hi all,

I have KDE 3.4.2 on Slackware 10.1 kernel 2.6.10. I just installed IPW2100 and it seems to work fine - when a wireless network is nearby the signal meter goes up, and when I scan for networks using KWifiManager I find their right names.

However, in several cases I need to connect to a DHCP wireless network, when I don't know anything about it, just it's name (from scanning), for example in the cafe Now, when I try to connect using Wireless Assistant tool or KWifiManager, it returns "connection failed" Why is that? how can I auto-connect without configuring anything I don't know?

* I preffer to use shell commands than K tools, so if it's possiable doing it with IWCONFIG or somehow else, I will be happy.

* This is my current IWCONFIG output: --- Thanks in advance

Your iwconfig output was taken when you're trying to connect to the "unknown" network in the cafe? "ESSIDff/any" indicates that it's not connecting properly. Perhaps that unknown network uses a WEP key?

no... the IWCONFIG is when there is no network nearby... When I try to connect It says it is connecting, but it takes a long time and doesn't connect...

If the network has encription, you'll have to set it up to be able to connect. You'll have to find out whether the requires encription before trying to connect.

I'm sure there is no WEP encryption there - I tried connecting using windowz and had no problem

Hi,
The first thing to do is to run the command iwlist scan.
The results will give you the name of the wireless network you are trying to connect to, assuming of course that the essid is being broadcast.
Then do:- ifconfig wlan0 (or whatever your interface is called) up,
then iwconfig wlan0 essid "essid of wireless net here"
then dhcpcd wlan0.

If you now do an ifconfig, you should see your i.p. If so, you should then be able to use the net, if not, then it may well be that you require a key from the owners of the wireless net. If so, and they are willing to give it, then issue the command iwconfig wlan0 key "key here" before the dhcpcd command.

Refer to man iwconfig to get the full idea how to use the key function.

I love this forum...

spoke too early -as always-
dhcpcd works but I could not actually connect to the internet. Browser is not aware that I'm connected.
Calltor: did you manage to log on to web pages after the
dhcpcd wlan0
command?

Ooops,
Sorry fellas, my mistake. You should of course use the commands in the following order.
iwconfig interface_name essid "essid_here"
Then ifconfig interface_name up
then the dhcpcd command.
If your interface is up before this, then issue an ifconfig iterface_name down first.

Afterwards, make sure you have everything running by issuing the ifconfig command as is. You should get info telling you your ip address, netmask etc if it all works.

Commands in the following order did not help either:

iwconfig interface_name essid "essid_here"
Then ifconfig interface_name up
then the dhcpcd command

I am attaching some output here, hoping that someone can help.

------------
cat /etc/resolv.conf
nameserver 192.168.0.1
------------
ifconfig
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:460 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:460 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:34916 (34.0 Kb) TX bytes:34916 (34.0 Kb)

wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:90:4B:4F:EC:67
inet addr:192.168.0.100 Bcast:192.168.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
inet6 addr: fe80::290:4bff:fe4f:ec67/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST NOTRAILERS RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:100 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:15 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:32878 (32.1 Kb) TX bytes:2646 (2.5 Kb)
Memory:d0200000-d0201fff
---------------
iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.

wlan0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:"essid" Nickname:"MOVINGSYSTEM"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:11:95:0A:98:34
Bit Rate=36 Mb/s Tx-Power:25 dBm
RTS thr=2347 B Fragment thr=2346 B
Encryption keyff
Power Managementff
Link Quality:99/100 Signal level:-84 dBm Noise level:-256 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:28 Invalid misc:6699 Missed beacon:0

eth0 no wireless extensions.

sit0 no wireless extensions.
------------------

Your info looks to be OK, but you might want to disable inet6 services with the following command, then restart your network services.


echo "alias net-pf-10 off" >> /etc/modprobe.conf
modprobe -r ipv6

Just copy and paste (as root)

Just tried that but did not work. Here is the current output (I also included output to route commands I know a little bit about):

root@MOVINGSYSTEM:/home/mehmet# cat /etc/resolv.conf
nameserver 192.168.0.1
root@MOVINGSYSTEM:/home/mehmet# route add default gw 192.168.0.1
SIOCADDRT: Network is down
root@MOVINGSYSTEM:/home/mehmet# route add netmask 255.255.255.0
netmask: Host name lookup failure
root@MOVINGSYSTEM:/home/mehmet# ifconfig
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:16436 Metric:1
RX packets:48 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:48 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:0
RX bytes:3520 (3.4 Kb) TX bytes:3520 (3.4 Kb)

wlan0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:90:4B:4F:EC:67
inet addr:192.168.0.100 Bcast:192.168.0.255 Mask:255.255.255.0
UP BROADCAST NOTRAILERS RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:111 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:4 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:35056 (34.2 Kb) TX bytes:1282 (1.2 Kb)
Memory:d0200000-d0201fff

root@MOVINGSYSTEM:/home/mehmet# iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.

wlan0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:"default" Nickname:"MOVINGSYSTEM"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:11:95:0A:98:34
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s Tx-Power:25 dBm
RTS thr=2347 B Fragment thr=2346 B
Encryption keyff
Power Managementff
Link Quality:100/100 Signal level:-83 dBm Noise level:-256 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:8 Invalid misc:11364 Missed beacon:0

eth0 no wireless extensions.

that looks fine, whats the output of route? try pinging the router, and then outside the network. then by hostname to see if its a resolving problem. make sure no firewalls... blah might as well post the output of interfaces file..

how do I ping the router (don't know its ip)?
what do you mean by "then outside the network" and by "by hostname" (i.e. what is the difference btw pinging the router and pinging the router by its hostname)?
where is (or what is the name of) the "interfaces file"?

the output of 'route' will give you the ip of your router (gateway) it is what you set in ifconfig and route, and it is also the ip in resolv.conf.. pinging outside the network, i mean as in the internet. so first ping your router (almost certainly will work) then try any other machines on the network, then try an internet host by ip, such as google, 66.102.7.147, then if succesful, try pinging by hostname, so ping www.google.com. i dont know where the interfaces file is on slack, but debian is /etc/network/interfaces man interfaces, man ifupdown, /usr/share/doc/ifupdown/examples/interfaces.gz (in debian anyway)