Linux-wlan-ng problems... "/sbin/prism2dl"?

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

So I grabbed myself a shiny new Linksys WUSB12 usb wireless adapter, and went to setting it up...on my other machine, I use HostAP, but it apparently doesn't support USB Prism2 devices just yet, so I had to use the prism2_usb driver from the linux-wlan-ng package. Now here's my question...I've emerged the package, set up wlan.conf correctly and all that, but when I try to do a /etc/init.d/wlan start, it complains about not being able to find 'prism2dl', and then stops. Now, the script is working just find, because I sure can't find prism2dl myself, either =P Reading through the config files and the docs, it seems like it's some utility for updating firmware in Prism2 cards...why is this requried to even get the card up and running? And if it isn't...how badly do I need to change that script? And if so...where do I get it, and how do I know it's not going to randomly fry my new adapter? =)

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

Never mind, I managed to cut the script apart enough to not load that part...I had to tear it to pieces anyway, just to get 128-bit WEP working for some reason =\ Ah, well, it works now!

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

would you mind posting the changes that you made? I have a microsoft usb wlan adaptor that I tried setting up yesterday (uses the prism2 drivers as well) with no luck. I was doing it from source in a tar though (didn't realize there was an ebuild).

I'm going to try tonight with the ebuild, but I too will also need WEP working. If you don't mind, it would be nice to have that info incase I have problems.

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

Sure...here's a listing of the lines that are changed from the default wlan-ng install =) It's actually not that much, except for basically removing an entire function (the firmware loading one) and enabling wep (which for some reason in the scripts is not ever checked for enabling)...

/etc/wlan/shared.prism2:
prism2_fwload() {
(all lines commented out except for "return 0" at the end)
}

/etc/init.d/wlan:
(after the line "wlan_user_mibs $DEVICE")
wlan_wep $DEVICE

Of course, you also have to add the correct settings in your /etc/conf.d/wlan.conf and /etc/conf.d/wlancfg-your_ssid_here files...but with the wlan_wep function called, it actually *reads* those settings =P

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

Thanks! I got it working without having to edit those things though. Well, I don't have WEP going yet, but I haven't really tried either. That will be something for me to try tomorrow night

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

WEP was the big part for me...I have no idea where this prism2dl stuff came from, but the most recent version of linux-wlan-ng sure doesn't behave well on my computer =P I honestly couldn't find a place in the script where the function that inits the WEP settings would be called...hence having to add it by hand =)

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

that line that you added was already in the script that i had installed. One thing I don't understand is, in my wireless router, i have the encryption setup using letters and numbers (hex), but in the config file for the adapter, it wants in the form of xx:xx:xx:xx...etc

How do I convert it to that?

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

Really? Wow...I guess it's just me that's having a problem =) And that's fine, you just split the hex into two-character sets, like 12:34:56:78:9A:BC or however =)

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

ahhhhhh...knew it had to be something simple. I'll try that when i get home from work. Thanks!

-dyno

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

how do you get the network to start and grab an ip off of a boot?

i tried doing:

rc-update add wlan default

and it didn't seem to work. suggestions?

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

Using DHCP? Well, first, make sure that the following line is in your /etc/conf.d/net:

iface_wlan0="dhcp"

Then, add wlan and net.wlan0 (just do a 'cp /etc/init.d/net.eth0 /etc/init.d/net.wlan0 if it's not there) with:

rc-update add wlan default
rc-update add net.wlan0 default

And that should do it...

(note: you may need to add the "need wlan" line to the net.wlan0 file in the depend section, to ensure that your device is configured before the system tries to bring it up and use DHCP on it -- it's especially crucial if you're using WEP) =)

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

I followed your directions and now I'm getting a couple errors at boot. I don't think "/etc/init.d/wlan start" is being executed. I get an error about needed programs not being there.

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

What exactly is the error?

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

OK, so it looks like net.wlan0 isn't being brought up...what's in the depend() section of /etc/init.d/net.wlan0?

And, in the /etc/conf.d/wlancfg-yourssidhere (or /etc/conf.d/wlancfg-DEFAULT if you didn't set such a thing), here's what I changed:

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

...and with it looking like this:

depend () {
use hotplug pcmcia
need wlan
}

? How does that work?

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

i get this: (there is a bunch of other [ok] stuff in between some of these errors that is unrealted)

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

OK, well, it looks like it doesn't know about the wlan service =) You're using linux-wlan-ng, right? It should have created an /etc/init.d/wlan file...is that file there? If so, have you done an 'rc-update add wlan default' to add it to the default runlevel?

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

yes, I've ran rc-update add wlan default. when it fails to load everything on boot I do this to bring it up:

/etc/init.d/wlan start
dhcpcd wlan0

and then everything works. I just can't get it to do it automatically on boot.

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

What happens when you try to bring it up manually like this, instead:

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

When I try it that way, of course /etc/init.d/wlan start works, but when I do the next command I get:

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

Okay, I got it to work when I enter the two commands manually. I got rid of the dependency in net.wlan0, and then deleted, and readded it using rc-update.

Problem still is though that it looks like "/etc/init.d/wlan start" is not being run at boot. It doesn't say anywhere during boot time that it's trying to start it. it gets to trying to start wlan0, and it fails, and I think this is because wlan hasn't been run yet. this in turn also causes netmount and sshd to fail. i've tried deleting and readding it using rc-update with no luck...

-dyno

Kesereti · Guru Joined: 07 Nov 2002 Posts: 520

Wow...that's really strange...I've never seen a service that was in the appropriate runtime directory /etc/runlevels/default, for example) that didn't start...right after booting, do a "dmesg | more", look for anything that looks like the card might be having problems with the kernel...

dyno · n00b Joined: 26 Apr 2003 Posts: 49

I didn't notice anything too weird. It loads the prism module fine, usb identifies it and such, and then a bunch of other usb stuff is configured. The only thing odd that noticed is that my dvdrom is running in PIO mode at ATA33. Ack. Guess I better fix that too

But yeah, I'm confused now.

-dyno