Mailinglist Archive: opensuse (2441 mails)

[James Knott <james.knott@xxxxxxxxxx>]

David McMillan wrote:
> James Knott wrote:
>> David McMillan wrote:
>>
>>> James Knott wrote:
>>>
>>>> David McMillan wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>>  Recap:   Laptop running 9.1Pro with a Cisco Aironet 350 card.  Worked
>>>>> fine for home WLAN, but would not work with public hotspots
>>>>> (particularly, tmobile).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> What I have done, is create different wifi config files and then just
>>>> copy the appropriate one, to the wlan file. Then simply restart the
>>>> interface.
>>>
>>>    Which files would those be, exactly?  (Man, I wish I knew this
>>> stuff...)  I went poking around, and found /etc/wlan/wlan.conf, which
>>> looked promising, but its contents don't resemble my settings.  The
>>> script idea certainly sounds cool.
>>
>>
>> There's a config file /etc/sysconfig/network/ifcfg-wlan-id-<mac
>> address>, which contains the info.  Configure the card and copy the file
>> to another directory.  You can create multiple versions, for different
>> networks.
> 
>     Huh!  I don't have one.  I *do* have one with the MAC-ID for my
> ethernet port (eth0), but nothing else with a MAC-ID in the filename.   
>     I *do,* however, have a file called ifcfg-wlan-bus-pcmcia that, when
> opened in an editor, that has settings that match my YAST setup.
>     Hm... okay, making changes to my wifi card setup in YAST causes
> immediate changes to this file, but the changes don't seem to 'take'
> until I reboot.  So if I use multiple versions of this file, and a
> script to swap them around, I need another command to force the card
> to re-apply the file.  'rcnetwork restart,' perhaps?

You could use the ifdown and ifup commands.

> 
>     Going back to the earlier problem for a moment, I've been playing
> around with the system, trying to learn by experimentation.  So far,
> I've found that fixing the encryption from iwconfig causes immediate
> association to the Access Point, but dhcp doesn't seem to follow
> through.  What I see from ifconfig is that eth1 will show an IP
> address, but /etc/resolv.conf remains blank.  Activating the dhcpcd
> command manually doesn't do anything -- in fact, I tried it with
> Ethereal running, and running the dhcpcd command generated *no* packet
> traffic at all(!).  And trying to ping my router at 192.168.0.1 from
> my laptop, which ifconfig is showing at 192.168.0.10, results in
> "destination network unreachable."  Now, all my previous network
> experience is with Windows, but I'd been under the impression that
> with these IPs, that error was impossible.  Could ifconfig possibly be
> showing me an IP that wasn't really assigned by DHCP?  Does Linux have
> anything like that "automatic private IP" that WXP defaults to when it
> fails to get anything from a DHCP server?

I haven't seen that for IPv4, though it's part of IPv6.  I don't imagine
it would be too hard to impliment.  You essentially have to pick a
"random" address and ping to see if anyone's using it.  Failing that,
just pick one and a Windows or Mac system should be able to find another
address.

Incidentally, in another message, I posted a link to the wificonfig rpm.
 Have you tried it?  If not, could you please give it a try and let me
know how it works for you.

tnx jk