Re: Connection sharing

[Simon Schampijer <simon schampijer de>]

Dan Williams wrote:
> On Sun, 2008-12-14 at 16:18 +0100, Simon Schampijer wrote:
> > Bill Moseley wrote:
> > > On Fri, Dec 05, 2008 at 05:19:33PM -0500, Dan Williams wrote:
> > > > On Thu, 2008-12-04 at 21:12 -0800, Bill Moseley wrote:
> > > > > I'm running Ubuntu 8.10 on a Thinkpad T60p w/ Atheros wireless.
> > > > madwifi or ath5k?  Only ath5k is supported, because madwifi isn't in the
> > > > upstream kernel.  NetworkManager only supports drivers that are shipped
> > > > in the official Linux kernel.  Since we cannot fix binary drivers, and
> > > > out-of-tree drivers are of questionable interoperability and quality,
> > > > they are not supported.
> > > I thought I was running madwifi, but according lsmod ath9k is loaded.
> > >
> > > > Is there a checkbox next to the wifi network you just created?  The icon
> > > > will show your *primary* internet connection, i.e. the one you are
> > > > sharing.  But the menu will also indicate the connection which is
> > > > sharing your primary connection.
> > > No check box -- a radio button, yes, if that's what you mean.
> > >
> > > > The sharing capability requires dnsmasq-base (on Ubuntu).
> > > Yes, installing that package was all it took. Very nice!
> > >
> > > To disable the ad-hoc network should I just select another wireless
> > > from the drop-down (or I guess I could just disable wireless all
> > > together).
> > >
> > > One thing that seems different since upgrading to 8.10 is that the
> > > wireless always connects even when on the wired LAN.  IIRC, before
> > > nm-applet would stop the wireless when I connected to the wired LAN.
> > > But, my memory might be wrong about that.
> > >
> > > > If you
> > > > install that, when you "create new wireless network", it will create an
> > > > Ad-Hoc wifi connection and will start dnsmasq as a forwarding nameserver
> > > > and DHCP server on that adhoc network.  Other computers that connect to
> > > > that adhoc network will then be able to get a DHCP address.
> > > I see.  So my Thinkpad is preforming NAT (it's address is 192.168. and
> > > the devices that connect to it (like my iBook) is 10.42.44.10,
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > > *however*, since you state that other computers cannot see the newly
> > > > created adhoc sharing network, this either indicates that you don't have
> > > > dnsmasq installed, or it indicates driver problems.  I had to fix quite
> > > > a few upstream drivers along the way to get adhoc networking to work
> > > > correctly, and fix wpa_supplicant in a few cases.  These changes are in
> > > > released kernels (2.6.27 and later) and also in the latest
> > > > wpa_supplicant releases (0.6.5 and later).
> > > Thanks very much for you effort.  Very impressive how well these
> > > things work now.
> > Yup, does work great for me as well to share my wired connection, 
> > terrific work!
> >
> > One thing I did not understand yet is, that once the second machine is 
> > connected I do not get any information about the signal strength anymore 
> > (it show up as being 0).
> >
> > This is reflected in both machines in the nm-applet but as well if I 
> > check with iwconfig. When I do scanning with iwlist I get the signal 
> > strength information fine.
> >
> > Any ideas what I miss here?
>
> The driver is either (a) not reporting the adhoc IBSS in its scan list,
> or isn't reporting signal strength for the IBSS in the scan list, or
> isn't reporting signal strength at all when in IBSS mode.  It's
> completely a driver problem.
>
> I think I've said a few times before on linux-wireless@ that drivers
> should be reporting 100% strength for adhoc no matter what, until we
> figure something else out.
>
> Dan

Oh, reading other posts I guess I hit a common issue. I guess reporting 
100% strength for adhoc would sort out the first confusion. Anything 
that one can do to get this process going?

Btw, I was testing with the drivers rt73usb and iwl3945.

Thanks for the quick comment,
   Simon