Problems with hostap on Gentoo 2005.0 workstation using PCMCIA->PCI adapter

[Jakob Schiotz]

On Monday 11 April 2005 16:48, Brent Vukmer wrote:
> Hi.  I can't seem to get hostap up and running on my Gentoo 2005.0
> installation. This Gentoo installation is on a dual-processor Xeon
> workstation (PowerEdge 1600SC).  I'm using a PCMCIA card in a PCI
> adaptor (both from NetGate).  The PCMCIA card is the Netgate 2511CD
> PLUS EXT2, which is supposed to be using the Intersil Prism 2.5
> chipset.

You will probably want to use the latest version of the hostap driver, not the 
one Gentoo marks stable.  Add this to /etc/portage/package.keywords (create 
the file if you don't have it)

# Use the newest HOSTAP driver
net-wireless/hostap-driver ~x86
net-wireless/hostap-utils ~x86
net-wireless/hostapd ~x86
net-wireless/wpa_supplicant ~x86

(dont worry about the wpa_supplicant line, it is harmless if you don't install 
wpa_supplicant).

Another thing I had to do to get it up and running was to add this 
to /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts to bring the card into managed mode:

case "$ADDRESS" in      # This line is already there!

*,*,*,XXXXXXXXXXX)
	MODE="Managed"
	INFO="Any ESSID"
	ESSID="any"
	;;


Unfortunately, this will only work if it is a PCMCIA card, not if it a CARDBUS 
card.  Much better wireless support will appear in Gentoo once baselayout 
version 1.11 is marked stable.  They have reworked the whole thing.  Real 
Soon Now. :-)

/Jakob


-- 
Jakob Schiotz, Ph.D., Associate professor (lektor)
CAMP, Department of Physics, Building 307
Technical University of Denmark
DK-2800 Lyngby, Denmark
http://www.fysik.dtu.dk/~schiotz/