SuSE 9.0 revisited, with Agere winmodems

I HEARD SOME VOICES . They came from my inbox folder. They were messages left unanswered since my last SuSE 9.0 review late last year, and crying to be published. Since I learned long ago to obey these voices, here is my reply.

The answers are in reply to two reader's comments published HERE

The Winmodem issue and my comment on programmers from India
I was accused by one sensible reader of making comments with an embedded "racial bias". Specifically when I talked about the low quality of the Agere "Softmodem" drivers linked from the IBM.com web page. Let me be 100% clear: I think that install script IS (or was at the time of the review) broken.

Plus, I found there was a name on the file's header that sounded Indian in nature. I have no problem with software written in India, Chile, Argentina, Mexico, Canada, the UK, South Africa, Taiwan, you name it. And I don't care of the programmer's race, color, religion (or lack of), etcetera.

The problem I see, and that's why I brought up the issue of the "Indian programmer" is that I suspect that big software corporations now give these type of "one time jobs" to contract workers. Something like: "hey, we need to do a install script for this linux driver. who can do it cheaper?". Then, I suspect, they get the first version of the code and that's it. Job done for the contractor. I have heard about this type of thing happen too many times in corporations.

Back to the facts: the script was is dated late 2002, yet the driver kept evolving, (and more importantly, Linux distros kept evolving over time), yet the install script remained with a late 2002 "last change" date. Had it been properly coded, it should have included something as simple as an email address to let the programmer know of any bugs. In that case I would just have written an e-mail to the programmer saying "hey, I'm no expert with linux install scripts, but this is failing miserably in SUSE 9.0. Can you help?". But no, there was no email address, just an India-sounding name on it and a date about 1 year old. That smelled like outsourcing to me. period.

That was my point. It had nothing to do with racial bias or geography. I would have said the same if the name were a "Juan Perez" with a .com.ar email address. It was neither arrogance nor bias as the reader suggests. It was my personal opinion that american companies should have linux knowledge INSIDE, and for God's sake maintain their code, not release broken install scripts.

I can name too many employees of the local IBM branch who know nothing about Linux and despise it with a passion, running like hell at the first glance of a csh/bash prompt, crying bloody murder and asking "can't we just install the windows version over WinXP?". And this from a company that is investing a LOT -even their future, some could say- into Linux.

Germany to the rescue
For those interested, one of our German readers, Tobias Burnus, pointed me to what look like T40 winmodem drivers in RPM format, specifically for SUSE 9.0. Find these HERE. And let me know if they work.

In his words: "I don't know whether you are still looking for a modem driver, but pro-com has a "modem driver for T40p and R40 under SUSE Linux 9.0 Professional".

The question about Network Profiles
At least another German reader, Andreas.Lucks, praised my review a bit and didn't burn me at the stake like the reader from India.

He asked what was the name of the Windows shareware utility that lets you switch easily between different networking "profiles" from the systray. I didn't mention the name of the utility because it was a Linux review, and we get punished by our Editor if we drift too much from the main topic.

The utility is called "Netswitcher" and is available from www.netswitcher.com. It costs under $15 per copy to register.

I have my copy registered and can report that it works very well (tested on a system with Windows 2000 sp4) and even changes the proxy settings from IE 6.0, Netscape 7.1, and Mozilla 1.5. In other words, works with ALL your browsers. With a single click you can select the right "networking profile" (which automatically changes all necessary tcp/ip settings like default router, dhcp or fixed ip, dns servers, etc).

And now that this reader brought that up, and speaking of software written anywhere in the world, here is a Linux project whose goal seems to bring the "Netswitcher" functionality to Linux, and written in Spain. Find it HERE. Caveat Emptor: I haven't tested it.

Now the next time, readers, please ask me what I meant before burning me at the stake. µ

* APOLOGIES, but the University hosted link about the Spanish Linux project is lost in Cyberspace. Here's the web archive of the site's contents.