I am running a FC3 and have an atheros wireless chipset.I got the madwifi driver installed and configured for the card and am able to access wireless networks that do not have an encryption key with ease.

So, for accessing encrypted N/W's i got the wpa supplicant and have compilied the binaries and installed it.But, I am not very sure of my config. file for this i.e., (wpa_supplicant.conf)

Here is how it looks:
# default, wpa_cli will use it when trying to connect with wpa_supplicant.
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=0
eapol_version=1
ap_scan=1
fast_reauth=1

#I just have this block in
network={
ssid="mynetwork"
psk= (my key in hex)
priority=5
}

So, after this when I run
$wpa_supplicant -i atho -D madwifi -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

I get error as ssid "my network" could not be parsed. can anyone suggest what could be the problem?

Thanks

Is the interface up?
Try running wpa_supplicant with the -dd flag to enable debug output to get some clues

[root@localhost wpa_supplicant-0.3.8]# wpa_supplicant -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -D madwifi -i ath0 -dd
Initializing interface 'ath0' conf '/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf' driver 'madwifi'
Configuration file '/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf' -> '/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf'
Reading configuration file '/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf'
ctrl_interface='/var/run/wpa_supplicant'
ctrl_interface_group=0
eapol_version=1
ap_scan=1
fast_reauth=1
Line: 264 - start of a new network block
Line 265: failed to parse ssid ' "mynetwork"'.
Line 265: failed to parse ssid ' "mynetwork"'.
scan_ssid=1 (0x1)
Line 268: unknown network field 'key_mgmt '.
Line 269: unknown network field 'WEP104'.
Line 270: unknown network field 'key_mgmt '.
priority=5 (0x5)
Line 272: WPA-PSK accepted for key management, but no PSK configured.
Line 272: failed to parse network block.
Failed to read configuration file '/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf'.
[root@localhost wpa_supplicant-0.3.8]#

Thats what I get @ the command prompt.
I have a 26bit(hex) WEP_key and once again this is how my network block in /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf looks like:

network={
ssid= "mynetwork"
scan_ssid=1
#psk= 2dd70a2b54c2df25f92152d853(I think I do not need this)
key_mgmt = IEEE8021X
WEP104= xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (my 26 bit key)
priority=5
}