Problem activating wlan0 on Kubuntu 8.04

geeeeky.girl · 06-19-2008, 06:47 PM

Hi all!

If I go into System Settings -> (General tab) -> Network Settings -> Network Connections -> Administrator Mode -> wlan0 "Disabled Wireless Network Device"... and I right-click on that line and "Enable Interface" It simply doesn't work!

If I go into "Administrator mode" and change settings (DHCP automatic, activate when computers starts, etc...) and save changes, the next time I go in there, nothing is set as I previously set it (at least when I reboot the computer)!

When I try to change the settings and then activate the wlan0, I get the following message:

"Could not parse the XML output from the network configuration backend."

"Please wait while saving the network settings..." continues to be displayed in a window in the background during this time.

Does anybody have any ideas on what I can do to get my wireless card working?

# ... iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

wmaster0 no wireless extensions.

wlan0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:""
Mode:Managed Channel:0 Access Point: Not-Associated
Tx-Power=0 dBm
Retry min limit:7 RTS thr: off Fragment thr=2346 B
Encryption key: off
Link Quality: 0 Signal level:0 Noise level:0
Rx invalid nwid: 0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries: 0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

Many thanks.

P.S. My Wireless card: "Broadcom 54g MaxPerforance 802.11g"

pinniped · 06-19-2008, 07:00 PM

Hmm... how about searching for the other X thousand times people have asked? I must have answered that at least twice in 2 days; I'm too lazy to repeat it a third time. Basically, don't use the graphical tools - they're probably still all defective. Set up your /etc/network/interfaces file correctly instead. If you use WPA-PSK (which you should), you also need to install 'wpasupplicant'.

geeeeky.girl · 06-20-2008, 03:00 PM

Quote:

Hmm... how about searching for the other X thousand times people have asked? I must have answered that at least twice in 2 days;

You being familiar with the problem doesn't mean it's common knowledge. I've looked and searched and haven't been able to find a solution, that is why I've posted here.

Quote:

I'm too lazy to repeat it a third time.

They say good programmers are lazy and that less is more. How about omitting your insulting discourse and simply pasting three or four links? If there are some thousand of them, this shouldn't pose any problem.

Quote:

Basically, don't use the graphical tools - they're probably still all defective.

I'm not a Linux wizard. If it's not graphical, I'm not all that confident that I won't mess everything up even more!

Quote:

Set up your /etc/network/interfaces file correctly instead.

How?!

Quote:

If you use WPA-PSK (which you should), you also need to install 'wpasupplicant'.

Keep in mind that I don't have an Internet connection when I'm on Kubuntu. I have to go back and forth from Linux to Windows to search... What the h*** is WPA-PSK and wpasupplicant?

If anybody out there is interested in helping me out, please do so, I'd certainly appreciate it. If your only objective is to express "I'm better than you!", please refrain from replying.

pinniped · 06-20-2008, 05:58 PM

"I'm not a Linux wizard. If it's not graphical, I'm not all that confident that I won't mess everything up even more!"

Well, stop being unconfident and play around. If you're not sure, just make a habit of:
1. copy the untouched config file - for example: cp interfaces interfaces.orig
You probably also want to prevent yourself from making changes to the original without being prompted: chmod a-w interfaces.orig
2. play with the config file
3. if it works, leave it (optionally, delete the old one) and if it doesn't work, just copy the original back over:
cp interfaces.orig interfaces
And if you changed the 'write' permissions:
chmod u+w interfaces

There's no point in using a GUI if it's defective - that's virtually guaranteed to screw up your configuration and you're forced to edit the files with pico/nano/vi/emacs/jove/whatever.

For more info on setting up the wireless gizmo:
http://www.mail-archive.com/debian-l.../msg48837.html

"What the h*** is WPA-PSK and wpasupplicant?"

Well, WPA-PSK is WiFi Protected Access - Public Shared Key - a data encryption protocol used on wireless networks. The much older "Wireless Encryption Protocol" (WEP) was a scam and did not protect your information at all.

"wpasupplicant" works with the network device to negotiate the keys etc used by WPA-PSK. For Debian-based systems like Kubuntu you can search for software in the listed archives:
apt-cache search somekeyword

You can check if wpasupplicant is already installed:
dpkg -s wpasupplicant

If it's not installed, you can install it (if it's listed in your archives and it is a 'local' list):
apt-get install wpasupplicant

Your archive list would be the file /etc/apt/sources.list
There should be a 'CDROM' entry for your install disk; if there isn't, then you can add your install disk:
apt-cdrom add
Then put in your Kubuntu installer disk when it asks for a disk.

geeeeky.girl · 06-21-2008, 02:08 PM

Could someone please help me by doing the following? ...

- Not include any English, prose, or discourse whatsoever. Please, no explanations...
- Cut and paste a complete, typical example of an /etc/network/interfaces file right here that works both with a wired connection and a wireless connection
- Do not write anything else

Many thanks.

P.S. - We'll talk about it later, once my network connections are working...

Hangdog42 · 06-21-2008, 02:31 PM

Quote:

P.S. My Wireless card: "Broadcom 54g MaxPerforance 802.11g"

OK, we're gonna need a bit more info because Broadcom are morons and don't support Linux. That makes getting their garbage going a bit tougher than average. What we need to know are two things:

1) The chipset that the card is using. If you don't know this, open a console and (as root) run lspci. If you want to save the output to a text file run lspci > lspci.txt. That will save the output in a file called lspci.txt and you can open that in any text editor.

2) The driver that Ubuntu is trying to use. Again in a console, type

Quote:

lsmod

(the lsmod > lsmod.txt trick will work here as well). This one you'll probably want to post the whole thing.

The third thing to do (OK, I lied about two things) is look in /lib/firmware and see if there are any files there that have b43, bcm43xx or broadcom in their name.

geeeeky.girl · 06-21-2008, 02:45 PM

Many thanks Hangdog42. Here's the info you wanted:

jc@jeje:~/Documents$ lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: nVidia Corporation nForce3 Host Bridge (rev a4)
00:01.0 ISA bridge: nVidia Corporation nForce3 LPC Bridge (rev a6)
00:01.1 SMBus: nVidia Corporation nForce3 SMBus (rev a4)
00:02.0 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation nForce3 USB 1.1 (rev a5)
00:02.1 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation nForce3 USB 1.1 (rev a5)
00:02.2 USB Controller: nVidia Corporation nForce3 USB 2.0 (rev a2)
00:06.0 Multimedia audio controller: nVidia Corporation nForce3 Audio (rev a2)
00:06.1 Modem: nVidia Corporation nForce3 Audio (rev a2)
00:08.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation nForce3 IDE (rev a5)
00:0a.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation nForce3 PCI Bridge (rev a2)
00:0b.0 PCI bridge: nVidia Corporation nForce3 AGP Bridge (rev a4)
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 440 Go 64M] (rev a3)
02:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments TSB43AB21 IEEE-1394a-2000 Controller (PHY/Link)
02:01.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
02:02.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 03)
02:04.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1620 PC Card Controller (rev 01)
02:04.1 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1620 PC Card Controller (rev 01)
02:04.2 System peripheral: Texas Instruments PCI1620 Firmware Loading Function (rev 01)
jc@jeje:~/Documents$

jc@jeje:~/Documents$ lsmod
Module Size Used by
ipv6 267780 8
rfcomm 41744 2
l2cap 25728 13 rfcomm
bluetooth 61156 4 rfcomm,l2cap
ppdev 10372 0
powernow_k8 16704 0
cpufreq_stats 7104 0
cpufreq_userspace 5284 0
cpufreq_conservative 8712 0
cpufreq_powersave 2688 0
cpufreq_ondemand 9740 1
freq_table 5536 3 powernow_k8,cpufreq_stats,cpufreq_ondemand
sbs 15112 0
sbshc 7680 1 sbs
dock 11280 0
af_packet 23812 2
iptable_filter 3840 0
ip_tables 14820 1 iptable_filter
x_tables 16132 1 ip_tables
aes_i586 33536 0
dm_crypt 15364 0
dm_mod 62660 1 dm_crypt
sbp2 24072 0
lp 12324 0
loop 18948 0
joydev 13120 0
rfkill_input 5504 0
pcmcia 40876 0
evdev 13056 29
parport_pc 36260 1
parport 37832 3 ppdev,lp,parport_pc
arc4 2944 2
ecb 4480 2
blkcipher 8324 1 ecb
serio_raw 7940 0
psmouse 40336 0
b43 115104 0
rfkill 8592 40 rfkill_input,b43
mac80211 165652 1 b43
pcspkr 4224 0
cfg80211 15112 1 mac80211
k8temp 6656 0
led_class 6020 1 b43
input_polldev 5896 1 b43
snd_intel8x0 35356 1
snd_ac97_codec 101028 1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus 3072 1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_pcm_oss 42144 0
snd_mixer_oss 17920 1 snd_pcm_oss
yenta_socket 27276 2
rsrc_nonstatic 13696 1 yenta_socket
pcmcia_core 40596 3 pcmcia,yenta_socket,rsrc_nonstatic
snd_pcm 78596 3 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss
video 19856 0
output 4736 1 video
battery 14212 0
snd_seq_dummy 4868 0
container 5632 0
ac 6916 0
snd_seq_oss 35584 0
snd_seq_midi 9376 0
snd_rawmidi 25760 1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq_midi_event 8320 2 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi
snd_seq 54224 6 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_timer 24836 2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
snd_seq_device 9612 5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
wmi_acer 9644 0
snd 56996 13 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_pcm,snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_rawmidi, snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
button 9232 0
soundcore 8800 1 snd
snd_page_alloc 11400 2 snd_intel8x0,snd_pcm
shpchp 34452 0
pci_hotplug 30880 1 shpchp
i2c_nforce2 7680 0
amd64_agp 13444 1
agpgart 34760 1 amd64_agp
i2c_core 24832 1 i2c_nforce2
ext3 136712 1
jbd 48404 1 ext3
mbcache 9600 1 ext3
sg 36880 0
sr_mod 17956 0
cdrom 37408 1 sr_mod
sd_mod 30720 3
ata_generic 8324 0
pata_acpi 8320 0
usb_storage 73664 0
libusual 19108 1 usb_storage
8139cp 24704 0
ohci1394 33584 0
pata_amd 14212 2
ssb 32260 1 b43
8139too 27520 0
mii 6400 2 8139cp,8139too
ieee1394 93752 2 sbp2,ohci1394
libata 159344 3 ata_generic,pata_acpi,pata_amd
scsi_mod 151436 6 sbp2,sg,sr_mod,sd_mod,usb_storage,libata
ehci_hcd 37900 0
ohci_hcd 25348 0
usbcore 146028 5 usb_storage,libusual,ehci_hcd,ohci_hcd
thermal 16796 0
processor 36872 3 powernow_k8,thermal
fan 5636 0
fbcon 42912 0
tileblit 3456 1 fbcon
font 9472 1 fbcon
bitblit 6784 1 fbcon
softcursor 3072 1 bitblit
fuse 50580 1
jc@jeje:~/Documents$

jc@jeje:/lib/firmware$ ls
2.6.24-16-generic
jc@jeje:/lib/firmware$

Hangdog42 · 06-21-2008, 03:13 PM

Quote:

02:02.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4306 802.11b/g Wireless LAN Controller (rev 03)

That is your card and you've got a 4306 chipset. Fortunately, that is one of the less infuriating ones Broadcom makes.

This is from your lsmod:

Quote:

b43 115104 0

So Ubuntu is trying to use the b43 driver, which is the native linux driver for most Broadcom cards.

Quote:

jc@jeje:/lib/firmware$ ls
2.6.24-16-generic
jc@jeje:/lib/firmware$

That looks very much like you haven't install the firmware for the card, which isn't surprising. To use a Broadcom card, you have to have both a driver (b43 in your case) and firmware for that driver. Unfortunately due to Broadcom's licensing, most distros won't distribute the firmware files. However, it looks from this that there are Ubuntu packages of the firmware available. You have an option here:

1) Install the firmware package (probably the easiest)
2) Create your own firmware files. To do this you need to install a program called fwcutter and have a Windows driver available. You can find both of those here.

Once you've got the firmware installed, do a reboot and then your card will likely behave.

In the interest of full disclosure, you've got another option as well, namely ndiswrapper. The b43 driver was built by reverse engineering (i.e. Broadcom had nothing to do with it) and can be a bit flaky. If it doesn't work, you can use ndiswrapper, which is a way to use a Windows driver in Linux. To use ndiswrapper, you have to blacklist b43 (which isn't hard) to prevent the two drivers from conflicting. In the past, ndiswrapper has given better performance on some Broadcom chipsets, but the 4306 is one of the better supported by b43.

geeeeky.girl · 06-22-2008, 01:22 PM

Thank you so much for your response. What you've said leads me to believe that it's not all that easy to solve this problem after all, that simply changing the /etc/network/interfaces file won't do the trick!

Based on what you've said, it seems that the ndiswrapper solution is best. I've had a look on the Net and done the following, although, I don't know if what I've done was a good idea:

sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-common
sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-utils-1.9
sudo apt-get install ndisgtk

I based this on this page: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Wi...er/Ndiswrapper

I now have a thing in my menu, "Settings", with "Windows Wireless Drivers", but I haven't the foggiest idea how to use it! Don't know where anything is! (You're supposed to choose a file to install, I think).

Where do I go from here? Or am I headed in the wrong direction?

Many thanks for your response. I'm eager to get my wifi working so that I can actually use my Kubuntu laptop!

Hangdog42 · 06-23-2008, 07:41 AM

Quote:

Based on what you've said, it seems that the ndiswrapper solution is best. I've had a look on the Net and done the following, although, I don't know if what I've done was a good idea:

sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-common
sudo apt-get install ndiswrapper-utils-1.9
sudo apt-get install ndisgtk

That looks OK to me (although I don't use *buntu, so I may be wrong about this). However, what you appear to have done is installed the nidswrapper binary, which doesn't go far enough. Have a look at the ndiswrapper wiki install instructions starting with the Install Windows Driver section. I'm assuming that the packages you've installed mean that you don't have to compile ndiswrapper.

That doc you linked to seems to be very good, so following that is probably a good idea. Especially be sure to blacklist the Linux drivers since if you don't there will be problems.

Quote:

I now have a thing in my menu, "Settings", with "Windows Wireless Drivers", but I haven't the foggiest idea how to use it! Don't know where anything is! (You're supposed to choose a file to install, I think).

Again, since I don't use *buntu, I might not be the best person to give advice here. If you could give a description of what you're seeing, that might help or you might want to ask on the Ubuntu forum. It also might be helpful if you could tell me what steps you've gotten through on the doc you linked to.

Quote:

Where do I go from here? Or am I headed in the wrong direction?

I don't think you're heading in the wrong direction, but I'm completely unfamiliar with all the GUI monstrosities that *buntu uses. One thing to check is your lsmod output again. If this is heading in the right direction you should see ndiswrapper and NOT see b43. If you see both we've got trouble. You also might have a look at the output of iwconfig and see if it sees a wireless card.

geeeeky.girl · 06-27-2008, 02:57 PM

Thanks again Hangdog42!

We're getting there, slowly but surely!

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to you, I only have a wired Internet connection at the weekend.

I'm having trouble doing what's mentioned here in the link you sent me:

Quote:

If you already have your device working in Windows you can try that driver. Open the device manager and find the name of the .sys driver file listed for the device. You need the .sys file and the .inf file. To find the .inf file search in the \Windows\inf\ directory for a file containing the name of the .sys file. You will need to do an advanced search to search for text within the files.

What do I include in the advanced search and what exactly am I looking for here? I noticed there are tons of .inf files in WINDOWS\INF.

A lot of this is Greek to me, but here's what happens when I run the following command in a shell:

Code:

jc@jeje:~$ lspci -n
00:00.0 0600: 10de:00d1 (rev a4)
00:01.0 0601: 10de:00d0 (rev a6)
00:01.1 0c05: 10de:00d4 (rev a4)
00:02.0 0c03: 10de:00d7 (rev a5)
00:02.1 0c03: 10de:00d7 (rev a5)
00:02.2 0c03: 10de:00d8 (rev a2)
00:06.0 0401: 10de:00da (rev a2)
00:06.1 0703: 10de:00d9 (rev a2)
00:08.0 0101: 10de:00d5 (rev a5)
00:0a.0 0604: 10de:00dd (rev a2)
00:0b.0 0604: 10de:00d2 (rev a4)
00:18.0 0600: 1022:1100
00:18.1 0600: 1022:1101
00:18.2 0600: 1022:1102
00:18.3 0600: 1022:1103
01:00.0 0300: 10de:0179 (rev a3)
02:00.0 0c00: 104c:8026
02:01.0 0200: 10ec:8139 (rev 10)
02:02.0 0280: 14e4:4320 (rev 03)
02:04.0 0607: 104c:ac54 (rev 01)
02:04.1 0607: 104c:ac54 (rev 01)
02:04.2 0880: 104c:8201 (rev 01)
jc@jeje:~$

This was also mentioned in the link you sent me.

Don't quite know where to take it from here...

Thanks again!

Hangdog42 · 06-27-2008, 03:46 PM

Quote:

What do I include in the advanced search and what exactly am I looking for here? I noticed there are tons of .inf files in WINDOWS\INF.

Sorry, I probably wasn't real clear. Broadcom drivers in Windows is usually named something like bcmwl5 and there are two files you need, bcmwl5.inf and bcmwl5.sys (You can also get them from Broadcom or from whoever makes your wireless card). Anyway, the .sys file is the actual driver and the .inf has some required information so you need to find, or get, both. Once you've got those two files copied somewhere Linux can see them, you need to use ndiswrapper to install them. By the way, both the .inf and .sys files need to be in the same location.

Once that is done, you should be able to load the ndiswrapper module (modprobe ndiswrapper) and that should give you a wireless interface you can configure.

As for the lspci, we needed that to find out what chipset you have, and since we know that (4306) we don't have to worry about it anymore.