[ILUG] Naive ADSL/WiFi questions (long (sorry!))?

[Gavin McCullagh]

Hi,

On Fri, 22 Jun 2007, Ian O'Connell wrote:

> On 22/06/07, Gavin McCullagh <gmccullagh at gmail.com> wrote:

> >Actually, I don't think I've ever heard anyone called a Microsoft
> >zealot, the word zealot only seems to get used in the other direction.
> >Perhaps it's only deserved by linux people?
> 
> Honistly, yeah generally it is linux people who deserve it. 

I wasn't being sarcastic.  I think it probably does mostly have more
meaning for linux users.

> so you'd start argue'n the merits of linux with an install technician who
> just wants the thing to be setup so he can move onto his next job/goto
> lunch?

No.  I'd present what I had (probably linux), do my best to help him with
it and let him bring a laptop if he really needs windows.  I wouldn't argue
anything.

> >Why would an ISP ever consider investing the slightest time on any other
> >operating system or avoid creating a dependency on windows if experience
> >shows them that "everyone always has windows anyway".

> Huh? you presume the ISP's have a dependency, anyone on this list will
> tell you they don't. 

Thanks for the tip.  I'm not saying that there is a dependency.  I'm
suggesting that if an ISP decided to inadvertently introduce one, let's say
a modem or router which can only be configured or debugged using a native
windows application, their engineers might think for a moment and say "we
do get some non-windows people, they'll not be able to use this".  If
everyone has windows in their experience, that's never going to happen.

> Their customers are the ones who like windows and use it everywhere. 

Not all of them and keeping them aware of this is useful.  I don't expect
you to do it, but I generally choose to.  I've never had an argument in
doing it.

> So why bother spending money to train technicians on an OS which is used
> by a negligble fraction of your customer base?  if you ever had a support
> issue and got through to an engineer they probably have a few unix heads
> lie'n about in any isp, but you won't find those on the support phones.

I don't expect them to be trained on linux.  I do expect them to have basic
networking knowledge and with some help from me we should be able to get
things working.  We were previously talking about an on-site engineer, not
phone support.  That said, I have spoken to UTV's phone support guys and
talked to them about networking issues, mentioning that I use linux but I
would deal with that end of things.  You do get a "well we don't really
support..." which I completely understand, then we've moved on and fixed
things.

> Fortunate for you then, the NTL modems are just ethernet to coax
> bridges, they don't require any configuring at all(they read configs
> off the network, nothing is really available client side). Buuut, the
> NTL engineer wanted to go off and do his thing, so windows laptop to
> the rescue again. 

No, he used my linux desktop.  He needed a web browser.  He appeared to
login to a webpage on an rfc1918 address which I presumed to be on the
modem (as it was not online yet at the time) but I could be wrong on that.
As it didn't work immediately, he wrote down a handful of instructions and
left me to complete them.

> That they do, but 2 i've delt with were a bit confused when they saw
> linux on a screen, if your paying for an installation they want to go
> off and configure network settings(horribly as they did it) and such,
> windows laptop lie'n around covered that for me.

Your choice.  I would choose to help him through the brief slight
confusion.  These guys are really not as stupid as you think.

> No but even a NAT alone is enough protection for you to turn on an
> archaic windows install and goto the ms update site and patch it.

I was trying to get the connection above 10kbps at the time and a NAT would
actually have blocked me from doing the debugging.  I didn't like the fact
that IBB required me to have windows for that but to be fair, they did
actually have a linux version of the software and thought they had it
covered.  It just didn't work too well.  I let them know on the phone that
their linux debugging software required very old version of linux.  I don't
expect them to change it now, but at least they're aware of the issue.

> While you have a valid point, and for most 'windows' style users it
> would be a big issue... but i dunno i'd have hoped anyone who decided
> that they wanted to spend their life in linux would have the common
> sence to update their windows if they run it.

FFS!  The whole point is that we don't run it.  You're advocating that we
all keep a 2-5GB windows install just in case.  Do we now have to reboot
into it on a regular basis to make sure it's up-to-date too?  Just in case
we need windows some day so as not to see a confused look on the face of an
ISP engineer who needs a web browser?

I'm NOT a linux zealot (perhaps you disagree?).  I've used windows and I
still do when I have to.  In general I don't tell people not to use
windows.  But I'm ****ed if I'm going to run it and keep it up-to-date so
some engineer I pay to come round can set up my DSL connection using IE
instead of firefox on my computer.  In my experience, these engineers are
not as stupid as you make out.  You can't expect them to know linux, but
that's okay.

Gavin