Slackware: Connecting to wireless network

flintmecha · 06-29-2008, 10:00 PM

I just can't seem to get this to work. I'm trying to connect to my home's wireless internet connection, which is WEP-secured. running iwlist scan shows 2 or 3 connections listed with wlan0, one of which is the one I'm trying to connect to - this tells me my card is detected correctly and Slackware is able to "see" the network I want.

With netconfig I chose to use DHCP.

I have this in /etc/rc.d/rc.wireless.conf:

Code:

INFO="linksys"
ESSID="sawyer"
KEY="XXXXXXXXXX"

I have the following uncommented in /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1.conf:

Code:

IFNAME[4]="wlan0"
NETMASK[4]="255.255.255.0"
USE_DHCP[4]="yes"
WLAN_ESSID[4]="sawyer"
WLAN_CHANNEL[4]="11"  #are the quotes necessary here?
WLAN_KEY[4]="XXXXXXXXXX"

#there's a bunch of default stuff still commented, I don't know if they are needed or not

Here's the output of iwconfig:

Code:

lo        no wireless extensions.

wmaster0  no wireless extensions.

wlan0     IEEE 802.11g ESSID:"sawyer"
          Mode:Managed Frequency:2.462 GHz Access Point: XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
          Bit Rate=54 Mbs   Tx-Power=27 dBm
          Retry min limit: 7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr=2346 B
          Encryption key: XXXX-XXXX-XX
          Link Quality=84/100 Signal level=-49 dBm Noise level=-127 dBm
          Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

eth0      no wireless extensions.

When I run rc.inet1 wlan0_start (which Slackbook says to do) I get:

Code:

root@slackware:/etc/rc.d# ./rc.inet1 wlan0_start
./rc.inet1:  wlan0 information: 'linksys'
Error for wireless request "Set Nickname" (8B1C) :
    SET failed on device wlan0 ; Operation not supported.
Polling for DHCP server on interface wlan0:
dhcpcd: MAC address = XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
root@slackware:/etc/rc.d#

As you can see nothing really appears to happen after the MAC address is printed. It almost seems to hang up for a few seconds before giving me the prompt.

Any ideas? I'm currently posting from my desktop PC running Windows. I'm trying to install Slackware on my Dell laptop. I'm not entirely new to Linux, but let's just say my only experience currently is about 7 or 8 months of Ubuntu.

bobaye · 06-29-2008, 10:21 PM

I'm trying to do the same with no better luck so far.................(One thing I notice in your post is machine address codes - you may want to overwright those for security reasons), I've been cautioned on that myself.
Wish I could be more help, I'll be following this thread for any help offered.
I can put up a little info though, I'm working with a new install of Slack 12.1.
It's on a hp ze2000 laptop and uses a Ralink 2500/rt61 pcmcia card.
The card shows up as wlan0, iwlist shows my linksys wrt54g by it's network name, and it appears that there's at least some TX/RX packet exchange going on (by ifconfig a- anyway).
I have been reading a bunch, and have done the recommended edits to
rc.wireless.conf.
No luck with wireless yet though, and I'd rather not go the ndiswrapper route as it looks like my chip is actually supported well enough.
Is there a short bus for some of us non-pragrammer types?
I'd rather not break the install so soon if I can possibly avoid it.
:-)

Greenfuse · 06-29-2008, 11:10 PM

flintmecha
It appears from the output of iwconfig that your wireless has authenticated correctly with the access point

What is the result of
ifconfig wlan0

Is your gateway set?

Can you ping your access point?