I apologise to readers expecting more Harry Potter but I need to record how I did something technical for future use.
I just installed Fedora 7 and it took a while to get the wireless connection working – though not as long as last time. It almost works automatically using NetworkManager but you need to tweak it for WPA authentication.
Mode: Master
SSID: Specified (SSID_NAME)
Channel: 11
Transmit Rate: Auto
Key: (leave blank this is for WEP keys)
Also under General I set the IP address etc. Then save and (re-)activate the device.
Alternatively it should lead to a file /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-wlan0 that looks like this:
# Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection
DEVICE=wlan0
ONBOOT=yes
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
DHCP_HOSTNAME=hostname
IPADDR=192.168.2.2
DOMAIN=domain
TYPE=Wireless
USERCTL=yes
IPV6INIT=no
PEERDNS=yes
ESSID=ssid_name
CHANNEL=11
MODE=Master
GATEWAY=192.168.2.1
RATE=Auto
Then you need to edit /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf so that it looks like this:
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=wheelnetwork={
ssid=”ssid”
scan_ssid=1
proto=WPA
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
psk=xxxxxxx…..
}
You generate the psk={hex string} line with wpa_passphrase. Also I need to change /etc/sysconfig/wpa_supplicant. It had -Dndiswrapper as the DRIVER when I needed -Dwext
Once this is done you restart the wpa_supplicant service and restart the network service.
Useful commands to see what’s happening are
dmesg – kernel messages, including dmesg -c which removes the current message
iwconfig – to manually configure the device
iwlist wlan0 scan – shows you what networks are within range and your status with relation to them.
Oh and I added wpa_supplicant to the list of services which start automatically using chkconfig.