[Sugar-devel] [DESIGN] Feature "Enhanced support for 3G modems"

[Peter Robinson]

On Wed, Jul 3, 2013 at 12:07 AM, James Cameron <quozl at laptop.org> wrote:
> Reviewing the GUI, I'm not sure I understand the intention of this
> opening statement:
>
> "You will need to provide the following information to set up a mobile
> broadband connection to a cellular (3G) network"
>
> It is ambiguous.  To whom should I provide this information?  My
> teacher?  My broadband device seller?  My broadband service?  No, I
> need not provide any information at all, I'm supposed to configure the
> computer.
>
> The opening predicts an action; "You will need to" can be removed and
> the sentence probably still has the same meanings.
>
> By mentioning mobile, you exclude the possibility of use with a fixed
> broadband device.  The devices need not move around to work.
>
> Also, by mentioning 3G, and showing a default 2G, there's an
> implication here that a 4G network cannot be used.  This isn't true; a
> 4G network should work fine with this GUI.

I agree mostly but in some cases you're splitting hairs. Ultimately
this should be an interface to ModemManager which already provides
things like carrier database information so in most cases you should
be able to input you Carrier and your plan and get a working WWAN
connection (2/3/4g) and it's also adding support for things like DSL
and other technologies rather than hard coding anything. I had sort of
hoped we'd learnt from the similarly related NetworkManager issues and
use underlying infra rather than reinventing the wheel which we
appeared to be doing the last time I browsed this feature.

Peter