wireless connection issues

[michael2010]

Hi, I moved forward to configure my new setup but somehow I can't seemed to get the wireless connection going. I would appreciate some advice. Thanks.

My wireless configuration (WPA + PSK) looks like this:

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config wifi-device  wl0
        option type     broadcom
        option channel  7

config wifi-iface
        option device   wl0
        option network  lan
        option mode     sta
        option ssid     <my ssid>
        option encryption psk
        option key <my key>
 

According to http://dev.luci.freifunk-halle.net/docs ... riable.wds For WPA and PSK I would need to use "psk" as encryption parameter. I could not find any information on what format the encryption key should be placed in the wireless config file. I assumed plain text. But it does not look to me I'm getting to that stage yet.

my network configuration is default:

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#### VLAN configuration
config switch eth0
        option vlan0    "1 2 3 4 5*"
        option vlan1    "0 5"


#### Loopback configuration
config interface loopback
        option ifname   "lo"
        option proto    static
        option ipaddr   127.0.0.1
        option netmask  255.0.0.0


#### LAN configuration
config interface lan
        option type     bridge
        option ifname   "eth0.0"
#       option proto    static
        option proto    dhcp
#       option ipaddr   192.168.1.1
#       option netmask  255.255.255.0

When I start my network I get the following:

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root@OpenWrt:/#
root@OpenWrt:/#
root@OpenWrt:/# /etc/init.d/network restart
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering disabled state
br-lan: port 1(eth0.0) entering disabled state
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering disabled state
device wl0 left promiscuous mode
br-lan: port 1(eth0.0) entering disabled state
device eth0.0 left promiscuous mode
device eth0.0 entered promiscuous mode
br-lan: port 1(eth0.0) entering learning state
br-lan: port 1(eth0.0) entering forwarding state
br-lan: topology change detected, propagating
device wl0 entered promiscuous mode
wl0: attempt to add interface with same source address.
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering learning state
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering forwarding state
br-lan: topology change detected, propagating
Received SIGTERM
Entering released state
udhcpc (v1.11.2) started
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering disabled state
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering disabled state
device wl0 left promiscuous mode
Sending discover...
device wl0 entered promiscuous mode
wl0: attempt to add interface with same source address.
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering learning state
br-lan: port 2(wl0) entering forwarding state
br-lan: topology change detected, propagating
root@OpenWrt:/# Sending discover...
Sending discover...

From what I can see the wireless LED never blinks (not sure if it does blink during setup). What am I doing wrong? Any hint on what I could check?
I reviewed

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/tmp/log

for any additional logs that might give me a clue but nothing going on in there. I would be thankful for any advice I could get to keep this going. Thanks. Regards, Michael

[jeroen94704]

Does the wifi led ever go on, or does it stay off completely?

The reason I'm asking is that I don't see "option disabled 0" in the config block for the wifi device. So maybe it's simply durned off completely.

Your wifi key is indeed entered in plain text. Make sure you get a nice, long password (25 chars minimum) or else your wifi network is trivially easy to break into.

Hope this helps,

Jeroen

[michael2010]

Jeroen, thanks for the tip. I put the line back in the config file. I still have the problem that I reported. But I did quite a lot of testing. I found out that my 63 character long password simply does not work. I also found out (had to change my entire wireless network) that a shorter key say 10-12 chars works. It is really strange. I have questions but I can't articulate them at this time. Will keep you guys posted. Thanks. Regards, Michael
PS: MPC radio with weak wireless network sounds great.

[jeroen94704]

That's weird indeed. My WPA PSK is a 63 character random string with special characters, and that works fine.

[michael2010]

Jeroen, I envy you for that. I spend some time trying to determine what is wrong. Here is what I found out:

No encryption = works
WEP = not tested
WPA = short password works
WPA = long password 63 characters does not work
WPA2 = short password works
WPA2 = long password not tested

For both WPA and WPA2 I used the so called personal setting. When the key string is long I always get the same error message (like reported above).

How did you configure your wifi radio to connect to the AP? I appreciate any help I can get. Thanks.

Regards, Michael

[michael2010]

Well, there are just so many variations you can try. It is the AES setting of the wireless AP that the openWRT doesn't like. I changed it to TKIP and that works fine with key with the length of 63 char. I'm pretty sure there is a way with openWRT to setup AES but I will put it on the to do list. It is nice to do something else then change network configurations for a change. Michael

[jeroen94704]

Then I guess I use TKIP as well . Good to hear you have things working. The fact remains that OpenWrt is geared towards it being used as a router, and that is where the focus of the development is. Setting it up as a wifi client is a secondary use that doesn't get the same amount of attention and testing.