[GLLUG] can't connect to Internet with mdk10.1 community

[Matt Graham]

On Tuesday 09 November 2004 12:12, after a long battle with technology, 
Ryan R. Matt wrote:
> To whomever may be able to assit:

I'm a'sssiting on m'chair right now, but I don't think that'll help you 
that much :-)

> I installed Mandrake 10.1 community last night and
> after restarting the computer, my Internet connection
> no longer works. First I tired the configuration 
> tools provided by the Drake Control Center,

Pointy-clicky tools tend to confuse things *unless* they work 
immediately.

> Next, I tried to run ifup eht0, ifdown eth0, neither
> gave me much information.

For a static IP, you typically use "ifconfig eth0 X.Y.Z.W up && route 
add default gw A.B.C.D" where X.Y.Z.W is the IP you want to assign to 
eth0 and A.B.C.D is the default gateway.  For a dynamic IP, you just do 
"dhcpcd -d eth0".  "ifup" is a Redhat-derived thing that reads a 
configuration file somewhere in the mess under /etc/sysconfig and 
eventually issues one of those two commands after going through a bunch 
of (usually unnecessary) fiddling.

> I tried modprobe eth0 and there was no response.

The module for your Ethernet card was already loaded.  modprobe and 
company only generate output when there's an error.

> So then I tried dmesg;
[snip]
> eth0: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex, lpa 0x41E1
[massive snip of Shorewall dropping packets]

> Now, I don't know what all of that means.  It would
> appear that the link is up so I attempted to connect
> to the DSL modem's interface, and it just stalls in
> the 'loading...' phase.  I tried to ping my friend's
> computer, but it won't work either.

What is the output of "ifconfig | grep -A7 eth0 && route -n"?  This 
information is vital to solving the problem and it wasn't in the first 
message.

> My ISP is SBC DSL 

Using PPPoE or a "normal" Ethernet-connected DSL router?  PPPoE requires 
some special handling, namely the Roaring Penguin PPPoE client software 
or an equivalent.

Your firewall (Shorewall according to the dmesg dump) *may* be 
interfering with something.  Try turning it off with whatever tools 
Mandrake uses.  If you can then ping other machines, you need to 
restart/reconfigure/something the firewall.  If the firewall was 
originally configured to allow packets to X.Y.Z.W and your machine's IP 
changed (DHCP or whatever, happens every so often) then you need to put 
the new allowed destination address in.

> Thank you for your courtesies and assitance.

Well, shucks, this feller's thankin' me fer a'ssittin' down when I was 
doin' that anyway!

-- 
   People don't tend to get paid.
   --MegaHAL, trained on Netizen's quotes file
There is no Darkness in Eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see