2.2.2.1. Install the windows driver

•   sudo ndiswrapper -i ~/drivers/{driver}.inf

  (assuming the driver is in a directory in your home folder called drivers)

2.2.2.2. checking to make sure it installed correctly.

• Run this command:

    ndiswrapper -l

  If this is installed correctly you should see:

attachment:IconsPage/IconExample48.png

•   Installed ndis drivers:
    {name of driver}  driver present, hardware present

  If you do NOT see this message.

  1. Try a different driver such as the drivers for win2k or another driver matching the pciid on the [http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/List ndiswrapper list]

  2. There is a [#trouble troubleshooting] section, you can see if there is an answer there.

  3. Look for additional help at [http://www.ubuntuforums.org the Ubuntu Forums].

2.2.2.3. loading the new module.

• If everything works, you need to tell your system to load the module on boot. Two ways you can do this are:

    sudo ndiswrapper -m

  which will add the proper line to the /etc/modules file or you can add it manually by opening the file with this command:

    sudo gedit /etc/modules

  and add the word ndiswrapper to the end of this file and save.

Anchor(trouble)

3. Troubleshooting

• If you can not get a working driver, you may want to consider compiling and using the latest ndiswrapper release. Breezy comes with v1.1 As of Jan 2006 v1.8 is the stable release.
• Can not modprobe ndiswrapper, fatal error given.

  • This error is usually given when ndiswrapper is compiled and installed. You have a bad installation or you didn't remove the module that came with ubuntu. Need to uninstall ndiswrapper and make sure you remove the ndiswrapper module that came with ubuntu. Uninstall instructions can be found [http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/Uninstall here]

3.1. Some common errors

• This HOWTO is based on ndiswrapper [http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/InstallDebian Wiki Page]

• This was copied from the forums, page found [http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=601226 here]. You can discuss any problems or errors there.

• It is recommended to remove any sign of ndiswrapper from your pc. There is a module that installs by default with ubuntu. To do this, from a terminal run these commands:

BR

•   sudo modprobe -r ndiswrapper 
    sudo apt-get --purge remove ndiswrapper-utils 
    sudo rm -r /etc/ndiswrapper/ 
    sudo rm -r /etc/modprobe.d/ndiswrapper
    sudo rm /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/net/ndiswrapper/ndiswrapper.ko

4.1. Install kernel headers:

•   sudo apt-get install linux-headers-$(uname -r)

  and dependencies:

    sudo apt-get install dh-make fakeroot gcc-3.4 build-essential

4.2. Download the current version

• You will find the current version of ndiswrapper [http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=93482 here].

4.3. Untar

• Move to the file where you downloaded the file and run these commands. On the second command replace [current version] with the actual version of the file you downloaded.

    tar xvfz ndiswrapper-[current version].tar.gz 
    cd ndiswrapper-[current version]

4.4. Build deb packages:

•   fakeroot debian/rules binary-modules 
    fakeroot debian/rules binary-utils 
    cd ..

4.5. Install

•   sudo dpkg -i ndiswrapper-modules-[your kernel]_[current version]-1_i386.deb ndiswrapper-utils_[current version]-1_i386.deb

  Now go back to the [#install install] section to set up and use your newly installed ndiswrapper package.

5. WPA setup

5.1. Pre-amble

• (quoting notzac): I've been bashing at this for the last few hours as I just got myself a shiny new wireless router and wanted to use WPA-PSK rather than WEP. I don't pretend to be any sort of guru at this; I spent most of my time reading FAQs and Wiki entries; swore at my computer for a while when it didn't work and then just started experimenting. I've finally got what appears to be a fairly nice configuration that works great for me - I'm writing it up in the hopes that it helps someone else.

5.2. Assumptions

1. You can already access the network/internet -without- WPA or other encryption.
2. You're using an ndiswrapper-based driver (probably not essential, but you'll have to modify a few of the commands if you're using madwifi or one of the native drivers - YMMV).
3. Your wireless card comes up with an interface name of 'wlan0' (if not, you'll need to modify my examples to suit).
4. You want to use WPA-PSK with either TKIP or AES/CCMP.
5. Your router (or whatever) provides IP address details via DHCP (not essential, but you'll have to modify one of the files beyond my examples).
6. Your router or WAP broadcasts its SSID (if not, [#anthony see Anthony's] notes at the bottom of this page).

   1. You're comfortable editing files and working with badly-written HOWTOs.

5.3. The procedure

• First up, you'll need the wpasupplicant package. It's in the Universe repository, so you'll need to have that in your sources.list file. If you've already installed this package, I recommend that you reinstall; use these commands to get rid of it:

    sudo killall wpasupplicant
    sudo dpkg --purge wpasupplicant

  Now install a fresh copy:

    sudo apt-get install wpasupplicant

If you compiled and installed a newer version of ndiswrapper then it's possible you will need to compile and install a newer version of wpasupplicant.

• After you've got it installed, start by modifying the "default" file -- I'm not sure why to be honest, but the installer told me to start there and I did:

    sudo vi /etc/default/wpasupplicant

attachment:IconsPage/IconExample48.png

• Here's what mine looks like; modify yours to taste:

    # /etc/default/wpasupplicant
    # WARNING! Make sure you have a configuration file!
    ENABLED=1
  
    # Useful flags:
    #  -D <driver>          Wireless Driver
    #  -i <ifname>          Interface (required, unless specified in config)
    #  -c <config file>     Configuration file
    #  -d                   Debugging (-dd for more)
    #  -w                   Wait for interface to come up
  
    # OPTIONS="-w"

  Save and exit. Next, you'll need to sort your pre-shared key out. My router allows me to input the passphrase that makes up the key itself; I originally tried putting this passphrase in as the wireless key, which failed to work altogether for fairly obvious reasons. Hindsight is wonderful like that. Take the passphrase that you used in your router or WAP and use wpa_passphrase to generate the key. You use this command in the following format:

    wpa_passphrase <ssid> <passphrase>

  So the command I ran looks something like this:

    wpa_passphrase MyHomeWireless SuperSecretPassphrase

attachment:IconsPage/IconExample48.png

• .. which gives you an output something like:

    network={
          ssid="MyHomeWireless"
          #psk="SuperSecretPassphrase"
          psk=e42ac2538ef03f906d37332a0df4446150e04cdcdd392e  309486075065a70a1f
    }

  Copy all that - we'll need in a moment. You now need to put that in to a configuration file for wpa_supplicant, which you first need to create. Given that you'll have the keys to your wireless access in this file, a little extra precaution is in order. Use the following commands to create and then open the file for editing:

    sudo touch /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
    sudo chmod 600 /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
    sudo vi /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

attachment:IconsPage/IconExample48.png

• Using the output of wpa_passphrase we copied earlier as a base, you'll need to tell wpa_supplicant a few more details about your network. Here's what my copy of this file looks like when complete, with the sample data:

    network={
          ssid="MyHomeWireless"
          #psk="SuperSecretPassphrase"
          psk=e42ac2538ef03f906d37332a0df4446150e04cdcdd392e  309486075065a70a1f
          key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
          proto=WPA
    }

  Save and exit. You should probably test this now - here's a good command to copy/paste to your cli (this will only work if you fulfill the assumptions of this HOWTO):

    sudo ifconfig wlan0 up && sudo /usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -Bw -Dndiswrapper -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf && sudo dhclient wlan0

  If that doesn't get you to the point where you can ping other hosts on your network, something is most likely wrong with wpa_supplicant (I'm assuming that it hasn't got anything to do with DHCP). Run these two commands:

    sudo dhclient -r wlan0 && sudo ifconfig wlan0 down && sudo killall wpa_supplicant
    sudo ifconfig wlan0 up && sudo /usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -w -Dndiswrapper -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -dd

  This will give you a bunch of debugging output, and someone who is much more skilled than I might be able to help you out. Sorry, but this HOWTO isn't going to help you much more, as it's beyond my ken completely. If you got lucky and you -are- able to ping hosts on your network, now is the time to automate it. It's actually really easy. Run this command first to bring the wireless link down cleanly:

    sudo dhclient -r wlan0 && sudo ifconfig wlan0 down && sudo killall wpa_supplicant

  You need to tell your network interface configuration file how to deal with the wireless config nicely; here's what you need to put in for your wireless card (again, if you don't completely fulfill the assumptions of this HOWTO, you'll need to change a few things). Open up /etc/network/interfaces:

    sudo vi /etc/network/interfaces

• .. here's the part you'll need to add/modify in yours for the wireless:

    auto wlan0
    iface wlan0 inet dhcp
    pre-up /usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -Bw -Dndiswrapper -iwlan0 -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
    post-down killall -q wpa_supplicant

  Save and exit. We're all done! Wireless will now come up on boot (assuming that your computer already detects the card and loads the drivers for it already), and you can start/stop the wireless link with the following two commands:

    sudo ifup wlan0
    sudo ifdown wlan0

Anchor(anthony)

5.4. If your router does not broadcast the SSID

• I recommend you do not broadcast the ssid for added security. It's just one more thing your potential intruder has to guess. First, set

    ap_scan=2

  This means, don't bother scanning (since it's not broadcasting anyway right), use the first network block. Since your router isn't broadcasting, you have to add some more detail about the encryption, in particular whether it's TKIP or CCMP(also known as AES).

  You also have to specify scan_ssid=1, which means this router does not broadcast.

attachment:IconsPage/IconExample48.png

• Here is a sample of my network block:

    network={
          ssid="myrouterssid"
          scan_ssid=1
          psk="topsecret"
          key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
          proto=WPA
          auth_alg=OPEN
          pairwise=TKIP
          group=TKIP 
   }

Enjoy using your network securely

6. links

[http://ndiswrapper.sourceforge.net/mediawiki/index.php/Main_Page ndiswrapper wiki]

[https://wiki.ubuntu.com/HowtoUseNdiswrapperOnAmd64Ubuntu?highlight=%28ndiswrapper%29 Ndiswrapper on amd64 box]

wiki:WifiDocs/WifiDocs

CategoryDocumentation CategoryNetworking