Description of problem: When a dial-up/PPP connection is defined, then activated via NetworkManager, NetworkManager does not check the status of the connection. i.e. if the PPP connection is initiated successful, this does not register in NetworkManager. The problem is that, if you then need to activate vpnc or OpneVPN, you cannot do so via NetworkManager. Evolution and other apps are put into offline mode. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): NetworkManager-0.6.4-5.fc6 How reproducible: Every time Steps to Reproduce: 1.Define a dial-up or PPP connection via system-config-network 2.Activate the connection via NetworkManager 3.Allow it to connect. Actual results: NetworkManager says there is no network connection, even if PPP connection is successful. Expected results: NetworkManager would show an activate network connection when PPP connection is successful. Additional info: Also reported in bugzilla.gnome.org #354068 #352325
Unfortunately, this is the most definitively bug which should be resolved upstream. I would personally be very happy when this is fixed, but we all have to wait before this is fixed by Gnome people.
The problem I have with marking this as CLOSE UPSTREAM is that both of the bugs attached to this bugzilla from bugzilla.gnome.org are assigned to Dan Williams, who is a Red Hat employee. So, it sure seems as if Red Hat will be the one doing this work, and push it upstream... However, I will work with Dan upstream to get this working.
All bugs go to Dan, who then might re-assign it to someone in the community if they want to. The point is not who does the work, but the process and Red Hat's committment to community work. Doing things in the community is an extremely important part of being good open source people. Apple and others have come under major criticism for doing work internally and then pushing it back to the community afterward so much that they are making headway into changing their model to do things in the community first and then pull back. This also has the advantage of not duplicating or wasting e.g. Red Hat resources if the upstream community decides the patch might be great for one distro but does not serve the community needs and rejects the patch for any number of reasons, and uses a different patch. Maintenance then becomes harder, etc. We don't want to follow those footsteps.
This bug is a duplicate of 208573, which is still in NEW status.
*** Bug 208573 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
The other issue this causes is with applications (gnome-y) that depend on NetworkManager to tell it about network status. (dbus notification?) For example, gaim will not connect to the network if you launch it when dialed in via PPP. It says "waiting for network" ...