[clug] Mobile Broadband

[Brett Worth]

I have a work supplied mobile phone which is on a Telstra plan that includes 600MB/month
internet access.  If I want to look at the web I just select the Internet icon and bingo,
I'm surfing.  The chances of me using up the 600MB of data in a month is zero given the
tiny screen and no qwerty keyboard.

What I'd really like to do is get my linux laptop to connect to the Internet via the
phone.  Ideally using bluetooth but for now I'd be happy for it work via USB.  In years
gone by I've used bluetooth and RFCOMM and been presented with a virtual modem through
which I can dial into a normal modem but this is obviously way off track in this case.

When I connect the phone to the laptop with a usb cable and select "PC Suite" on the
phone, the kde network manager pops up a message saying that a mobile broadband device has
been detected (so that's good).  The network manager system tray icon has a new option
that has a mobiel phone icon and says "create network connection".  Then when I go into
the knetwork manager's "manage connections" dialog I am presented with a (not greyed out)
tab called "Mobile Broadband".  So far so good.

I can then say "Add GSM" and am presented with a dialog box that has a "Mobile Broadband"
and "PPP" tab.

The Mobile Broadband tab has a "Basic" block with entry fields for Number, Username and
Password and an "Advanced" block with fields for APN, Type (dropdown), PIN and PUK.

The PPP tab is a series of tick boxen for Authentication types and Compression.

Now I've never had to do anything inside the phone for it to magically connect to the
Telstra network but it seems that the details I need for knetwork manager are somehow
preset in the phone.

Has anyone on the list been through this exercise and is able to give me some hints as to
what setting I might need?

Regards
Brett