[NTLUG:Discuss] help getting wireless working

[Stephen Davidson]

Terry Henderson wrote:

>On Sat, 30 Oct 2004 06:36:28 -0500, Stephen Davidson
><gorky at freenet.carleton.ca> wrote:
>  
>
>>Kevin Hulse wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>    
>>
>>>>>hello group.
>>>>>i was looking for someone to help me to get
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>          
>>>>>
>>>>wireless working or at least
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>        
>>>>
>>>>>started on the write path ill pay 60 bucks per
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>          
>>>>>
>>>>hour.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>        
>>>>
>>>>>jim
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>          
>>>>>
>>>For starters, build, install and attempt to isnmod
>>>any wifi driver kernel module for the wifi NIC
>>>hardware
>>>that you think you are going to use. Wifi
>>>compatibility
>>>is tricky. You may have to build your own module or
>>>depend on a binary one. Claims of support may not
>>>necessarily pan out. A source module might not build
>>>or
>>>a binary module might be dependent upon a particular
>>>distribution release.
>>>
>>>You also have to worry about attennas and signal
>>>strength. You should look into what cards are the
>>>strongest in this area and what hardware can be
>>>augmented with after market mods. For example: my
>>>wifi router has 3rd party antennas on it to boost
>>>it's signal strength.
>>>
>>>I've had good luck with the dlink Atheros G laptop card.
>>>
>>>_______________________________________________
>>>https://ntlug.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>Hi Guys.
>>Build, install, insmod????  If the guy is like me, (and with an offer to
>>hire/pay someone for this, it sounds like he is) he doesn't have time
>>and the expertise to be fooling around with building modules and
>>drivers.  He just wants it to work.  (This is why I go with SuSE, it
>>just works, usually).  And as was pointed out in another thread on this
>>list, not all wireless cards work in Linux.  So, for starters, he needs
>>to determine if this is a firm that is MS only, or if there are Linux
>>wireless drivers available.  And that has always been a tough nut for ME
>>to crack.
>>    
>>
>
>It's MS only, if there are no Linux drivers.  See following sites and
>others on the Internet to see if any of the many devices are what you
>[as a Linux user] would want to buy:
>
>http://www.prism54.org/supported_cards.php
>http://madwifiwiki.thewebhost.de/wiki/MadWifi
>
>Or, just use a bridge instead of a PCI or PCMCI device and you'll not
>need any driver software.
>
>  
>
>>You guys need to start coming up with an easier solution for the
>>corporate and home users, other than "build your own code".  An idea
>>would be to start building binaries (rpms would be great!) that anyone
>>can just download and install for the different wireless cards.
>>Something with a Wizard would be really nice.
>>
>>Regards,
>>Steve
>>
>>    
>>
>
>As to the question of ease of installation of software?
>"an easier solution"  than "build your own code"
>  
>
I want to know the code will work before I even try to install it.  
Trying to match drivers and hardware is a HUGE pain, and a task that I 
normally fail at.

>I guess that boils down to whether a person is willing to use a
>keyboard or not.  To compile from source, one has to type in 3
>commands.
>
>./configure
>make
>make install
>
>  
>
That does not start the software.  And how do you configure?  If you do 
not already know the command line options, at this point, you are 
toast.  Even with RPMs.  Nor does it tell me that I am compiling the 
right software, let alone the right version, for a given piece of 
hardware.  I have a couple of Airlink Wireless Nics that I bought and 
then could not get to work because of this issue.  Same driver chip as 
in my laptop (a realtek RTL8080L, or something like that), but the 
drivers won't bring up the Nics, for I don't know what reason.  
Something I hope was fixed in the Wireless enhancements for SuSE 9.2.

>I realize that's pretty tough, [my fingers are aching already], but to
>me, it's easier than wizards, (I'm more of a coffee drinker than a
>wizard person).
>
>  
>
For techie types, command line is generally easier (including for me in 
many cases, but most glaringly NOT for most config files).  However, 
Linux is moving out of the techie market to the mass consumer-market, 
and believe me, they NEED wizards (otherwise, they DO shoot themselves 
in the foot).  You are talking the average MS user at this point, and 
Wizards is one thing that MS did get right.  It would do the Linux 
community much benefit to see what the competition got right and why, 
and then exceed it (KDE and Gnome on the desktop, for instance).  Do 
this, and the competition will fail.  Don't, and they will continue to 
clobber you in unexpected fashions (why is MS still making 
billions/year, while Linux is the better OS?).  Remember MS still has 
billions of dollars to clobber Linux with, if they can find/figure out a 
chink.

Remember, Linux is now moving from the "back office", where it is worked 
on by experts and has an excellent track record, to the consumer and 
front office.  These new users do need Wizards, because they do not know 
what they are doing.  You say the word "compile" to them, and some do 
run away screaming, literally!  You say, "Install Wizard", and they will 
happily spend hours trying to get stuff to work. 

>But I will agree with you on one point, binaries are [a little] easier, i.e.
>rpm -ivh package-name.rpm 
>
>Actually, I'll agree with you on a second point, SuSe is a very nice,
>user friendly distribution.
>
>:)
>
>  
>
The Yast "Install Software", and then just using the checkboxes is what 
I really like.  Btw, I am looking forward to getting my hands on 9.2.  
The claim is, many "Irritation" fixes, including a few issues that have 
been bugging me that I have not had time to chase down. 

Btw, where I come from is this - I develop solutions, usually for large 
corporations, to handle issues that they have decided they need 
tackled.  I can not afford downtime, and the cost of downtime for the 
deployed software is generally measured in the Millions of dollars per 
minute range.  With these kinds of dollars at stake, money is not an 
issue for a solution (at least, not in the $100sK range).  Reliability 
is the issue.  For obvious reasons, I develop on Linux normally.  
Databases tend to be Oracle, as they normally are far ahead of the 
competition in features and reliability (price it out sometime, you will 
see that is more expensive than MS for a solution, but it works).  J2EE 
servers tend to be either BEA Weblogic (its been in business for quite 
some time, and when was the last time your Visa Transaction crashed 
during processing?), or more recently, JBoss (an open source solution, 
but as of 3.0, extremely reliable).  Deploy OSes tend to be either 
Solaris or Linux.  So I tend to be "neutral" in the 
propeitary/OpenSource war.  Give me what works, and charge a fee that is 
reasonable against expected revenue, and I will happily consider (and 
often, use) your solution.  This is why I will not deploy Solaris on my 
Laptop, but will put SuSE on.  SuSE will work, and run just about 
everything in the laptop, where as I would be lucky if Solaris even 
booted.  (I am hoping SuSE fixed the powersaved stuff in 9.2 - one of 
the issues I have not had time to track down on my own).

That was, and is my point.  Give me something that just works, and I 
will be happy.  And so would Joe Regular down the street.  And that is 
what MS is really afraid of, Linux getting to the point where it just 
works, and the end user does not have to do anything to make it so.

Regards,
Steve

-- 
Java/J2EE Developer/Integrator
Stephen Davidson and Associates, Inc.
Past Chair, Dallas/FortWorth J2EE Sig
214-724-7741