Oops... Some notes on how I broke ppp
The upstream maintainers of ppp are not much active anymore. This means that, unless you nag them, they tend to ignore bug reports and proposed patches, especially when posted to the mailing list. In their defense I must say that last year I was offered commit access to the ppp CVS, but I refused because I'm not familiar enough with the code.
When I received #227899 I was a bit suspicious: the patch touched critical parts of the program, so I asked the author to send it upstream for review. Nothing happened, and when after three months and two requests I tried it on my system I verified that I was still able to connect to my ISP, so I added it to the package.
Sadly, the patch author made a small but important mistake, and my last upload broke a function I did not remember it could be affected by the changes... Anyway, he already sent me the fix and I will upload a new package tomorrow.
Two days ago, half joking and half seriously I suggested that somebody could sponsor me the PPP design book, to help me understanding the package. I did not think I would receive half a dozen offers, but I had to refuse them because they were from other developers and because I cannot commit myself to work on the package: I think it would be inappropriate to request a donation for something I cannot guarantee I will put to good use. Anyway, I created an Amazon wish list, so if after reading this you still want to potentially waste your money, please go ahead. If instead you would like to help in a different way, please consider spending some time testing patches and fixing the bugs reported.