I fixed my problem of launching a ppp session from a non-root account 
by using the sudo command from the packages collection.

As I was wandering through the packages collection I noticed a ppp 
package with this cryptic comment in it's history page:
  hubertf	Seems NetBSD 1.5's pppd is not as good as this one, 
so make it available for Net...

I've seen some recent comments about how slow the 1.5... versions 
are. It might be interesting to compare this package with the built 
in version. Right now my phone connection is so slow (max 31 kb/s) 
that I don't think I could see any difference.
Tom

>I have pppd working from root to connect my IIci (vanilla NetBSD 
>1.5.2) to my isp via a supra v90 modem. However, when I try to start 
>it from a user account with the call: pppd call nethere (this is the 
>same call I use from root)
>I get the message:
>Can't open options file /etc/ppp/peers/nethere
>
>I've set up pppd following the chapter 9.2 of the netbsd guide by 
>Federico Lupi. The protections are:
>drwx------ root wheel /etc/ppp
>drwx------ root wheel /etc/ppp/peers
>-rw-rw-r-- root wheel /etc/ppp/peers/nethere
>
>The man page for pppd says (in it's usual obscure way) that a 
>non-privileged user running a setuid-root pppd can used the call 
>option to run pppd.
>I'm not sure what a setuid-root pppd means, but here's the protection:
>-r-sr-xr-x root wheel /usr/sbin/pppd
>
>Is a normal user supposed to be able to run pppd to connect? If so, 
>what am I doing in wrong?
>Thanks, Tom
>--
>Tom Jernigan,  jernigantc@ornl.gov
>presently at General Atomics in San Diego, Bldg 13/551
>Phone (858) 455-4122, FAX (858)455-4515


-- 
Tom Jernigan,  jernigantc@ornl.gov
presently at General Atomics in San Diego, Bldg 13/551
Phone (858) 455-4122, FAX (858)455-4515