But what about wireless?
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| billbar May 08, 2007 7:31 PM EDT |
Will we ever recognize that auto-wireless connection is one of the key values in a Windows laptop? Users simply want to open their machine and be internet connected, no humping, no hassles. Any hope for that? |
| bigg May 08, 2007 7:40 PM EDT |
I have to admit that I'm not sure what you're getting at. If you buy a laptop with Windows or Linux installed, wireless will work. As for doing your own installation, you install the driver, then click in the appropriate places to choose your connection, whether in Linux or Windows. The only difference I've noticed is that sometimes wireless works without any configuration in Linux. I've been spending a lot of time with wireless the last few months, and if anything it's a little more difficult on Windows. Maybe you are referring to unsupported wireless cards? Added later: I'm referring specifically to Feisty, the distribution in the article. |
| dbmoyes May 08, 2007 8:07 PM EDT |
The question is, do you really want your notebook connecting to some strange network automatically? Wireless does work in Linux, however some cards may need a little more configuration. For the notebooks I build [Edited out link to owner's store as an advertisement - please see our Terms of Service - dcparris], they have a Intel wireless card in them, which has full Linux support by Intel. Now, some distributions, like Ubuntu (and we've been complaining about it, yet they still mark it as being an "unconfirmed bug") don't configure the card in the correct order so WEP/WPA keys will work. It's a trivial matter to create a script that will configure the card for you. I have three, in fact: one to bring the wireless connection down, one to connect to my office. They work pretty well, in fact. And there's no question as to which network I'm connection to. Then there's windows.... It searches for any free wireless network, and it may not be one you can trust. Public networks I consider "dirty networks" and, personally, I feel a lot better about having a chance to kill all my network services prior to connecting to such a network, firewalled or not. At least you have a choice with Linux how, and with what program(s) you set up your wireless connection with. For those with Intel cards, here's how you set up your wireless connection under Linux (after installing the drivers from http://http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/): To list wireless networks, issue the command: iwlist [network interface] scanning To connect: sudo iwconfig eth1 essid $ESSID sudo iwconfig eth1 key $KEY sudo ifup eth1 To disconnect: sudo ifdown [network interface] Also, you could power down your Intel wireless card by: echo 1>sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0*/rf_kill To power it up: echo 0>sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0*/rf_kill To really kill it (hardware power-off): echo 3>sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0*/rf_kill Gee, wasin't that a lot more fun than clicking through a ton of menus? You also might find this script useful: #!/bin/sh #wifiup-all echo -n "ESSID:" read ESSID echo -n "KEY:" read KEY sudo iwconfig eth1 essid $ESSID sudo iwconfig eth1 key $KEY sudo ifup eth1 ## end ## |
| billbar May 08, 2007 10:18 PM EDT |
Thanks, dbmoves, for your detailed comments. But, here is a case in point. My laptop is an HP Pavilion (D5000?) and has a broadcom 802.11b/g installed. MEPIS will give me instructions for black listing the driver but never gets to a wireless connection. Mandriva leads me down a primrose path and finally says I should be a club member or go load a driver from somewhere else. I don't remember what Suse said but it lead no place. Arch suggested that drivers from a Knoppix cd would help. I'm not new to Linux (Window-less for 6+ years) and have installed every (more or less) distro from Arch (my favorite) to Suse and remember from years ago that installing printers was an endless frustration. Finally, everybody has it right. Ditto with ethernet cards. So maybe wireless will be painless eventually. Command line work can be fun and be very productive, but when you have to flop back and forth from Windows for internet research on one machine you find yourself yearning for a simpler life. |
| dcparris May 09, 2007 1:02 AM EDT |
In fairness to dbmoyes, I listed his site in our Pre-Installed Linux Vendor database, and invited him to join the LXer community. His post linked to his website in a way that advertises his services, which violates our ToS. Just be aware of that - I don't mind people pointing to the fact that their business is listed in our DB, but you're not allowed to drum up business in the forums. You want to advertise, you have to talk to Bob. ;-) No harm intended, and none done that I can tell. With that said, do make yourself at home, dbmoyes! And thanks for your input on the wireless issue! |
| bigg May 09, 2007 3:13 AM EDT |
> My laptop is an HP Pavilion (D5000?) and has a broadcom 802.11b/g installed. Now I understand your post. Yes, Broadcom is evil. |
| jimf May 09, 2007 3:21 AM EDT |
I know there is a recently reverse engineered Broadcom driver. How well that works may be another matter. |
| bigg May 09, 2007 6:29 AM EDT |
> I know there is a recently reverse engineered Broadcom driver. How well that works may be another matter. I've got the Broadcom 1390. It is now easy to use ndiswrapper to install the Windows driver. I've not tried, but have read, that the quality of the open driver is not very good. When we first got the laptop, nothing would work, so I can feel billbar's pain. |
| tuxchick May 09, 2007 6:47 AM EDT |
Wireless on Linux is soon going to be way better, thanks to the entirely-new wireless subsystem that is being developed:
http://www.enterprisenetworkingplanet.com/nethub/article.php... Automatic connections are something that should be controlled by the ace user or admin; I know I don't want my PCs leaping into every stray network. But that is something that should be easily controllable by the user. What the new wi-fi subsystem will do is provide a common driver base: " the Linux wireless community can provide a consistent feature set across a broad range of wireless drivers while minimizing the effort to create and maintain those drivers." The current state of affairs is a nasty hodge-podge. But the pieces are lining up, and it looks like NetworkManager is going to be standard on most linuxes, so maybe by beginning of next year wireless on Linux will be sleek and awesome. |
| Abe May 09, 2007 9:29 AM EDT |
TuxChick: I just read your article. It is Excellent. |
| dbmoyes May 20, 2007 12:26 PM EDT |
Yeah okay, dcparis, but my main point I was trying to make is that if you wanted a computer that works with Linux, then you're better off having someone else configure it for you. If that company preinstalls Linux, then that'll save you an hour or so of setup time. For instance, the 64-bit Ubuntu image I have took about 4 hours to setup after downloading all the extra packages to do software development and install the 32-bit Firefox browser so Flash and Java plugins will work (which, btw, I install on the default configurations). It was a bit of a pain figuring out how to do that. BTW, Fedora Core hasn't gotten 32-bit support right under their 64-bit OS, but Ubuntu has. The problem with Fedora Core is that 64-bit libraries are installed in lib64 while the 32-bit libraries are in lib. This is a problem since programs, by default, compile as 64-bit and so look for their libraries under lib instead of lib64, also they will install their 64-bit libraries under lib instead of lib64. Ubuntu puts the default libraries for the system in lib (which could either be 32 bit or 64 bit depending on the OS). When a 32-bit program runs, a separate linker runs for the 32-bit support which uses /lib32 instead for 64-bit systems. hence, everything works as expected. Still, their wireless configuration has much to be desired. Another point is there looks like there's something wrong with the edit option. When you click "edit" all the newlines disappear in the preview. As more users begin demanding Linux support, hardware manufacturers will begin adding more Linux support. When it becomes a matter of lack of Linux support hurting their sales to the point that supporting Linux makes sense to the bean counters, then Linux support will follow. For me, if I find out a product isn't supported by Linux, I don't ever buy it again. |
| dcparris May 20, 2007 12:58 PM EDT |
Thanks. And I definitely agree it's frequently better to let someone else do something I'm not all that familiar with. I don't get to play on 64-bit, so I can't say much on that. Your knowledge wrt wireless seems pretty strong. |
| Bob_Robertson May 20, 2007 2:47 PM EDT |
As I have put my own thread on this subject into place, I'll be brief here. I am having a seriously bad time getting wireless working. HP Pavilion 6305, Broadcom 1390 just like Bigg. As he says, ndiswrapper (finally!) does work with the Windows driver. However, this machine is not for me. I have been able to make it work by hand-editing /etc/network/interfaces but _NONE_ of the graphical front ends will connect. They all display the locally reachable nets, but either they refuse to allow a connection, or they simply fail in their connection attempt. If the machine were for me, I wouldn't care. I have hand-edited my interfaces file "since the beginning", it doesn't bother me at all. But if any of the wifi front-ends worked, I would be able to ship the machine off to Mom tomorrow. |
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