1 .\" manual page [] for pppd 2.4
2 .\" $Id: pppd.8,v 1.90 2008/03/26 12:09:40 paulus Exp $
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9 .\" Copyright (c) 1993-2003 Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>
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25 pppd \- Point-to-Point Protocol Daemon
33 PPP is the protocol used for establishing internet links over dial-up
34 modems, DSL connections, and many other types of point-to-point
35 links. The \fIpppd\fR daemon works together with the kernel PPP
36 driver to establish and maintain a PPP link with another system
37 (called the \fIpeer\fR) and to negotiate Internet Protocol (IP)
38 addresses for each end of the link. Pppd can also authenticate the
39 peer and/or supply authentication information to the peer. PPP can be
40 used with other network protocols besides IP, but such use is becoming
42 .SH FREQUENTLY USED OPTIONS
45 Use the serial port called \fIttyname\fR to communicate with the
46 peer. If \fIttyname\fR does not begin with a slash (/),
47 the string "/dev/" is prepended to \fIttyname\fR to form the
48 name of the device to open. If no device name is given, or if the
50 connected to the standard input is given, pppd will use that terminal,
51 and will not fork to put itself in the background. A value for this
52 option from a privileged source cannot be overridden by a
56 An option that is a decimal number is taken as the desired baud rate
57 for the serial device. On systems such as
58 4.4BSD and NetBSD, any speed can be specified. Other systems
59 (e.g. Linux, SunOS) only support the commonly-used baud rates.
62 This option sets the Async-Control-Character-Map (ACCM) for this end
63 of the link. The ACCM is a set of 32 bits, one for each of the
64 ASCII control characters with values from 0 to 31, where a 1 bit
65 indicates that the corresponding control character should not be used
66 in PPP packets sent to this system. The map is encoded as a
67 hexadecimal number (without a leading 0x) where the least significant
68 bit (00000001) represents character 0 and the most significant bit
69 (80000000) represents character 31.
70 Pppd will ask the peer to send these characters as a 2-byte
72 If multiple \fIasyncmap\fR options are given, the values are ORed
73 together. If no \fIasyncmap\fR option is given, the default is zero,
74 so pppd will ask the peer not to escape any control characters.
75 To escape transmitted characters, use the \fIescape\fR option.
78 Require the peer to authenticate itself before allowing network
79 packets to be sent or received. This option is the default if the
80 system has a default route. If neither this option nor the
81 \fInoauth\fR option is specified, pppd will only allow the peer to use
82 IP addresses to which the system does not already have a route.
85 Read additional options from the file /etc/ppp/peers/\fIname\fR. This
86 file may contain privileged options, such as \fInoauth\fR, even if pppd
87 is not being run by root. The \fIname\fR string may not begin with /
88 or include .. as a pathname component. The format of the options file
92 Usually there is something which needs to be done to prepare the link
93 before the PPP protocol can be started; for instance, with a dial-up
94 modem, commands need to be sent to the modem to dial the appropriate
95 phone number. This option specifies an command for pppd to execute
96 (by passing it to a shell) before attempting to start PPP negotiation.
97 The chat (8) program is often useful here, as it provides a way to
98 send arbitrary strings to a modem and respond to received characters.
100 for this option from a privileged source cannot be overridden by a
104 Specifies that pppd should set the serial port to use hardware flow
105 control using the RTS and CTS signals in the RS-232 interface.
106 If neither the \fIcrtscts\fR, the
107 \fInocrtscts\fR, the \fIcdtrcts\fR nor the \fInocdtrcts\fR option
108 is given, the hardware flow control setting for the serial port is
110 Some serial ports (such as Macintosh serial ports) lack a true
111 RTS output. Such serial ports use this mode to implement
112 unidirectional flow control. The serial port will
113 suspend transmission when requested by the modem (via CTS)
114 but will be unable to request the modem to stop sending to the
115 computer. This mode retains the ability to use DTR as
116 a modem control line.
119 Add a default route to the system routing tables, using the peer as
120 the gateway, when IPCP negotiation is successfully completed.
121 This entry is removed when the PPP connection is broken. This option
122 is privileged if the \fInodefaultroute\fR option has been specified.
124 .B disconnect \fIscript
125 Execute the command specified by \fIscript\fR, by passing it to a
127 pppd has terminated the link. This command could, for example, issue
128 commands to the modem to cause it to hang up if hardware modem control
129 signals were not available. The disconnect script is not run if the
130 modem has already hung up. A value for this option from a privileged
131 source cannot be overridden by a non-privileged user.
133 .B escape \fIxx,yy,...
134 Specifies that certain characters should be escaped on transmission
135 (regardless of whether the peer requests them to be escaped with its
136 async control character map). The characters to be escaped are
137 specified as a list of hex numbers separated by commas. Note that
138 almost any character can be specified for the \fIescape\fR option,
139 unlike the \fIasyncmap\fR option which only allows control characters
140 to be specified. The characters which may not be escaped are those
141 with hex values 0x20 - 0x3f or 0x5e.
144 Read options from file \fIname\fR (the format is described below).
145 The file must be readable by the user who has invoked pppd.
148 Execute the command specified by \fIscript\fR, by passing it to a shell, to
149 initialize the serial line. This script would typically use the
150 chat(8) program to configure the modem to enable auto answer. A value
151 for this option from a privileged source cannot be overridden by a
155 Specifies that pppd should create a UUCP-style lock file for the
156 serial device to ensure exclusive access to the device. By default,
157 pppd will not create a lock file.
160 Set the MRU [Maximum Receive Unit] value to \fIn\fR. Pppd
161 will ask the peer to send packets of no more than \fIn\fR bytes.
162 The value of \fIn\fR must be between 128 and 16384; the default is 1500.
164 296 works well on very slow links (40 bytes for TCP/IP header + 256
166 Note that for the IPv6 protocol, the MRU must be at least 1280.
169 Set the MTU [Maximum Transmit Unit] value to \fIn\fR. Unless the
170 peer requests a smaller value via MRU negotiation, pppd will
171 request that the kernel networking code send data packets of no more
172 than \fIn\fR bytes through the PPP network interface. Note that for
173 the IPv6 protocol, the MTU must be at least 1280.
176 Enables the "passive" option in the LCP. With this option, pppd will
177 attempt to initiate a connection; if no reply is received from the
178 peer, pppd will then just wait passively for a valid LCP packet from
179 the peer, instead of exiting, as it would without this option.
182 .I <local_IP_address>\fB:\fI<remote_IP_address>
183 Set the local and/or remote interface IP addresses. Either one may be
184 omitted. The IP addresses can be specified with a host name or in
185 decimal dot notation (e.g. 150.234.56.78). The default local
186 address is the (first) IP address of the system (unless the
188 option is given). The remote address will be obtained from the peer
189 if not specified in any option. Thus, in simple cases, this option is
190 not required. If a local and/or remote IP address is specified with
192 will not accept a different value from the peer in the IPCP
193 negotiation, unless the \fIipcp\-accept\-local\fR and/or
194 \fIipcp\-accept\-remote\fR options are given, respectively.
196 .B ipv6 \fI<local_interface_identifier>\fR,\fI<remote_interface_identifier>
197 Set the local and/or remote 64-bit interface identifier. Either one may be
198 omitted. The identifier must be specified in standard ascii notation of
199 IPv6 addresses (e.g. ::dead:beef). If the
200 \fIipv6cp\-use\-ipaddr\fR
201 option is given, the local identifier is the local IPv4 address (see above).
202 On systems which supports a unique persistent id, such as EUI\-48 derived
203 from the Ethernet MAC address, \fIipv6cp\-use\-persistent\fR option can be
204 used to replace the \fIipv6 <local>,<remote>\fR option. Otherwise the
205 identifier is randomized.
207 .B active\-filter \fIfilter\-expression
208 Specifies a packet filter to be applied to data packets to determine
209 which packets are to be regarded as link activity, and therefore reset
210 the idle timer, or cause the link to be brought up in demand-dialling
211 mode. This option is useful in conjunction with the
212 \fBidle\fR option if there are packets being sent or received
213 regularly over the link (for example, routing information packets)
214 which would otherwise prevent the link from ever appearing to be idle.
215 The \fIfilter\-expression\fR syntax is as described for tcpdump(1),
216 except that qualifiers which are inappropriate for a PPP link, such as
217 \fBether\fR and \fBarp\fR, are not permitted. Generally the filter
218 expression should be enclosed in single-quotes to prevent whitespace
219 in the expression from being interpreted by the shell. This option
220 is currently only available under Linux, and requires that the kernel
221 was configured to include PPP filtering support (CONFIG_PPP_FILTER).
223 is possible to apply different constraints to incoming and outgoing
224 packets using the \fBinbound\fR and \fBoutbound\fR qualifiers.
226 .B allow\-ip \fIaddress(es)
227 Allow peers to use the given IP address or subnet without
228 authenticating themselves. The parameter is parsed as for each
229 element of the list of allowed IP addresses in the secrets files (see
230 the AUTHENTICATION section below).
232 .B allow\-number \fInumber
233 Allow peers to connect from the given telephone number. A trailing
234 `*' character will match all numbers beginning with the leading part.
237 Request that the peer compress packets that it sends, using the
238 BSD-Compress scheme, with a maximum code size of \fInr\fR bits, and
239 agree to compress packets sent to the peer with a maximum code size of
240 \fInt\fR bits. If \fInt\fR is not specified, it defaults to the value
241 given for \fInr\fR. Values in the range 9 to 15 may be used for
242 \fInr\fR and \fInt\fR; larger values give better compression but
243 consume more kernel memory for compression dictionaries.
244 Alternatively, a value of 0 for \fInr\fR or \fInt\fR disables
245 compression in the corresponding direction. Use \fInobsdcomp\fR or
246 \fIbsdcomp 0\fR to disable BSD-Compress compression entirely.
249 Use a non-standard hardware flow control (i.e. DTR/CTS) to control
250 the flow of data on the serial port. If neither the \fIcrtscts\fR,
251 the \fInocrtscts\fR, the \fIcdtrcts\fR nor the \fInocdtrcts\fR
252 option is given, the hardware flow control setting for the serial
253 port is left unchanged.
254 Some serial ports (such as Macintosh serial ports) lack a true
255 RTS output. Such serial ports use this mode to implement true
256 bi-directional flow control. The sacrifice is that this flow
257 control mode does not permit using DTR as a modem control line.
259 .B chap\-interval \fIn
260 If this option is given, pppd will rechallenge the peer every \fIn\fR
263 .B chap\-max\-challenge \fIn
264 Set the maximum number of CHAP challenge transmissions to \fIn\fR
267 .B chap\-restart \fIn
268 Set the CHAP restart interval (retransmission timeout for challenges)
269 to \fIn\fR seconds (default 3).
271 .B child\-timeout \fIn
272 When exiting, wait for up to \fIn\fR seconds for any child processes
273 (such as the command specified with the \fBpty\fR command) to exit
274 before exiting. At the end of the timeout, pppd will send a SIGTERM
275 signal to any remaining child processes and exit. A value of 0 means
276 no timeout, that is, pppd will wait until all child processes have
279 .B connect\-delay \fIn
280 Wait for up to \fIn\fR milliseconds after the connect script finishes for
281 a valid PPP packet from the peer. At the end of this time, or when a
282 valid PPP packet is received from the peer, pppd will commence
283 negotiation by sending its first LCP packet. The default value is
284 1000 (1 second). This wait period only applies if the \fBconnect\fR
285 or \fBpty\fR option is used.
288 Enables connection debugging facilities.
289 If this option is given, pppd will log the contents of all
290 control packets sent or received in a readable form. The packets are
291 logged through syslog with facility \fIdaemon\fR and level
292 \fIdebug\fR. This information can be directed to a file by setting up
293 /etc/syslog.conf appropriately (see syslog.conf(5)).
296 Disable asyncmap negotiation, forcing all control characters to be
297 escaped for both the transmit and the receive direction.
300 Disable MRU [Maximum Receive Unit] negotiation. With this option,
301 pppd will use the default MRU value of 1500 bytes for both the
302 transmit and receive direction.
305 Request that the peer compress packets that it sends, using the
306 Deflate scheme, with a maximum window size of \fI2**nr\fR bytes, and
307 agree to compress packets sent to the peer with a maximum window size
308 of \fI2**nt\fR bytes. If \fInt\fR is not specified, it defaults to
309 the value given for \fInr\fR. Values in the range 9 to 15 may be used
310 for \fInr\fR and \fInt\fR; larger values give better compression but
311 consume more kernel memory for compression dictionaries.
312 Alternatively, a value of 0 for \fInr\fR or \fInt\fR disables
313 compression in the corresponding direction. Use \fInodeflate\fR or
314 \fIdeflate 0\fR to disable Deflate compression entirely. (Note: pppd
315 requests Deflate compression in preference to BSD-Compress if the peer
319 Initiate the link only on demand, i.e. when data traffic is present.
320 With this option, the remote IP address must be specified by the user
321 on the command line or in an options file. Pppd will initially
322 configure the interface and enable it for IP traffic without
323 connecting to the peer. When traffic is available, pppd will
324 connect to the peer and perform negotiation, authentication, etc.
325 When this is completed, pppd will commence passing data packets
326 (i.e., IP packets) across the link.
328 The \fIdemand\fR option implies the \fIpersist\fR option. If this
329 behaviour is not desired, use the \fInopersist\fR option after the
330 \fIdemand\fR option. The \fIidle\fR and \fIholdoff\fR
331 options are also useful in conjuction with the \fIdemand\fR option.
334 Append the domain name \fId\fR to the local host name for authentication
335 purposes. For example, if gethostname() returns the name porsche, but
336 the fully qualified domain name is porsche.Quotron.COM, you could
337 specify \fIdomain Quotron.COM\fR. Pppd would then use the name
338 \fIporsche.Quotron.COM\fR for looking up secrets in the secrets file,
339 and as the default name to send to the peer when authenticating itself
340 to the peer. This option is privileged.
343 With the \fBdryrun\fR option, pppd will print out all the option
344 values which have been set and then exit, after parsing the command
345 line and options files and checking the option values, but before
346 initiating the link. The option values are logged at level info, and
347 also printed to standard output unless the device on standard output
348 is the device that pppd would be using to communicate with the peer.
351 With the \fBdump\fR option, pppd will print out all the option values
352 which have been set. This option is like the \fBdryrun\fR option
353 except that pppd proceeds as normal rather than exiting.
356 Enables session accounting via PAM or wtwp/wtmpx, as appropriate.
357 When PAM is enabled, the PAM "account" and "session" module stacks
358 determine behavior, and are enabled for all PPP authentication
359 protocols. When PAM is disabled, wtmp/wtmpx entries are recorded
360 regardless of whether the peer name identifies a valid user on the
361 local system, making peers visible in the last(1) log. This feature
362 is automatically enabled when the pppd \fBlogin\fR option is used.
363 Session accounting is disabled by default.
365 .B endpoint \fI<epdisc>
366 Sets the endpoint discriminator sent by the local machine to the peer
367 during multilink negotiation to \fI<epdisc>\fR. The default is to use
368 the MAC address of the first ethernet interface on the system, if any,
369 otherwise the IPv4 address corresponding to the hostname, if any,
370 provided it is not in the multicast or locally-assigned IP address
371 ranges, or the localhost address. The endpoint discriminator can be
372 the string \fBnull\fR or of the form \fItype\fR:\fIvalue\fR, where
373 type is a decimal number or one of the strings \fBlocal\fR, \fBIP\fR,
374 \fBMAC\fR, \fBmagic\fR, or \fBphone\fR. The value is an IP address in
375 dotted-decimal notation for the \fBIP\fR type, or a string of bytes in
376 hexadecimal, separated by periods or colons for the other types. For
377 the MAC type, the value may also be the name of an ethernet or similar
378 network interface. This option is currently only available under
381 .B eap\-interval \fIn
382 If this option is given and pppd authenticates the peer with EAP
383 (i.e., is the server), pppd will restart EAP authentication every
384 \fIn\fR seconds. For EAP SRP\-SHA1, see also the \fBsrp\-interval\fR
385 option, which enables lightweight rechallenge.
387 .B eap\-max\-rreq \fIn
388 Set the maximum number of EAP Requests to which pppd will respond (as
389 a client) without hearing EAP Success or Failure. (Default is 20.)
391 .B eap\-max\-sreq \fIn
392 Set the maximum number of EAP Requests that pppd will issue (as a
393 server) while attempting authentication. (Default is 10.)
396 Set the retransmit timeout for EAP Requests when acting as a server
397 (authenticator). (Default is 3 seconds.)
400 Set the maximum time to wait for the peer to send an EAP Request when
401 acting as a client (authenticatee). (Default is 20 seconds.)
404 When logging the contents of PAP packets, this option causes pppd to
405 exclude the password string from the log. This is the default.
408 Specifies how many seconds to wait before re-initiating the link after
409 it terminates. This option only has any effect if the \fIpersist\fR
410 or \fIdemand\fR option is used. The holdoff period is not applied if
411 the link was terminated because it was idle.
414 Specifies that pppd should disconnect if the link is idle for \fIn\fR
415 seconds. The link is idle when no data packets (i.e. IP packets) are
416 being sent or received. Note: it is not advisable to use this option
417 with the \fIpersist\fR option without the \fIdemand\fR option.
418 If the \fBactive\-filter\fR
419 option is given, data packets which are rejected by the specified
420 activity filter also count as the link being idle.
422 .B ipcp\-accept\-local
423 With this option, pppd will accept the peer's idea of our local IP
424 address, even if the local IP address was specified in an option.
426 .B ipcp\-accept\-remote
427 With this option, pppd will accept the peer's idea of its (remote) IP
428 address, even if the remote IP address was specified in an option.
430 .B ipcp\-max\-configure \fIn
431 Set the maximum number of IPCP configure-request transmissions to
432 \fIn\fR (default 10).
434 .B ipcp\-max\-failure \fIn
435 Set the maximum number of IPCP configure-NAKs returned before starting
436 to send configure-Rejects instead to \fIn\fR (default 10).
438 .B ipcp\-max\-terminate \fIn
439 Set the maximum number of IPCP terminate-request transmissions to
442 .B ipcp\-restart \fIn
443 Set the IPCP restart interval (retransmission timeout) to \fIn\fR
447 Provides an extra parameter to the ip\-up, ip\-pre\-up and ip\-down
449 option is given, the \fIstring\fR supplied is given as the 6th
450 parameter to those scripts.
452 .B ipv6cp\-max\-configure \fIn
453 Set the maximum number of IPv6CP configure-request transmissions to
454 \fIn\fR (default 10).
456 .B ipv6cp\-max\-failure \fIn
457 Set the maximum number of IPv6CP configure-NAKs returned before starting
458 to send configure-Rejects instead to \fIn\fR (default 10).
460 .B ipv6cp\-max\-terminate \fIn
461 Set the maximum number of IPv6CP terminate-request transmissions to
464 .B ipv6cp\-restart \fIn
465 Set the IPv6CP restart interval (retransmission timeout) to \fIn\fR
469 Enable the IPXCP and IPX protocols. This option is presently only
470 supported under Linux, and only if your kernel has been configured to
474 Set the IPX network number in the IPXCP configure request frame to
475 \fIn\fR, a hexadecimal number (without a leading 0x). There is no
476 valid default. If this option is not specified, the network number is
477 obtained from the peer. If the peer does not have the network number,
478 the IPX protocol will not be started.
480 .B ipx\-node \fIn\fB:\fIm
481 Set the IPX node numbers. The two node numbers are separated from each
482 other with a colon character. The first number \fIn\fR is the local
483 node number. The second number \fIm\fR is the peer's node number. Each
484 node number is a hexadecimal number, at most 10 digits long. The node
485 numbers on the ipx\-network must be unique. There is no valid
486 default. If this option is not specified then the node numbers are
487 obtained from the peer.
489 .B ipx\-router\-name \fI<string>
490 Set the name of the router. This is a string and is sent to the peer
494 Set the routing protocol to be received by this option. More than one
495 instance of \fIipx\-routing\fR may be specified. The '\fInone\fR'
496 option (0) may be specified as the only instance of ipx\-routing. The
497 values may be \fI0\fR for \fINONE\fR, \fI2\fR for \fIRIP/SAP\fR, and
498 \fI4\fR for \fINLSP\fR.
500 .B ipxcp\-accept\-local
501 Accept the peer's NAK for the node number specified in the ipx\-node
502 option. If a node number was specified, and non-zero, the default is
503 to insist that the value be used. If you include this option then you
504 will permit the peer to override the entry of the node number.
506 .B ipxcp\-accept\-network
507 Accept the peer's NAK for the network number specified in the
508 ipx\-network option. If a network number was specified, and non-zero, the
509 default is to insist that the value be used. If you include this
510 option then you will permit the peer to override the entry of the node
513 .B ipxcp\-accept\-remote
514 Use the peer's network number specified in the configure request
515 frame. If a node number was specified for the peer and this option was
516 not specified, the peer will be forced to use the value which you have
519 .B ipxcp\-max\-configure \fIn
520 Set the maximum number of IPXCP configure request frames which the
521 system will send to \fIn\fR. The default is 10.
523 .B ipxcp\-max\-failure \fIn
524 Set the maximum number of IPXCP NAK frames which the local system will
525 send before it rejects the options. The default value is 3.
527 .B ipxcp\-max\-terminate \fIn
528 Set the maximum nuber of IPXCP terminate request frames before the
529 local system considers that the peer is not listening to them. The
533 Enable debugging code in the kernel-level PPP driver. The argument
534 values depend on the specific kernel driver, but in general a value of
535 1 will enable general kernel debug messages. (Note that these
536 messages are usually only useful for debugging the kernel driver
537 itself.) For the Linux 2.2.x kernel driver, the value is a sum of
539 enable general debug messages, 2 to request that the contents of
540 received packets be printed, and 4 to request that the contents of
541 transmitted packets be printed. On most systems, messages printed by
542 the kernel are logged by syslog(1) to a file as directed in the
543 /etc/syslog.conf configuration file.
546 Enables pppd to alter kernel settings as appropriate. Under Linux,
547 pppd will enable IP forwarding (i.e. set /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward
548 to 1) if the \fIproxyarp\fR option is used, and will enable the
549 dynamic IP address option (i.e. set /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_dynaddr to
550 1) in demand mode if the local address changes.
552 .B lcp\-echo\-failure \fIn
553 If this option is given, pppd will presume the peer to be dead
554 if \fIn\fR LCP echo\-requests are sent without receiving a valid LCP
555 echo\-reply. If this happens, pppd will terminate the
556 connection. Use of this option requires a non-zero value for the
557 \fIlcp\-echo\-interval\fR parameter. This option can be used to enable
558 pppd to terminate after the physical connection has been broken
559 (e.g., the modem has hung up) in situations where no hardware modem
560 control lines are available.
562 .B lcp\-echo\-interval \fIn
563 If this option is given, pppd will send an LCP echo\-request frame to
564 the peer every \fIn\fR seconds. Normally the peer should respond to
565 the echo\-request by sending an echo\-reply. This option can be used
566 with the \fIlcp\-echo\-failure\fR option to detect that the peer is no
569 .B lcp\-max\-configure \fIn
570 Set the maximum number of LCP configure-request transmissions to
571 \fIn\fR (default 10).
573 .B lcp\-max\-failure \fIn
574 Set the maximum number of LCP configure-NAKs returned before starting
575 to send configure-Rejects instead to \fIn\fR (default 10).
577 .B lcp\-max\-terminate \fIn
578 Set the maximum number of LCP terminate-request transmissions to
582 Set the LCP restart interval (retransmission timeout) to \fIn\fR
585 .B linkname \fIname\fR
586 Sets the logical name of the link to \fIname\fR. Pppd will create a
587 file named \fBppp\-\fIname\fB.pid\fR in /var/run (or /etc/ppp on some
588 systems) containing its process ID. This can be useful in determining
589 which instance of pppd is responsible for the link to a given peer
590 system. This is a privileged option.
593 Don't use the modem control lines. With this option, pppd will ignore
594 the state of the CD (Carrier Detect) signal from the modem and will
595 not change the state of the DTR (Data Terminal Ready) signal. This is
596 the opposite of the \fBmodem\fR option.
599 Send log messages to file descriptor \fIn\fR. Pppd will send log
600 messages to at most one file or file descriptor (as well as sending
601 the log messages to syslog), so this option and the \fBlogfile\fR
602 option are mutually exclusive. The default is for pppd to send log
603 messages to stdout (file descriptor 1), unless the serial port is
604 already open on stdout.
606 .B logfile \fIfilename
607 Append log messages to the file \fIfilename\fR (as well as sending the
608 log messages to syslog). The file is opened with the privileges of
609 the user who invoked pppd, in append mode.
612 Use the system password database for authenticating the peer using
613 PAP, and record the user in the system wtmp file. Note that the peer
614 must have an entry in the /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets file as well as the
615 system password database to be allowed access. See also the
616 \fBenable\-session\fR option.
619 Terminate the connection when it has been available for network
620 traffic for \fIn\fR seconds (i.e. \fIn\fR seconds after the first
621 network control protocol comes up).
624 Terminate after \fIn\fR consecutive failed connection attempts. A
625 value of 0 means no limit. The default value is 10.
628 Use the modem control lines. This option is the default. With this
629 option, pppd will wait for the CD (Carrier Detect) signal from the
630 modem to be asserted when opening the serial device (unless a connect
631 script is specified), and it will drop the DTR (Data Terminal Ready)
632 signal briefly when the connection is terminated and before executing
633 the connect script. On Ultrix, this option implies hardware flow
634 control, as for the \fIcrtscts\fR option. This is the opposite of the
638 Enables the use of PPP multilink; this is an alias for the `multilink'
639 option. This option is currently only available under Linux.
642 Allow MPPE to use stateful mode. Stateless mode is still attempted first.
643 The default is to disallow stateful mode.
646 Enables the use of short (12-bit) sequence numbers in multilink
647 headers, as opposed to 24-bit sequence numbers. This option is only
648 available under Linux, and only has any effect if multilink is
649 enabled (see the multilink option).
652 Sets the Maximum Reconstructed Receive Unit to \fIn\fR. The MRRU is
653 the maximum size for a received packet on a multilink bundle, and is
654 analogous to the MRU for the individual links. This option is
655 currently only available under Linux, and only has any effect if
656 multilink is enabled (see the multilink option).
659 If pppd is acting as a server for Microsoft Windows clients, this
660 option allows pppd to supply one or two DNS (Domain Name Server)
661 addresses to the clients. The first instance of this option specifies
662 the primary DNS address; the second instance (if given) specifies the
663 secondary DNS address. (This option was present in some older
664 versions of pppd under the name \fBdns\-addr\fR.)
666 .B ms\-wins \fI<addr>
667 If pppd is acting as a server for Microsoft Windows or "Samba"
668 clients, this option allows pppd to supply one or two WINS (Windows
669 Internet Name Services) server addresses to the clients. The first
670 instance of this option specifies the primary WINS address; the second
671 instance (if given) specifies the secondary WINS address.
674 Enables the use of the PPP multilink protocol. If the peer also
675 supports multilink, then this link can become part of a bundle between
676 the local system and the peer. If there is an existing bundle to the
677 peer, pppd will join this link to that bundle, otherwise pppd will
678 create a new bundle. See the MULTILINK section below. This option is
679 currently only available under Linux.
682 Set the name of the local system for authentication purposes to
683 \fIname\fR. This is a privileged option. With this option, pppd will
684 use lines in the secrets files which have \fIname\fR as the second
685 field when looking for a secret to use in authenticating the peer. In
686 addition, unless overridden with the \fIuser\fR option, \fIname\fR
687 will be used as the name to send to the peer when authenticating the
688 local system to the peer. (Note that pppd does not append the domain
692 Disable Address/Control compression in both directions (send and
696 Do not require the peer to authenticate itself. This option is
700 Disables BSD-Compress compression; \fBpppd\fR will not request or
701 agree to compress packets using the BSD-Compress scheme.
704 Disable CCP (Compression Control Protocol) negotiation. This option
705 should only be required if the peer is buggy and gets confused by
706 requests from pppd for CCP negotiation.
709 Disable hardware flow control (i.e. RTS/CTS) on the serial port.
710 If neither the \fIcrtscts\fR nor the \fInocrtscts\fR nor the
711 \fIcdtrcts\fR nor the \fInocdtrcts\fR option is given, the hardware
712 flow control setting for the serial port is left unchanged.
715 This option is a synonym for \fInocrtscts\fR. Either of these options will
716 disable both forms of hardware flow control.
719 Disable the \fIdefaultroute\fR option. The system administrator who
720 wishes to prevent users from creating default routes with pppd
721 can do so by placing this option in the /etc/ppp/options file.
724 Disables Deflate compression; pppd will not request or agree to
725 compress packets using the Deflate scheme.
728 Don't detach from the controlling terminal. Without this option, if a
729 serial device other than the terminal on the standard input is
730 specified, pppd will fork to become a background process.
733 Disables pppd from sending an endpoint discriminator to the peer or
734 accepting one from the peer (see the MULTILINK section below). This
735 option should only be required if the peer is buggy.
738 Disable IPCP negotiation and IP communication. This option should
739 only be required if the peer is buggy and gets confused by requests
740 from pppd for IPCP negotiation.
743 Disable IPv6CP negotiation and IPv6 communication. This option should
744 only be required if the peer is buggy and gets confused by requests
745 from pppd for IPv6CP negotiation.
748 Disables the default behaviour when no local IP address is specified,
749 which is to determine (if possible) the local IP address from the
750 hostname. With this option, the peer will have to supply the local IP
751 address during IPCP negotiation (unless it specified explicitly on the
752 command line or in an options file).
755 Disable the IPXCP and IPX protocols. This option should only be
756 required if the peer is buggy and gets confused by requests from pppd
757 for IPXCP negotiation.
760 Opposite of the \fIktune\fR option; disables pppd from changing system
764 Opposite of the \fIlock\fR option; specifies that pppd should not
765 create a UUCP-style lock file for the serial device. This option is
769 Do not send log messages to a file or file descriptor. This option
770 cancels the \fBlogfd\fR and \fBlogfile\fR options.
773 Disable magic number negotiation. With this option, pppd cannot
774 detect a looped-back line. This option should only be needed if the
778 Disables the use of PPP multilink. This option is currently only
779 available under Linux.
782 Disables MPPE (Microsoft Point to Point Encryption). This is the default.
785 Disable 40-bit encryption with MPPE.
788 Disable 128-bit encryption with MPPE.
791 Disable MPPE stateful mode. This is the default.
794 Disables the use of short (12-bit) sequence numbers in the PPP
795 multilink protocol, forcing the use of 24-bit sequence numbers. This
796 option is currently only available under Linux, and only has any
797 effect if multilink is enabled.
800 Disables the use of PPP multilink. This option is currently only
801 available under Linux.
804 Disable protocol field compression negotiation in both the receive and
805 the transmit direction.
808 Exit once a connection has been made and terminated. This is the
809 default unless the \fIpersist\fR or \fIdemand\fR option has been
813 Do not accept or agree to Predictor\-1 compression.
816 Disable the \fIproxyarp\fR option. The system administrator who
817 wishes to prevent users from creating proxy ARP entries with pppd can
818 do so by placing this option in the /etc/ppp/options file.
821 Allow pppd to operate without having an IP address for the peer. This
822 option is only available under Linux. Normally, pppd will request the
823 peer's IP address, and if the peer does not supply it, pppd will not
824 bring up the link for IP traffic. With this option, if the peer does
825 not supply its IP address, pppd will not ask the peer for it, and will
826 not set the destination address of the ppp interface. In this
827 situation, the ppp interface can be used for routing by creating
828 device routes, but the peer itself cannot be addressed directly for IP
832 Normally, pppd requires a terminal device. With this option, pppd
833 will allocate itself a pseudo-tty master/slave pair and use the slave
834 as its terminal device. Pppd will create a child process to act as a
835 `character shunt' to transfer characters between the pseudo-tty master
836 and its standard input and output. Thus pppd will transmit characters
837 on its standard output and receive characters on its standard input
838 even if they are not terminal devices. This option increases the
839 latency and CPU overhead of transferring data over the ppp interface
840 as all of the characters sent and received must flow through the
841 character shunt process. An explicit device name may not be given if
845 Disable Van Jacobson style TCP/IP header compression in both the
846 transmit and the receive direction.
849 Disable the connection-ID compression option in Van Jacobson style
850 TCP/IP header compression. With this option, pppd will not omit the
851 connection-ID byte from Van Jacobson compressed TCP/IP headers, nor
852 ask the peer to do so.
855 Indicates that all secrets in the /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets file which are
856 used for checking the identity of the peer are encrypted, and thus
857 pppd should not accept a password which, before encryption, is
858 identical to the secret from the /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets file.
860 .B pap\-max\-authreq \fIn
861 Set the maximum number of PAP authenticate-request transmissions to
862 \fIn\fR (default 10).
865 Set the PAP restart interval (retransmission timeout) to \fIn\fR
869 Set the maximum time that pppd will wait for the peer to authenticate
870 itself with PAP to \fIn\fR seconds (0 means no limit).
872 .B pass\-filter \fIfilter\-expression
873 Specifies a packet filter to applied to data packets being sent or
874 received to determine which packets should be allowed to pass.
875 Packets which are rejected by the filter are silently discarded. This
876 option can be used to prevent specific network daemons (such as
877 routed) using up link bandwidth, or to provide a very basic firewall
879 The \fIfilter\-expression\fR syntax is as described for tcpdump(1),
880 except that qualifiers which are inappropriate for a PPP link, such as
881 \fBether\fR and \fBarp\fR, are not permitted. Generally the filter
882 expression should be enclosed in single-quotes to prevent whitespace
883 in the expression from being interpreted by the shell. Note that it
884 is possible to apply different constraints to incoming and outgoing
885 packets using the \fBinbound\fR and \fBoutbound\fR qualifiers. This
886 option is currently only available under Linux, and requires that the
887 kernel was configured to include PPP filtering support (CONFIG_PPP_FILTER).
889 .B password \fIpassword\-string
890 Specifies the password to use for authenticating to the peer. Use
891 of this option is discouraged, as the password is likely to be visible
892 to other users on the system (for example, by using ps(1)).
895 Do not exit after a connection is terminated; instead try to reopen
896 the connection. The \fBmaxfail\fR option still has an effect on
897 persistent connections.
899 .B plugin \fIfilename
900 Load the shared library object file \fIfilename\fR as a plugin. This
901 is a privileged option. If \fIfilename\fR does not contain a slash
902 (/), pppd will look in the \fB/usr/lib/pppd/\fIversion\fR directory
903 for the plugin, where
904 \fIversion\fR is the version number of pppd (for example, 2.4.2).
907 Request that the peer compress frames that it sends using Predictor-1
908 compression, and agree to compress transmitted frames with Predictor-1
909 if requested. This option has no effect unless the kernel driver
910 supports Predictor-1 compression.
912 .B privgroup \fIgroup\-name
913 Allows members of group \fIgroup\-name\fR to use privileged options.
914 This is a privileged option. Use of this option requires care as
915 there is no guarantee that members of \fIgroup\-name\fR cannot use pppd
916 to become root themselves. Consider it equivalent to putting the
917 members of \fIgroup\-name\fR in the kmem or disk group.
920 Add an entry to this system's ARP [Address Resolution Protocol] table
921 with the IP address of the peer and the Ethernet address of this
922 system. This will have the effect of making the peer appear to other
923 systems to be on the local ethernet.
926 Specifies that the command \fIscript\fR is to be used to communicate
927 rather than a specific terminal device. Pppd will allocate itself a
928 pseudo-tty master/slave pair and use the slave as its terminal
929 device. The \fIscript\fR will be run in a child process with the
930 pseudo-tty master as its standard input and output. An explicit
931 device name may not be given if this option is used. (Note: if the
932 \fIrecord\fR option is used in conjuction with the \fIpty\fR option,
933 the child process will have pipes on its standard input and output.)
936 With this option, pppd will accept all control characters from the
937 peer, including those marked in the receive asyncmap. Without this
938 option, pppd will discard those characters as specified in RFC1662.
939 This option should only be needed if the peer is buggy.
941 .B record \fIfilename
942 Specifies that pppd should record all characters sent and received to
943 a file named \fIfilename\fR. This file is opened in append mode,
944 using the user's user-ID and permissions. This option is implemented
945 using a pseudo-tty and a process to transfer characters between the
946 pseudo-tty and the real serial device, so it will increase the latency
947 and CPU overhead of transferring data over the ppp interface. The
948 characters are stored in a tagged format with timestamps, which can be
949 displayed in readable form using the pppdump(8) program.
951 .B remotename \fIname
952 Set the assumed name of the remote system for authentication purposes
955 .B remotenumber \fInumber
956 Set the assumed telephone number of the remote system for authentication
957 purposes to \fInumber\fR.
960 With this option, pppd will not agree to authenticate itself to the
964 With this option, pppd will not agree to authenticate itself to the
967 .B refuse\-mschap\-v2
968 With this option, pppd will not agree to authenticate itself to the
969 peer using MS\-CHAPv2.
972 With this option, pppd will not agree to authenticate itself to the
976 With this option, pppd will not agree to authenticate itself to the
980 Require the peer to authenticate itself using CHAP [Challenge
981 Handshake Authentication Protocol] authentication.
984 Require the use of MPPE (Microsoft Point to Point Encryption). This
985 option disables all other compression types. This option enables
986 both 40-bit and 128-bit encryption. In order for MPPE to successfully
987 come up, you must have authenticated with either MS\-CHAP or MS\-CHAPv2.
988 This option is presently only supported under Linux, and only if your
989 kernel has been configured to include MPPE support.
992 Require the use of MPPE, with 40-bit encryption.
994 .B require\-mppe\-128
995 Require the use of MPPE, with 128-bit encryption.
998 Require the peer to authenticate itself using MS\-CHAP [Microsoft Challenge
999 Handshake Authentication Protocol] authentication.
1001 .B require\-mschap\-v2
1002 Require the peer to authenticate itself using MS\-CHAPv2 [Microsoft Challenge
1003 Handshake Authentication Protocol, Version 2] authentication.
1006 Require the peer to authenticate itself using EAP [Extensible
1007 Authentication Protocol] authentication.
1010 Require the peer to authenticate itself using PAP [Password
1011 Authentication Protocol] authentication.
1014 When logging the contents of PAP packets, this option causes pppd to
1015 show the password string in the log message.
1018 With this option, pppd will not transmit LCP packets to initiate a
1019 connection until a valid LCP packet is received from the peer (as for
1020 the `passive' option with ancient versions of pppd).
1022 .B srp\-interval \fIn
1023 If this parameter is given and pppd uses EAP SRP\-SHA1 to authenticate
1024 the peer (i.e., is the server), then pppd will use the optional
1025 lightweight SRP rechallenge mechanism at intervals of \fIn\fR
1026 seconds. This option is faster than \fBeap\-interval\fR
1027 reauthentication because it uses a hash\-based mechanism and does not
1028 derive a new session key.
1030 .B srp\-pn\-secret \fIstring
1031 Set the long-term pseudonym-generating secret for the server. This
1032 value is optional and if set, needs to be known at the server
1033 (authenticator) side only, and should be different for each server (or
1034 poll of identical servers). It is used along with the current date to
1035 generate a key to encrypt and decrypt the client's identity contained
1038 .B srp\-use\-pseudonym
1039 When operating as an EAP SRP\-SHA1 client, attempt to use the pseudonym
1040 stored in ~/.ppp_psuedonym first as the identity, and save in this
1041 file any pseudonym offered by the peer during authentication.
1044 Use synchronous HDLC serial encoding instead of asynchronous.
1045 The device used by pppd with this option must have sync support.
1046 Currently supports Microgate SyncLink adapters
1047 under Linux and FreeBSD 2.2.8 and later.
1050 Sets the ppp unit number (for a ppp0 or ppp1 etc interface name) for outbound
1054 With this option, pppd will detach from its controlling terminal once
1055 it has successfully established the ppp connection (to the point where
1056 the first network control protocol, usually the IP control protocol,
1060 Enforce the use of the hostname (with domain name appended, if given)
1061 as the name of the local system for authentication purposes (overrides
1062 the \fIname\fR option). This option is not normally needed since the
1063 \fIname\fR option is privileged.
1066 Ask the peer for up to 2 DNS server addresses. The addresses supplied
1067 by the peer (if any) are passed to the /etc/ppp/ip\-up script in the
1068 environment variables DNS1 and DNS2, and the environment variable
1069 USEPEERDNS will be set to 1. In addition, pppd will create an
1070 /etc/ppp/resolv.conf file containing one or two nameserver lines with
1071 the address(es) supplied by the peer.
1074 Sets the name used for authenticating the local system to the peer to
1077 .B vj\-max\-slots \fIn
1078 Sets the number of connection slots to be used by the Van Jacobson
1079 TCP/IP header compression and decompression code to \fIn\fR, which
1080 must be between 2 and 16 (inclusive).
1082 .B welcome \fIscript
1083 Run the executable or shell command specified by \fIscript\fR before
1084 initiating PPP negotiation, after the connect script (if any) has
1085 completed. A value for this option from a privileged source cannot be
1086 overridden by a non-privileged user.
1089 Use software flow control (i.e. XON/XOFF) to control the flow of data on
1092 Options can be taken from files as well as the command line. Pppd
1093 reads options from the files /etc/ppp/options, ~/.ppprc and
1094 /etc/ppp/options.\fIttyname\fR (in that order) before processing the
1095 options on the command line. (In fact, the command-line options are
1096 scanned to find the terminal name before the options.\fIttyname\fR
1097 file is read.) In forming the name of the options.\fIttyname\fR file,
1098 the initial /dev/ is removed from the terminal name, and any remaining
1099 / characters are replaced with dots.
1101 An options file is parsed into a series of words, delimited by
1102 whitespace. Whitespace can be included in a word by enclosing the
1103 word in double-quotes ("). A backslash (\\) quotes the following character.
1104 A hash (#) starts a comment, which continues until the end of the
1105 line. There is no restriction on using the \fIfile\fR or \fIcall\fR
1106 options within an options file.
1109 provides system administrators with sufficient access control that PPP
1110 access to a server machine can be provided to legitimate users without
1111 fear of compromising the security of the server or the network it's
1112 on. This control is provided through restrictions on which IP
1113 addresses the peer may use, based on its authenticated identity (if
1114 any), and through restrictions on which options a non-privileged user
1115 may use. Several of pppd's options are privileged, in particular
1116 those which permit potentially insecure configurations; these options
1117 are only accepted in files which are under the control of the system
1118 administrator, or if pppd is being run by root.
1120 The default behaviour of pppd is to allow an unauthenticated peer to
1121 use a given IP address only if the system does not already have a
1122 route to that IP address. For example, a system with a
1123 permanent connection to the wider internet will normally have a
1124 default route, and thus all peers will have to authenticate themselves
1125 in order to set up a connection. On such a system, the \fIauth\fR
1126 option is the default. On the other hand, a system where the
1127 PPP link is the only connection to the internet will not normally have
1128 a default route, so the peer will be able to use almost any IP address
1129 without authenticating itself.
1131 As indicated above, some security-sensitive options are privileged,
1132 which means that they may not be used by an ordinary non-privileged
1133 user running a setuid-root pppd, either on the command line, in the
1134 user's ~/.ppprc file, or in an options file read using the \fIfile\fR
1135 option. Privileged options may be used in /etc/ppp/options file or in
1136 an options file read using the \fIcall\fR option. If pppd is being
1137 run by the root user, privileged options can be used without
1140 When opening the device, pppd uses either the invoking user's user ID
1141 or the root UID (that is, 0), depending on whether the device name was
1142 specified by the user or the system administrator. If the device name
1143 comes from a privileged source, that is, /etc/ppp/options or an
1144 options file read using the \fIcall\fR option, pppd uses full root
1145 privileges when opening the device. Thus, by creating an appropriate
1146 file under /etc/ppp/peers, the system administrator can allow users to
1147 establish a ppp connection via a device which they would not normally
1148 have permission to access. Otherwise pppd uses the invoking user's
1149 real UID when opening the device.
1151 Authentication is the process whereby one peer convinces the other of
1152 its identity. This involves the first peer sending its name to the
1153 other, together with some kind of secret information which could only
1154 come from the genuine authorized user of that name. In such an
1155 exchange, we will call the first peer the "client" and the other the
1156 "server". The client has a name by which it identifies itself to the
1157 server, and the server also has a name by which it identifies itself
1158 to the client. Generally the genuine client shares some secret (or
1159 password) with the server, and authenticates itself by proving that it
1160 knows that secret. Very often, the names used for authentication
1161 correspond to the internet hostnames of the peers, but this is not
1164 At present, pppd supports three authentication protocols: the Password
1165 Authentication Protocol (PAP), Challenge Handshake Authentication
1166 Protocol (CHAP), and Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP). PAP
1167 involves the client sending its name and a cleartext password to the
1168 server to authenticate itself. In contrast, the server initiates the
1169 CHAP authentication exchange by sending a challenge to the client (the
1170 challenge packet includes the server's name). The client must respond
1171 with a response which includes its name plus a hash value derived from
1172 the shared secret and the challenge, in order to prove that it knows
1173 the secret. EAP supports CHAP-style authentication, and also includes
1174 the SRP\-SHA1 mechanism, which is resistant to dictionary-based attacks
1175 and does not require a cleartext password on the server side.
1177 The PPP protocol, being symmetrical, allows both peers to require the
1178 other to authenticate itself. In that case, two separate and
1179 independent authentication exchanges will occur. The two exchanges
1180 could use different authentication protocols, and in principle,
1181 different names could be used in the two exchanges.
1183 The default behaviour of pppd is to agree to authenticate if
1184 requested, and to not require authentication from the peer. However,
1185 pppd will not agree to authenticate itself with a particular protocol
1186 if it has no secrets which could be used to do so.
1188 Pppd stores secrets for use in authentication in secrets
1189 files (/etc/ppp/pap\-secrets for PAP, /etc/ppp/chap\-secrets for CHAP,
1190 MS\-CHAP, MS\-CHAPv2, and EAP MD5-Challenge, and /etc/ppp/srp\-secrets
1192 All secrets files have the same format. The secrets files can
1193 contain secrets for pppd to use in authenticating itself to other
1194 systems, as well as secrets for pppd to use when authenticating other
1197 Each line in a secrets file contains one secret. A given secret is
1198 specific to a particular combination of client and server - it can
1199 only be used by that client to authenticate itself to that server.
1200 Thus each line in a secrets file has at least 3 fields: the name of
1201 the client, the name of the server, and the secret. These fields may
1202 be followed by a list of the IP addresses that the specified client
1203 may use when connecting to the specified server.
1205 A secrets file is parsed into words as for a options file, so the
1206 client name, server name and secrets fields must each be one word,
1207 with any embedded spaces or other special characters quoted or
1208 escaped. Note that case is significant in the client and server names
1211 If the secret starts with an `@', what follows is assumed to be the
1212 name of a file from which to read the secret. A "*" as the client or
1213 server name matches any name. When selecting a secret, pppd takes the
1214 best match, i.e. the match with the fewest wildcards.
1216 Any following words on the same line are taken to be a list of
1217 acceptable IP addresses for that client. If there are only 3 words on
1218 the line, or if the first word is "\-", then all IP addresses are
1219 disallowed. To allow any address, use "*". A word starting with "!"
1220 indicates that the specified address is \fInot\fR acceptable. An
1221 address may be followed by "/" and a number \fIn\fR, to indicate a
1222 whole subnet, i.e. all addresses which have the same value in the most
1223 significant \fIn\fR bits. In this form, the address may be followed
1224 by a plus sign ("+") to indicate that one address from the subnet is
1225 authorized, based on the ppp network interface unit number in use.
1226 In this case, the host part of the address will be set to the unit
1229 Thus a secrets file contains both secrets for use in authenticating
1230 other hosts, plus secrets which we use for authenticating ourselves to
1231 others. When pppd is authenticating the peer (checking the peer's
1232 identity), it chooses a secret with the peer's name in the first
1233 field and the name of the local system in the second field. The
1234 name of the local system defaults to the hostname, with the domain
1235 name appended if the \fIdomain\fR option is used. This default can be
1236 overridden with the \fIname\fR option, except when the
1237 \fIusehostname\fR option is used. (For EAP SRP\-SHA1, see the
1238 srp\-entry(8) utility for generating proper validator entries to be
1239 used in the "secret" field.)
1241 When pppd is choosing a secret to use in authenticating itself to the
1242 peer, it first determines what name it is going to use to identify
1243 itself to the peer. This name can be specified by the user with the
1244 \fIuser\fR option. If this option is not used, the name defaults to
1245 the name of the local system, determined as described in the previous
1246 paragraph. Then pppd looks for a secret with this name in the first
1247 field and the peer's name in the second field. Pppd will know the
1248 name of the peer if CHAP or EAP authentication is being used, because
1249 the peer will have sent it in the challenge packet. However, if PAP
1250 is being used, pppd will have to determine the peer's name from the
1251 options specified by the user. The user can specify the peer's name
1252 directly with the \fIremotename\fR option. Otherwise, if the remote
1253 IP address was specified by a name (rather than in numeric form), that
1254 name will be used as the peer's name. Failing that, pppd will use the
1255 null string as the peer's name.
1257 When authenticating the peer with PAP, the supplied password is first
1258 compared with the secret from the secrets file. If the password
1259 doesn't match the secret, the password is encrypted using crypt() and
1260 checked against the secret again. Thus secrets for authenticating the
1261 peer can be stored in encrypted form if desired. If the
1262 \fIpapcrypt\fR option is given, the first (unencrypted) comparison is
1263 omitted, for better security.
1265 Furthermore, if the \fIlogin\fR option was specified, the username and
1266 password are also checked against the system password database. Thus,
1267 the system administrator can set up the pap\-secrets file to allow PPP
1268 access only to certain users, and to restrict the set of IP addresses
1269 that each user can use. Typically, when using the \fIlogin\fR option,
1270 the secret in /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets would be "", which will match any
1271 password supplied by the peer. This avoids the need to have the same
1272 secret in two places.
1274 Authentication must be satisfactorily completed before IPCP (or any
1275 other Network Control Protocol) can be started. If the peer is
1276 required to authenticate itself, and fails to do so, pppd will
1277 terminated the link (by closing LCP). If IPCP negotiates an
1278 unacceptable IP address for the remote host, IPCP will be closed. IP
1279 packets can only be sent or received when IPCP is open.
1281 In some cases it is desirable to allow some hosts which can't
1282 authenticate themselves to connect and use one of a restricted set of
1283 IP addresses, even when the local host generally requires
1284 authentication. If the peer refuses to authenticate itself when
1285 requested, pppd takes that as equivalent to authenticating with PAP
1286 using the empty string for the username and password. Thus, by adding
1287 a line to the pap\-secrets file which specifies the empty string for
1288 the client and password, it is possible to allow restricted access to
1289 hosts which refuse to authenticate themselves.
1292 When IPCP negotiation is completed successfully, pppd will inform the
1293 kernel of the local and remote IP addresses for the ppp interface.
1294 This is sufficient to create a host route to the remote end of the
1295 link, which will enable the peers to exchange IP packets.
1296 Communication with other machines generally requires further
1297 modification to routing tables and/or ARP (Address Resolution
1298 Protocol) tables. In most cases the \fIdefaultroute\fR and/or
1299 \fIproxyarp\fR options are sufficient for this, but in some cases
1300 further intervention is required. The /etc/ppp/ip\-up script can be
1303 Sometimes it is desirable to add a default route through the remote
1304 host, as in the case of a machine whose only connection to the
1305 Internet is through the ppp interface. The \fIdefaultroute\fR option
1306 causes pppd to create such a default route when IPCP comes up, and
1307 delete it when the link is terminated.
1309 In some cases it is desirable to use proxy ARP, for example on a
1310 server machine connected to a LAN, in order to allow other hosts to
1311 communicate with the remote host. The \fIproxyarp\fR option causes
1312 pppd to look for a network interface on the same subnet as the remote
1313 host (an interface supporting broadcast and ARP, which is up and not a
1314 point-to-point or loopback interface). If found, pppd creates a
1315 permanent, published ARP entry with the IP address of the remote host
1316 and the hardware address of the network interface found.
1318 When the \fIdemand\fR option is used, the interface IP addresses have
1319 already been set at the point when IPCP comes up. If pppd has not
1320 been able to negotiate the same addresses that it used to configure
1321 the interface (for example when the peer is an ISP that uses dynamic
1322 IP address assignment), pppd has to change the interface IP addresses
1323 to the negotiated addresses. This may disrupt existing connections,
1324 and the use of demand dialling with peers that do dynamic IP address
1325 assignment is not recommended.
1327 Multilink PPP provides the capability to combine two or more PPP links
1328 between a pair of machines into a single `bundle', which appears as a
1329 single virtual PPP link which has the combined bandwidth of the
1330 individual links. Currently, multilink PPP is only supported under
1333 Pppd detects that the link it is controlling is connected to the same
1334 peer as another link using the peer's endpoint discriminator and the
1335 authenticated identity of the peer (if it authenticates itself). The
1336 endpoint discriminator is a block of data which is hopefully unique
1337 for each peer. Several types of data can be used, including
1338 locally-assigned strings of bytes, IP addresses, MAC addresses,
1339 randomly strings of bytes, or E\-164 phone numbers. The endpoint
1340 discriminator sent to the peer by pppd can be set using the endpoint
1343 In some circumstances the peer may send no endpoint discriminator or a
1344 non-unique value. The bundle option adds an extra string which is
1345 added to the peer's endpoint discriminator and authenticated identity
1346 when matching up links to be joined together in a bundle. The bundle
1347 option can also be used to allow the establishment of multiple bundles
1348 between the local system and the peer. Pppd uses a TDB database in
1349 /var/run/pppd2.tdb to match up links.
1351 Assuming that multilink is enabled and the peer is willing to
1352 negotiate multilink, then when pppd is invoked to bring up the first
1353 link to the peer, it will detect that no other link is connected to
1354 the peer and create a new bundle, that is, another ppp network
1355 interface unit. When another pppd is invoked to bring up another link
1356 to the peer, it will detect the existing bundle and join its link to
1359 If the first link terminates (for example, because of a hangup or a
1360 received LCP terminate-request) the bundle is not destroyed unless
1361 there are no other links remaining in the bundle. Rather than
1362 exiting, the first pppd keeps running after its link terminates, until
1363 all the links in the bundle have terminated. If the first pppd
1364 receives a SIGTERM or SIGINT signal, it will destroy the bundle and
1365 send a SIGHUP to the pppd processes for each of the links in the
1366 bundle. If the first pppd receives a SIGHUP signal, it will terminate
1367 its link but not the bundle.
1369 Note: demand mode is not currently supported with multilink.
1372 The following examples assume that the /etc/ppp/options file contains
1373 the \fIauth\fR option (as in the default /etc/ppp/options file in the
1376 Probably the most common use of pppd is to dial out to an ISP. This
1377 can be done with a command such as
1381 where the /etc/ppp/peers/isp file is set up by the system
1382 administrator to contain something like this:
1386 connect '/usr/sbin/chat \-v \-f /etc/ppp/chat\-isp'
1390 In this example, we are using chat to dial the ISP's modem and go
1391 through any logon sequence required. The /etc/ppp/chat\-isp file
1392 contains the script used by chat; it could for example contain
1393 something like this:
1405 ABORT "Username/Password Incorrect"
1413 "name:" "^Umyuserid"
1415 "word:" "\\qmypassword"
1421 See the chat(8) man page for details of chat scripts.
1423 Pppd can also be used to provide a dial-in ppp service for users. If
1424 the users already have login accounts, the simplest way to set up the
1425 ppp service is to let the users log in to their accounts and run pppd
1426 (installed setuid-root) with a command such as
1430 To allow a user to use the PPP facilities, you need to allocate an IP
1431 address for that user's machine and create an entry in
1432 /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets, /etc/ppp/chap\-secrets, or /etc/ppp/srp\-secrets
1433 (depending on which authentication method the PPP implementation on
1434 the user's machine supports), so that the user's machine can
1435 authenticate itself. For example, if Joe has a machine called
1436 "joespc" that is to be allowed to dial in to the machine called
1437 "server" and use the IP address joespc.my.net, you would add an entry
1438 like this to /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets or /etc/ppp/chap\-secrets:
1440 joespc server "joe's secret" joespc.my.net
1442 (See srp\-entry(8) for a means to generate the server's entry when
1443 SRP\-SHA1 is in use.)
1444 Alternatively, you can create a username called (for example) "ppp",
1445 whose login shell is pppd and whose home directory is /etc/ppp.
1446 Options to be used when pppd is run this way can be put in
1449 If your serial connection is any more complicated than a piece of
1450 wire, you may need to arrange for some control characters to be
1451 escaped. In particular, it is often useful to escape XON (^Q) and
1452 XOFF (^S), using \fIasyncmap a0000\fR. If the path includes a telnet,
1453 you probably should escape ^] as well (\fIasyncmap 200a0000\fR). If
1454 the path includes an rlogin, you will need to use the \fIescape ff\fR
1455 option on the end which is running the rlogin client, since many
1456 rlogin implementations are not transparent; they will remove the
1457 sequence [0xff, 0xff, 0x73, 0x73, followed by any 8 bytes] from the
1461 Messages are sent to the syslog daemon using facility LOG_DAEMON.
1462 (This can be overridden by recompiling pppd with the macro
1463 LOG_PPP defined as the desired facility.) See the syslog(8)
1464 documentation for details of where the syslog daemon will write the
1465 messages. On most systems, the syslog daemon uses the
1466 /etc/syslog.conf file to specify the destination(s) for syslog
1467 messages. You may need to edit that file to suit.
1469 The \fIdebug\fR option causes the contents of all control packets sent
1470 or received to be logged, that is, all LCP, PAP, CHAP, EAP, or IPCP packets.
1471 This can be useful if the PPP negotiation does not succeed or if
1472 authentication fails.
1473 If debugging is enabled at compile time, the \fIdebug\fR option also
1474 causes other debugging messages to be logged.
1476 Debugging can also be enabled or disabled by sending a SIGUSR1 signal
1477 to the pppd process. This signal acts as a toggle.
1479 The exit status of pppd is set to indicate whether any error was
1480 detected, or the reason for the link being terminated. The values
1484 Pppd has detached, or otherwise the connection was successfully
1485 established and terminated at the peer's request.
1488 An immediately fatal error of some kind occurred, such as an essential
1489 system call failing, or running out of virtual memory.
1492 An error was detected in processing the options given, such as two
1493 mutually exclusive options being used.
1496 Pppd is not setuid-root and the invoking user is not root.
1499 The kernel does not support PPP, for example, the PPP kernel driver is
1500 not included or cannot be loaded.
1503 Pppd terminated because it was sent a SIGINT, SIGTERM or SIGHUP
1507 The serial port could not be locked.
1510 The serial port could not be opened.
1513 The connect script failed (returned a non-zero exit status).
1516 The command specified as the argument to the \fIpty\fR option could
1520 The PPP negotiation failed, that is, it didn't reach the point where
1521 at least one network protocol (e.g. IP) was running.
1524 The peer system failed (or refused) to authenticate itself.
1527 The link was established successfully and terminated because it was
1531 The link was established successfully and terminated because the
1532 connect time limit was reached.
1535 Callback was negotiated and an incoming call should arrive shortly.
1538 The link was terminated because the peer is not responding to echo
1542 The link was terminated by the modem hanging up.
1545 The PPP negotiation failed because serial loopback was detected.
1548 The init script failed (returned a non-zero exit status).
1551 We failed to authenticate ourselves to the peer.
1553 Pppd invokes scripts at various stages in its processing which can be
1554 used to perform site-specific ancillary processing. These scripts are
1555 usually shell scripts, but could be executable code files instead.
1556 Pppd does not wait for the scripts to finish (except for the ip-pre-up
1557 script). The scripts are
1558 executed as root (with the real and effective user-id set to 0), so
1559 that they can do things such as update routing tables or run
1560 privileged daemons. Be careful that the contents of these scripts do
1561 not compromise your system's security. Pppd runs the scripts with
1562 standard input, output and error redirected to /dev/null, and with an
1563 environment that is empty except for some environment variables that
1564 give information about the link. The environment variables that pppd
1568 The name of the serial tty device being used.
1571 The name of the network interface being used.
1574 The IP address for the local end of the link. This is only set when
1578 The IP address for the remote end of the link. This is only set when
1582 The authenticated name of the peer. This is only set if the peer
1583 authenticates itself.
1586 The baud rate of the tty device.
1589 The real user-id of the user who invoked pppd.
1592 The username of the real user-id that invoked pppd. This is always set.
1594 For the ip-down and auth-down scripts, pppd also sets the following
1595 variables giving statistics for the connection:
1598 The number of seconds from when the PPP negotiation started until the
1599 connection was terminated.
1602 The number of bytes sent (at the level of the serial port) during the
1606 The number of bytes received (at the level of the serial port) during
1610 The logical name of the link, set with the \fIlinkname\fR option.
1613 If the peer supplies DNS server addresses, this variable is set to the
1614 first DNS server address supplied.
1617 If the peer supplies DNS server addresses, this variable is set to the
1618 second DNS server address supplied.
1620 Pppd invokes the following scripts, if they exist. It is not an error
1621 if they don't exist.
1623 .B /etc/ppp/auth\-up
1624 A program or script which is executed after the remote system
1625 successfully authenticates itself. It is executed with the parameters
1627 \fIinterface\-name peer\-name user\-name tty\-device speed\fR
1629 Note that this script is not executed if the peer doesn't authenticate
1630 itself, for example when the \fInoauth\fR option is used.
1632 .B /etc/ppp/auth\-down
1633 A program or script which is executed when the link goes down, if
1634 /etc/ppp/auth\-up was previously executed. It is executed in the same
1635 manner with the same parameters as /etc/ppp/auth\-up.
1637 .B /etc/ppp/ip\-pre\-up
1638 A program or script which is executed just before the ppp network
1639 interface is brought up. It is executed with the same parameters as
1640 the ip\-up script (below). At this point the interface exists and has
1641 IP addresses assigned but is still down. This can be used to
1642 add firewall rules before any IP traffic can pass through the
1643 interface. Pppd will wait for this script to finish before bringing
1644 the interface up, so this script should run quickly.
1647 A program or script which is executed when the link is available for
1648 sending and receiving IP packets (that is, IPCP has come up). It is
1649 executed with the parameters
1651 \fIinterface\-name tty\-device speed local\-IP\-address
1652 remote\-IP\-address ipparam\fR
1654 .B /etc/ppp/ip\-down
1655 A program or script which is executed when the link is no longer
1656 available for sending and receiving IP packets. This script can be
1657 used for undoing the effects of the /etc/ppp/ip\-up and
1658 /etc/ppp/ip\-pre\-up scripts. It is
1659 invoked in the same manner and with the same parameters as the ip\-up
1662 .B /etc/ppp/ipv6\-up
1663 Like /etc/ppp/ip\-up, except that it is executed when the link is available
1664 for sending and receiving IPv6 packets. It is executed with the parameters
1666 \fIinterface\-name tty\-device speed local\-link\-local\-address
1667 remote\-link\-local\-address ipparam\fR
1669 .B /etc/ppp/ipv6\-down
1670 Similar to /etc/ppp/ip\-down, but it is executed when IPv6 packets can no
1671 longer be transmitted on the link. It is executed with the same parameters
1672 as the ipv6\-up script.
1675 A program or script which is executed when the link is available for
1676 sending and receiving IPX packets (that is, IPXCP has come up). It is
1677 executed with the parameters
1679 \fIinterface\-name tty\-device speed network\-number local\-IPX\-node\-address
1680 remote\-IPX\-node\-address local\-IPX\-routing\-protocol remote\-IPX\-routing\-protocol
1681 local\-IPX\-router\-name remote\-IPX\-router\-name ipparam pppd\-pid\fR
1683 The local\-IPX\-routing\-protocol and remote\-IPX\-routing\-protocol field
1684 may be one of the following:
1686 NONE to indicate that there is no routing protocol
1688 RIP to indicate that RIP/SAP should be used
1690 NLSP to indicate that Novell NLSP should be used
1692 RIP NLSP to indicate that both RIP/SAP and NLSP should be used
1694 .B /etc/ppp/ipx\-down
1695 A program or script which is executed when the link is no longer
1696 available for sending and receiving IPX packets. This script can be
1697 used for undoing the effects of the /etc/ppp/ipx\-up script. It is
1698 invoked in the same manner and with the same parameters as the ipx\-up
1702 .B /var/run/ppp\fIn\fB.pid \fR(BSD or Linux), \fB/etc/ppp/ppp\fIn\fB.pid \fR(others)
1703 Process-ID for pppd process on ppp interface unit \fIn\fR.
1705 .B /var/run/ppp\-\fIname\fB.pid \fR(BSD or Linux),
1706 \fB/etc/ppp/ppp\-\fIname\fB.pid \fR(others)
1707 Process-ID for pppd process for logical link \fIname\fR (see the
1708 \fIlinkname\fR option).
1710 .B /var/run/pppd2.tdb
1711 Database containing information about pppd processes, interfaces and
1712 links, used for matching links to bundles in multilink operation. May
1713 be examined by external programs to obtain information about running
1714 pppd instances, the interfaces and devices they are using, IP address
1716 .B /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets
1717 Usernames, passwords and IP addresses for PAP authentication. This
1718 file should be owned by root and not readable or writable by any other
1719 user. Pppd will log a warning if this is not the case.
1721 .B /etc/ppp/chap\-secrets
1722 Names, secrets and IP addresses for CHAP/MS\-CHAP/MS\-CHAPv2 authentication.
1723 As for /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets, this file should be owned by root and not
1724 readable or writable by any other user. Pppd will log a warning if
1725 this is not the case.
1727 .B /etc/ppp/srp\-secrets
1728 Names, secrets, and IP addresses for EAP authentication. As for
1729 /etc/ppp/pap\-secrets, this file should be owned by root and not
1730 readable or writable by any other user. Pppd will log a warning if
1731 this is not the case.
1734 Saved client-side SRP\-SHA1 pseudonym. See the \fIsrp\-use\-pseudonym\fR
1738 System default options for pppd, read before user default options or
1739 command-line options.
1742 User default options, read before /etc/ppp/options.\fIttyname\fR.
1744 .B /etc/ppp/options.\fIttyname
1745 System default options for the serial port being used, read after
1746 ~/.ppprc. In forming the \fIttyname\fR part of this
1747 filename, an initial /dev/ is stripped from the port name (if
1748 present), and any slashes in the remaining part are converted to
1752 A directory containing options files which may contain privileged
1753 options, even if pppd was invoked by a user other than root. The
1754 system administrator can create options files in this directory to
1755 permit non-privileged users to dial out without requiring the peer to
1756 authenticate, but only to certain trusted peers.
1763 \fICompressing TCP/IP headers for low-speed serial links.\fR
1768 .I The MD5 Message-Digest Algorithm.
1773 .I PPP Internet Protocol Control Protocol (IPCP).
1777 Lloyd, B.; Simpson, W.A.
1778 .I PPP authentication protocols.
1783 .I The Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP).
1788 .I PPP in HDLC-like Framing.
1792 Blunk, L.; Vollbrecht, J.,
1793 .I PPP Extensible Authentication Protocol (EAP).
1798 .I IP Version 6 over PPP
1803 .I The SRP Authentication and Key Exchange System
1806 .B draft\-ietf\-pppext\-eap\-srp\-03.txt
1807 Carlson, J.; et al.,
1808 .I EAP SRP\-SHA1 Authentication Protocol.
1811 Some limited degree of control can be exercised over a running pppd
1812 process by sending it a signal from the list below.
1815 These signals cause pppd to terminate the link (by closing LCP),
1816 restore the serial device settings, and exit. If a connector or
1817 disconnector process is currently running, pppd will send the same
1818 signal to its process group, so as to terminate the connector or
1819 disconnector process.
1822 This signal causes pppd to terminate the link, restore the serial
1823 device settings, and close the serial device. If the \fIpersist\fR or
1824 \fIdemand\fR option has been specified, pppd will try to reopen the
1825 serial device and start another connection (after the holdoff period).
1826 Otherwise pppd will exit. If this signal is received during the
1827 holdoff period, it causes pppd to end the holdoff period immediately.
1828 If a connector or disconnector process is running, pppd will send the
1829 same signal to its process group.
1832 This signal toggles the state of the \fIdebug\fR option.
1835 This signal causes pppd to renegotiate compression. This can be
1836 useful to re-enable compression after it has been disabled as a result
1837 of a fatal decompression error. (Fatal decompression errors generally
1838 indicate a bug in one or other implementation.)
1841 Paul Mackerras (paulus@samba.org), based on earlier work by
1850 Pppd is copyrighted and made available under conditions which provide
1851 that it may be copied and used in source or binary forms provided that
1852 the conditions listed below are met. Portions of pppd are covered by
1853 the following copyright notices:
1855 Copyright (c) 1984-2000 Carnegie Mellon University. All rights
1858 Copyright (c) 1993-2004 Paul Mackerras. All rights reserved.
1860 Copyright (c) 1995 Pedro Roque Marques. All rights reserved.
1862 Copyright (c) 1995 Eric Rosenquist. All rights reserved.
1864 Copyright (c) 1999 Tommi Komulainen. All rights reserved.
1866 Copyright (C) Andrew Tridgell 1999
1868 Copyright (c) 2000 by Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved.
1870 Copyright (c) 2001 by Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved.
1872 Copyright (c) 2002 Google, Inc. All rights reserved.
1874 The copyright notices contain the following statements.
1876 Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
1877 modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
1880 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
1881 notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
1883 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
1884 notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in
1885 the documentation and/or other materials provided with the
1888 3. The name "Carnegie Mellon University" must not be used to
1889 endorse or promote products derived from this software without
1890 prior written permission. For permission or any legal
1891 details, please contact
1893 Office of Technology Transfer
1895 Carnegie Mellon University
1899 Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890
1901 (412) 268-4387, fax: (412) 268-7395
1903 tech-transfer@andrew.cmu.edu
1905 3b. The name(s) of the authors of this software must not be used to
1906 endorse or promote products derived from this software without
1907 prior written permission.
1909 4. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following
1912 "This product includes software developed by Computing Services
1913 at Carnegie Mellon University (http://www.cmu.edu/computing/)."
1915 "This product includes software developed by Paul Mackerras
1916 <paulus@samba.org>".
1918 "This product includes software developed by Pedro Roque Marques
1919 <pedro_m@yahoo.com>".
1921 "This product includes software developed by Tommi Komulainen
1922 <Tommi.Komulainen@iki.fi>".
1924 CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO
1925 THIS SOFTWARE, INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY
1926 AND FITNESS, IN NO EVENT SHALL CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY BE LIABLE
1927 FOR ANY SPECIAL, INDIRECT OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES
1928 WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN
1929 AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING
1930 OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
1932 THE AUTHORS OF THIS SOFTWARE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO
1933 THIS SOFTWARE, INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY
1934 AND FITNESS, IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY
1935 SPECIAL, INDIRECT OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES
1936 WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN
1937 AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING
1938 OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.