What?

This is mostly a reminder for myself, my Father in Law’s laptop has a very touchy caps lock key. Here is the reg file to disable it:

Create a file called something.reg. Paste this into it and save it. Then import this registry change:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout]

“Scancode Map”=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,02,00,00,00,00,00,3a,00,00,00,00,00

I recently installed a SVN snapshot from the Network Manager project to see how development was going. Tambet Ingo and Dan Williams deserve the thanks of all Linux users for the work they have done so far.

New Features:
Revamped Connection manager
Static Address Support
PPPOE (DSL) Support
Mobile Aircard Support (GSM and CDMA)
Multiple Active Devices

The new Connection Editor exposes every possible option, but none of them should be needed for most users. Network-Manager detects the type of network and will prompt the user for just the information needed to connect. When I plugged in my AT&T Aircard it was immediately available for use and connected on the first try. The VPN plugins worked properly regardless of how I was connected.

Below is a screenshot tour of the new features, this is a development snapshot so layout and features are likely to change.

Drop-Down Menu:

Connected to via GSM Aircard

Network Connections Window:
The connection manager window is a simple tabbed window, from what I can see every possible option is available except Dial.

Wired Settings:
The ability to manually set a MAC Address and to specify the MTU.

802.1x is primarily used in enterprise environments to authenticate the user or device before it is allowed to connect. The options here are PEAP, EAP-TTLS and EAP-TLS.

You can set a static IP address, DNS server(s), default gateway, and DNS Search order. It looks like each option on the page is independent. So you can obtain an IP from DHCP but specify a DNS server and DNS search suffix. I will validate this soon.

Wireless Settings
Every wireless option is available, unencrypted wireless, static WEP, WPA(2) Preshared Keys, LEAP, WPA+EAP and WEP+EAP. The only possible option that might be missing is EAP-FAST but that is Cisco proprietary.

Note the option for Key Index

DSL
The long awaited PPPOE support is now available.

Login information: it may also support PPTP but I do not have a DSL line to test with.

You can clone a MAC Address if needed.

If your ISP has some strange PPP settings you can set them here.

VPN

The VPN Settings screen only has the option to set Static IP, the rest of the VPN options are in the same place as before under configure VPN.

Mobile Broadband

My Aircard 860 worked automatically.

I doubt anything of any value to anyone will ever be here…