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Connecting Puppy Linux to the Internet via a network cable is a piece of cake. Wireless networking can be slightly more difficult but is still easy to do. Here’s how. By GREG SWAIN Wireless Networking With Ubuntu & Puppy Linux L AST MONTH, we described how to resurrect an old laptop using Puppy Linux as the operating system. Puppy runs fast, even on old hardware, and is just the shot as an OS for machines that would otherwise finish up in landfill. In the course of preparing that ar- ticle, we decided to resurrect an old laptop that had once belonged to the daughter of one of the SILICON CHIP staff members. This 6-year old machine is a Compaq Presario M2000 running an AMD Sempron 3000 processor, 512MB of RAM and Windows XP. Well, it used to run Windows XP but somehow this had become kaput. It was taking an age to load and had become so corrupted that it would take several minutes just for the fly-up menu to appear after the Start button was clicked. Cleaning up the disk debris and running a registry checker did improve Fig.1 (above): set the menu timeout value and comment out the hiddenmenu line in Ubuntu’s /boot/grub/menu.lst file if setting up a dual-boot Ubuntu/Puppy system. Fig.2 (right): how the Puppy boot lines are added to menu.lst. 14  Silicon Chip siliconchip.com.au Fig.3: setting up a wireless networking profile in Ubuntu 8.1 (Intrepid Ibex) is a breeze using the Network Configuration wizard. These three dialog boxes show the basic set-up for a secure connection. things somewhat but it was clearly beyond redemption. So why not ditch Windows altogether and install Linux? In fact, why stop at just one flavour of Linux? To cut a long story short, we ended up installing both Ubuntu Linux and Puppy Linux as a dual-boot set-up. Ubuntu was installed first into one partition and then Puppy was installed into a second partition. Ubuntu’s boot menu file (/boot/menu.lst) was then modified to add Puppy as one of the boot options. How to you do that? Easy – Puppy recognises the Ubuntu install and tells you what lines to add to Ubuntu’s /boot/menu.lst file. While you’re at it, you also have to comment out the hiddenmenu line and change the timeout entry to suit – eg, seven seconds (Fig.1). Wireless networking Getting wireless networking going in Ubuntu 8.1 (aka Intrepid Ibex) proved to be child’s play. The laptop we were using didn’t have a built-in wireless adaptor, so we tested it with four plug-in adaptors: (1) a Netgear WG511 Wireless PC Card; (2) a Netgear WG111T USB Adaptor; (3) a Netgear WG111v2 USB Adaptor; and (4) a Belkin Wireless G USB Adaptor. In each case, as soon as the device was plugged in, Ubuntu loaded the correct native driver and the device was ready to go. siliconchip.com.au An external USB or PC Card wireless adaptor will be necessary if your laptop lacks a builtin adaptor. It was then just a matter of setting up a wireless networking configuration and saving the profile. That’s done by clicking System -> Preferences -> Network Configuration to bring up the Network Connections wizard – see Fig.3. You then add a wireless profile and enter in the necessary details such as the broadcast SSID, the mode and the security details (use WPA security if the driver supports it, otherwise use WEP). You also need to enter the MAC address of the wireless adaptor if you are using MAC address filtering. This is always a good idea but note that if you do use MAC address filtering, you will have to create a separate profile for each wireless device you intend using. And that’s it. Once the network profile has been created, Ubuntu 8.1 automatically connects to the Internet. What could be easier? – you just plug the device in, set up the wireless network configuration details and it works. However, based on personal experience, wireless networking with previous versions of Ubuntu is not April 2009  15 Wireless Networking . . . https://help.ubuntu.com/community/ WifiDocs/Driver/Ndiswrapper. This website gives the full step-by-step procedure and is easy to follow – just be sure to blacklist the listed native drivers as instructed. Note: this last step is critical and is necessary to prevent the native driver from loading and interfering with Ndiswrapper. If it doesn’t work, then it may be necessary to blacklist extra drivers – either that, or you’ve got the wrong Windows driver for your wireless adaptor. A list of drivers that you can try blacklisting is shown below (these entries go in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist). Fig.4: clicking the “Connect” icon on the Puppy desktop brings up the Internet Connection Wizard. quite as simple. For example, none of the native drivers for the above-listed wireless adaptors worked with Ubuntu 8.04 (aka Hardy Heron) but they could all be made to work by using a utility called “Ndiswrapper” and the relevant Windows driver for each device. As the name suggests, Ndiswrapper “wraps” the Windows driver so that it can be used under Linux. The procedure is relatively straightforward but we won’t go into it in detail here because the latest 8.1 version of Ubuntu apparently doesn’t need it – at least not for the adaptors we tested. If you are forced to use Ndiswrapper with Ubuntu, then take a look at blacklist b43 blacklist b43legacy blacklist ssb blacklist rt2500usb blacklist islsm_pci blacklist islsm blacklist islsm_usb blacklist prism2_usb blacklist rtl8187 blacklist r8187b blacklist rt73usb blacklist p54usb blacklist ath_pci blacklist ath_hal Note that while Ndiswrapper works well in practice it’s needed only if the native driver doesn’t do the job. Puppy wouldn’t play ball Getting the wireless networking going with Puppy also required some coaxing. With each of the three USB wireless adaptors, Puppy correctly loaded a native driver but things went Fig.5: in this case, no native driver has been loaded for wireless networking – just one for the ethernet adaptor. Click the Load module button to proceed. 16  Silicon Chip pear-shaped from there. Although each USB adaptor could “see” the wireless network, it stubbornly refused to connect even though the correct wireless profile had been created and loaded in Puppy’s networking set-up wizard. Similarly, Puppy identified and loaded a driver for the WG511 PC card. But that was as far as it got. In that case, the adaptor couldn’t even “see” the wireless network. Doggone it! Use Ndiswrapper After some trial and error, we quickly got all four wireless adaptors working with Puppy. Once again, the trick is to use the Ndiswrapper utility plus the relevant Windows driver for the device. Unlike Ubuntu, Puppy installs the Ndis­wrapper utility by default along with a GUI, so it’s easy to get going. Here’s how it’s done: Step 1: obtain the Windows .inf and .sys driver files for the wireless network adaptor. These can either be obtained from the installation CD supplied with the device or downloaded from the manufacturer’s website. If necessary, install the driver software on a Windows machine to extract the .inf and .sys files from a .exe install file. That done, copy them onto a USB flash drive or, better still, into the /home folder in Puppy. Step 2: run the Internet Connection Wizard by clicking the “Connect” icon on the desktop to bring up the dialog shown in Fig.4. Step 3: click the “Internet By Network Or Wireless LAN” button to bring up the dialog box shown in Fig.5, then Fig.6: after choosing the Ndiswrapper option, browse to Windows .inf driver file location, select it and click OK. siliconchip.com.au Fig.7 (above): this is the dialog that appears if Ndiswrapper and the Windows driver find the wireless adaptor. Click Save to keep the driver configuration. Fig.8 (right): once Ndiswrapper is working correctly, the wlan0 entry will appear in this dialog. You then click the wlan0 button to go to the dialog shown in Fig.9. click “Load Module” and choose the “Ndiswrapper” button at the next dialog. Be sure to unload and blacklist any existing native WLAN0 driver when prompted during this procedure (if one has been loaded). Alternatively, if no native driver has loaded, just click on the “None” button at this prompt. Step 4: follow the prompts to install the Windows driver. Note that you must select the .inf file to install (Fig.6). Step 5: having loaded the driver, the wizard will now bring up a dialog advising that it is trying to associate with an interface. If the driver finds the wireless interface and loads cor- rectly (see Fig.7), then so far so good – proceed to Step 7. Step 6: if it doesn’t find the adaptor, unload the driver at the subsequent prompt, then reload Ndiswrapper and the Windows driver and try again. This step is apparently necessary to completely unload other drivers, to prevent them from conflicting with Ndiswrapper and the Windows driver. In short, if a native driver has initially been loaded, you may have to go through the Ndiswrapper driver installation procedure twice to get it working. Based on my experience, simply installing Ndiswrapper and the driver once doesn’t work. Step 7: once the driver has associated with the wireless adaptor correctly, the dialog shown in Fig.8 will appear. This should now show the wlan0 entry with the driver module listed as “ndiswrapper”. If it does, click the wlan0 button and then the Wireless button at the next dialog (Fig.9) to go to the dialog shown in Fig.10. Step 8: click the “Scan” button. If it finds one or more wireless networks, you are in business. Select your network, then click the “New Profile” button to set-up a wireless networking profile as shown in Fig.10. STEP 9: Once the profile is completed, Fig.9 (above): click the Wireless button in this dialog to set up a wireless networking profile. Fig.10 (right): to set up the profile, first click the New Profile button, then enter in the details as shown here. You then save the profile and click the Use This Profile button. siliconchip.com.au April 2009  17 Wireless Networking . . . Locking Down A Wireless Network It’s surprising just how many unsecured wireless networks there are out there. Out of the box, most wireless modems/routers are unsecured and the owner often has no idea that this is the case. As a result, the network is wide open and can be accessed by other people in the vicinity (eg, your neighbours). If you don’t want others using your wireless Internet connection for free, there are four steps you should take to lock your wireless modem or wireless router down: STEP 1: change the default user name and password that’s used to log in to your wireless modem via your browser in order to set it up. The default user names are easy to discover on the net or even guess, so why make it easy for someone to gain access? STEP 2: change the ESSID (ie, the name given to the wireless network) from the default, then disable “Broadcast ESSID”. After all, there’s no point in changing it from the default if you’re then going to broadcast it to the world. STEP 3: Enable MAC address filtering if available, then enter the MAC address for your wireless network adaptor into the set-up. To explain, each wireless adaptor is assigned a unique identification number when it’s manufactured. This number is in hexadecimal format and is referred to as the “MAC address”. By enabling MAC filtering in your wireless router, you can limit access to those wireless adaptors that have the corresponding MAC addresses (you can enter more than one address). To obtain the MAC address of your wireless network adaptor, just go to a terminal window and type ifconfig -a for a Linux system or ipconfig /all on a Windows system. This will be listed as the Hwaddr in Puppy or as the Physical Address in Windows. Be sure to use the MAC address listed for your wireless adaptor, not for your ethernet adaptor. Fig.11: you can check which native drivers have been blacklisted by clicking Menu -> System -> BootManager Configure Bootup, then clicking “Click Here To Blacklist A Module”. click “Save” followed by “Use This Profile”. If Puppy subsequently reports that it was able to find a live network, you then click the Auto DHCP button to obtain an IP address. That’s it – you will now be connected to the Internet. Note, however, that Puppy does not automatically connect to a wireless network each time it starts up. Instead, you have to reload the networking profile (select the profile, then click “Load”, click “Use This Profile” and then “Auto 18  Silicon Chip DHCP” to reacquire an IP address. Of course, there is a way to make it automatically connect to a particular network but let’s not go there. In practice, the Netgear WG511 & WG111T adaptors and the Belkin USB wireless daptor all work reliably using the Ndiswrapper. In the case of the WG511, the p54pci driver had to be blacklisted while for the Belkin device it was the rt2500usb driver. No blacklisting was required for the WG111T, since no native driver was Alternatively, if you are using an external adaptor, the MAC address will be on a label attached to the device. STEP 4: Enable either WPA or WEP encryption (WPA = Wifi Protected Access; WEP = Wired Equivalent Privacy). Provided your network adaptor supports it, WPA is the one to go for since WEP is no longer regarded as being secure (although it’s still better than nothing if you have no choice). Note that the wireless router should be set up from your laptop or PC using a wired (ie, ethernet or USB) connection. Don’t set it up using an unsecured wireless connection because it’s wide open to anyone who may be snooping while you’re doing so. Note that it will also be necessary to enter the WPA (or WEP) key into the wireless networking profile on the laptop, otherwise you will not be able to access the wireless router. Depending on the operating system, you may have to enter the MAC address as well. loaded in the first place. By the way, the athfmwdl.inf driver was the one that worked for my WG111T, not the netwg11t.inf driver which was also on the Netgear installation CD. WG111v2 tantrums The WG111v2 loads the Prism p54usb driver as its native driver but despite correctly blacklisting this, it initially stubbornly refused to work under Ndiswrapper. It fact, the installed Windows driver wouldn’t even recognise the device. A few minutes research on the Internet licked that problem. If you’ve got a WG111v2 and its serial number starts with WG72 or WG16, then it’s really a WG111v1 device (despite what the label says) and you must use the WG111v1 driver. So the incorrect driver was being used. Downloading and installing the correct v1 driver from the Netgear website got it working. Troubleshooting If Ndiswrapper doesn’t work, try using a different Windows driver. Some wireless adaptors come in different siliconchip.com.au Useful Command Line Utilities A USB wireless adaptor can be used if necessary but PC card adaptors (eg, the WG511) are less vulnerable to damage in laptops. versions with different chipsets, so be careful if downloading drivers off the Internet. You must get the correct driver for your particular device otherwise it won’t work (see the note about the Netgear WG111v2 above). For this reason, try to use the driver that was supplied on the CD-ROM with the wireless adapter. Note that you cannot use Windows Vista drivers with Ndiswrapper – it’s limited to Windows XP and Windows 2000 drivers. If you want to check which files have been installed under Ndiswrapper, take a look at the /etc/ndiswrapper folder. The install procedure should have copied both the Windows .inf and .sys files to a sub-folder. Delete the sub-folder if you want to get rid of them. Blacklisting If you want to check which driver modules have been blacklisted, click Menu -> System -> BootManager Configure Bootup. This allows you to access the “Module Blacklist Manager” – see Fig.11. The loaded modules are listed at left, while the blacklisted modules are in the righthand pane. To add a module to the blacklist, simply select it in the lefthand pane and click “Add”. Conversely, to remove it from the blacklist, select it in the righthand pane and click “Remove”. Alternatively, you can directly handfettle the /etc/rc.d/modulesconfig file in a text editor. The blacklisted files go in the SKIPLIST section. Always be sure to leave a space between the last siliconchip.com.au Fig.12: the ifconfig -a command can be used to discover the MAC address of any network adaptors attached to the machine. It will also display any IP addresses that have been assigned. Fig.13: the iwconfig command gives information on the wireless set-up, including the broadcast ESSID if connected to a network. Several useful Linux command-line utilities can be used to help you get your network (either wireless or cable) up and running. They are as follows: (1) ifconfig -a, (2) iwconfig and (3) lsmod. Ifconfig -a is useful for discovering the MAC address of the wireless network adaptor and will also list its IP address if one has been picked up (the equivalent Windows command is ipconfig /all ). By contrast, iwconfig gives information on the wireless set-up. It shows the broadcast ID or ESSID (provided it’s connected), the frequency, the bit rate and even the encryption key. The third command, lsmod, lists the driver modules that Puppy (or Ubuntu) has loaded. Among other things, this is useful for discovering which native driver is loading for your wireless adaptor (this driver must be blacklisted if you are using Ndiswrapper). To run a command in Puppy, simply click the “Console” icon on the desktop to open a terminal window, then type the command and press Enter. entry and the end quote mark. Finally, if Ndiswrapper stubbornly refuses to work, try blacklisting the Broadcom drivers in the /etc/rc.d/ modulesconfig file. Open this file in a text editor and add bcm43xx b43 b43legacy ssb to the end of the SKIPLIST section. Be sure to leave a space between the final entry and the SC end quote mark. April 2009  19