The following is based on a comment by sparcleosx on June 25th to this hint that explains how to share an Internet connection to a Palm. This new hint will explain how to connect (network) a Mac to another Mac via bluetooth. I hope it's a step forward to allow internet sharing to another Mac in Tiger, and, as usual, use at your own discretion...In the "Server" Mac (I used a G4 iBook with 10.4.3):
- In case you are running Hotsync Manager, stop it (open it, and select Disable).
- In the Bluetooth System Preferences pane, change the Bluetooth-PDA-Sync serial setting from modem to RS-232.
- In the Network System Preferences pane, in Bluetooth PDA Sync, change the modem to Null modem, 115200 speed.
- In a Terminal, enter the following:
Here you see the 172.16.140.14 address, which makes it possible not to use natd, since it's in the same network as the Mac is. So the firewall knows where to sent it to -- no routing problems etc. Pick any free address in your private range. For instance, if you are using the following ... firewall: 192.168.1.1, Mac: 192.168.1.2, you can enter 192.168.1.3, assuming it's not used elsewhere on your network.$ sudo /usr/sbin/pppd /dev/tty.Bluetooth-PDA-Sync 115200 \ noauth local passive proxyarp asyncmap 0 silent persist :172.16.140.14
If you want to be sure you did it right, open the system.log file on the Mac (tail -f /var/log/system.log), and you should see something like this (line breaks added for a narrower display):Jun 25 10:33:57 hostname pppd[679]: pppd 2.4.2 (Apple version 229) started by username, uid 0 Jun 25 10:33:57 hostname pppd[679]: Connect: ppp0 <--> /dev/tty.Bluetooth-PDA-Sync - In Terminal, write sudo sysctl -w net.inet.ip.forwarding=1, which should give the following feedback: net.inet.ip.forwarding: 0 -> 1
- In Terminal, write sudo ifconfig ppp0 up.
Next, on the client Mac (I used a G3 iBook running 10.4.3):
- Open the Bluetooth System Preferences panel, go to the Sharing tab, Add a Serial Port Service, make it type RS-232, and enable the "Require pairing for security" checkbox.
- Go to the Device tab, select the Server device, and click Edit Serial Ports. Add a serial port, select Port Type: RS-232, and enable Show in Network Preferences.
- Go to the Network System Preferences panel, select the new Bluetooth PDA service, and click Configure. Go to the Modem tab and select Null Modem 115200, then uncheck "Wait for dial tone before dialing."
- Open Internet Connect (in Applications), select the Bluetooth-PDA service, and click Connect, and it should start a connection.

