[Rt2400-devel] mac80211 / rt2x00 / rt61 and adhoc status

[Dan Williams]

On Sun, 2008-08-17 at 22:42 +0200, Lars Ericsson wrote:
> > > > > > Two tests cases, but same behaviour:
> > > > > > 1) Linx.git: 2.6.26 and wpa_supplicant 0.5.9
> > > > > > 2) rt2x00.git: Version 2.2.0 and wpa_supplicant 0.5.9
> > > > > 
> > > > > Are any beacons going out? Is there anything in the logs which
> > > > > indicates what is happening?
> > > > > 
> > > > 
> > > > As you can se in the trace below, the configuration 
> > > proceeds and the adhoc
> > > > is created.
> > > > The warnon might give some clues.
> > > 
> > > So how about those beacons? are they getting out?
> > > 
> > 
> > After patching the wpa_suplicant (0.5.9) adhoc works.
> > When first started, as the only part in the adhoc net, the 
> > driver just scans
> > around for other adhoc members.
> > This happen in mac80211 state 4 and no beacons are sent, as 
> > far as I can
> > tell. Only probe requests are sent.
> > 
> > When an other node (N2) shows up in the same adhoc net work, N2 starts
> > sending beacons immediately.
> > The RT61 catch that and merge that ibss, switch to state 5 
> > and all is fine.
> > At this time ping works in both directions.
> > 
> > When removing the second note, leaving the RT61 alone, RT61 
> > starts sending
> > beacons, still in state 5.
> 
> The reason for the above behaviour are timeouts.
> - Mac80211 will create an ibss after 20 seconds probing for existing ibss.
> - Wpa_supplicant will restart this timer every 5 second ....
> 
> Changing the wpa timer will make the rt61 start sending beacons even if no
> other STA is available.
> 
> I think that wpa_supplicant 0.5.10 addresses this issue, I will check and
> come back.

If fixed your issues about a month or two ago.  Either use
wpa_supplicant 0.6.4 and a 2.6.26 kernel, or else grab the following
patches and apply locally:

wpa_supplicant (committed to 0.6.x):
[PATCH] wpa_supplicant: give adhoc associations a bit more time
?[PATCH v2] wext: handle mode switches correctly for mac80211

kernel (SHA1s from wireless-testing.git, both in 2.6.26):
872ba53395b2a8be08c3ea2d39e225e5b4a8cb40 mac80211: decrease IBSS creation latency
507b06d0622480f8026d49a94f86068bb0fd6ed6 mac80211: send association event on IBSS create

You'd need to backport the wpa_supplicant patches to 0.5.x, or else poke
Jouni and maybe he'll backport them for you.  I do want to get them into
0.5.x as well.

Dan