Lan Barnes wrote:
[snip]
Here is where I am.
When the laptop boots, all three net interfaces apparently initialize. I
say three because iwconfig is showing ath0 _and_ wifi0, and the RH
network GUI controller shows eth0, eth1 (wireless), and ath0.
There seems to be a move in the networking dev community (especially
those wireless-related) to get wireless interfaces to stop using the
ethn notation (after all, wireless is not Ethernet). Apparently, there's
yet no consensus regarding the new nomenclature (ath? wifi?, ??).
route -n shows both eth0 and ath0 routed to the network with eth0 on the
default route through the firewall/router. To make the wireless card
work, I have to:
1. use route del to remove the default route for eth0
2. use the RH GUI network manager (I'm sure I could use an "if-" command
if I knew which and the syntax) to close eth0
3. use route add default gw to add a path through the router for ath0
First, I've had consistent results by setting up profiles for various
network configurations in the RH network tool (system-config-network, or
System Settings -> Network from the KDE main menu.
On my laptop, I have a profile each for my home LAN (Cyprus) using
Ethernet, Cyprus using wireless, as well as one for each of a couple of
other scenarios, including AnyLAN and AnyWireless profiles for
connecting to Ethernet or Wireless networks respectively using DHCP.
Next, I have had good luck using NetworkManager for connecting to
wireless networks. I have have less than satisfactory results using KWifi.
Note that NetworkManager runs as a service and requires its companion
service NetworkManagerDispatcher. NetworkManagerInfo is a user space
panel applet used to control NM. In the version I am running
NetworkManagerInfo must be started manually (or you could script its start).
Additional services you might want to run are mDNSResponder and dhcdbd.
Then I'm on the air, but watch out! -- trying to browse a web site
through Firefox drops the link light on the d-link and locks the
machine. No problem getting to the same web site using lynx.
Can't address this. Wireless on Linux is still quirky, at best, mainly
due to buggy chipset drivers. Throw into the mix that Windows is fairly
tolerant of non-RFC-compliant code, proprietary extensions, and the fact
that chipset drivers write their Windows drivers knowing things they
won't tell Linux developers about their chipsets. [1]
Oh, and complicate it further when BIOS writers don't follow ACPI specs
and the fact that the Windows ASL compiler ignores code errors in DSDT
source files (while the Intel ASL compiler does not). Linux expects to
see proper DSDT files and does not ignore errors.
The result of all this is that using Linux on a laptop can pretty much
suck unless you are willing to either forgo many or all laptop-specific
features (sound control, display control, FN keys, wireless, card
reader, Firewire, modem, etc.) or massage drivers and possibly the
kernel to get some or all of that working.
More bad news is that more BIOS/mobo makers are starting to ignore
Intel's ACPI spec and make up their own proprietary spec, to which,
apparently only Microsoft is privy. It's been put to Intel by developers
on the the ACPI4Linux list (on which Intel heavily participates) that
Intel disallow such code to called "ACPI".
The good news is that it's actually getting better.
BTW, all of the config files in /etc/sysconf/networking/devices are set
to ONBOOT=no. If I set the ath0 to =yes, the machine locks up on boot.
But the interface comes up on anyway. Very puzzling.
Almost certainly I have something in the RedHat constellation of scripts
misconfigured. Possibly, because of the web site lock up, I also have a
deeper problem. But perhaps even that can be corrected by some magic
option in the /etc/modprobe.conf.
Most likely your problem will be fairly specific to both your laptop
brand and model and the specific wireless card and driver you are using.
My solution to getting things working was to find user websites, like these
http://resonance.org/~josh/laptop.html
http://home.arcor.de/Leviathan81/z71v.html
which supported my laptop, and to subscribe to relevant developer lists.
My thanks to Tom and everyone on both lists who have gotten me this far.
I think I'm close but not quite there.
[1] Oddly, once wireless is working in Linux, it seems to work better
there than on Windows. Wireless usability as far as user control over
the connection(s) is far better under Linux.
My observation is that wireless works best on OSX, followed by Linux
(once you get it working), distantly followed by Windows ("You'll
connect to the network _I_ say you will, _when_ I say you will!").
--
Best Regards,
~DJA.
--------
"Remember Microsoft's "Where do you want to go today" ads? The real
slogan is "Who cares! You're coming with us." -An Apple engineer
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