try. I thought there were only 4 files that would need modifying and I've tried all those now, so I don't have anymore ideas.
The main reason I wanted wvdial was so I can use gkrellm to connect/disconnect to the internet from Fluxbox/Blackbox.

Forgive me for asking, but are you sure your modem's OK?

Oops, I can see it is. I'm sorry, couldn't cancel.