setting

[capacity77 at tin.it]

Hi everybody!
how can I see if hostap works? if I run iwconfig, I get

wifi0     IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"test"
          Mode:Master  Frequency:2.422 GHz  Access Point: 00:50:8B:99:B7:FF
          Bit Rate:11 Mb/s   Sensitivity=1/3
          Retry min limit:8   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:84  Invalid misc:89   Missed beacon:0

wlan0     IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"test"
          Mode:Master  Frequency:2.422 GHz  Access Point: 00:50:8B:99:B7:FF
          Bit Rate:11 Mb/s   Sensitivity=1/3
          Retry min limit:8   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:0  Signal level:0  Noise level:0
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:84  Invalid misc:89   Missed beacon:0

It seems i don't have an IP assigned. I should give myself a static IP,
in which file can I set it?
And if I want to use Compaq WL100 to use another existing AP, should I change
the mode?
thanks. 
Dom