multilink PPP

[Al Zick <al%familysafeinternet.com@localhost>]

Hi,

I would like to setup a system to run 4 to 8 modems using multilink  
PPP. I have looked at the man pages for this on one of my systems,  
but it looks like multilink PPP is not supported by NetBSD. Can  
someone verify this?

Also, I need to find a serial card that has at least 4 network ports  
that is supported by NetBSD. Does any one know where I could get one?

Thanks,
Al




       mp     Enables the use of PPP multilink; this is an alias for  
the `mul-
              tilink' option.  This option is currently only   
available  under
              Linux.

       multilink
              Enables the use of the PPP multilink protocol.  If the  
peer also
              supports  multilink,  then this link can become part  
of a bundle
              between the local system and the peer.  If there is  
an  existing
              bundle  to  the  peer,  pppd will join this link to  
that bundle,
              otherwise pppd will create a new bundle.  See the  
MULTILINK sec-
              tion  below.   This  option  is  currently  only  
available under
              Linux.

       nomultilink
              Disables  the  use  of  PPP multilink.  This option is  
currently
              only available under Linux.

MULTILINK
       Multilink PPP provides the capability to combine two or more  
PPP  links
       between  a  pair of machines into a single `bundle', which  
appears as a
       single virtual PPP link which has the combined bandwidth of   
the  indi-
       vidual  links.  Currently, multilink PPP is only supported  
under Linux.

       Pppd detects that the link it is controlling is connected to   
the  same
       peer  as  another  link using the peer's endpoint  
discriminator and the
       authenticated identity of the peer (if it authenticates   
itself).   The
       endpoint discriminator is a block of data which is hopefully  
unique for
       each peer.  Several types of  data  can  be  used,   
including  locally-
       assigned  strings  of  bytes,  IP  addresses,  MAC   
addresses, randomly
       strings of bytes, or E-164 phone numbers.  The  endpoint   
discriminator
       sent to the peer by pppd can be set using the endpoint option.

       In  some circumstances the peer may send no endpoint  
discriminator or a
       non-unique value.  The bundle option adds  an  extra  string   
which  is
       added  to  the peer's endpoint discriminator and  
authenticated identity
       when matching up links to be joined together in a bundle.    
The  bundle
       option  can also be used to allow the establishment of  
multiple bundles
       between the local system and the peer.  Pppd uses  a  TDB   
database  in
       /var/run/pppd2.tdb to match up links.

       Assuming that multilink is enabled and the peer is willing to  
negotiate
       multilink, then when pppd is invoked to bring up the first  
link to  the
       peer,  it  will  detect that no other link is connected to  
the peer and
       create a new bundle, that is, another ppp network interface  
unit.  When
       another  pppd  is invoked to bring up another link to the  
peer, it will
       detect the existing bundle and join its link to it.

       If the first link terminates (for example, because of  a   
hangup  or  a
       received  LCP  terminate-request)  the  bundle  is not  
destroyed unless
       there are no other links remaining in the bundle.  Rather  
than exiting,
       the  first  pppd keeps running after its link terminates,  
until all the
       links in the bundle have terminated.  If  the  first  pppd   
receives  a
       SIGTERM  or SIGINT signal, it will destroy the bundle and  
send a SIGHUP
       to the pppd processes for each of the links  in  the   
bundle.   If  the
       first pppd receives a SIGHUP signal, it will terminate its  
link but not
       the bundle.

       Note: demand mode is not currently supported with multilink.