[Xastir] Xastir 1.8.5 + FreeBSD + D700 + Newbie

[Tom Russo]

On Sat, Jan 20, 2007 at 03:50:08PM -0800, we recorded a bogon-computron collision of the <greg at eigsti.com> flavor, containing:
> I am trying to get Xastir to use a serial TNC (D700) and am getting the
> following error trying to open my serial port:
> 
> Interface Error! Error opening interface 2 Hard fail
> 
> My Xastir serial TNC parameters look like:
> TNC port: /dev/cuad0
> Port Settings: 9600 bps
> Port Style: 8,N,1
> Igate Options: Allow RF to Inet traffic ONLY
> Path 1: WIDE1-1
> Path 2: WIDE2-1
> Igate -> RF path: WIDE2-1 (auto-generated by Xastir)
> Using tnc-startup.d700 and tnc-stop.d700 (appropriately edited)
> 
> I can communicate with the D700 using the following cmd - I can both change
> settings as well as display incoming RF packets...
> 
> sudo cu -l/dev/cuad0 -s9600
> 
> I am thinking that this is a permissions issue for /dev/cuad0 but am a bit
> unsure about just chmod'ing it willy nilly.  Should I execute the following
> chmod command to proceed?  I am familiar with chmod'ing files but not
> devices - don't want to mess anything up!
> 
> chmod 4511 /dev/cuad0

There are a couple of approaches, they're discussed in the "INSTALL" document.

My approach (used on FreeBSD and Ubuntu) is to have a group for such things
in /etc/group.  For example, "dialer" on free BSD and "dialout" on Ubuntu.
This group is given permission to read and write the device.  Then add yourself
to the group.

So, for example, there'd be a line in /etc/group like this:
dialer:*:68:russo
and /dev/cuaa0 (which is the BSD version of /dev/cuad0) has permissions:
crw-rw----  1 uucp  dialer  240, 128 Jan 14 22:46 /dev/cuaa0

(i.e., do:
  chown :dialer /dev/cuaa0
  chmod g+rw /dev/cuaa0
on BSD, or something similar on your linux system)

There are other approaches, but I don't think the chmod you're suggesting is 
the one you want.


-- 
Tom Russo    KM5VY   SAR502   DM64ux          http://www.swcp.com/~russo/
Tijeras, NM  QRPL#1592 K2#398  SOC#236 AHTB#1 http://kevan.org/brain.cgi?DDTNM
"And, isn't sanity really just a one-trick pony anyway? I mean all you get is
 one trick, rational thinking, but when you're good and crazy, oooh, oooh,
 oooh, the sky is the limit!"  --- The Tick