> I believe that I already have a kernel with pppoe support
> built in, but don't have a /dev/pppoe and can't make it with /dev/MAKEDEV
> either.

You can check that with "ifconfig -C" - it should list "pppoe" (among others)
if you have "pseudo-device pppoe" in your kernel config.

In this case you should start reading "man 4 pppoe", it has an example config
and actually it is quite simple to setup. It refers you to "man 8 ifwatchd",
where you can find the magic neede to run ip-up/ip-down scripts.

I'm working on a small web page describing howto set this up.

Martin