Date: Sun, 26 Jul 1998 15:24:13 +0100 (BST) From: David Marsh <drmarsh@bigfoot.com> To: D_Mertcan <ah109@city.ac.uk>, FreeBSD-Questions <freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: RE: Comms problems Message-ID: <XFMail.980726205044.drmarsh@bigfoot.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.3.95q.980725125020.21101B-100000@paddington>
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On 25-Jul-98 D_Mertcan wrote: >I purchased FreeBSD in the Uk a couple of months ago along with the >book and am very happy with apart from the fact that I am having major >communication problems. >I have an external K56Flex Modem connected to my serial port and a >Canon Laser Printer attached to my only parallel port. I cannot get >any kind of respond from either of them even though I have tried to >what the handbook and the reference manual say. I'm afraid I can't be of an awful lot of help as I'm still pretty much a newbie myself.. I suspect that you'll need to provide a little more information to the list to get any real meaningful help from the experts, for example: What version of FreeBSD are you running (eg, 2.2.5, 2.2.6, etc)? What are the exact model names of the modem and printer you have? (Some people might have working configurations for these models) Is your printer PostScript capable (this will make a difference in configuration, as far as I'm aware)? What steps have you taken to try and get any kind of response from your peripherals? I was quite lucky with my system in that I had a good friend who did pretty much all of the initial install for me, leaving it up to me to do the 'easier' parts of getting the modem and printer actually working. My only real advice (sorry) would be as follows: Check that your kernel is actually installed with the correct serial and parallel port devices (in your kernel config file, look for lines beginning with device sioN for your serial port(s), and with device lptN for your parallel port(s) (with N being the appropriate number)). Read the (online) Handbook section about changing your kernel config file if you need to. These entries 'correspond' (umm, I hope that's the right analogy) to device files which the system uses to communicate with your peripherals (for example, on my system the modem is connected to "COM2" which is /dev/cuaa1 (ie numbering from zero) and my parallel port is /dev/lpt0). Luckily my friend seemed to have had these set up for me, but you need to check your kernel configuration to see that the ports are enabled, and also check that these 'files' are present in /dev. You may have to use MAKEDEV to ensure that these special device files have been created. I'm havering slightly here, hopefully somebody with better knowledge than I will be able to explain the above a little more concisely. If these device files do exist, you should try to see if you can get any kind of response from your modem/printer. I found the ppp and printer sections of the Handbook to be extremely useful and helpful, as was the Serial Comms section of the FAQ, and unfortunately I had to do quite a bit of verbose man page reading as well.. If you have followed through the advice in the online docs without success, then I'm afraid I'm a little stumped. You could try checking to make sure that every needed file does exist and has the right permissions. What I say below might just be repeating what the docs say, I'm afraid.. To see if you can get some kind of response from your modem, trying starting 'ppp' as root (this requires your kernel to be compiled to run with loadable kernel modules, and for 'user-ppp' as it's known, to be installed) and then when you get the ppp prompt, type 'term' to enter terminal mode. You can then spew direct Hayes commands to your modem. Type: AT<return>, and if your serial port is alive and well, you should receive 'OK' in acknowledgement. If this is the case you can actually start to set up whatever programs you need: you've not explained what you'll be using your modem for, but I'd assume, that if it's a 'conventional' TCP/IP PPP dialup internet connection you'll have to start fiddling with /etc/ppp.conf and associated files. It's a bit of a fiddly process, but the man pages for ppp, chat, and the Handbook make it reasonably clear. If you're using your modem for a terminal dialup to a BBS, for example, you'd probably have to look into something else.. For your printer, the Handbook section is again very useful. The section detailing using lptest is particularly useful, just to see if you can spew *something* at the printer, and hopefully get a result. >From then on, as long as the port is configured correctly, it's mainly (at least in my case) a case of getting the end-of-line mapping set up correctly for the printer, putting the right entries into /etc/printcap (I was quite lucky as I have an HP-DJ500 and could pretty much follow the examples given), making sure that all the files/dirs that the print spooler requires *do* actually exist (I was getting no response at all until I suddenly realised that I hadn't 'touched' the log file for the spooler into existence, and after that, it worked!), and then doing whatever you need to do to handle PostScript output. If your printer is PostScript capable, this appears to be reversed to "Making your printer handle *non*-PS output" (ie, text), as the special case(!). If you have a non-PS printer, you will need to install ghostscript to convert non-textual application output into printer data. >I would very much appreciate it if someone could advise me on how I >could remedy my problem... I hope the above was of _some_ use to you. :-) You might also like to know that there is a FreeBSD-UK user group and mailing list that you can join. See http://www.freebsd-uk.eu.org/ for details. Dave. --- David Marsh,drmarsh@bigfoot.comPLEX | http://squelch.home.ml.org/ | Glasgow/Glaschu, Scotland. *If urgent, phone: +44 141 400-0577*| > CYCLEWAY: cycle activism GB/IE: http://squelch.home.ml.org/cycleway/ < > includes bikes on public transport, & cycle organisation directories < To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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