To get your Intel PRO/Wireless 2200 WLAN card to run, you need
the kernel drivers ieee80211 and ipw2200 as well as the
corresponding firmware version.
To download the firmware, see the
ipw2200 project page.
Linux kernel 2.6.15 comes with ieee80211 and ipw2200 drivers.
Unfortunally, Users of 2.6.12 must compile the modules on their own,
but that's quite easy to do: Install the ieee80211-source and
ipw2200-source debian packages and use the module assistant to
build and install the binary debian packages for you.
cd /usr/src
export KERNELDIRS=/usr/src/linux-source-2.6.12
module-assistant a-i ieee80211
module-assistant a-i ipw2200
WLAN LED
Support for the WLAN LED doesn't work as expected. You can turn
the LED on if you are already connected to an access point with
echo >/sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0000*.0/led
but the LED doesn't turn off when the connection is lost or the WLAN
card is turned off (=radio kill or rf_kill) via Fn-F2. The only way
I found to turn the LED off again is to switch from managed mode
to ad-hoc (iwconfig eth1 mode ad-hoc)
and back again (iwconfig eth1 mode managed) :-(
Update: Karol T. Gajowniczek emailed me with the following
information: "I know how to switch wi-fi led off:
echo 1 > /sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0000*.0/rf_kill
to switch it back on, just:
echo 0 > /sys/bus/pci/drivers/ipw2200/0000*.0/rf_kill".
Unfortunally, the LED still only reflects the software rf_kill state but not
hardware rf_kill (Fn-F2).
Secure your WLAN
It is highly recommended that you use WPA to secure your WLAN
setup and prevent malicous users from abusing your network.
WEP is not secure enough, the encryption can be cracked
within minutes. Fortunally, most modern access points support
WPA encryption, just turn it on and set the shared key to a random
combination of at least 20 numbers and letters.
On your laptop, WPA encryption is handled by the wpasupplicant
daemon. Install the debian wpasupplicant package and edit
/etc/default/wpasupplicant:
/etc/default/wpasupplicant (for kernel 2.6.15)
ENABLE=1
DRIVER=wext
INTERFACE=eth1
CONFIG=/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
OPTIONS="-w -i ${INTERFACE} -D ${DRIVER} -c ${CONFIG}"
/etc/default/wpasupplicant (for kernel 2.6.12)
ENABLE=1
DRIVER=ipw
INTERFACE=eth1
CONFIG=/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
OPTIONS="-w -i ${INTERFACE} -D ${DRIVER} -c ${CONFIG}"
Next, run the wpa_passphrase program included in the wpasupplicant
package. It takes an ESSID and the shared key mentioned above as
input and gives you the configuration lines needed for
/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf as output. Use this output instead of the
network={ ... } part in the example presented here:
/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=0
eapol_version=1
ap_scan=1
fast_reauth=1
network={
ssid="homer_simpson"
#psk="[your key here]"
psk=[your converted key here]
}
Finally, it's time to tell Debian about your new network.
/etc/network/interfaces
[...]
auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp
pre-up /etc/init.d/wpasupplicant start
post-down /etc/init.d/wpasupplicant stop
Now you can give it a try and fire up your WLAN:
ifup eth1. After about 10-20 seconds, the
connection should be established.
For troubleshooting, use the tools iwconfig eth1,
iwlist scan and wpa_cli. |