[gmane.linux.drivers.hostap] [patch] Unable to associate with already associated network on ipw3945 hardware

[Scott Robinson]

> > > the ipw3945 driver does not send an association event in the case of a
> > > requested association to the already associated AP.
> 
> Does the driver actually re-associate at this point or just ignore the
> request? If it re-associates, I would certainly expect it to report the
> association. If not, I would have expected it to reassociate and
> consequently, report the association.. ;-)
> 

As noted in the launchpad bug, and in the associated ipw3945 patch:

  https://code.launchpad.net/~asac/intellinuxwireless/ipw3945.asac

The driver was not reporting the association.

> I'm not that keen on forcing the disassociation at this point
> unconditionally, but I do have to admit that I ended up doing exactly
> the same with driver_ndis.c. Then again, with Linux, I would expect us
> to be more likely to be able to make drivers behave more sanely than in
> the NDIS case..
> 

I agree. Though, on that note, the wext is used with ndiswrapper now, so
oddities like this still occur.

> What is the get_bssid used for here if the next operation is to request
> disassociation immediately? The wording of that comment is not that
> helpful here..
> 

Because wpa_supplicant_disassociate ignores the request if the BSSID
isn't valid.

> Using get_bssid to figure out whether the driver is associated and then
> do something differently could be one option. However, with WPA it is
> often best to just force the driver to re-associate. I would just expect
> the driver to do this (and report new association) when we ask it to
> associate; even if this is for the same BSS that was used before.
> 

I agree. Fortunately, it seems the patch to ipw3945 mentioned earlier
nullifies this patch.

-- 
Scott Robinson | http://quadhome.com/

Q: Why is this reply five sentences or less?
A: http://five.sentenc.es/
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