[sclug] Wireless networking with Ubuntu 9.04 (and derivatives)

[David Given]

Neil Haughton wrote:
> I upgraded my Ubuntu box from 7.10 to 9.04 today and the net result is I
> cannot get my previously reasonably reliable wireless connection to work at
> all. (I have a Netgear W311gV3 which I was using with ndiswrapper and the
> WinXP driver.)
> 
> The fruits of my googling are that the consensus seems to be that wireless
> in 9.04 is a bit dodgy and that I should change my adapter to something that
> is known to work 'out of the box', an Atheros based card being the most
> likely solution.

9.04 has known issues where the networking system can get its knickers 
in a twist with respect to the keyring, where it keeps the WPA/WEP key. 
So if the problem is that it can see the network connection but fails to 
connect to it and keeps prompting you for the pass phrase, it's likely 
to be this.

The good news is that it's easily worked around --- the simplest 
solution is to use wicd rather than NetworkManager. (The actual wireless 
*driver* is fine, it's just an issue with the front end, so using 
another front end solves it.) If you want to stick with NetworkManager 
then there's an easy fix... which, er, I can't find just right now. Sorry!

That's assuming that is what the problem is, of course...

-- 
David Given
dg at cowlark.com