Wireless 1390 WLAN (Dell D620 laptop)

[canuk]

On install, Puppy is using the bcm43xx module.
I can go to the Puppy Network Wizard and scan. I see networks, but see "Unable to connect to a wireless network" when I try and connect to a network.
After doing some reading, I thought that maybe I should use ndiswrapper to load bcmwl5 after downloading the Dell driver and unzipping it.
I get the same issue where I can scan available networks, but can't connect.
I have tried connecting to WPA and open networks.
Is there any known issue and/or work around for the Dell 1390 WLAN mini-card?

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
I am a brand new Linux user. I have tried many Linux projects over the years but seemed to get stopped with the wireless problem. When I downloaded the Puppy 3.01 I fell in love with Linux for the first time especially with the EZ-Pup-3.01 Desktop loaded.
Getting this darned Dell 1390 Express card working has been a job though. I setup the Ndiswrapper with the new bcmwl5 driver. The driver would load but I couldn't get DHCP or scan a router. Finally I went to the Pet Install site and found a program called WAG 0.3.2 Wifi utility and installed it. It runs from the Console by typing "wag". When it listed my 1390 Express Card I clicked the SCAN button and !bravo the red light came on and it found my router. I then exited the wag program and went to the network wifi manager, clicked TEST and got a successful result. I then clicked the wireless button and gave the profile a name then clicked the SCAN button at the bottom and my router came up. I then clicked the SAVE button.
I then opened my browser and have very fast wifi. Possibly even faster than the lan.
Problem!! when I reboot my wifi doesn't come back up. I can go back to Wag and do a rescan and it is right back. This is something I can live with until the Linux crew gets this fixed. I have been waiting for 10 years now so I guess I can wait a while longer.
One more thing, I got a error from wag that said that my driver was compiled with version 22 and that wag only supports up to version 21. This didn't keep it form working though.

If anyone can tell my how to save my wifi settings after I get the card working I will be a very happy puppy.
Thanks

PS I am using a Dell B120 (el cheapo) with 256M Ram Integrated lan and Dell 1390 Express Card that plugs into a external Express slot. This use to be a PCMCIA slot on older models however the express slot is not a PCMCIA bridged device. They did away with PCMCIA because it was too slow.
I am booting from a wake puppy disk and have my puppy system on a 2Gig FAT32 partition. My other partition boots XP Pro.SP2. I repartition with Partition Magic from a Hirems 9.1 utility disk. My puppy will also run off the CD or USB but I like to keep my Save File on the HD.

This is off topic but if you can tell me if there is a C++
Gnu compiler that will run under puppy I would appreciated it.

[tempestuous]

rarsa reports that the bcm43xx module needs to be unloaded/reloaded to work properly
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=22459

Seems like a much more simple (and elegant) solution than ndiswrapper.

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
The link "http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=22459" seemed to have more problems than solutions. Especially for someone new to linux. I don't think I am going to rewrite the connection wizard right now. I have the linux driver blacklisted.
If you have some coherent instructions I can use to implement whatever they are talking about on that link I would appreciate it and would be glad to spend a couple of more days trying to get it to work.
Makes sense to me though that the driver could be having a timing problem and can't get loaded with all of its instructions. How to fix that is obscure at best.
Since you probably know something and I know nothing (at this point) please advise. I am using ndiswrapper with the latest drivers and am not using encryption. The RARSA link is starting to make sense though. the WAG program just lets me implement one instruction at a time so that the process is run slower. I would prefer to use the Linux driver though. *%@$* Michael Dell.
Thanks

[jonyo]

You may be having a small problem but you also may be the first to have made a wifi connection this way (by installing WAG 0.3.2) with pup v3.01!

Least I've not heard of it.

Problem!! when I reboot my wifi doesn't come back up. I can go back to Wag and do a rescan and it is right back. This is something I can live with until the Linux crew gets this fixed. I have been waiting for 10 years now so I guess I can wait a while longer.

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
The real issue for me now is just saving the settings so that my system will reboot with the changes. When I reboot my Puppy save file is unchanged. I am booting a Fat 32 drive with the WakePup disk for now. My save file in on the fat32 drive. If I need to do something different then I'm up to it.
I agree with all the heat on these forums that a native driver is better. However if I can just get this network to work in the first place then I can divorce that bloated MS$&*XP and move on. I am retired and have plenty of experience and time to solve all the other problems (data conversion etc).
Thanks

[jonyo]

wifi settings not being saved is a common problem that can usually be fixed but I don't quite understand how to go about it myself so higher ups'll have to chime in on that.

In the meantime, this may help. http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=22469

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
Thanks for the info Jonyo. I will fire up my puppy and give those instructions a try. If I have success with any of this I will post.
Thanks

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
I went back to the RARSA link posted by Tempestous above. It is starting to sink in. I am going to unblacklist the linux driver and try to get that working first. Go back to the wrapper if I need to, since I know that will work.
Thanks.

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
I went back and tried some of the commands on the link provided by Jonyo "http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=22469".

I couldn't get them to work but will try again later. Mean time, I opened the console and typed wag and in two clicks had my wifi up.
type # wag
click on scan
click on Cell0
No need to mess with dhcp or the rest.
Wifi up and running.

Above instructions presume that you have your drivers loaded in ndiswrapper. iwconfig can see your card but you can't connect. And, WAG is installed.
Hopes this helps. I'm going to work on that linux driver now.
Thanks

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
I got the Linux driver working using instructions from RARSA however it still wouldn't connect to the router. Same problem as ndiswrapper. I used wag and it worked. So if you want the Linux native driver working do the following. I will fix the remaining problem later.

First goto you Boot Manager under System and unblacklist your bcm43xx driver if it is blacklisted. Then..

1. From the console
# ndiswrapper -r bcmwl5 ; ndiswrapper and Windows driver down

2. from the Connection Manager load the bcm43xx driver. No problem if it loads but doesnt work. you should see the wifi card as eth(n) or wlan(n) if it is loaded.

3. From the Console type the following commands. This presumes that the Access Point is unencrypted.
Ifconfig eth1 up ; eth1 should be replaced with your own wifi
iwconfig eth1 essid linksys ; linksys should be replaced with yours
iwconfig eth1 mode managed
iwconfig eth1 key off ; if encrypted use "key open" and the key

Your card is now loaded

Open the Connection manager click on your wifi card link, then choose "wireless" , click the scan button at the bottom. You should see your access point under essid. Create a profile and save.
You are done with setting up the linux driver. This part should return after a reboot so you won't have to repeat it.
You should now see that if you try to login to the internet your card won't work. So do this
From the console
Type # wag ; This presumes you have wag installed.
Click on Scan
Click on Cell 01
Done, you should now have working card.
If you reboot you have to open Console
1. #modprobe bcm43xx
2. # ifconfig eth1 up ; replace eth1 with your wifi
3. Run the 3 Wag instructions and your card will be back.
I am now a happy puppy.
Thanks

[jonyo]

Since you probably know something and I know nothing (at this point)

Umm..I have some reading to do.. to try and figure out all you've done here..

Nice!

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
I'm about to crack this nut. I have some script to write. I'm not used to the Linux bash language. However I am a retired computer consultant and have written script on MS based machines since back in the 80s. Once I get this boot problem solved and the boot script written and figure out how to implement it, I will do the Linux thing and share, so we will all have the solution. Actually this problem is a result of the tightness of the Linux kernel. It does what is does very well, but isn't tolerant of loose processes. Thats what makes it so small and fast. Thing is we can fix this problem. We just need some deliberate effort.
Stay tuned. Might be tomorrow, but probably Wednesday.
Thanks

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
Sorry about the delay. Took me a couple of days of testing to find the problem with this 1390 driver. I could get the card running but would loose it on reboot. Since I am a newbie with Linux (but not with computers) I had to figure out the boot registry and also learn some scripting. But my solution works. I want the write up to be complete so that the reader doesn't have to go all over the net for more info. I will try and get it done by tomorrow (Nov 1).
Thanks

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
UPDATE
My WIFI startup script is working great after many reboots. As soon as I can get this the instructions written and the script posted, I will start on a script with encryption enabled, and also a roaming Wifi version.
Thanks
Bill C.

[tempestuous]

tlcstat,
It's great that you have a solution, and are prepared to share with others, but let's stand back and look at the big picture.

1. The most straightforward way to configure wifi is with manual commands. I have provided comprehensive instructions for this process here (it's the first listed sticky topic in the HOWTO section) -
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=22469


2. Many users are too scared/reluctant/impatient to use manual commands, and insist on using a gui setup wizard. Various contributors have helped put together the Puppy Network Wizard, which runs the very same commands in the background. A major shortcoming of wizards is that if/when they fail, you have no idea of what went wrong. This is the strength of the commandline: you can identify when a command fails.
WAG is a very early attempt at a wizard, which has many shortcomings. rarsa updated WAG to accommodate multiple wifi drivers, plus WPA support, at which point it became known as the "Network Wizard". Then Dougal improved the Wizard further. Then Barry modified it further again.
Under Puppy 3.x especially, the Wizard has been failing in quite a few instances, but we have not had enough clear feedback to identify the problem(s).
Personally, I suspect that Puppy 3.x has some underlying problems with the way that modules are loaded.

So I'm just letting everyone know that your solution is not new or different, it's a combination of manual commands and exisiting wizards.
The commands that you explained are exactly the same as I outlined in my HOWTO, except that yours stop short of obtaining an IP address, at which point you suggest going back to a wizard (and an outdated wizard, at that).

My concern is that there are appearing various wifi "solutions" on the forum which must be extremely confusing to new users.
It's worth noting that whatever gui may be in use, there is only ONE basic set of commands that will configure WEP-encrypted wifi connections, and only ONE basic set of commands that will configure WPA/WPA2-encrypted wifi connections.

[tlcstat]

Greetigs,
Thanks for the feed back Tempestous. Actually, Wag and the other wizards have nothing to do with the solution. My WIFI starts up just fine, every time and I do it with command line instructions run from a script file that I created. That I created using information garnered from posts put up by "you" and also others across the internet. I also downloaded a manual on Linux scripting to do the job.
However, I'm not new to this. I have been working at the command prompt since DOS 2.1 and was writing Menu Systems in DR DOS batch language back in the 80s and writting accounting automation in Lotus Macro language since the 90s.
I agree that people using Linux need to learn to use the console. They also need to live their life. The computer should be their slave not the reverse. Linux is only installed on 1% of the computer market and lack of WIFI support is one of the reasons. I can see that the Linux community has been working hard trying to get this fixed. The Fwcutter is a example of that. But consider this. When you start your computer in Linux thie boot manager starts up the kernel, the display, the drives, the keyboard, the mouse, any USB devices, it loads the PCMCIA bridge and everything plugged into it (if it can), it setup printers and scanners (I suppose, haven't got there yet). But it doesn't startup the WIFI. This fact will be unacceptable to a former Windows user, which is what the new users are for the most part.
In solving this problem I have seen that the boot scripts run too fast to accomodate the wait states that WIFI requires for DHCP. In other words the boot process just runs right past it. That fact doesn't mean that it shouldn't work at boot. The process is there to startup the card, but because of Linux's speedy boot it can't get a job "that slow" finished. The solution is to run the wifi script at the end of the boot with the required wait states. The card will then startup and get DHCP and that is exactly what I have done. The script can be run from the console with a bash command or put in the startup folder and run automatically. That is the users choice. I hear a lot of stuff on the forums about the use of Ndiswrapper being a lazy solution. Not so! Ndiswrapper takes just as long to implement as a native driver. It also doesn't work at boot time for the same reasons I have already stated. In other words, The WIFI won't start up with the fwcutter driver "most of the time' and it also won't startup with Ndiswrapper. Lazyness has nothing to do with it. Both are difficult, else the problem would have been fix by now. The attitude that it "shouldn't" be fixed is the reason it "hasn't" been fixed. I am a new Linux user and I found a solution in four days. Some will want to use it and the rest can use the command line everytime their computer boots. I have other things to do, like writing a script that will automate logging into roaming WIFI (stay tuned). Hey, I think I'm up to this, but if I wasn't retired I would go back to WindowsXP. Anyway thank you Tempestous for all your helpful posts and also the rest thats been available. I know you have a lot of time invested in this Linux project. I'm just not the kind of person to accept a problem just because the solution is difficult. Computers were created to help us "get the job done", not to spend all our time at the prompt "getting the computer to work". I still struggling over these instructions! That is my downfall. Fixing the computer is easy. Been doing that for a long time. Writting instructions isn't my strong suit, but I will get it done.
Main objective is to compile this into a self installer. But, first thing first.
Thanks
tlcstat

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
Just one more thing.
quote from post..
"My concern is that there are appearing various wifi "solutions" on the forum which must be extremely confusing to new users"

Actually, I "am" a new user.

Quote from post...
"'So I'm just letting everyone know that your solution is not new or different, it's a combination of manual commands and exisiting wizards'"

Don't let everyone know what it is when you haven't seen it. Its not a combination of anything. Getting past the denial is the hard part. The rest isn't easy but it can be done!

Thanks
tlcstat

[tempestuous]

Your 7th post in this thread is written as a wifi connection howto, quite explicitly -
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 101#150101
by literal definition, that's a solution (for wifi connectivity) even though you may have some other solution ultimately in mind.

My comments were offered in good faith to avoid the confusion I have seen on the forum before.

So in case my central point was missed in all of this, let me rephrase: the information contained in tlcstat's 7th post (I deliberately avoided the word solution) is a combination of manual commands and existing wizards.

[tlcstat]

Greetings,
Actually, I made it clear from my first post that I was brand new to Linux. My post was just to let any one concerned know that I had actually got this 1390 card working in the first place with the native driver, and how I did it. I never thought it was a solution. My concern from the beginning was the orginal post that the card would not start upon reboot. Later I found that anything that worked with the native driver (with the 1390 express card) was buggy. It would work fine a couple of times and next time the card would be gone completely.
I decided that the bcm43xx driver had to be abandoned and I went back to the ndiswrapper since the bcmwl5 drivers work properly. This gave me a dependable working card but still no dhcp at boot. With the boot script that I have written the cards loads at every boot with out utilities or console commands and has been doing so for a couple of days. I switch back to WindowsXP several times a day, and the card always comes back on ;reboot. This will fix the original problem that brought me to this post. Thing is, as a new linux user I had no way of knowing that the fwcutter file for this card wouldn't work right. When I got it going I thought I was "done". So what you see is just a newbie struggling with a very good but difficult operating system. I can see now that Linux is very much today what MSDOS was back in the old days. A operating system that is very much in control of the user and thus appeals to the techie types (which I am). Only difference is that MSDOS was crap and Linux is actually a very fast and robust operating system. I just don't want anyone to think that the solution I have has anything to do with the post that you reference.
Remember I've only been at this for 4 days so be patient. All of your post have been helpful and I thank you for that.
Thanks
tlcstat