http://blogs.gnome.org/dcbw/2009/06/22/mobile-broadband-assistant-makes-it-easy/

Mobile Broadband Configuration Assistant

Introduction

In these days of tie-in sales it is easy and inexpensive to get a mobile broadband subscription, but it is difficult to configure a mobile connection for GNU/Linux based systems. There are no easy to use tools for creating the needed connection settings and thus the user must create nontrivial configuration files by hand! What makes the situation even worse is that the service providers often have support documentation only for Microsoft Windows operating systems and thus it can be very difficult even for an experienced user - let alone for a novice - to find the needed information.

The project aims to address the current problematics in configuring mobile broadband connections under GNU/Linux by developing an assistant software for GNOME desktop environment. The assistant will be integrated with NetworkManager to provide the user the most convenient mobile broadband experience under GNOME desktop. Main part of the project consists from the assistant and a database of mobile broadband service provider specific settings.

Dan Williams - who is employed by Red Hat and who is the main developer of NetworkManager - has promised to mentor the project. Original announcement on networkmanager-list can be found from the archive. Information about current progress can be found through development blog. Don't forget to check the project plan.

Service Provider Database

When you want to configure a mobile broadband connections there usually is some service provider specific information you have to know before the connection can be established. Problem with this information is that it's highly technical for an ordinary consumer and it's available only from service providers web page or from Microsoft Windows installation media that becomes with tie-in subscription devices.

The interesting side of this information is that it's the same for every user of a given service provider. This means that service provider specific information can be stored in a database. When this database is available the information can be fetched there and the ordinary user does not need to bother about it.

Mobile Broadband Configuration Assistant has it's own database. This database is constructed by volunteers from different countries. The volunteers gather service provider specific information of all providers in their country and then add it to the database. After the information is added by even a single contributor all the users of the given country will benefit from that contribution and they will get their connections up and running with ease.

More information about the database is found from Service Provider Database page.

Assistant

The following information is asked from the user:

• communication method
• which device to communicate with
• country and name of the service provider

Assistant supports following communication methods between a mobile phone and users computer:

• Bluetooth
• USB
• PC Card, PCMCIA or Express Card
• Serial (DE-9)

note about NetworkManager integration

Although the assistant can discover different kind of devices, NetworkManager can not. The assistant is only used as a front-end to service provider database and thus NetworkManager users do not see the device selection pages.

Download

Releases are available from GNOME SVN:
http://svn.gnome.org/viewvc/mobile-broadband-provider-info/
http://svn.gnome.org/viewvc/libmbca/

Schedule

From project plan appendix B:

Help Wanted

Current database is based on GPRS EC database and it requires some love: Updating GPRS EC Legacy

also take a look at this page: GPRS CID

Contact