Possible to connect to WPA2 encrypted AP using Live CD?

gmic · 02-17-2009, 01:21 PM

Is it possible to connect with a wireless network card to a wpa2 encrypted access point using only what is supplied with the 6.3 Live CD?

My wlan card seems to be installed correctly and with ifconfig wlan0 up I can activate it. I also know how to tell it which essid to use. But how can I tell it to use WPA2 and the correct pre-shared key?

alan_ri · 02-17-2009, 02:03 PM

Now,I don't know what you mean by "6.3 Live CD" but you can easily enter encryption key with the command;

Code:

iwconfig wlan0 enc < key >

But that will maybe only work for WEP.
You can try;

Code:

iface wlan0 inet dhcp
   wpa-conf /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

and then

Code:

ifdown wlan0 && ifup wlan0

After bringing up the interface with wpa_supplicant, you can run wpa_cli and issue the command 'status' to see if and to which AP you are connected.

gmic · 02-17-2009, 02:27 PM

With '6.3 Live CD' I meant the LFS Live CD version 6.3.

Wpa_supplicant is part of that live cd?

alan_ri · 02-17-2009, 02:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gmic

Wpa_supplicant is part of that live cd?

I never used LFS,so I wouldn't know and it was my bad;I wasn't thinking about where is this thread started.

Mystican · 02-24-2009, 11:40 PM

You may already have figured this one out by now, but just in case you haven't - and for the benefit of others with the same question - the following is how I usually do it. wpa_supplicant is indeed available on the LFS 6.3 LiveCD, so to connect to a WPA-enabled access point, just run these commands after you boot:

Code:

wpa_passphrase <ssid> <passphrase> > /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

wpa_supplicant -B -Dwext -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

dhcpcd wlan0

And that's it. You can run

Code:

iwconfig wlan0

to make sure the ESSID field is set properly and to confirm that there's an Encryption key set (though you'll only be able to see the latter field when running as root, which of course is usually the case after you've first booted from the CD). Finally, to check that the connection is working properly, I'll usually do a quick ping of Google, for example, using

Code:

ping -c 3 google.com