[maemo-developers] WLAN connectivity using only wireless-tools

[From: Kalle Valo]

"ext Kalle Vahlman" <kalle.vahlman at gmail.com> writes:

>> I assume that you didn't modify initfs.
>
> Apart from installing bootmenu, no. It's the exact same initfs that I
> use daily with the ITOS.

Good, then WLAN module should be loaded correctly.

>> Not a problem, should work just fine. Occasionally I also use
>> wireless-tools directly.
>
> The version available for ITOS seems to be 28, while I have 29. I
> don't think that should be a problem though?

I'm not familiar with wireless-tools internals, but I remember the
maintainer mentioning something about wireless-tools being backward
compatible. So that it shouldn't be a problem, but maybe you could
downgrade it, if nothing else helps.

>> You just have to do ifconfig wlan0 up before using wireless-tools.
>> When the interface is down, the driver doesn't accept any commands.
>
> Here's everything in a nutshell:
>
> Currently I do:
>
> ifconfig wlan0 up
> iwlist wlan0 scanning > /wlan-list
> iwconfig wlan0 mode managed
> iwconfig wlan0 ap auto
> iwconfig wlan0 essid "xxx"

I don't use the ap command at all, try without it first. Note that
scanning with iwlist buggy, you get incomplete results (bug #1106).

> after which iwconfig says:
>
> wlan0     IEEE 802.11b/g  ESSID:off/any
>           Mode:Managed  Channel:0  Access Point: Not-Associated
>           Bit Rate=0 kb/s   Tx-Power=19 dBm   Sensitivity=0/200
>           RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
>           Encryption key:off
>           Power Management:off
>           Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
>           Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
>           Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0
>
> ie. nothing happened with the iwconfig commands

cx3110x has "a feature" that essid will be shown only after an
succesfull association. Yes, it is annoying and will be fixed in
future. So this is normal in a situation where association fails.

> , and the dmesg log doesn't contain much either:
>
> <4>[    8.456665] umac: module license 'Proprietary' taints kernel.
> <4>[    8.621368] CX3110x chip variant: STLC4550
> <4>[    8.699401] CX3110x: firmware version: 2.13.0.0.a.22.8
> <4>[    8.708160] Loaded CX3110x driver, version 0.8
> [snip unrelated mmc/ext3 mumble]
> <4>[   10.249450] Loading 3826.arm firmware
> <4>[   10.493041] (c)opyright 2004 Conexant
> <4>[   10.496917]
> <4>[   10.496917] build info: PRISM SoftMAC
> <4>[   10.496948]   creator: [kvalo]
> <4>[   10.496948]   date: [07/05/03-10:28]
> <4>[   10.496978]
> <4>[   10.512023] CX3110x: MAC address 00:19:4f:xx:xx:xx
> <4>[   14.845031] Scan complete, scanned 2 channels

Only two channels? Should be 13 with devices sold in Finland. Strange.

> <4>[   14.895599] Using default authentication order
> <4>[   15.628631] sm_drv_transmit: sm_frame_tx returned error -9
> [snip few more identical lines from trying to send unconnected]
>
> And that's it. The errors at the bottom are clear now, but... And I
> can even see my AP in the 'iwlist scanning' output, but the interface
> acts dead for me.

I think the only problem is that the association is failing for some
reason. First ditch the ap command from your script, see if that
helps. I can't think of anything else.

> I just can't think of or find anything in the ITOS boot scripts might
> be setting up, that's why I thought maybe wlancond or someone did some
> powerup stuff.

I just checked from wlancond sources, it doesn't set anything in WLAN
driver during boot. So it should just work.

I'm on a train now, so I can't test this with real device. But I'll
try to do that later.

> I don't see any PSM lines for example, while with the ITOS I do.

Yeah, you have to enable PSM with the power iwconfig parameter.
Otherwise PSM is disabled.

-- 
Kalle Valo