[SOLVED] WiFi : (my) slackware15x64 fails connecting to Xfinity hotspots

I have about 10 years experience with slackware. But only 1 month's experience with any kind of WiFi.

I am using a dual-boot win7/slackware15 laptop, with a rtl8812au usb wireless adapter.

From the windows side, it connects to every AP I have tried. Including "Xfinity now wifi pass" with the ssid "xfinitywifi".

After I built the linux driver for rtl8812au from it's github repo, Slackware can connect to every AP *except* "xfinitywifi". Every time I try to connect to xfinity wifi, I get an error message "supplicant took too long to authenticate". I am using networkmanager (nmcli).

Users of other distros tell me they can access xfinity hotspots just fine. But I am not going to blame Slackware - given my inexperience with wifi, it is pretty sure I just have things configured wrong.

If any slackware users can access xfinity wifi, perhaps you could advise me re: your working wifi configs?

Thank you, in advance.

It's probably a protocol thing with the Xfinity. Most folks use the init scripts for wifi, interface 4 in rc.inet1.conf & rc.wifi (which rc.inet1 starts)

A useful command:

sudo iwlist wlan0 scan

run this from a terminal under X so you can scroll back. Post the xfinity output.

Have a look at the wpa_supplicant man page, useful because you see all the weird and wonderful protocols that wpa_supplicant can use but that NM might be puking on. We can configure them if needs be.

This page seems to suggest a particular type of authentication is required:
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1257...-kubuntu-20-04

If you look at the "man wpa_supplicant page under "supported features, there is a range of protocol pairs which are usually employed together in key management. In /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf, these are mentioned in the network section.

network={
               ssid="MY-ESSID"
               scan_ssid=1
               key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
               #psk="MY-PLAINTEXT PASSWO0RD"
               psk=MY-SUPER-LONG-ENCRYPTED-PASSWORD-GOING-ON-FOREVER
}

I have highlighted the key management in bold, and that's what you need to fiddle. You have an idea what you want.Choose from the list & try. Then (as root) try a connection, something like

wpa_supplicant -D nl80211 -i wlan0 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

That will display the negotiation on stdout. The '-D' option adds debug. This leaves NM out totally, but once you make sense of the options you can set up NM, I'm sure.

Once wpa_supplicant is happy, grab another terminal and use 'sudo dhcpcd wlan0' to actually connect.

Originally Posted by business_kid It's probably a protocol thing with the Xfinity. Most folks use the init scripts for wifi, interface 4 in rc.inet1.conf & rc.wifi (which rc.inet1 starts) A useful command: sudo iwlist wlan0 scan run this from a terminal under X so you can scroll back. Post the xfinity output. Have a look at the wpa_supplicant man page, useful because you see all the weird and wonderful protocols that wpa_supplicant can use but that NM might be puking on. We can configure them if needs be.

nmcli device wifi connect "xfinitywifi"
Error: Connection activation failed: (11) 802.1X supplicant took too long to authenticate.

Here is a sample of the xfinity hotspots I am trying to access. They are all pretty much the same, except for their mac-address and channel and signal strength.

They are not encrypted, no key needed. After connecting, which I can only do from windows right now, one must go to a portal landing page and login. But from my Slackware installation, I get no connection and there is no landing page for me to go to.

iwlist wlan0 scan
wlan0     Scan completed :
.
.
.
Cell 44 - Address: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
                    ESSID:"xfinitywifi"
                    Protocol:IEEE 802.11AC
                    Mode:Master
                    Frequency:5.22 GHz (Channel 44)
                    Encryption key:off
                    Bit Rates:1.56 Gb/s
                    Quality=64/100  Signal level=51/100
                    Extra:fm=0002
.
.
.
Cell 46 - Address: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
                    ESSID:"xfinitywifi"
                    Protocol:IEEE 802.11an
                    Mode:Master
                    Frequency:5.22 GHz (Channel 44)
                    Encryption key:off
                    Bit Rates:300 Mb/s
                    Quality=79/100  Signal level=65/100
                    Extra:fm=0002

Xfinity also has secured hotspots, which I have not bothered trying because they specifically state that Linuxes are *NOT* supported. Those are all pretty much the same too.

Cell 53 - Address: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
                    ESSID:"Xfinity Mobile"
                    Protocol:IEEE 802.11AC
                    Mode:Master
                    Frequency:5.785 GHz
                    Encryption key:on
                    Bit Rates:1.7335 Gb/s
                    Extra:rsn_ie=30140100000fac040100000fac040100000fac010000
                    IE: IEEE 802.11i/WPA2 Version 1
                        Group Cipher : CCMP
                        Pairwise Ciphers (1) : CCMP
                        Authentication Suites (1) : 802.1x
                    Quality=67/100  Signal level=60/100
                    Extra:fm=0002

What happens when you try with dhcpcd or dhclient?

dhcpcd wlan0

Originally Posted by business_kid What happens when you try with dhcpcd or dhclient? dhcpcd wlan0

% nmcli device wifi connect "xfinitywifi"
Error: Connection activation failed: (11) 802.1X supplicant took too long to authenticate.

% dhcpcd wlan0
dhcpcd-9.4.1 starting
DUID xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
wlan0: waiting for carrier
timed out

% nmcli device wifi connect "xfinitywifi"
Error: Timeout 90 sec expired.
Error: Connection activation failed: (0) No reason given.

Interesting. After trying dhcpcd, a second attempt to connect failed with a different error message.

The first thing the dhcp protocol does is ask "Is there (server) there?" Apparently it's not getting a response. Time to grok the long man pages of each program.

Since 24 hours ago, the problem accessing "xfinitywifi" hotspots no longer happens. I wish I could say I solved it, because then I would know what the problem was, and I would be wiser for it. But no, I had changed nothing in my config. The problem just went away by itself.

I could theorize that some network engineer working at xfinity might have been reading this forum, said "ohh ...", and made some tiny network-wide change to fix it. But that would probably be just my imagination.