Ugh, it looks like I need the gtk library for this. Looking at a long install time for wicd.
*stretch*
Alright, now in /etc/rc.conf I’m adding
rc_hotplug="!net.eth* !net.wlan*"
As suggested after wicd emerged.
I’m also instructed to update /etc/pam.d/system-login
Gentoo has a guide (of course!) for wicd which I will follow until I don’t.
# /etc/init.d/wicd start
works.
Wicd connects to the router, but I can’t connect to any other computer
I love fluxbox! It’s easy on the system and the eyes. By default it’s little more than an empty desktop with a background.
As with most processes in this endeavor, I begging with Gentoo’s fluxbox HOWTO
So I’ll unmerge twm and xterm. They don’t take up much space, but they’re ugly and will soon be redundant.
I’m adding truetype and vim-syntax to my USE flags in /etc/make.conf and then:
# emerge fluxbox xlockmore eterm
Next, we install a graphical login manager. With it, I can have the desktop environment start at boot with a login screen. Gentoo recommends slim, so that’s next up.
I need to edit /etc/conf.d/xdm with
DISPLAYMANAGER="slim"
Once I know it works, I’ll add it to the run level with:
# rc-update add xdm default
followed by some eye-candy in the form of themes and wallpapers.
Now we try to start things up with
# /etc/init.d/xdm start
Fortunately the login comes up and looks pretty. Unfortunately, Whether I log in as root or my user I get
Failed to execute log in command
To fix this I followed this forum posting:
# echo "XSESSION=fluxbox > /etc/env.d/90xsession
And when logging in, I need to press f1 to select fluxbox.
Also, since I uninstalled xterm I needed to replace the instances of ‘xterm’ in ~/.fluxbox/menu with ‘eterm’
Hmm, for some reason eterm isn’t coming up, which makes the desktop kinda useless :/ So back to xterm and I can worry about prettying things up later.
Make fluxbox the default and start it at boot to polish it off.
Okay, now back to wireless.
This is where the big memory savings come.
X
Server Configuration How-to is much less
aggravating than the wireless, and that’s what I’ll be using here.
Before a windowing environment is installed I need to emerge the X Window Server
Overnight I emerged the xorg-drivers and attendant packages. I prefer a minimalist environment, somewhat by necessity, so in /etc/make.conf, I have the following:
USE="-gtk -gnome -qt4 -kde -cdr ncirses libkms dvd alsa X acpi ipod latex unicode pcmcia wifi
This will avoid installing the infrastructure of the gnome and KDE windowing environments, two very nice systems, but a little resource intensive for a decades old computer.
The next step:
emerge xorg-server
making sure that udev is in the USE flags for this package.
Now I install the barest of bones window manager and terminal:
emerge twm xterm
And the initial test
$ startx
It’s not pretty, but it works!
Next up, fluxbox.
Okay, I found this old guide that seems like progress. The basic steps
I took:
update-modules
ndiswrapper -i lsbcmnds.inf
modprobe ndiswrapper
vim /etc/conf.d/modules
modules="ndiswrapper" (to add it at boot)Now I can scan for wireless networks, and I can start wireless services, and even got assigned an ip address, but I cannot ping an outside address.
It seems that the card is working, now I need to check some settings, such as might be done with wicd, although it requires a desktop interface. sigh.
Skipped pub quiz tonight in exchange for (modest) progress. Also, I think it’s below freezing outside. At least below 50°, in any case just as bad.
Victory at The Local! AND the Science fair was amusing, too. Did you know water was made of “tiny atoms”? It’s fine to make fun of children for not being able to talk, right?
Alright, so the WPA_supplicant.conf is pretty basic:
network={
ssid="network-name"
psk="pass phrase"
proto=WPA
}
Nothing special from the Handbook; it looks like you should be able to get it up and running without installing wpa_supplicant. This Gentoo page says all I need to do is set the ESSID and key:
But that's not enough, so here's another Gentoo site that want me to make a symlink: Then added in /etc/rc.conf: and put dhcp for wlan0 in /etc/conf.d/net. Then a test: Okay, going to comment out some of the old wpa_supplicant stuff in /etc/conf.d/net, since this page has a simpler layout. Now: This forum posting has some simple example configs.iwconfig wlan0 essid
iwconfig wlan0
cd /etc/init.d
ln -s net.lo net.wlan0
rc_logger=yes
/etc/init.d/net.wlan0 start
* Caching service dependencies ...
* Bringing up interface wlan0
* Running preup ...
* No link on wlan0, aborting configuration
* ERROR: net.wlan0 failed to start/etc/init.d/net.wlan0 start
* Caching service dependencies ...
* Bringing up interface wlan0
* Starting wpa_supplicant on wlan0 ...
Could not set interface wlan0 flags: No such file or directory
Failed to initialize driver interface
* start-stop daemon: failed to start `/usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant'
* ERROR: net.wlan0 failed to start
First let’s tackle the SIOCSIFFLAGS:
It looks like all of this might be a result
of having the wrong driver installed. We’ll try v2 next. To do this, I had to manually delete the directory /etc/ndiswrapper/lsbcmnds
UPDATE: No change.
Found another website that has a non-ndiswrapper walk through. Apparently I hadn’t installed any firmware (a step not included in any of the other guides).
This process went smoothly enough, although I had to temporarily alter /etc/make.conf to emerge a couple masked packages (the firmware itself) but concluded with “reboot and configure your wireless.”. Aaaaaaaasaa that’s what I’m trying to do : (
Now I’m returning to the Gentoo Wireless Networking guide to repeat a number of steps, but this time with the firmware installed. That should make a difference, right?
Okay, Pub Quiz tonight, Science Fair judging in the morning and then back to this.
Peter Rawrsgaard
I’m going to give ndiswrapper a chance. I know I said the emerge failed last night, but I was too tired to read why. I know it worked back in 2004, and I don’t think it was even in portage, then. So here goes (after pancakes and undoing what I’ve already done).
First step was to enable WIRELESS_EXT in the kernel by configuring it with support for the prism54 driver. We’ll
see if it emerges after the kernel compiles. UPDATE: Enabling USB in the kernel, now. UPDATE: Install succeeded.
I need a .inf and a .sys file from a Windows driver. Once I get them into my root directory I’m to:
ndiswrapper -I /root/foo.inf
update-modules
NOW: headed over to http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net
I’m looking for the drivers for WPC54g, although lspci gives me BCM4306; the card itself says “linksys” and it was the driver I used back in the day. Unfortunately, the link I the driver on the website is dead.
I found a link for version 3. I think that’s what worked before. Fingers crossed!
Okay: no errors during the install. And back to the manual, and there’s a little modification to the wpa_supplicant.conf
Then on running:
ifconfig wlan0 up wpa_supplicant -Dwext -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -dd
I get the following:
SIOCSIFFLAGS: no such file or directory
wpa_supplicant: Unknown host
ifconfig: `--help' gives usage information
Back to Gentoo’s guide, I’m giving wpa supplicant a go.
After the emerge of wpa_supplicant I did:
rc-update add dbus default
then:
/etc/init.d/dbus restart
Then in /etc/conf.d/net I commented out the old module spec with iwconfig and the key, adding
modules="wpa_supplicant"
wpa_supplicant_eth0="-Dwext"
in its place.
Then there is the creation and editing of /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf
And then I remove the comments fr everything above ifplugd.
After reboot, with the Ethernet unplugged, this led to no connection, and seeing as how it’s now 5 in the morning, I’m calling it for the time being.
After the last surprise in which I lost even wired networking, I have commented out everything in /etc/conf.d/net after
modules="iwconfig"
key_your essid
and am rebooting to see if the wired connection, at least, has returned.
