Linux - Wireless NetworkingThis forum is for the discussion of wireless networking in Linux.
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Originally posted by kronixx What do you mean by a name server, and how would I find one? I have a normal NIC card, and it works just FINE without the resolv.conf file, or is that file wlan specific?
A nameserver resolves host names ("linuxquestions.org") to
IP addresses ("64.179.4.146"). But if you can't even ping
by IP address yet, a nameserver isn't your first problem :-)
If you're on Suse and you've gotten another NIC card working
"automagically", I wonder if the "ifup" scripts are working for
that interface, and if we could set them up for "wlan0".
Do you have any files with names like:
/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-<whatever>
What's in them?
On my system (admittedly not Suse), I've created
a "/etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-wlan0" that looks
like this:
---snip---
DEVICE=wlan0
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.1.1
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
PEERDNS=yes
ONBOOT=no
---snip---
When I run my "wlanup" script and it "insmod"s the
driver into the kernel, the kernel invokes "/sbin/ifup"
(indirectly, via /etc/hotplug/net.agent). This script
reads the config file above and does the necessary
"ifconfig", "route", setting up resolv.conf, etc.
If you've already got a "ifcfg-eth0" file that works, creating
a similar "ifcfg-wlan0" can't hurt. (You'd also want to remove
the explicit "ifconfig" from your wlanup script in this case).
Originally posted by ginster I'm trying to verify them with iwconfig or iwlist or checking the /proc/rtl8180/status and even though i'm calling iwpriv wlan0 wlan_para channel=6, nothing is showing that this actually happened. What can I do to verify these settings??? My wlanup script insmod's the driver, sets the ssid2scan, networktype, channel, and wep off, in that order, then calls enable. I get three short blinks out of my link light on the card and then it's black.
This sounds like what happened to me when my card settings didn't
match my router settings.
I got pretty good at reading the debug output of the driver in these
cases. Try adding this:
/sbin/iwpriv wlan0 msglevel 2
just after the "insmod" in your "wlanup" script. Run the script, and
then eyeball the end of "/var/log/messages", from the last
"****RTL8180 ... loaded****" message to the end. Anything look strange?
If you can't make sense of it, post the output here and I'll try
to decipher it.
Incidentally, in my so-far-unsuccessful quest to get this working
without "SSID Broadcasting" on my router, I've discovered that
the "wlan_para channel" seems to be ignored. When the driver
is "enable"-ed, it scans all 12 channels looking for the SSID and
just uses whichever channel it gets a probe response on.
"wlan_para channel" must only be used (like a lot of the other parameters) in "adhoc" mode, where the card itself has to act
as an access point. I wish the readme was a little clearer on stuff like this.
Thought I'd update my status. I did compile a 2.4.20 kernel and could insmod the driver without the computer dying. However, I couldn't quite get it working and was having other problems with my Mandrake install, so I decided to reformat and install a clean Redhat 9.
After doing so, I have been able to insmod the driver fine. I edited a wlanup script to match my settings here and dhclient and ifconfig wouldn't work. BUT, after making an ifcfg-wlan0 script, I did an ifup-wlan0 got online! Pretty excited after a few weeks to get to this point.
Now though I've taken my laptop to work and haven't quite figured out why I'm not able to connect the wireless AP here, though I'm pretty confident it's just settings of some sort. (I've got a linksys AP at home and there's a D-Link AP here). So will hopefully find the right set of settings for this guy and will be up at home and work. =)
In my /var/log/messages this is what I'm getting after wlandown script:
kernel: ***** RTL8180 Wireless Lan Driver Version 1.1 (2003-05-22) removed *****
This is what I'm getting after wlanup:
kernel:
/etc/hotplug/net.agent: register event not handled
(yes, that's a blank kernel: line) Could this be a hint? I've tried insmod with a -f and without ... same result.
Originally posted by ginster
This is what I'm getting after wlanup:
kernel:
/etc/hotplug/net.agent: register event not handled
(yes, that's a blank kernel: line)
That net.agent message might be interesting later, but you have to get the wireless parts working before you can worry about the
networking parts. If your card's "LINK" light isn't blinking, the wireless
parts aren't working yet.
There should have been a lot of "RTL8180:" and "wlan0" lines
in /var/log/messages at around the same time, showing the
card scanning for an active channel and then trying to associate
with an access point. If you post them, we can try to figure out
what's going wrong.
That's what I'm saying ... not getting any messages from wlanup. The only blinking is 2 or 3 quick one's when the iwpriv enable is called. Beleive me, I'd love to post some output for analysis ... but I'm gettin nothin.
Hmm, maybe this is a distro difference. "/etc/syslog.conf" specifies
where syslog messages go. On RedHat, it includes:
---snip---
*.info;mail.none;authpriv.none;cron.none /var/log/messages
---snip---
which means send pretty much everything (except mail, authpriv
and cron messages) to "/var/log/messages".
Anyway, check yours to see where Slackware sent all those driver
messages.
my syslog.conf file looks fine. should be output going to the /var/log/messages, but still getting none. so not sure what to do on that front.
BUT - just screwing around with the iwpriv settings in my script i discovered that by setting the type to auto and making sure the channel is set then the link light will start blinking and not stop until i wlandown. is there a hint there? i played around with all the settings i could, but they still don't really look like they're doing anything because iwconfig and iwlist don't show me my changes ...
"iwconfig" and "iwlist" don't work because this driver apparently
doesn't play nice with the wireless configuration API. finegan
had a post on this earlier.
If you've got the "LINK" light blinking, and "/proc/rtl8180/status"
shows the MAC address of your router as the BSSID, maybe it's working.
You could always try configuring networking through the "wlan0"
device and see what happens.
Ouch, sorry to make you re-type all those messages!
I had to reset my router again today (after failing *again* to get
SSID broadcasting turned off. Grrr!), so I tried a few variations.
These messages:
---snip---
RTL8180: No BSS detected, start an IBSS.wlan0: SwChnl Set PHY channel number = 6
...
wlan0_MLME-NicBeaconSetup set beaconItv=100, AtimWnd=25
wlan0_MLME-NicBeaconSetup set BintrItv=32, IMR=0x60cf
wlan0_MLME-SetupBeaconPacket setup ssid element in beacon frame
---snip---
come out only if you're trying to run in "networktype=adhoc" mode.
I don't know if that's what you really want, but I've only used
"networktype=infra", which my router (a Linksys BEFW11S4)
seems to like. Indeed, a quick Google seems to indicate this
router has some "adhoc" problems.
When I tried "adhoc", I got all the same failures as you, except
I also got this during the scanning portion:
---snip---
wlan0:SwChnl Set PHY channel number = 6
RTL8180: Scan PHY channel number = 6
wlan0_MLME-OnProbeRsp Get value from probe response!
---snip---
showing the router was at least responding to probes. Only
by actually turning my router off could I duplicate exactly what
you typed.
So I'd suggest trying "networktype=infra", and then if that
doesn't work, just stamping up and down on the router :-)
I have tried everything from this thread but I still can't get it to go om my Dell i8500 with Mandrake 9.1. I can set it all up and everything works fine withe my AP turned off. Module loads, wlanup sets all parameters. As soon as the AP is on the system freezes withe the capslock and scroll lock lights flashing.
Downloading RedHat 9.0 now as it seems that helped steven999. I still think there must be some way around the crashes but I can't find it. Any ideas?
yes, using redhat things have been working well for me. i still haven't gone about getting the link up automatically with system scripts, but upping it manually for now and it's fine.
i tried using a different kernel on redhat, i think 2.4.20-11 that had some modifications to the kernel for low latency and other things. that also refused to work with the driver.
i did get pretty far with compiling a 2.4.20 kernel on mandrake, which you might want to try. if you download a stock 2.4.20 kernel and do 'make xconfig', there's an option to load a configuration in. doing that, you can select /boot/config which is a symlink (should be) to the config for the mandrake 2.4.21 kernel that comes with mandrake 9.1.
after that, i did get much further along the process, perhaps even all the way though not knowing it. i ended up switching to redhat as i just got frustrated, but there were other reasons besides the need for wireless.
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