wireless config open 128 bit system sees but does not conne

[woodsmoke]

This is curious.
Running the latest Adrianne on a Toshiba with the onboard 802.1` and the Wireless N and G pcmcia cards, the laptop sees a home network a Starbuck's networlk, McD''s network, etc. no problem.

However, at the college where I teach, again, it "sees" the student network and the faculty, 128 bit encryption, network, but won't connect.

I've spent several years at the college and have been the "cocklebur under the saddle" as it were for Linux compliance. The IT people and I get along fine, but the people with actual experience with Linux have somewhat moved on to other jobs. They know the word Knoppix, but may not know much about the OS.

It used to be that anyone, faculty or student, had to go through the complete Windows, or MAC setup to log in, WEP key doubled in size, had to enter addresses, you name it.

However, this last couple of years, I've been mainly using the campus computers and was not aware of any changes.

Today, the student access is just logging in through the normal web interface with no setup. No WEP key nothing.

Faculty requires entering the faculty password etc. but, again, apparently, no actual setup, even the WEP is provided automatically, but since I have not been able to actually "get" anywhere, I don't know for sure.

Knoppix Adrianne does, indeed, provide a somewhat truncated version of the old wireless setup interface, but again, I have not been able to get it to work,

Today, I brought in a triple boot of Windows and two Ubu variants.

This on a Sony Vaio, PCG 6Q1L.

All three saw the college's network and got on automatically, all I had to do was enter my normal e-mail address and password.

So, I called IT to discuss this and they put into a "work order" thing, and how long it will take for them to get back, I told them that it is a LOW priority and probably not anything they can do anything about

BUT......

I did ask if there is something "new" about web protocols in general, or specifically, that has been enabled in the last short while, maybe a year, of which i am not aware.

Possibly there is some kind of "number" that is automatically generated, if the site allows it, or something like that, that I would need to enter manually.

So. that is where things stand as of now.

If there is some thing of which I'm not aware that I could "enter" in the normal setup screens to test this then I would be glad to do so and pass the information on to the wonderful Knoppix team.

Otherwise, I will await letters of transit here in Casablanca......

woodsmoke

[woodsmoke]

I searched here before I posted but didn't find a post which is in this list. It is included somewhat down in the list.

I searched the Debian forums particularly for 128 bit stuff and did not find anything.

In the interests of helping the cause, here are a lot of links from around the web that may be somewhat tangential to the situation. I have only included returns which discussed Debian.

However, for whatever reason, it looks as if it just isn't fixable at this particular time.

Not Knoppix's fault, apparently the situation is with Debian itself.

http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/370

http://wiki.openwrt.org/oldwiki/open...wifiencryption

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wired_Equivalent_Privacy

http://weplab.sourceforge.net/

http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/de...e/ch05.en.html

http://www.phparchitecture.com/howto...p?id=3&showall

http://www.debiantutorials.org/wirel...linux-etch-213

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/lo...hDecision=-203

http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=42150

http://www.scribd.com/doc/2096961/Wi...N-Security-FAQ

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...dapter-366661/

http://www.fmepnet.org/debian_pptp.html

http://lug.wsu.edu/wireless

http://www.patoche.org/alone/info/t23.html

http://www.ctunion.com/node/77

http://www.faughnan.com/wirelesshome.html

The link below included this little item about a shell script for Debian, which I have no clue about but thought maybe someone might;

· Other: linux-2.6.8-gentoo kernel, ndiswrapper 0.10.Kept having kernel panic (interrupt-related) upon module load until I set CONFIG_PCI_MSI=y (and unset CONFIG_4KSTACKS, just in case.) Also, used “ndiswrapper -i LSTINDS.INF” (NOT lsbcmnds.inf). Works with 64 and 128-bit WEP. Sometimes need to repeat config info (and commit) repeatedly, else driver & card will ignore requested setup. Also works with Gentoo 2.6.9-r9, ndiswrapper 0.12 and drivers that came from CD.
· NEW USER NOTE 12/30/05 by -JSK-: I had lots of problems getting the settings to take with this card and the above Windows driver. I finally found that the settings were timing and order dependent. Here is how I got the card to stick in Managed mode with 128 bit WEP and open authentication:
· ifconfig wlan0 essid $ESSID mode ad-hoc
· sleep 1
· iwconfig wlan0 key $KEY open
· sleep 1
· iwconfig wlan0 key open
· iwconfig wlan0 key on
· sleep 3
· iwconfig wlan0 essid $ESSID mode managed
· sleep 1
· iwconfig wlan0 key $KEY open
· sleep 1
· iwconfig wlan0 key open
· sleep 15
· ifconfig $DESIRED_IP_MASK_BROADCAST_ETC up
· I know it’s a hack, but this script works every single time for me. Before, life was miserable.

On debian, you can put this in a shell script and add a “pre-up” line in your interfaces file instead of using the “wireless” options. YMMV.

· Other: Working fine on Ubuntu Breezy Badger (kernel 2.6.12) using ndiswrapper 1.9 / ndiswrapper-utils 1.7 and lstinds.inf driver. –Johnmxl 10:45, 13 February 2006 (PST)

http://gabston-howell.org/wl/2006/06...woes-reloaded/


This from the forum here:

http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=106317

This one has “part” of a review that is to the effect of enabling nonfree repos for a Belkin usb wireless.

http://www.pricespider.com/Wireless-...0-p178166.html

this is an OLD thread but has some stuff that I kind of recognized:

http://lists.debian.org/debian-lapto.../msg00216.html

This is a brand new thread:

http://groups.google.com/group/linux...939a1127?pli=1

http://osdir.com/ml/drivers.atmel-wl.../msg00007.html

Well, I'm gonna quit, this is down through 8 pages of a Google search, hope it might help someone smarter than me!

woodsmoke

[chip.ling]

Today, the student access is just logging in through the normal web interface with no setup. No WEP key nothing.

Base on what you have mentioned, I have reason to believe your campus does not use any WEP security feature at all. Think about this, when the PC is abled to communicate with the college wireless network and get back a web page, you already establish a wireless connection with the wireless network.

This can be further confirmed by your trial on the other 3 laptops you have and can directly connected to the network without any problem.

So the college only use the customized web interface to act as the gateway for your access. Not using any of the wireless security feather like WEP, WAP2 etc.

Rgds,
Chip