Using Multiple ISPs With Your Amiga

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                    Using Multiple ISPs With Your Amiga
  Robert Davis - Amateur Radio K0FPC                       rdavis@nyx.net
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Robert Davis
1107 Mary #4
Emporia, KS 66801

For the month of April, 1996, I am comparing the Internet Service Providers
of Emporia, Kansas.  My plan is to choose the best of the three and drop my
accounts on the other two.

So I have to make my Amiga, running AmiTCP 4 and ppp 1.45 alternately
connect to the ISPs, which we shall refer to as C, V, and S ...  because
their real names don't matter.

I had been starting my Internet connection by typing internet from a shell.
That script (sys:s/internet) looks like this:

.bra {
.ket }
.key param
; Installed with iNTERiNSTALL 1.51
path >nil: amitcp:bin add
;
run >nil: execute >NIL: amitcp:bin/startinternet {param}

The startinternet script reads the ppp0.config file (env:sana2/ppp0.config)
which tells the program to use the ppp.dial script (env:sana2/ppp.dial) to
actually call the Internet Service Provider.

So to call multiple ISPs, I created a separate ppp.dial script for each
one.  Those files are stored on my hard drive as:

envarc:sana2/Vppp.dial
envarc:sana2/Cppp.dial
envarc:sana2/Sppp.dial

In these files, the telephone number of the ISP, username, and password are
different for each script.  Of course, other differences may exist in the
logon procedures.  Those differences may require additions or other changes
to the scripts.  Every ISP is different from all the others.

Then, instead of one sys:s/internet script, I created three different
scripts:

sys:s/callV
sys:s/callC
sys:s/callS

Here is the callV script:

.bra {
.ket }
.key param
; Installed with iNTERiNSTALL 1.51
path >nil: amitcp:bin add
;
copy envarc:sana2/Vppp.dial envarc:sana2/ppp.dial
copy env:sana2/Vppp.dial env:sana2/ppp.dial
;
run >nil: execute >NIL: amitcp:bin/startinternet {param}

And that script copies the appropriate ppp.dial script to the necessary
directories on both the hard drive and the ram disk before calling the rest
of the procedures which accomplish the connection to the Internet.  Except
for the first letter of the filename to copy from, the other two scripts
are identical to this one.

So instead of typing internet to start my internet connection, I type
either callv callc or calls and my Amiga calls the Internet Service
Provider of my choice. 

If you normally click on an icon to start your Internet connection, you
will have to create separate icons for each ISP, and probably use xicon to
execute the scripts.  I shall leave that as an exercise for the reader.

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