wmp@vaxine.UUCP (Wayne Power) (10/29/85)
I am admittedly a compu-novice. Flaming my ignorance will be considered
ignorance.
I've got several Sun 2/120's with Zilog 8530's on the cpu and SCSI boards for
serial communications. We are running release 1.1 of Sun 4.2. The man page for
zs(4) says "with full modem control". I think not. Why?
1. The most benevolent of the local Sun technical people told me my
problem was "a known bug in the 1.1 zs driver". He suggested we
buy 1.4.
2. I've tried every value from 0 through the moon for flags to the zs
driver in the config file. I get gettys on all lines with nothing
physically attached to the port.
My understanding of "modem control" is admittedly sketchy. I think it means
(among other things)...
1. If getty is not enabled in /etc/ttys, DTR will be low and hence
appropriately configured modems won't answer the phone.
2. If no carrier is present (pin 8 is not high), getty will not be
invoked even though /etc/ttys says 'invoke getty'.
3. If carrier drops, the current process group (especially the login
shell) will die.
Why am I asking you folks?
1. I really need to have one of these 120's set up to talk on the
phone for mail etc.
2. We are a poor company, unable to pay the suggested monthly tribute
(Sun service contract) and alas, it seems Sun technical people
require a P.O. to speak with us plebes.
3. Our assigned Sun sales person has been unable to return my calls
for weeks. I'd imagine he's busy selling their new Cray on a
Watchstrap. :-) All attempts to contact other Sun personnel have
been met with request for system serial number followed by a
request for a P.O. number before being allowed to speak with
anybody who can tell me if what I think I want to buy will do what
I want it to do. :-(
My questions.
1. Does anybody out there have a Sun 120 running 1.X that does modem
control on a zs?
2. If so 1.?
3. Is 1.? available.
4. Is my understanding of "modem control" even close?
A few facts for those who may be interested in helping.
Configuration
Sun 2/120, 2Mb memory, 142Mb Micropolis disk, 1/4" SCSI tape, currently
running Sun 4.2 release 1.1. Hayes Smartmodem 1200.
We are not interested in running Sun 2.X at this time.
Application
Answer the phone and invoke getty so that UUCP may log in for mail and
file transfer and so users can log in over the phone. There are
currently no plans to have UUCP dial out or to allow use of tip with
this line.
Thanks in advance,
--wmp (Wayne Power decvax!encore!vaxine!wmp)
(617) 667-7900