Re: A couple of minor issues

["Peter Roediger" <p roediger web de>]

There's no doubt that periodic scanning is indeed important and convenient. But there's not always the case that people want to actually know about all the networks around them, but they just want to connect to a specific one. For example, if you have wired connection you most likely want to connect to one and the same wireless network every time after 
unplugging. And then it is _really_ annoying to have to wait for NM (or the wifi card) to scan (even if it's only for 30 seconds). So why can't we have both? Background scanning AND a scan on unplugging the wired network? So this "just works" effect would at least work for the newer cards as they have good hardware and drivers...

On 12/28/06, Dan Williams <dcbw redhat com > wrote:

On Thu, 2006-12-28 at 16:53 +0100, Peter Roediger wrote:
> Alright, but wouldn't it be way smarter to just scan for wireless
> networks on unplugging the wired network? Then it would connect
> immediately and automatically to the preferred network without any
> user interaction.
> This is something that probably needs to be changed in nm itself but
> not in the applet...

Possibly, but this wouldn't provide quite the experience you're looking
for.  Keep in mind that only very, very new cards (ipw, atheros) do
background scanning.  No other cards do.  And scans take time to
perform, sometimes up to 5 or 10 seconds for some (stupid) cards and
drivers.

So while this would work, I don't think it would have quite the desired
"Just Works" effect.  Also keep in mind that people click the menu
looking for what networks are around, either to find ones that are
connected, or just to see what's there.  Periodic scanning keeps that
list refreshed.

It's about _both_ an up-to-date list for determining which network to
connect to when you've lost a wired connection, _and_ letting the user
know what's out there.

Dan

>
>         On 12/28/06, Timo Hoenig <thoenig suse de > wrote:
>                 Hi,
>
>                 On Mon, 2006-12-25 at 10:11 -0500, Darren Albers
>                 wrote:
>                 > On 12/24/06, Peter Roediger <p roediger web de >
>                 wrote:
>
>                 > > 1) My laptop (like many other laptops i think) has
>                 a bright and, when not
>                 > > connected, flashing LED for the ipw2200 which I
>                 turn off when I'm on the
>                 > > wired network. When turning the ipw2200 on and
>                 unplugging the wired network
>                 > > card, NM does not immediately connect to the
>                 wireless network. I takes up to
>                 > > two minutes until I'm able to "see" the wireless
>                 networks around me in the
>                 > > kde applet. And then, NM connects automatically to
>                 my preferred network.
>                 > > During that time there seems to be no way to
>                 update the list, not even
>                 > > manually. "iwlist eth1 scan" on a command shows
>                 all available networks
>                 > > correctly.
>                 >
>                 > I am not certain about knetworkmanager but nm-applet
>                 (The gnome
>                 > applet) initiates a scan everytime you show the
>                 wireless networks.   I
>                 > think Timo monitors this list so maybe he
>                 can  answer if
>                 > knetworkmanager does the same.
>
>                 KNetworkManager tells NetworkManager that there is
>                 user interaction --
>                 which in turn raises the scanning frequency --
>                 whenever there is a mouse
>                 enter event on the tray icon.
>
>                    Timo
>
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