To connect via PPP, dial in from any other system using dial up networking.

To connect from a Win 9x system, go to Dialup Networking in My Computer, select "Make a New Connection", enter some name (such as "Linux dialup"), make sure the correct modem is selected (and optionally configure it), and press Next. Do not select "bring up terminal after dialing" in the modem configuration, it’s not required. Nor should you assign a dialup-script.

Enter the telephone number that is attached to your modem, press Next, and then finish the setup. Now right click the newly created connection, go to "Server Types" and disable "Log on to Network", NetBEUI and IPX/SPX Compatible, leaving only "TCP/IP" and "Enable Software Compression" ticked. Click on OK.

That’s it. Now to connect from the Win 9x machine, double click the new connection, enter your user ID and password (and optionally tell the system to remember your password), click on connect, and your Windows machine will dial into the Linux box, connect, establish PPP, and voila! You are on! Check it out by pointing your browser to your Linux box, you should see the Web pages stored there. Tell your mail client to send and receive mail via the Linux box, and that too works.

While reading this, you might feel that the setup is complex. Don’t let this detailed article scare you away. We thought the same but the whole process took us a little less than five minutes, and was far easier than configuring a Win NT RAS server.