RE: [Sheflug] Wireless Networks

["Dawson, Alan" <xxxxx [at] xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Does the card make two high pitched beeps when inserted ..?  This shows that
the card was detected correctly and that its driver was loaded successfully.

If not what does 
cardctrl ident 
produce..?

I don't know about suse 8.0 but after compiling pcmcia-cs source, and
orinoco-cs source I got a directory called 
/etc/pcmcia 
in which a file called called "config" included a "hermes.conf" which
matched the card identity to the correct module - orinoco_cs
and a file called config.opts allowed me to set initial parameters for the
module.

Assuming that you get 2 high beeps..
Are you trying to connect to an Access Point (AP) or an ad hoc network (
peer to peer wifi) ..?
Guessing an AP , whats your network essid - AP's must have some utility to
set essid ID.

You can use iwconfig, from the wireless tools, 
http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Jean_Tourrilhes/Linux/ 
to set essid

If you got 2 beeps then the wifi card will appear to be an ethernet
interface - eth1 say.  
iwconfig eth1
will show its settings

if you are using an access point with essid MyNetwork then 
iwconfig eth1 essid MyNetwork mode 2 
would set  the card to be part of network MyNetwork.  mode 2 sets the card
to be talking to an AP rather than peer to peer with other wifi cards (mode
1).  You can control loads of other things with iwconfig - see man iwconfig

Once you get the card in the same wifi network as your AP you can set IP up
on it and expect it to communicate with other ip devices in the same way as
an ethernet nic can.  So you could use 
ifconfig eth1 inet 192.168.1.26 netmask 255.255.255.0 
to set up tcp/ip (address 192.168.1.26) on the card and then start pinging
things on the other side of the AP

802.11 is quite different to ethernet, though when it all works it looks the
same.  A lot of the differences are around authenticating to the network.
In ethernet its easy - you just plug a rj45 into a hub - in wifi networks
really are invisible clouds, so the essid stuff enables you to set
boundaries on networks. Setting the essid is like plugging the rj45 into a
particular hub.  This has got to be done before worrying about the IP stuff
(which also has to be correct).
AP's are simply bridges between 802.11 and ethernet allowing IP to move
transparently across them.

For the full monty on 802.11 try the O'Reilly "802.11 Wireless Networks, A
defintive guide" ISBN 0596001835, for an , er , definitive guide to 802.11.
18 Chapters + 443 pages on it ... more than anyone ought to need to know!!

HTH 
Alan Dawson

PS.  I've been oodling about with a couple of orinoco silver cards and an
"Planet" card (PRISM chipset) + AP for a couple of weeks now.  The only way
I could get it to work on SuSE 7.2 was by getting the pcmcia-cs source and
untarring the orinoco-cs source into the pcmcia-cs source directory.  After
that I compiled pcmcia-cs, following the instructions as per the README and
all was fine, after copying hermes.conf, and messing with config.opts ...
man pages are youre friend!
I'm sure there must be a better way though.  There are some instructions
relevant to suse 8.0 on the unofficial suse FAQ at from Keith Winston at 
http://susefaq.sourceforge.net/ethernetproblems.html


-----Original Message-----
From: James Mears
To: shef-lug [at] list.sheflug.org.uk
Sent: 6/16/2002 8:23 PM
Subject: RE: [Sheflug] Wireless Networks

It should not be this hard to get a network card to work.

Most of the related documents talk about not using the kernel related
pcmcia-cs but rather external modules version.

I am currently lost in the depths of trying to install pcmcia-cs form
source..... hmm this is getting tricky.

I imagine I will be bringing this stuff to the next meeting to let the
real boffins have a look.

James

___________________________________________________________________

Sheffield Linux User's Group -
http://www.sheflug.co.uk/mailfaq.html

  GNU the choice of a complete generation.