In answer to your posting number 12...


This is a link to the page I downloaded it from:

http://sourceforge.net/project/showf...group_id=82936

And FROM this page I downloaded THIS file: madwifi-0.9.4.tar.gz

I'd be interested to know why you place such importance on the source of the module/driver?

Thanks,

cc.

Further info from the boot up report. Everything else in the boot up goes fine, but for
these two failure points which I've reproduced verbatim from the screen:


Determining IP information for eth0... failed; no link present. Check cable

Bringing up interface wlan0: SIOCSIFFLAGS: invalid argument. Failed.

I'm inclined to believe these are further clues as to the problem, but since they're in 'computerspeak'
and I'm a mere mortal, I'm afraid they're incomprehensible to me. :-(

CC.

Ouch!
You have 37 posts to LQ and you haven't grasped the concept of the "root" or "superuser" or in windows terms maybe "the administrator"???

Yes, it is (potentially) confusing that the "root" of the filesystem, /, is also referred to as "root" (but that's because the linux filesystem is built like a tree, with a root, and then "branches" off it.

It probably doesn't help that this "tree" is usually depicted upside-down or sideways, but we are imaginative people, and can do 90 and 180 degree rotations in our heads without too much stress on the organic processor )

Anyway, please take a look at this document: http://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/ or
here (as a nice PDF): http://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/intro-linux.pdf
If you D/L the PDF, you can search it for root, and learn a bit about it.

So you need to be the root user to use those commands I gave you in post #13. To do this with fedora you give the command "switch user", abbreviated to su like this:

su -

The "-" is there, so you inherit root's environment. You need this, although at the moment I appreciate you may have no idea what this means.

You will be asked for "root's password", you gave the system this when you installed. I hope you have remembered it. Once you have given the correct password you will be the root user.

You will notice that your prompt has changed, to remind you that you are root, all-powerful, and can trash your system with a 7 character command (that I'll leave you to discover for yourself), so be careful with what you type. To stop being the root user type exit at the terminal (.. and yes, you do have to press the return key for anything to happen). Then you will be back as yourself, do you notice the change in the prompt?

Type the commands I gave you. Do not prefix them with "/". They will be recognised by fedora when you are the root user. Otherwise, they won't, and you'll get an error message.

See how you get on.

[PAUSE]

I see you have posted whilst I am typing this. So .... .. .
Yes, I have already been there (I guessed it, sorry, but it needed confirming )

So I can find out just what exactly it is you have downloaded and what (if anything) needs to be done with it. In my post #13 I am saying that you probably do not need this download, it's probably already on your system. The instructions I gave you there are to see if this is indeed the case. Please try them out as the root user.

Means that it cannot bring up your wired connection because you have not plugged it in. If you had plugged in a cable, it would probably be working.
But you want wireless, sigh.

Means that there is something wrong with your wireless interface. We are trying to fix that.

Finally:
I have no idea. It could be any of the above, but, as usual, you are not providing any useful information: You have your PC listed as "Fujitsu-Siemens Esprimo Notebook" but which fscking one? Believe me I have been to their site (on your behalf), and there are lots of variations. I gave up, because I do not know your model number. It matters, especially with laptops as the hardware is often non-standard, and cut-down to save a bit of weight, and a "Fujitsu-Siemens Esprimo Notebook XXXYYYZZZ" is completely different from a "XXXYYYZZF". Otherwise they wouldn't have changed the model number, would they?

It's a bit like you posting "My car isn't working"
- "What type of car is it?"
- "It's a BMW"
- "Tell me more"
- "It's a 720, I think"
- "Ooooo Kaaaaaay: 720i, 720g, 720Tig, 720F1, ...."
I am making this up, but do you get the idea?

So, it's late for me now, a long day and I'm tired. Please print this out, and decide for yourself where the Q's are.
Make notes. Provide the requested information, and error messages. Then maybe we can make some progress.

Oh, one last thought: Please search for "Linux for CC" or even "Linux for dummies" (no offence meant) and read some introductory texts. You need to do some homework. I'll bet the first time you were confronted with a windows machine, you needed some help to work it. Maybe you found this yourself, maybe somebody helped you. Linux is no different.

Linux is not windows. It's not clicky-clicky, Yum it WORKS! I can watch TV, and IM my "friends", (Windows is a little slow sometimes but maybe that is because I am invaded by trojans, my bank account has been emptied, and I am spamming the world, but I don't care, I just plugged it in clicked "Yes" to everything and I'm HAAAPPPPY )

Linux is much better, but it takes some re-learning. Persevere, be prepared to learn (education probably wards off Alzheimer's ), and you'll be amply rewarded

Now: Go and do your homework. Come back when you have done it. Help will be provided if you can show that you are able to help yourself by reading and learning. We all started where you are now. Then doors begin to open and I hope you'll walk through them and be content, as I am

Okay, well thanks.
There's an awful lot of information in your last post, and it will take some time for me to assimilate it - which I don't propose to do now as it's 1.00am here already and I don't want to piss you off by missing out any instruction.

Thanks for your input; I'll be back in due course - and hopefully a bit less Clueless.

CC.

Yes there is, and you'll see that it took me quite some time to write it. But I'd like to help you leap the first hurdles, as others did for me waaaay back in time, when it was much more complicated than it is now.
That's completely understandable. "Completely Clueless" I can understand and accept, and am more than willing to help but "Completely Helpless" or "Completely lazy" is a No No.

Don't get dispirited. There's no rush. Find the time to do a bit of homework. Experiment a little. Just try things out (you still have windows to go back to) until you are more comfortable with the way linux does things.

When you understand the concept of "Do this as root", please come back and reply to this thread, as we'll be ready and waiting to help you pick up from where we left off.

Sorry, but sometimes I too, get frustrated. "You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink". I am not "pissed off". I just *assumed* you knew about water. My mistake

Cheer up - linux is an adventure: lots to learn, puzzles to be solved, mistakes to be made, but in the end life (at least with wretched PCs) gets better.
Come back here whenever you are ready

Good luck.

Hi again,

I'm just about to execute the commands you suggested "as root" now you've explained what that means. It's obvious a lot of these problems I've been having seem to be caused by naming conventions rather than any fundamental lack of understanding on my part. Here again, there's a naming problem. "Root" to me as an escaping WhineDos luser means the root directory of C:\ from whence all other directories spread out. If you had simply said, "as administrator" rather than "as root" I would have known exactly what you meant! And yes, I am fully familiar with the directory tree structure! :-)

I do plead guilty on the imprecise description of the notebook, however. I'll alter my profile accordingly to leave no room for ambiguity. My apologies. I appreciate you're trying to save me from the nightmare future of MS style Big Brother slavery for which I am most thankful.

Now I shall enter the commands and see what comes back.

CC

Okay, now I have some outputs. Going back to your earlier post you suggested:

As root, try:
lsmod | grep ath
Q2] - Is anything listed?
If not, try inserting the module (as root again):
modprobe ath_pci
Once the module has loaded (it loads some others that are needed as well) try (again, as root)
iwlist scan
Q3] - What happens?

Here's the results:

[root@localhost ~]# lsmod | grep ath
dm_multipath 18249 0
ath5k 85197 0
mac80211 131409 2 rc80211_simple,ath5k
dm_mod 46209 9 dm_multipath,dm_snapshot,dm_zero,dm_mirror
[root@localhost ~]# modprobe ath_pci
FATAL: Module ath_pci not found.
[root@localhost ~]# iwlist scan
lo Interface doesn't support scanning.

eth0 Interface doesn't support scanning.

wmaster0 Interface doesn't support scanning.

wlan0 Interface doesn't support scanning : Network is down

[root@localhost ~]#


Obviously the commands you have suggested mean nothing to me. But if they are to get the system to look for the module, then ought it (the module) be copied over to someplace the system will expect to find it? At the moment It's still on the USB memory stick which whilst plugged into the notebook, may not be where the system is looking.

Any ideas?

CC.

Ok, some progress.

Well we do not see the module ath_pci, but we do see the module ath5k, which is another module that (maybe) can control your Atheros chipset. The ath5k homepage is here: http://madwifi.org/ It is still under development.

The module ath_pci is not available on your system. It looks like fedora wants to use ath5k instead.

wlan0 looks as though it is the name of your wireless interface. But it "doesn't support scanning : Network is down"

So there is something wrong.

If you search for device 001c on this page http://madwifi.org/wiki/Compatibility/Atheros
you will see some data referring to an Atheros AR5007EG (which could well be your chipset [Edit:] Is your chipset, with PCI vendor/system IDs: 168c:001c [/Edit]) and references to some Fujitsu-Siemens computers (but not your exact one).
There are also comments like "Works perfectly with latest madwifi snapshot and this patch --> http://madwifi.org/ticket/1679 "

On that page there's also this link explaining how to get it to work with (k)ubuntu:
http://www.ubuntugeek.com/atheros-50...-platform.html

Unfortunately, (k)ubuntu handles networking setup very differently from Fedora. Applying (k)ubuntu network configuration to Fedora will not work, and I do not know Fedora, so I am unable to help you with specifics here. (My maintained distros are Debian / kubuntu).

But there is hope yet.

I searched around and found this page http://menkou.homelinux.net/serendip...f-the-box.html
which tells you how to install the ath_pci driver on F8, and they say it works.

Give it a go?

You can find out what any commands are with the man CommandName command. Eg:
man ifconfig or even
man man
[Page-up, Page-Down, q to Quit]
Or you could put man ifconfig into your search engine if you'd like a nicely formatted page in your browser.

The module you have download is as source code. It will need compiling against your kernel before you can use it. Really, I'd rather not go there, as you are CC and I am unfamiliar with Fedora! Much easier is to use the link I gave you above, and install a precompiled module.

If you do need to compile the ath_pci module from source, I think you'll need to start another thread, because I can't help you here.

Best wishes & have fun

Okay, thanks for that lot.

Since you think it best to try the solution described in the link you posted (http://menkou.homelinux.net/serendip...f-the-box.html) that is what I shall do. Having visited the site and checked the files are still available (and downloaded them) I will have a stab at it but it will take me a while to do so by the look of it.

Just a couple of final questions for the time being:

1). When installing any given Linux module on any PC., is there a particular location on the system that said module must be placed in order for it to be most easily found?

2). I read in some beginner's guide to Linux that irrespective of the distro, they all use a single, common kernel. Is that not true?

Thanks again for your help.

CC.

Different linux distros install things in different places. It depends on the distro. That's why it's usually better to use your distro's "package manager" to install any additional software you might need. Or download an rpm that matches your distro & kernel number. If that fails, compile-from-source always worked for me, but it's a PITA.

The .rpm's in that link should install themslves in the right places for your distro. But please check your kernel number, as it says on that page. It should match exactly. If it doesn't, perhaps you can search for one that does and then download that.

You have read http://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/intro-linux.pdf I take it?
It's homework

This is off the topic of this thread. Please post that Q in "Linux-General"

Oh, so package managers install modules as well as applications; that's useful to know.

I hadn't seen the pdf document you posted a link to before. It does look interesting, though, so I've saved a copy and will endeavour to work through it. Priorities first, though and I must get this wlan business sorted out!

Thanks again,

CC.

Okay, well I've now carried out the suggested solution from that third party site. Everything appeared to be in accordance with that guy's step-by-step instructions, but I regret to say still no change. :-(
However, in overcoming some unforeseen obstacles along the way, it became my first up-close-and-personal fiddle with Linux and though it was scarey at times, I quite enjoyed it. Took me to some unexpected (but useful and interesting places) too. :-) Pity there was no pay off, though. :-(

There's a log file (varlog) of highly detailed mumbo-jumbo that probably shows what went wrong, but it's very long. Even if I only post today's segment of it and I'm not sure what the LQ policy on posting long text files is.

If it's acceptable, I'll post the relevant part.

CC.

Neither am I, but they need to be split up, and become difficult to read.

You can post stuff like that to a site like this: http://rafb.net

Click the Paste link, Set your languge as "Plain Text", Give yourself a nickname, give it a description, Do not convert tabs, Paste in the log to the blank space, and finally click the Paste button. You should get a link to publish for us here.

It should stay available for us to read for 24 hours.

When you post the link, please also tell us the outputs of:
uname -a
ls /usr/src
which gcc
Thanks.

Glad you are having an interesting journey, maybe one day, we'll get you to your destination. Meanwhile, time for a bit more sightseeing?

Absolutely. Maybe I'll become hooked! At first glance it certainly 'feels' like a REAL *system* unlike Windoze, which always comes across a bit 'plasticy' like a kid's pedal car - and very matriarchal. For example:
"You do NOT have permission to access this file!"
"WTF do you mean? I OWN the Goddamn system! If I want to trash it, I can!!"
"Not possible! You're not the SuperUser!"
"Yes I am!! I have Administrator privileges! I bought this pile of junk OS for good money in perpetuity!"
"Your initials, for one thing, do not correspond to those of the SuperUser."
"What the hell are you talking about? What initials??"
"BG"
"Who??"
"Anyway, whatever you enter, however many times, you cannot change this file. Access is denied!"

Get this: I'm NOT joking. My 16 credit card accounts with FULL details were stuck inside this Windows SYSTEM file (yeah, you read that right) UNENCRYPTED - for any trojan to come along and steal. And worse still was that Windoze refused to even ackowledge said file existed! It didn't even show up under the 'reveal all files' system settings. It took 3rd party software to track it down and when it did it was in a WINDOWS SYSTEM FILE THAT IS NORMALLY "open" on the hard drive as unencrypted. What kind of security is THAT?????

Anyway, I'll stop the rant here because I could easily go on too far.

Until then, thanks again for the info, Tredegar. Since there's a strict time deadline of just 24 hours on this site you quote, I'd best post it (plus your output requests) with forewarning. So that'll now be sometime in the evening, UK-time tomorrow.

Woah!

Rant off please, you are preaching to the converted: I quit at win98
Linux can be bossy too, as you'll soon find out. But it usually has good reasons

You can put your unencrypted credit card information into any linux PC, and it won't necessarily be any more secure than a windows PC, but at least you can find out how your OS is dealing with "security".

I don't want this thread to go "off-topic", so just post the outputs / log files / whatever so we can understand what it is you are trying to do ( = , I hope, "Get the Atheros wireless chipset working" rather than "Installing ethernet card driver", and read the error messages you are receiving and try to help you understand and resolve them.

When things go wrong with linux it doesn't just say "Unexpected error 0FF5F32". Blue Screen of Death. Die. Usually, there's something useful reported, that points you to the problem. But if you do not understand what the error messages mean, maybe we can help.

Now, I am going to be a bit "picky" here: There's no need to quote my entire previous entry to this thread: It's there for all to read in the thread, they've already read it, it doesn't need repeating. Just post your follow-up. You are free to say "in post #XYZ you said, but ...."

So, post the (long) error log to wherever, give us the link to it, and we'll do what we can to help you.
Welcome to the world of puzzle-solving. I hope you like to solve puzzles