created: 2016/12/22
From a brand new install of Slackware 14.2, here are the steps used to configure and start up the wireless network. All of the following commands and edits need to be done using the root account.
.
Step 1: Bring up the wireless interface
$ ifconfig wlan0 up.
Step 2: Check that the wireless card is working. This command should produce a list of all the wifi networks in your location.
$ iwlist scan
eth0 Interface does not support scanning.
wlan0 Scan completed :
Cell 01 - Address: 4C:8B:30:03:BC:E8
Channel:11
Frequency:2.462 GHz (Channel 11)
Quality=63/70 Signal level=-47 dBm
Encryption key:on
ESSID:"MOS6502"
Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
Bit Rates:6 Mb/s; 9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s
Mode:Master
Extra:tsf=000011f952246674
Extra: Last beacon: 8084ms ago
.....
......
Step 3: Create the WPA security pass phrase. You might want to redirect this to a file as you need add this to the wireless config file in the next step. In this example my SSID is MOS6502 (and yes, my network is named after the 8-bit 6502 CPU) and the password is fake.
$ wpa_passphrase MOS6502 0123456789
network={
ssid="MOS6502"
#psk="0123456789"
psk=42a2d4ac4a7c8a10ec6586bf087266c471c9942381a74e009af4cf7d7a47d78b
}.
Step 4: Edit the wireless configuration file /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf to added the security pass phrase.
wpa_supplicant.conf before
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=rootafter
ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=root
network={
ssid="MOS6502"
#psk="0123456789"
psk=42a2d4ac4a7c8a10ec6586bf087266c471c9942381a74e009af4cf7d7a47d78b
}.
Step 5: Edit the wireless networking configuration file /etc/rc/rc.inet1.conf
Find the section in the file that looks like
# /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1.conf
#
.....
.....
## Example config information for wlan0. Uncomment the lines you need and fill
## in your info. (You may not need all of these for your wireless network)
#IFNAME[4]="wlan0"
#IPADDR[4]=""
#NETMASK[4]=""
#USE_DHCP[4]="yes"
#DHCP_HOSTNAME[4]="icculus-wireless"
#DHCP_KEEPRESOLV[4]="yes"
#DHCP_KEEPNTP[4]="yes"
#DHCP_KEEPGW[4]="yes"
#DHCP_IPADDR[4]=""
#WLAN_ESSID[4]=BARRIER05
#WLAN_MODE[4]=Managed
##WLAN_RATE[4]="54M auto"
##WLAN_CHANNEL[4]="auto"
##WLAN_KEY[4]="D5AD1F04ACF048EC2D0B1C80C7"
##WLAN_IWPRIV[4]="set AuthMode=WPAPSK | set EncrypType=TKIP | set WPAPSK=96389dc66eaf7e6efd5b5523ae43c7925ff4df2f8b7099495192d44a774fda16"
#WLAN_WPA[4]="wpa_supplicant"
#WLAN_WPADRIVER[4]="ndiswrapper"
.....Uncomment a few lines and edit the ESSID line
# /etc/rc.d/rc.inet1.conf
#
....
....
## Example config information for wlan0. Uncomment the lines you need and fill
## in your info. (You may not need all of these for your wireless network)
IFNAME[4]="wlan0"
IPADDR[4]=""
NETMASK[4]=""
USE_DHCP[4]="yes"
WLAN_ESSID[4]=MOS6502
WLAN_WPA[4]="wpa_supplicant".
Step 6: Restart the wireless network to pick up the new configuration.
$ cd /etc/rc.d
$ ./rc.inet1 restart.
Step 7: Enjoy your wireless network. Since my slackware was brand new I did a upgrade to get all the new packages. First I uncommented one line of the /etc/slackpkg/mirrors file, then ran the following commands.
$ slackpkg update gpg
$ slackpkg update
$ slackpkg install-new
$ slackpkg upgrade.
For more information: