Re: Kernel drivers (newbie questions)

[Dan Williams <dcbw redhat com>]

On Wed, 2008-02-20 at 08:12 +0100, PEDRO MACANAS VALVERDE wrote:
> Where can I obtain a list with the correspondences between my device
> name (i.e. Linksys WRTXXX) and its Kernel Driver (or simply its
> driver) in Linux ?. Can I use the web for this ?.

If you really mean WRTXXX, that seems like an access point.  So it's not
"driven" by anything in Linux.  What actually happens is that the kernel
drives the wireless client adapter in your computer, and an application
like NetworkManager will tell the wireless client adapter to connect to
your WRTXXX access point.

Each wireless adapter on your system has an "interface name" like "eth1"
or "wlan0".  You can see these by running 'iwconfig' from a terminal.
It is somewhat hard to know exactly what interface name matches up with
what _physical_ hardware that you have plugged into your machine if you
have more than one network adapter.

> Does network manager "manages" my PPP internet connection ?. Can I use
> it to link the PPP Internet access to a WiFi network ?.

NetworkManager will manage mobile broadband connections, which use PPP
to establish internet connectivity over cellular networks.  It doesn't
yet support Bluetooth DUN or serial dialup, though that's planned and
not too hard.

If you are connecting to the internet over Wifi, you shouldn't need PPP
at all, since it's only used with cable modems, some ADSL USB modems,
dialup modems, bluetooth DUN, and mobile broadband.  Ethernet and Wifi
don't need PPP.

Dan