SUSE & openSUSE » Wireless

BCM4311/4312/4321/4322 Wireless in openSUSE 11.3

admin — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 21:46:32 +0000

In openSUSE 11.3, laptops installed with the BCM4311/BCM4312/BCM4321/BCM4322 Wireless LAN cards like the Dell Inspiron 1525 do not have drivers installed and hence do not work out of the box. In Dell this Wireless card is labelled as “Dell 1395 Wireless card”. The broadcom-wl package which contain Broadcom’s IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n hybrid Linux® device driver for use with Broadcom’s BCM4311-, BCM4312-, BCM4321-, and BCM4322-based hardware doesn’t seem to work.

To get your Wireless up and running, you need your Wired Ethernet assistance to connect to the internet and download the b43-firmware package 1-click installer.
To check and confirm the Broadcom wireless card installed on your Laptop:

Annai:~ # lspci|grep -i broad
0b:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01

Click to download and automatically start YST package manager. Follow the onscreen instructions to complete the installation. Once installed, reboot your laptop and run the following command:

Annai:~ # /usr/sbin/install_bcm43xx_firmware
Downloading b43 firmware
######################################################################## 100.0%

Extracting b43 firmware

This file is recognised as:

ID : FW15

filename : wl_apsta.o

version : 478.104

MD5 : bb8537e3204a1ea5903fe3e66b5e2763

Extracting b43/ucode5.fw

Extracting b43/pcm5.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0bsinitvals5.fw

Extracting b43/a0g0bsinitvals5.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0initvals5.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1initvals5.fw

Extracting b43/a0g0initvals5.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1bsinitvals5.fw

Extracting b43/ucode9.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1initvals9.fw

Extracting b43/a0g0bsinitvals9.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0bsinitvals9.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0initvals9.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1bsinitvals9.fw

Extracting b43/a0g0initvals9.fw

Extracting b43/ucode11.fw

Extracting b43/n0bsinitvals11.fw

Extracting b43/n0absinitvals11.fw

Extracting b43/n0initvals11.fw

Extracting b43/ucode13.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0initvals13.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1bsinitvals13.fw

Extracting b43/a0g1initvals13.fw

Extracting b43/lp0bsinitvals13.fw

Extracting b43/b0g0bsinitvals13.fw

Extracting b43/lp0initvals13.fw

Extracting b43/ucode14.fw

Extracting b43/lp0initvals14.fw

Extracting b43/lp0bsinitvals14.fw

Extracting b43/ucode15.fw

Extracting b43/lp0bsinitvals15.fw

Extracting b43/lp0initvals15.fw

Extracting b43/ucode16.fw

Extracting b43/n0bsinitvals16.fw

Extracting b43/sslpn0initvals16.fw

Extracting b43/n0initvals16.fw

Extracting b43/lp0initvals16.fw

Extracting b43/sslpn0bsinitvals16.fw

Extracting b43/lp0bsinitvals16.fw

Downloading b43legacy firmware

######################################################################## 100.0%

Extracting b43legacy firmware

This file is recognised as:

ID : FW10

filename : wl_apsta.o

version : 295.14

MD5 : e08665c5c5b66beb9c3b2dd54aa80cb3

Extracting b43legacy/ucode2.fw

Extracting b43legacy/ucode4.fw

Extracting b43legacy/ucode5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/ucode11.fw

Extracting b43legacy/pcm4.fw

Extracting b43legacy/pcm5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g0bsinitvals2.fw

Extracting b43legacy/b0g0bsinitvals5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g0initvals5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g1bsinitvals5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g0initvals2.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g1initvals5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/b0g0bsinitvals2.fw

Extracting b43legacy/b0g0initvals5.fw

Extracting b43legacy/b0g0initvals2.fw

Extracting b43legacy/a0g0bsinitvals5.fw

b43 firmware successfully installed.

b43legacy firmware successfully installed.

This should enable your Wireless Card on your laptop.

To confirm

Annai:~ # iwconfig

lo no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

wlan0 IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:”xxxxx”

Mode:Managed Frequency:2.412 GHz Access Point: AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF

Bit Rate=1 Mb/s Tx-Power=20 dBm

Retry long limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off

Encryption key:off

Power Management:off

Link Quality=70/70 Signal level=-22 dBm

Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0

Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

pan0 no wireless extensions.

You can now connect your Wireless network from your Network Manager

Atheros AR5418 Wireless using madwifi in openSUSE & SLED SP2

admin — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 00:10:26 +0000

If you are using Atheros AR5418 Wireless PCI Express Adapter then you can use the Madwifi driver package from the development trunk for the AR5008 family to get your Wireless up and running. Ths madwifir driver package supports the AR5418 chipset. This means you can directly use the Wireless native drivers without having to use ndiswrapper and Windows XP Drivers.

You need to install the Kernel Source and header files, the GNU Compiler, make utility and SVN client packages before we proceed to download and install the madwifi driver package from trunk.

opensuse11:~ # yast2 -i gcc make kernel-source kernel-headers kdesvn

This should install the relevant packages prior to install the madwifi drivers.

Download the latest madwifi package from the trunk to your current directory (better create a directory like madwifi and download into that directory as follows):

opensuse11:~ # mkdir madwifi
opensuse11:~ # cd madwifi
opensuse11:~/madwifi # svn co http://svn.madwifi.org/madwifi/trunk

This should download the latest madwifi package into the newly created madwifi directory.

Install Madwifi

Now, change to the downloaded trunk directory and install as follows:

opensuse11:~/madwifi # cd trunk
opensuse11:~/madwifi/trunk # make && make install

This should compile and install madwifi wireless package for you.

Now, insert the installed Atheros Wireless module as follows:

opensuse11:~/madwifi/trunk # modprobe ath_pci

This should insert the module and get your Wireless up and should enable you to configure the wireless device from the Network Manager.

SuSE Enterprise Linux SP2 (SLED SP2) x86_64 (64bit)

In SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED SP2) x86_64 (64-bit), the following changes to the Makefile.inc and net80211/ieee80211_crypto_ccmp.c under the trunk directory is neccessary to get installed properly.

Edit the file Makefile.inc and look for the line

WARNINGS = -Werror -Wall

and remove the entry “-Werror” so it looks like

WARNINGS = -Wall

Similarly, edit the file ieee80211_crypto_ccmp.c under trunk/net802111 directory and go to the line number 343 (in vi use this command :343 to go to the line 343)

and change it from

crypto_cipher_encrypt(tfm, &sg_dst, &sg_src, AES_BLOCK_LEN);

to look like

//crypto_cipher_encrypt(tfm, &sg_dst, &sg_src, AES_BLOCK_LEN);

Now, install as explained earlier to install smoothly.

rtl8187b wireless native driver support in openSUSE 11.1 (Kernel 2.6.27)

admin — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 23:17:54 +0000

Users of Realtek RTL 8187b Wireless cards have something to cheer with the coming of openSUSE 11.1. With openSUSE 11.1, the default Linux Kernel 2.6.27 integrated rtl8187 native drivers works well for the Realtek rtl8187b wireless cards.

Previous versions of the Linux kernel used in the earlier versions of openSUSE did not support the 8187b wireless card and hence have to be used with ndiswrapper and Windows version of the driver.

If you are using a Realtek rtl8187b wireless device then it is good to upgrade your openSUSE to openSUSE 11.1. Alternatively, you can upgrade yourLinux Kernel to the2.6.27 or later to have native driver support and remove all ndiswrapper configurartions for better performance.

To check you Linux Kernel Version

opensuse11:~ # uname -a
Linux opensuse11 2.6.27.7-9-default #1 SMP 2008-12-04 18:10:04 +0100 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Fix BCM4311/4312/4321/4322 Wireless in openSUSE 11.1 and earlier

admin — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 20:06:41 +0000

In openSUSE 11.1, laptops installed with the BCM4311/BCM4312/BCM4321/BCM4322 Wireless LAN cards like the Dell Inspiron 1525 do not have drivers installed and hence do not work out of the box. In Dell this Wireless card is labelled as “Dell 1395 Wireless card”. Broadcom has released a linux version of its driver both 32-bit (x86) and 64bit (x86_64) editions for BCM4311, BCM4312, BCM4321 & BCM4322 Wireless cards. A 1-click install Yast Metapackage file (YMP) is available for install from Packman which makes it easy to get your wireless up and running in no time.

While this procedure is written for openSUSE 11.1, it should just work fine for openSUSE 11.0, openSUSE 10.3 as well as the 1-click install supports these versions.

Check the install Wireless module to confirm it is one of the above listed Broadcom Wireless devices.

openSUSE11_1:~ # lspci|grep -i broad
0b:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g (rev 01)

Click this to download and automatically start YaST Package manager. Click Next on the installation Welcome screen and click “Customize” on the screen showing the Repository and the packages selected to install. Click Next on the repository selection and screen.

And finally, in the screen showing the list of packages selected to install, untick the drivers for custom Kernels like Kernel-pae, Kernel-trace & Kernel-xen (unless you use any of these Kernel versions than the default one).

This means you will untick the following:

Broadcom-wl-kmp-pae
Broadcom-wl-kmp-trace
Broadcom-wl-kmp-xen

and finally, click Next on the proposal screen. This will start adding the packman repository and download and install the required driver packages and required dependencies. Click Finish when the drivers have successfully installed on your openSUSE.

Now, insert the installed wireless module

openSUSE11_1:~ # modprobe wl

Now, confirm the Kernel module is loaded on your openSUSE

openSUSE11_1:~ # lsmod | grep wl
wl 1080320 0
ieee80211_crypt 6476 2 ieee80211_crypt_tkip,wl

Confirm with the iwconfig command:

openSUSE11_1:~ # iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

pan0      no wireless extensions.

eth1      IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:”"
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.412 GHz Access Point: Not-Associated
Bit Rate:54 Mb/s   Tx-Power:32 dBm
Retry min limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
Power Managementmode:All packets received
Link Quality=5/5 Signal level=0 dBm Noise level=0 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

You are now ready to go, you should already see your KNetworkManager adjusting itself to insert the wireless (eth1 in my laptop) into its list of active devices.

From KnetworkManager, click “New Connection” and select your wireless device (eth1) in my laptop, select your Wireless Network from the list of scanned networks (or manually enter the details if your Wireless network doesn’t broadcast), click next and enter your Encryption details and click Connect & Save. You should now be up and running with your Wireless.

openSUSE11_1:~ # iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

eth0      no wireless extensions.

eth1      IEEE 802.11bg ESSID:”SKY12345″
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:11:42:F3:AA:6E
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   Tx-Power:32 dBm
Retry min limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
Power Managementmode:All packets received
Link Quality=5/5 Signal level=-29 dBm Noise level=-89 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:14 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

pan0      no wireless extensions.

iwevents – Track Wireless events on the Wireless interfaces on your system

admin — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:52:41 +0000

iwevents is yet another linux utility which helps track any events related to the Wireless Interfaces on the network. iwevents can monitor for events related to the settings of the interfaces itself. For instance, a change to the encryption key, ESSID etc done via iwconfig command or events related to the hardware itself like the device joining a new Wireless network, scan completion (using iwlist), packet dropped, driver event, node registration, node expiration.

Simply run the command without any arguements. In the following example, I simply switched off my Wireless Router and restarted again to trigger some events.

opensuse11:~ # iwevents
Waiting for Wireless Events from interfaces…
19:46:47.447103   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:01.551857   wlan0    Scan request completed
19:47:05.161466   wlan0    Scan request completed
19:47:05.161865   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162313   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162342   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162358   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162371   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162384   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.162871   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:Not-Associated
19:47:05.163403   wlan0    Set Mode:Managed
19:47:05.163499   wlan0    Set Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
19:47:05.163616   wlan0    Set ESSID:”SKYNET”
19:47:05.171008   wlan0    Custom driver event:ASSOCINFO(ReqIEs=0008534b593532313438010802040b160c12182432043048606cdd160050f20101000050f20201000050f20201000050f202 RespIEs=010882848b0c1296182432043048606cdd0900037f01010000ff7f)
19:47:05.171054   wlan0    New Access Point/Cell address:00:11:22:23:AF:6E

iwspy – Check Wireless link quality in Linux by monitoring IP/MAC/Host addresses

admin — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 18:39:34 +0000

iwspy is a linux utility to check the link quality by checking against an IP Address or a Hardware address (MAC-Address) or DNS hostname (resolved through DNS) that is attached to the same Wireless network as the host itself. The reason being it depends on the ARP cache on the system. So, if there is an addresses not in the ARP cache you can then ping once before trying. iwlist can help you to set upto 8 addresses which can be monitored and read back the quality of the link.

This utility is again based on the driver support and the /proc/net/wireless where the quality of link, signal strength and noise levels are updated each timea packet is received. This means, more the number of addresses montiored the more is the overhead on the driver. I didn’t have much of a luck with my Intel 3945 wireless card with Compat drivers.

The syntax is

iwspy [interface]
iwspy interface [+] DNSNAME | IPADDR | HWADDR [...]
iwspy interface off
iwspy interface setthr low high
iwspy interface getthr

For instance

opensuse11:~ # iwspy wlan0 192.168.0.1

or

opensuse11:~ # iwspy wlan0 00:11:22:33:44:55

To turn off monitoring

opensuse11:~ # iwspy wlan0 off

Set/Get Signal threshold values

To display the current threshold values

opensuse11:~ # iwspy wlan0 getthr

To set the value

opensuse11:~ # iwspy wlan0 setthr

iwlist – Detailed information from Wireless Interface & Wireless scan in Linux

admin — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 22:22:48 +0000

iwlist command in Linux is used to extract more detailed information from a Wireless Network interface which may not be available from running the iwconfig command. This includes detailed information on available Wireless networks, Frequencies supported, power management support, Encryption key sizes supported, WPA keys configured on the device etc.

The general syntax is

iwlist

If no interface is specified, it will display information on all interfaces available on the system

Simply,type iwlist or iwlist –help to find a detailed list.

opensuse11:~ # iwlist

or

opensuse11:~ # iwlist –help
Usage: iwlist [interface] scanning [essid NNN] [last]
[interface] frequency
[interface] channel
[interface] bitrate
[interface] rate
[interface] encryption
[interface] keys
[interface] power
[interface] txpower
[interface] retry
[interface] ap
[interface] accesspoints
[interface] peers
[interface] event
[interface] auth
[interface] wpakeys
[interface] genie
[interface] modulation

Scanning
The most used option is the “scanning” which scans for all available access points, ad-hoc wireless devices etc within the range with detailed information which depends on the cards capabilities.
My Intel 3945 picked up as many as 10 Wireless networks within range and I need to cutdown on the list

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 scan
wlan0 Scan completed :
Cell 01 – Address: 00:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
ESSID:”Live1″
Mode:Master
Channel:1
Frequency:2.412 GHz (Channel 1)
Quality=46/100 Signal level:-81 dBm Noise level=-69 dBm
Encryption key:on
IE: WPA Version 1
Group Cipher : TKIP
Pairwise Ciphers (1) : TKIP
Authentication Suites (1) : PSK
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s; 9 Mb/s
12 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s
Extra:tsf=000000155fac7185
Extra: Last beacon: 3268ms ago
Cell 02 – Address: 01:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
ESSID:”SKYNET”
Mode:Master
Channel:6
Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
Quality=94/100 Signal level:-35 dBm Noise level=-69 dBm
Encryption key:on
IE: WPA Version 1
Group Cipher : TKIP
Pairwise Ciphers (1) : TKIP
Authentication Suites (1) : PSK
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s
9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s; 24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s
48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
Extra:tsf=00000001779b1581
Extra: Last beacon: 4ms ago

Display Channels/Frequencies

To display the channels and frequencies supported by the device

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 channel

or

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 frequency
wlan0 19 channels in total; available frequencies :
Channel 01 : 2.412 GHz
Channel 02 : 2.417 GHz
Channel 03 : 2.422 GHz
Channel 04 : 2.427 GHz
Channel 05 : 2.432 GHz
Channel 06 : 2.437 GHz
Channel 07 : 2.442 GHz
Channel 08 : 2.447 GHz
Channel 09 : 2.452 GHz
Channel 10 : 2.457 GHz
Channel 11 : 2.462 GHz
Channel 36 : 5.18 GHz
Channel 40 : 5.2 GHz
Channel 44 : 5.22 GHz
Channel 48 : 5.24 GHz
Channel 52 : 5.26 GHz
Channel 56 : 5.28 GHz
Channel 60 : 5.3 GHz
Channel 64 : 5.32 GHz
Current Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)

Display Bit Rates supported

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 rate

or

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 bitrate
wlan0 unknown bit-rate information.
Current Bit Rate:54 Mb/s

Display Encryption Key Sizes and Keys set

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 keys

or

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 encryption
wlan0 2 key sizes : 40, 104bits
4 keys available :
[1]: off
[2]: xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx (256 bits)
[3]: yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy-yyyy (256 bits)
[4]: off
Current Transmit Key: [2]
Security mode:open

Display Power Management options

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 power
wlan0 Current mode:off

Display Transmit Power available

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 txpower
wlan0 unknown transmit-power information.

Current Tx-Power=15 dBm (31 mW)

Display Retry Transmit/Lifetime on device

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 retry
wlan0 Fixed limit ; min limit:0
max limit:255
Current mode:on
min limit:7
max limit:4

Display Wireless Events supported

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 events
wlan0 Wireless Events supported :
0x8B04 : Set Frequency/Channel (kernel generated)
0x8B06 : Set Mode (kernel generated)
0x8B15 : New Access Point/Cell address – roaming
0x8B19 : Scan request completed
0x8B1A : Set ESSID (kernel generated)
0x8B2A : Set Encoding (kernel generated)

Display WPA Authentication parameters

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 auth
wlan0 Authentication capabilities :
WPA
WPA2
CIPHER-TKIP
CIPHER-CCMP
Current Authentication algorithm :
open

Display Encryption Keys set

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 wpa
wlan0 2 key sizes : 40, 104bits
4 keys available :
Error reading wpa keys (SIOCGIWENCODEEXT): Operation not supported

Display Generic Informartion Elements (WPA)

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 genie
wlan0 no generic IE (Operation not supported).

Display supported Modulations

opensuse11:~ # iwlist wlan0 modulation
wlan0 unknown modulation information.

iwconfig – Wireless Interface configuration utility in Linux

admin — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 21:29:32 +0000

Iwconfig like ifconfig is a Wireless interface configuration utility in Linux.It is used to set the parameters of the network interface which are specific to the wireless operation. Iwconfig may also be used to display the parameters and the wireless statistics. iwconfig extracts these information from /proc/net/wireless file.

In the simplest form, simply typing the command without any arguements displays the current status of all the Wireless interfaces on the system:

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig
lo        no wireless extensions.

wmaster0 no wireless extensions.

wlan0     IEEE 802.11abg ESSID:”xxxxxxxx”
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:11:22:33:44:55
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   Tx-Power=15 dBm
Retry min limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr=2352 B
Encryption key:xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx [2]   Security mode:open
Power Management:off
Link Quality=96/100 Signal level:-32 dBm Noise level=-69 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

Alternatively, you can run the command with an interface name like the following:

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0
wlan0     IEEE 802.11abg ESSID:”xxxxxxxx”
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: 00:11:22:33:44:55
Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   Tx-Power=15 dBm
Retry min limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr=2352 B
Encryption key:xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx [2]   Security mode:open
Power Management:off
Link Quality=96/100 Signal level:-32 dBm Noise level=-69 dBm
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

Set operation Mode
The Wireless interface can be set to one of the following different modes which impacts how the device operates:

managed – Node is a client connecting to an Access Point
master – Node acts as an Acces point
secondary – Node acts as a Secondary to a master Access point
ad-hoc – Operates in a One to One Ad-hoc connection to another Wireless device
monitor – Doesn’t connect to any Wireless network but sits and listens on all the packets on a frequency
repeater – Forwards packets between wireless nodes

The mode can be set as follows:

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig mode

For example

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 mode managed

The above sets the interface wlan0 in managed mode.

Set ESSID for Network

Once, the mode is set, we can go ahead and set the essid of the network to which we connect

The ESSID can be set as

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig essid

For instance,

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 essid “ABC-WIFI”

Set Wireless Key (WEP)

We can set the WEP Encryption key (64bit or 128 bit)

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig key

For example,

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 key 1234-5678-9101-1213

To disable WEP key

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 key off

or to connect to an open network

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 key open

Setting Channel which the interface uses

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 channel

For example,

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 channel auto

or

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 channel 11

to use channel 11.

There are other options that can be set using the iwconfig command. This can be found from the help or man page

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig –help
Usage: iwconfig [interface]
interface essid {NNN|any|on|off}
interface mode {managed|ad-hoc|master|…}
interface freq N.NNN[k|M|G]
interface channel N
interface bit {N[k|M|G]|auto|fixed}
interface rate {N[k|M|G]|auto|fixed}
interface enc {NNNN-NNNN|off}
interface key {NNNN-NNNN|off}
interface power {period N|timeout N|saving N|off}
interface nickname NNN
interface nwid {NN|on|off}
interface ap {N|off|auto}
interface txpower {NmW|NdBm|off|auto}
interface sens N
interface retry {limit N|lifetime N}
interface rts {N|auto|fixed|off}
interface frag {N|auto|fixed|off}
interface modulation {11g|11a|CCK|OFDMg|…}
interface commit
Check man pages for more details.

Let’s use the above for instance to quickly connect to a Wireless network as follows

opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 mode managed
opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 essid “ABC-WIFI”
opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 key 1111-2222-3333-4444
opensuse11:~ # iwconfig wlan0 channel auto

The above sets the wlan0 interface to managed mode so it can connect to a Wireless Access point. We then configure an ESSID of a network and then a related key and an auto channel selection.

NOTE: using WEP security is not secure and can be cracked in in minutes. We’ll cover soon the use of WPA/WPA2 for stronger protection from hackers.

Broadcom BCM4328 Wireless not working in openSUSE 11.0

admin — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 18:58:38 +0000

The broadcom BCM4328 Wirelss devices may not work with the current opensource drivers as it is not reverse engineered yet. The resolution would be to opt for the NDiswrapper option. One can use the Windows drivers with the NDiswrapper to workaround the situation.

NOTE: Please note this is a workaround only as using a Windows component may let your Kernel unsupported and there can be impact on the system performance as seen with older versions.

Download the Broadcom Windows driver from the oem websites like Compaq/HP, Dell etc as per your laptop/pc model. If you have access to Windows, then download and extract the files from the installer, the two files we are looking for are bcmwl5.inf and bcmwl5.sys

Alternatively, you can download drivers (R151517-pruned.zip) here posted by farimi for ubuntu users.

Download the drivers

opensuse11:~ # wget http://myspamb8.googlepages.com/R151517-pruned.zip

Unzip and extract the files

opensuse11:~ # unzip R151517-pruned.zip

This extracts the driver files we are looking for.

Unload the current broadcom driver kernel modules

Unload the current bcm43xx drivers and blacklist it before installing the ndiswrapper driver modules

opensuse11:~ # rmmod bcm43xx

opensuse11:~ # echo “blacklist bcm43xx” >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

Install NDisWrapper

opensuse11:~ # yast2 –install ndiswrapper

This installs the NDiswrapper.

Configure NDiswrapper to use the extracted driver

opensuse11:~ # ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5.inf

Update ndiswrapper config

opensuse11:~ # ndiswrapper -m

Initiate the ndiswrapper

opensuse11:~ # modprobe ndiswrapper

This loads the new ndiswrapper driver.

Now, make the Wireless card use this driver module from

YaST – “Network Devices” – “Network Settings”

Select the Wireless card, click Edit and then click Hardware Tab

Under Kernel module – select ndiswrapper as module and save the settings.

You are done, reboot the system and you should be online on your wireless with ndiswrapper driver.

WiFi Radar – opensource utility for managing WiFi profiles

admin — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 22:52:03 +0000

WiFi Radar is a Python/PyGTK2 utility for managing WiFi profiles. It enables you to scan for available networks and create profiles for your preferred networks. At boot time, running WiFi Radar will automatically scan for an available preferred network and connect to it. You can drag and drop your preferred networks to arrange the profile priority.

Install WiFi Radar

Pre-Requisites

To install WiFi Radar, you need the following installed on your PC or Laptop

Python

PyGTK2

iwconfig

opensuse11:~ # yast2 –install python python-gtk-2 iwconfig

Once installed, you can go ahead and install WiFi Radar. Packman has RPM packages from which WiFi Radar can be installed in openSUSE 11.0. For, openSUSE 10.3/10.2 there is a 1-Click install link to install the utility.

Install in openSUSE 11.0

opensuse11:~ # yast2 –install http://packman.links2linux.org/download/wifi-radar/130414/wifi-radar-1.9.8-0.pm.1.noarch.rpm

This should install the WiFi Radar software from RPM.

Install in openSUSE 103/10.2

For openSUSE 10.3 & 10.2, click the 1 click Install link and open with YaST2 installer to complete the installation.

WiFi Radar Run modes

QuickScan

WiFi Radar can run in two modes, one is a quick scan mode and connects to any available profiles

opensuse11:~ # wifi-radar -d

UI mode

To show the UI and manage profiles:

opensuse11:~ # wifi-radar &

WiFi Radar at Startup

To start the WiFi Radar at system startup, you may download the source Tar files from here and extract the files. There is a init_script available in the source packages which can be copied as wifi-radar file into /etc/init.d/ directory and set to run at the Run-Levels 2 3 and 5.

opensuse:~ # wget http://wifi-radar.systemimager.org/pub/wifi-radar-1.9.9.tar.bz2

opensuse:~ # tar -xjf wifi-radar-1.9.9.tar.bz2

opensuse:~ # cd wifi-radar-1.9.9

opensuse:~/wifi-radar-1.9.9 # cp init_script /etc/init.d/wifi-radar

opensuse:~ # chkconfig wifi-radar on

This should install and start WiFi Radar at System Startup!