PPPoE, Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet, is a network protocol for encapsulating Point-to-Point Protocol (["PPP"]) frames inside Ethernet frames. It is used mainly with ADSL services where individual users connect to the ADSL transceiver (modem) over Ethernet and in plain Metro Ethernet networks. (more on [wiki:Point-to-Point_Protocol_over_Ethernet Wikipedia]).

Installing Debian from the start a PPPoE enabled system

Debian Installer, starting with February 2007 supports installing a system via PPPoE and will configure the system accordingly. At the regular Debian Installer boot line just append modules=ppp-udeb (e.g.: type installgui modules=ppp-udeb to start a graphical installation via PPPoE).

More information in the Installation Guide, chapter [http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/i386/apds05.html Installing Debian GNU/Linux using PPP over Ethernet (PPPoE)].

How to enable PPPoE for an already installed system

In order to make PPPoE run on a Debian station you should follow the following steps:

PPPoE with kernelspace pppoe driver

pppoeconf try to load pppoe kernel module (modprobe -q pppoe). If there is a file /proc/net/pppoe, configuration will be in "kernel_mode". It's the case for a large majority of users because standard Debian installation have a kernel with pppoe compiled in module.

PPPoE with userspace pppoe driver

Alternatively, user-space agent pppoe can be used.

Notes