Re: NM does not work with iwl4965 device

[Dan Williams <dcbw redhat com>]

On Wed, 2007-08-08 at 10:58 -0400, John W. Linville wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 08, 2007 at 07:34:47AM -0400, Dan Williams wrote:
> 
> > 1 means wpa_supplicant scans around and tries to find the AP.  But if
> > the AP is "hidden", wpa_supplicant won't find it because wpa_supplicant
> > doesn't know how to find hidden APs.  NM works around that by caching
> > the BSSID after a successful connection, and when it finds that BSSID in
> > scan results, filling in the SSID.
> 
> Just caught this -- so, how does NM find that BSSID in the first place?
> Someone un-hides the network long enough to connect, then NM just
> remembers?  Or is this "ask for the SSID, expect driver scanning
> routines to find it _somehow_, then cache the results"?

After the first successful connect, NM grabs the BSSID off the card and
caches that BSSID.  If the ESSID stays the same but the BSSID changes
(ie, the firmware/driver has decided to roam), NM caches that BSSID too.
Therefore, when scan results come back, NM can match up the BSSID in a
hidden scan result with an ESSID based on it's list of cached
BSSID->ESSID mappings.

Dan