Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Am 8. Mai 2025 08:08:46 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg :
>On 04/05/2025 at 21:59, Holger Wansing wrote:
>> 
>> So I think we are ready for a MR?
>> Any objections, to get this into trixie, as a workaround for WiFi 7 ?
>
>Draft MR opened:
>
>But this was originally intended as a quick and dirty PoC, not sure it is 
>ready for production.

I know this started as a PoC initially, that's why I asked for objections.
IMO it's better than having nothing, and let users run into the issue of 
not-working wifi, file bugreports and so on.
It would only be temporary code, I hope we will get WiFi-7 support for Forky.


Holger



-- 
Sent from /e/ OS on Fairphone3

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 04/05/2025 at 21:59, Holger Wansing wrote:


So I think we are ready for a MR?
Any objections, to get this into trixie, as a workaround for WiFi 7 ?


Draft MR opened:

But this was originally intended as a quick and dirty PoC, not sure it 
is ready for production.

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Sun, 4 May 2025 21:53:06 +0200):
> On 04/05/2025 at 21:17, Holger Wansing wrote:
> > 
> > Maybe one more proposal:
> > do not focus on the "USB-attached ethernet interface" in the template.
> > Maybe the user already has a wired ethernet interface built into the
> > laptop, but the user did not take that into account, since using WiFi is
> > just the preferred option, because it's easier (no need to plug in a cable).
> 
> The user will see that template only if no supported interface was 
> detected. There is no user's choice, unless they chose to disable the 
> built-in ethernet controller in BIOS settings.

Ah, ok. Sorry for the noise then.

So I think we are ready for a MR?
Any objections, to get this into trixie, as a workaround for WiFi 7 ?



Holger


-- 
Holger Wansing 
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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 04/05/2025 at 21:17, Holger Wansing wrote:


Maybe one more proposal:
do not focus on the "USB-attached ethernet interface" in the template.
Maybe the user already has a wired ethernet interface built into the
laptop, but the user did not take that into account, since using WiFi is
just the preferred option, because it's easier (no need to plug in a cable).


The user will see that template only if no supported interface was 
detected. There is no user's choice, unless they chose to disable the 
built-in ethernet controller in BIOS settings.

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Fri, 2 May 2025 11:52:02 +0200):
> On 02/05/2025 at 09:19, Marcin Owsiany wrote:
> >> Am 1. Mai 2025 15:17:54 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg 
> >> :
> >
> >> - Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ?
> >>>
> >>> PoC: 
> > 
> > I gave it a go, it seems to work as intended, see attached screenshots.
> > 
> > A couple of notes that I would have found useful on this screen or related
> > docs:
> > - the installed system (network manager etc) might in fact support WiFi7
> > just fine
> > - an USB-attached ethernet interface might be a good enough workaround for
> > installation time
> 
> New tweaked version with this and "Go back" working as expected when 
> both supported and unsupported interfaces are found:

Maybe one more proposal:
do not focus on the "USB-attached ethernet interface" in the template.
Maybe the user already has a wired ethernet interface built into the
laptop, but the user did not take that into account, since using WiFi is 
just the preferred option, because it's easier (no need to plug in a cable).


So, something like this:

 You may need to load a specific module for your network card, if you have
 one. For this, go back to the network hardware detection step.
-Else, a USB Ethernet adapter might be a workaround during installation.
+Else, a wired Ethernet connector (built into your machine or externally
+attached via USB) might be a workaround during installation.


Holger

-- 
Holger Wansing 
PGP-Fingerprint: 496A C6E8 1442 4B34 8508  3529 59F1 87CA 156E B076

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Sun, 4 May 2025 20:26:04 +0200):
> On 04/05/2025 at 20:10, Holger Wansing wrote:
> > Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Fri, 2 May 2025 11:52:02 
> > +0200):
> >>
> >> New tweaked version with this and "Go back" working as expected when
> >> both supported and unsupported interfaces are found:
> > 
> > You are talking about a "new (...) version" here, but I cannot find any
> > such commit.
> 
> Because I amended the last two commits and force-pushed.

Hmm, I thought about a possibility to do it that way, but my guess was
that there should be an indication, that such action happened (like an
additional timestamp or similar).
This is apparently not the case though.
Thanks for teaching me


Holger


-- 
Holger Wansing 
PGP-Fingerprint: 496A C6E8 1442 4B34 8508  3529 59F1 87CA 156E B076

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 04/05/2025 at 20:10, Holger Wansing wrote:

Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Fri, 2 May 2025 11:52:02 +0200):


New tweaked version with this and "Go back" working as expected when
both supported and unsupported interfaces are found:


You are talking about a "new (...) version" here, but I cannot find any
such commit.


Because I amended the last two commits and force-pushed.

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  wrote (Fri, 2 May 2025 11:52:02 +0200):
> On 02/05/2025 at 09:19, Marcin Owsiany wrote:
> >> Am 1. Mai 2025 15:17:54 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg 
> >> :
> >
> >> - Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ?
> >>>
> >>> PoC: 
> > 
> > I gave it a go, it seems to work as intended, see attached screenshots.
> > 
> > A couple of notes that I would have found useful on this screen or related
> > docs:
> > - the installed system (network manager etc) might in fact support WiFi7
> > just fine
> > - an USB-attached ethernet interface might be a good enough workaround for
> > installation time
> 
> New tweaked version with this and "Go back" working as expected when 
> both supported and unsupported interfaces are found:

You are talking about a "new (...) version" here, but I cannot find any
such commit. Maybe you forgot to push something?

> 


Holger

-- 
Holger Wansing 
PGP-Fingerprint: 496A C6E8 1442 4B34 8508  3529 59F1 87CA 156E B076

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 02/05/2025 at 09:19, Marcin Owsiany wrote:

Am 1. Mai 2025 15:17:54 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg :



- Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ?


PoC: 


I gave it a go, it seems to work as intended, see attached screenshots.

A couple of notes that I would have found useful on this screen or related
docs:
- the installed system (network manager etc) might in fact support WiFi7
just fine
- an USB-attached ethernet interface might be a good enough workaround for
installation time


New tweaked version with this and "Go back" working as expected when 
both supported and unsupported interfaces are found:




Note: You do not need Wi-Fi 7 hardware to test the user interface. You 
can simulate an unsupported wireless interface with an ethernet 
interface by booting the installer in expert mode, starting a shell and 
editing the script /lib/netcfg/is_wireless with nano before starting the 
network configuration step. This is how I test it in a VM with two 
ethernet interfaces.


To make all ethernet interface appear as unsupported, insert this after 
the first line:


"exit 0"

To make only a specific ethernet interface enpXsYfZ appear as 
unsupported, insert this after the first line:


if [ "$1" = enpXsYfZ ]; then exit 0; fi

(you can run "ip link" to show detected network interfaces)

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Cyril Brulebois]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  (2025-05-01):
> I may be missing something so correct me if I am wrong but IMO you do not
> need Wi-Fi 7 hardware to test: you can disable the current check which uses
> wext in is_wireless_iface() and use any wireless adapter whose driver uses
> nl80211. AFAICS since Linux 6.8 all in-kernel wireless drivers depend on
> cfg80211/mac80211.

If that statement is correct (I have no knowledge so cannot judge),
that's nice. But I really meant to be able to test things that currently
don't work, and make sure they start working after whatever is needed is
implemented.

What to do with other hardware that support different mode of operation
(keep wext for a while, or switch everyone to nl if that just works
without regressions) would be a different topic.

(But I fully understand the overlap, and thanks for pointing this out.)


Cheers,
-- 
Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org)
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant


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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi Marcin,

Am 1. Mai 2025 15:17:54 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg :
>On 29/04/2025 at 08:44, Holger Wansing wrote:
>> Am 29. April 2025 00:21:37 MESZ schrieb Cyril Brulebois :
>>> Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):
>>> 
 - Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ? (with
a new debconf template, implies translation effort).
>>> 
>>> At this stage? That really doesn't look like either reasonable or feasible.
>> 
>> I could think of adding a new template, but not mark it as translatable.
>> So it's always in English, and does not break translation status.
>
>PoC: 
>
>Not sure if I made the new two templates non translatable properly, please 
>check.
>
>Temporary ISO image: 
>

Would you mind testing this image as well?
That would be great.


Thanks
Holger




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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Am 1. Mai 2025 15:17:54 MESZ schrieb Pascal Hambourg :
>On 29/04/2025 at 08:44, Holger Wansing wrote:
>> Am 29. April 2025 00:21:37 MESZ schrieb Cyril Brulebois :
>>> Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):
>PoC: 
>
>Not sure if I made the new two templates non translatable properly, please 
>check.

Looks good.


Holger



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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 29/04/2025 at 18:40, Cyril Brulebois wrote:


To be honest, at this stage, I'm a little worried about getting the
logic right. If someone managed to have a piece of code that works in
the installed system, I could look into doing whatever is needed to get
it to work inside d-i (dealing with Makefiles, build systems, linking
against libnl or whatever).

If someone had reference(s) of external adapters I could easily shop for
and get delivered to France, that would make the feedback loop shorter
(I'd be able to hack and build and test, instead of hacking and
building, then asking others to test).


I may be missing something so correct me if I am wrong but IMO you do 
not need Wi-Fi 7 hardware to test: you can disable the current check 
which uses wext in is_wireless_iface() and use any wireless adapter 
whose driver uses nl80211. AFAICS since Linux 6.8 all in-kernel wireless 
drivers depend on cfg80211/mac80211.

Re: Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

Quoting Marcin's feedback so that debian-boot readers can see it.

On 30/04/2025 at 22:27, Marcin Owsiany wrote:

wt., 29 kwi 2025, 21:57 użytkownik Pascal Hambourg 
napisał:


I made up a very crude PoC: (...)>> IF you want to test it (...)


Here is what I did:

1. dd-ed the image onto a USB stick
2. ran fdisk -w never -W never on it, created a fourth partition of
500MB, set its type to FAT12
3. ran mkfs -t vfat on the partition
4. mounted the official alpha installer image
5. copied all files from the firmware directory on the official image
into the new partition
6. unmounted
7. Booted the P1 Gen3 laptop, confirmed that I want to load firmware,
and it showed the available SSIDs, as expected
8. Booted the P1 Gen7 laptop, confirmed that I want to load firmware,
and it showed the "No network interfaces detected" screen, as expected
9. Took a screenshot and also a screenshot of the log virtual console
with the /lib/netcfg/is_wireless messages, see attached images.


(Attached pictures were too big for the list size limit, you can get 
them at )

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 29/04/2025 at 08:44, Holger Wansing wrote:

Am 29. April 2025 00:21:37 MESZ schrieb Cyril Brulebois :

Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):


- Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ? (with
   a new debconf template, implies translation effort).


At this stage? That really doesn't look like either reasonable or feasible.


I could think of adding a new template, but not mark it as translatable.
So it's always in English, and does not break translation status.


PoC: 

Not sure if I made the new two templates non translatable properly, 
please check.


Temporary ISO image: 

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 29/04/2025 at 00:21, Cyril Brulebois wrote:

Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):


- Silently ignore unsupported interfaces ? (but the user may wonder why the
   interface is not showing)


Log + documentation, yes.


I made up a very crude PoC: 



It checks sysfs for wireless heuristics.
For this I made netcfg binary call a shell script because it is more 
flexible for debugging in the installer.


IF you want to test it, an ISO image is available for a limited time: 



This image does not include non-free firmware, so you may need to 
provide firmware packages for your hardware such as firmware-iwlwifi on 
a separate media or in a FAT partition on the installer media. It has a 
6MB FAT partition but it is too small for firmware-iwlfiwi. If you want 
to enlarge it or create another partition, you can use fdisk with 
options "-w never -W never" to preserve existing metadata.

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 29/04/2025 at 11:40, Marcin Owsiany wrote:


These commands yield the same output on both P1 Gen7 (WiFi 7 I assume) and
P1 Gen3 (I assume not WiFi 7, because wifi worked in netcfg back when I
installed Debian on it)


Thank you, this is what I expected.


Eyeballing these device directories from both laptops side by side did not
reveal anything that could be used to distinguish wifi7 from earlier
versions, but maybe I missed something.


These tests would happen only if the interface does not support legacy 
wireless extensions (wext). The logic would be (pseudo-code):


if $interface supports legacy wireless extensions (wext)
  type = supported_wireless
else if /sys/class/net/$interface/wireless exists
 or /sys/class/net/$interface/uevent contains "DEVTYPE=wlan"
 or /sys/class/net/$interface/type = "801" (802.11)
  type = unsupported_wireless
else
  type = wired

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Cyril Brulebois]

Holger Wansing  (2025-04-29):
> Am 29. April 2025 00:21:37 MESZ schrieb Cyril Brulebois :
> >At this stage? That really doesn't look like either reasonable or feasible.
> 
> I could think of adding a new template, but not mark it as translatable.
> So it's always in English, and does not break translation status.
> 
> After Trixie is released, it could then be changed in translatable and
> translators get it (for Forky and probably trixie point release).

Oh, right, sorry, I didn't think of that.

To be honest, at this stage, I'm a little worried about getting the
logic right. If someone managed to have a piece of code that works in
the installed system, I could look into doing whatever is needed to get
it to work inside d-i (dealing with Makefiles, build systems, linking
against libnl or whatever).

If someone had reference(s) of external adapters I could easily shop for
and get delivered to France, that would make the feedback loop shorter
(I'd be able to hack and build and test, instead of hacking and
building, then asking others to test). Additionally/alternatively, given
that's supposed to be widespread, maybe some cheap laptop reference(s)?

(I don't want to have huge piles of hardware at home but it seems worth
it to tackle that Wi-Fi 7 topic, and I can cope with 1-2 extra laptops
if that's OK/cheap enough for either me, my company, or the project.)


Cheers,
-- 
Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org)
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant


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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Marcin Owsiany]

wt., 29 kwi 2025, 06:29 użytkownik Marcin Owsiany 
napisał:

>
>
>
> These commands yield the same output on both P1 Gen7 (WiFi 7 I assume) and
> P1 Gen3 (I assume not WiFi 7, because wifi worked in netcfg back when I
> installed Debian on it)
>

Eyeballing these device directories from both laptops side by side did not
reveal anything that could be used to distinguish wifi7 from earlier
versions, but maybe I missed something.

I tried packing these directory up to attach to the bug, but the symlink
loops make it hard, and I'd rather not upload the entirety of /sys to the
internet, who knows what might be there...

Marcin

>

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Holger Wansing]

Hi,

Am 29. April 2025 00:21:37 MESZ schrieb Cyril Brulebois :
>Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):
>> On the user interface side, what would be best ?
>
>I think I answered that in my previous answer?
>
>> - Silently ignore unsupported interfaces ? (but the user may wonder why the
>>   interface is not showing)
>
>Log + documentation, yes.
>
>> - Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ? (with
>>   a new debconf template, implies translation effort).
>
>At this stage? That really doesn't look like either reasonable or feasible.

I could think of adding a new template, but not mark it as translatable.
So it's always in English, and does not break translation status.

After Trixie is released, it could then be changed in translatable and 
translators get it (for Forky and probably trixie point release).


Holger




-- 
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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Marcin Owsiany]

wt., 29 kwi 2025 o 00:11 Pascal Hambourg 
napisał(a):

> if /sys/class/net/$[interface}/wireless exists
> or /sys/class/net/$[interface}/uevent contains "DEVTYPE=wlan"
> or /sys/class/net/$[interface}/type = "801" (802.11)
>

I'm assuming this is pseudocode?


> Lennart or Marcin, can you check if any of these conditions match your
> Wi-Fi 7 interface ?
>

These commands yield the same output on both P1 Gen7 (WiFi 7 I assume) and
P1 Gen3 (I assume not WiFi 7, because wifi worked in netcfg back when I
installed Debian on it):

+ interface=wlp9s0f0
+ ls -ld /sys/class/net/wlp9s0f0/wireless
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 0 04-29 06:24 /sys/class/net/wlp9s0f0/wireless
+ grep --color DEVTYPE=wlan /sys/class/net/wlp9s0f0/uevent
DEVTYPE=wlan
+ cat /sys/class/net/wlp9s0f0/type
1

Marcin

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Cyril Brulebois]

Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-29):
> On the user interface side, what would be best ?

I think I answered that in my previous answer?

> - Silently ignore unsupported interfaces ? (but the user may wonder why the
>   interface is not showing)

Log + documentation, yes.

> - Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ? (with
>   a new debconf template, implies translation effort).

At this stage? That really doesn't look like either reasonable or feasible.


Cheers,
-- 
Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org)
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant


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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

On 24/04/2025 at 15:48, Cyril Brulebois wrote:


Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-24):


However wouldn't it be desirable to mark wifi 7 controllers as
unsupported in netcfg and in the installation guide in order to limit
user frustration ?


If we can easily spot unsupported cards and not offer them at all
(ignore entirely, with explicit log lines in syslog?) and also document
that in the installation guide, that'd be nice to have. Best if that can
land in 13.0; OK if that lands in 13.n, n>0. (Until support comes along
and is considered for a possible backport as detailed above.)


Unsupported wireless interface detection could use nl80211 (not trivial, 
link with libnl) or try to use some heuristics based on information 
available in sysfs, maybe something like:


if /sys/class/net/$[interface}/wireless exists
or /sys/class/net/$[interface}/uevent contains "DEVTYPE=wlan"
or /sys/class/net/$[interface}/type = "801" (802.11)

Lennart or Marcin, can you check if any of these conditions match your 
Wi-Fi 7 interface ?


On the user interface side, what would be best ?
- Silently ignore unsupported interfaces ? (but the user may wonder why 
the interface is not showing)
- Or warn the user that the wireless interface is not supported yet ? 
(with a new debconf template, implies translation effort).

Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Cyril Brulebois]

Lennart Sorensen  (2025-04-25):
> I get the impression most laptops shipping now are wifi 7.  Most
> machines I have seen in the last year had had it at least.

That's a useful data point, thanks.

I'm not sure I can commit to giving it a try, but it might be worth
pinging the DPL to get some test machines sent out.

> I can certainly test it.  I asked a few months ago about how a desired
> implementation should be done, but got no response from anyone to the
> question.

I suppose you were the or one of the person(s) I was thinking about.
Again, sorry about that. (You'll get a little more info out of band.)

> Given the new interface is netlink based, and there already is libnl
> in the installer, I don't think it would be a big change package wise,
> but it would need netcfg to add support for making netlink calls to
> control wifi 7 devices (and optionally wifi 6 devices I suppose).

Yeah, the initial brainstorming I've seen a while back seemed rather
encouraging.

> Certainly the current installer behaviour is confusing since the
> driver loads, then it treats it like a wired port which doesn't work
> because wifi 7 drivers require using the new interface which netcfg
> doesn't support.  So you see the network device present but it doesn't
> ask about wifi settings it just tries to do dhcp and fails.

Yeah, I gathered that from earlier mails, but I suppose it's nice to
have a little reminder of the actual confusion, that can be picked up by
documentation writers for example.


Cheers,
-- 
Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org)
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant


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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Thu, Apr 24, 2025 at 03:48:15PM +0200, Cyril Brulebois wrote:
> The difference between normal and important is a matter of opinion, and
> that doesn't really factor in what we're going to do about these bug
> reports anyway. Important looks good to me.
> 
> (Also, when a submitter considers their bug to be covered by another bug
> report, an option would be to close their bug, mentioning that's a
> duplicate of another one, or that the other one is more complete,
> precise, etc.)
> 
> > To d-i people: adding nl80211 and wifi 7 support to netcfg looks like
> > a big task and I guess it is way too late to do it before Trixie
> > release.
> 
> ISTR someone asking for help to implement/test that, but I couldn't deal
> with that at the time (or now), but I had some vague hopes to look into
> it (either assisting or hacking myself) “in the near future”. I'm not
> sure how prevalent Wi-Fi 7 is at the moment, but it seems to me this is
> definitely something we should tackle, and that might be worth
> considering as a backport to Trixie (via point releases) (1) if and when
> support has landed and has been tested, and (2) if backporting doesn't
> seem crazy (code/packaging change wise, and risk wise).

I get the impression most laptops shipping now are wifi 7.  Most machines
I have seen in the last year had had it at least.

I can certainly test it.  I asked a few months ago about how a desired
implementation should be done, but got no response from anyone to the
question.  Given the new interface is netlink based, and there already is
libnl in the installer, I don't think it would be a big change package
wise, but it would need netcfg to add support for making netlink calls
to control wifi 7 devices (and optionally wifi 6 devices I suppose).

> > However wouldn't it be desirable to mark wifi 7 controllers as
> > unsupported in netcfg and in the installation guide in order to limit
> > user frustration ?
> 
> If we can easily spot unsupported cards and not offer them at all
> (ignore entirely, with explicit log lines in syslog?) and also document
> that in the installation guide, that'd be nice to have. Best if that can
> land in 13.0; OK if that lands in 13.n, n>0. (Until support comes along
> and is considered for a possible backport as detailed above.)

Certainly the current installer behaviour is confusing since the driver
loads, then it treats it like a wired port which doesn't work because wifi
7 drivers require using the new interface which netcfg doesn't support.
So you see the network device present but it doesn't ask about wifi
settings it just tries to do dhcp and fails.

-- 
Len Sorensen

Processed: Re: Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Debian Bug Tracking System]

Processing control commands:

> severity 1095302 important
Bug #1095302 [installation-reports] Installation on Thinkpad P1Gen7
Severity set to 'important' from 'normal'
> merge 1095302 -1
Bug #1095302 [installation-reports] Installation on Thinkpad P1Gen7
Bug #1103993 [installation-reports] installation-reports: network configuration 
does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7
Merged 1095302 1103993
> reassign -1 netcfg 1.194
Bug #1103993 [installation-reports] installation-reports: network configuration 
does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7
Bug #1095302 [installation-reports] Installation on Thinkpad P1Gen7
Bug reassigned from package 'installation-reports' to 'netcfg'.
Bug reassigned from package 'installation-reports' to 'netcfg'.
Ignoring request to alter found versions of bug #1103993 to the same values 
previously set
Ignoring request to alter found versions of bug #1095302 to the same values 
previously set
Ignoring request to alter fixed versions of bug #1103993 to the same values 
previously set
Ignoring request to alter fixed versions of bug #1095302 to the same values 
previously set
Bug #1103993 [netcfg] installation-reports: network configuration does not ask 
for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7
Bug #1095302 [netcfg] Installation on Thinkpad P1Gen7
Marked as found in versions netcfg/1.194.
Marked as found in versions netcfg/1.194.

-- 
1095302: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1095302
1103993: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1103993
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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Cyril Brulebois]

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg  (2025-04-24):
> Control: severity 1095302 important
> Control: merge 1095302 -1
> Control: reassign -1 netcfg 1.194
> 
> [Please send replies to the bug mail address, not only mine]
> 
> On 24/04/2025 at 12:59, Marcin Owsiany wrote:
> > I did think about merging, but wasn't sure about the priority. Don't you
> > think this deserves "important"?
> 
> I am not sure either but let's raise the original bug priority anyway, merge
> and reassign the two bugs to netcfg. If anyone objects, the priority can be
> lowered.

The difference between normal and important is a matter of opinion, and
that doesn't really factor in what we're going to do about these bug
reports anyway. Important looks good to me.

(Also, when a submitter considers their bug to be covered by another bug
report, an option would be to close their bug, mentioning that's a
duplicate of another one, or that the other one is more complete,
precise, etc.)

> To d-i people: adding nl80211 and wifi 7 support to netcfg looks like
> a big task and I guess it is way too late to do it before Trixie
> release.

ISTR someone asking for help to implement/test that, but I couldn't deal
with that at the time (or now), but I had some vague hopes to look into
it (either assisting or hacking myself) “in the near future”. I'm not
sure how prevalent Wi-Fi 7 is at the moment, but it seems to me this is
definitely something we should tackle, and that might be worth
considering as a backport to Trixie (via point releases) (1) if and when
support has landed and has been tested, and (2) if backporting doesn't
seem crazy (code/packaging change wise, and risk wise).

> However wouldn't it be desirable to mark wifi 7 controllers as
> unsupported in netcfg and in the installation guide in order to limit
> user frustration ?

If we can easily spot unsupported cards and not offer them at all
(ignore entirely, with explicit log lines in syslog?) and also document
that in the installation guide, that'd be nice to have. Best if that can
land in 13.0; OK if that lands in 13.n, n>0. (Until support comes along
and is considered for a possible backport as detailed above.)


Cheers,
-- 
Cyril Brulebois (k...@debian.org)
D-I release manager -- Release team member -- Freelance Consultant


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Bug#1103993: installation-reports: network configuration does not ask for ESSID in Thinkpad P1 Gen7

[Pascal Hambourg]

Control: severity 1095302 important
Control: merge 1095302 -1
Control: reassign -1 netcfg 1.194

[Please send replies to the bug mail address, not only mine]

On 24/04/2025 at 12:59, Marcin Owsiany wrote:

I did think about merging, but wasn't sure about the priority. Don't you
think this deserves "important"?


I am not sure either but let's raise the original bug priority anyway, 
merge and reassign the two bugs to netcfg. If anyone objects, the 
priority can be lowered.


To d-i people: adding nl80211 and wifi 7 support to netcfg looks like a 
big task and I guess it is way too late to do it before Trixie release.
However wouldn't it be desirable to mark wifi 7 controllers as 
unsupported in netcfg and in the installation guide in order to limit 
user frustration ?