Re: network profiles

[Bill Moss <bmoss clemson edu>]

Some comments to Dan's reply to my original message.

I think NM is not working properly with ipw2200 because ip2200 does not 
yet support scan quality; i.e. I have to keep entering ESSID and WEP key 
using 'Other Wireless Networks'

I like the concept "it just works." I also like the idea of an advanced 
user or administrator being able to input data when it makes sense, for 
example, the list of MAC addresses for my campus wireless network.

IBM's Access Connections tool works equally well with broadcast and 
hidden ESSID's and only requires the input of ESSID and WEP key. I go 
back and forth from home (broadcast) to office (hidden) without problem. 
In fact, for a long time I operated my home with the same ESSID as 
campus. It was only after I started using NM, that I created a separate 
ESSID for home. My guess is that IBM's Access Connections utility scans 
for MAC's and compares to its database. If it finds a MAC in the 
database for an AP inrange, it looks up the corresponding ESSID and WEP 
key. Using ESSID as the primary key for the networks database does not 
make sense to me. I have gconf set up with a network called Clemson. The 
addresses key contains the list of campus MAC's. The ESSID is cuairnet 
and there is a 128 bit hex WEP key. When an ipw2200 scan tells NM that 
there is an AP in range with MAC XXX, I would expect NM to look in gconf 
for that MAC. If it finds it, then NM can read the corresponding ESSID 
and the key

--
Bill Moss
Professor, Mathematical Sciences
Clemson University