Wireless networking in Linux: Explained

Coyote sharing his experience with a famous Singapore tech forum on how to get wireless networking working in linux. He is using DWL-G520 network card and Fedora Core 4 linux to demonstrate how easy to get wireless networking in Linux.

According to Coyote, basically there are two parts in getting it working:
1) Installing the linux drivers for the D-Link DWL-G520 network card.
2) Getting the OS to be support WPA encryption, such that the card can connect to the router using the protocol.

1. Install the madwifi driver

Add the following section into /etc/yum.conf

[atrpms]
name=Fedora Core $releasever - $basearch - ATrpms
baseurl=http://dl.atrpms.net/fc$releasever-$basearch/atrpms/stable

To retrieve the public key for ATrpm,

rpm –import http://ATrpms.net/RPM-GPG-KEY.atrpms

Installing the madwifi drivers by using yum

yum install madwifi

2. Installing & configuring wpa_supplicant

Again using yum to install wpa_supplicant

yum install wpa_supplicant

Edit /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf

ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant

network={
ssid=”myssid”
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
proto=WPA
pairwise=TKIP
group=TKIP
psk=”my_psk_key”
}

To activate the DWL-G520 with wpa protocol

wpa_supplicant -c/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf -iath0 -Dmadwifi -B

Activate the network adapter

dhclient ath0

To read more on the detail description, read DLink gaming router & 108Mbps wireless card in Linux.