[plug] Debian Wireless

[Matt Kemner]

On Sat, 10 May 2003, quoth Luke Brown:

> Im now in the process of trying to configure the netgear card (which is
> being picked up by cardctl just fine) as an interface. I followed a
> howto on this which went through changing the /etc/pcmcia/network.opts
> and wireless.opts files but it doesnt setup the interface when i
> restart cardmgr or remove/add the card.

Do you get two high beeps when you insert the card, or a high beep and a
low beep?

Also check the output of /var/log/syslog, because it should say something
similar to this:

May 10 09:56:26 nirvana cardmgr[352]: socket 1: Cabletron RoamAbout 802.11 DS
May 10 09:56:26 nirvana cardmgr[352]: executing: 'modprobe hermes'
May 10 09:56:26 nirvana cardmgr[352]: executing: 'modprobe orinoco'
May 10 09:56:26 nirvana cardmgr[352]: executing: 'modprobe orinoco_cs'

If pcmcia-cs can't work out what type of card it is you may need to add it
to /etc/pcmcia/config so cardmgr knows which module to load.

Run "cardctl ident" to see what the card reports itself as, and add a
stanza to /etc/pcmcia/config
eg my wireless card reports itself as:

Socket 1:
  product info: "Cabletron", "RoamAbout 802.11 DS", "Version 01.01", ""
  manfid: 0x0156, 0x0002
  function: 6 (network)

and I have a stanza in /etc/pcmcia/config that says:

card "Cabletron RoamAbout 802.11 DS"
  version "Cabletron", "RoamAbout 802.11 DS"
  bind "orinoco_cs"

The first line is a description field where you can add whatever you like,
and it will be reported in syslog.  The second line is what cardmgr uses
to match the card, and should either be something from the "product info"
line, or the manfid.  The third line says what module to load.

For your netgear card (which is prism2 based) you have the choice of
multiple drivers, including orinoco_cs; wlan-ng and HostAP.
orinoco_cs is included with the kernel, and should work fine.

Always eject the card and run "/etc/init.d/pcmcia restart" after making
changes to any files in /etc/pcmcia/

> Ive configured the Xircom card to work using /etc/network/interfaces
> can I just do the same with the netgear?

The Xircom is most likely a cardbus card, which is handled slightly
different.  PCMCIA cards are configured via /etc/pcmcia/network.opts -
which is very versatile.

The problem with using /etc/network/interfaces is that it binds an IP
address to a "virtual" name such as eth0 or eth1, and if you were to
insert your PCMCIA cards in a different order they would be assigned
different IP addresses.

With network.opts you can assign an IP address to a MAC address, which
should be unique to each card.  You can also set up "schemes" so a card in
one scheme has a different configuration from another.

For example, when I take my laptop home I run "cardctl scheme home" and it
grabs the config from wireless.opts and network.opts to set my ESSID etc,
and IP address to match my home network.
When I get to work I run "cardctl scheme linuxit" and the work settings
are loaded.

Regards,

 - Matt