Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

[thedevilsjester]

Ok my wireless is a bit flaky and will cut out for a few seconds at least once an hour. (Does this is Windows too...)

However Kubuntu never reconnects, as far as it knows, its still connected, still has signal, etc...

Nothing I seem to do (even init.d scripts) will allow it to work again unless I reboot.

I tried setting my settings in the KDE control panel, and now Wifi wont connect at all. My system tray applet (KNetworkManager) wont even recognize that I have a Wifi card anymore.

So how can I get it to reconnect when the connection is lost (rebooting is for Windows users), and how can I fix what I did to it so that the network manager will again see my Wifi?

I have a onboard Wifi on a M2N32-SLI Deluxe motherboard, the Wifi is plugged into a USB connector directly on the board, so even though its not removable, its counted as a USB device.

Update: I have found that I can manually connect via the CLI by going:

iwconfig wlan0 essid "MYESSID" mode managed key "KEY" channel MYCHANNEL rate auto
dhclient wlan0

It still will not show up on my KNetworkManager taskbar icon, nor will it show my connection status or any other goodies.

This doesnt really solve any of my problem, it just allows me to connect manually, so my questions still stand.

[integr8e]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

Will you please post the contents of your '/etc/network/interfaces' config - that seems to be where KNetworkManager looks for its available interfaces (in Gutsy), and if it isn't setup correctly, your wifi card won't be detected.

[thedevilsjester]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

KNetworkManager worked (other then the non reconnect issues), until I went into the Networking module in KControl and setup my info there, now KNetworkManager doesnt even list my Wifi card.

Here is the output of that file.

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
address 127.0.0.1
netmask 255.0.0.0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
wireless-essid MYESSID
auto wlan0

Note that I have my Wired interfaces turned off at the BIOS level so Linux isnt even aware of them and MYESSID does of course, really show my real essid.

[integr8e]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

Try changing it a little to look like this:

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
address 127.0.0.1
netmask 255.0.0.0

auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
wireless-essid MYESSID

[thedevilsjester]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

That didnt change a thing. I know that the LiveCD works fine so I took a look at the file you suggested on the LiveCD and it looked like this.

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

Thats it.

So I decided to make my file look just like that and start KNetworkManager again, I had to wait for about 15 second (probably so it could scan for access points), after that it shows my Wifi connection just fine.

So from what I gather, KNetworkManager does not want any info for your wireless network stored in that file, it wants to auto configure itself, and the KControl network module (after you save your changes) adds the info to the file, so the two cannot work together in harmony.

This fixes what I broke, but I am still forced to reboot the computer entirely every time my Wifi has a hiccup. I have tried reconnecting though KNetworkManager, and via the CLI even restarting many related init scripts and it doesnt seem to work. Any ideas on this front?

[monte48lowes]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

Here is the method I use to drop wifi and restart, without rebooting:

1) from konsole: 'sudo /etc/init.d/networking stop'
2) Alt-F2 > 'kdesu ksysguard' > filter for "network"
3) kill "knetworkmanager" "NetworkManager" & "NetworkManagerDispatcher"

4) from konsole: 'sudo /usr/sbin/NetworkManager', 'sudo /usr/sbin/NetworkManagerDispatcher'
5) from konsole: 'sudo /etc/init.d/networking start'
6) finally.. Alt-F2 > 'knetworkmanager'

Mike

[thedevilsjester]

Re: Have Wireless auto reconnect? (and another problem)

Thank You I will try that soon an see if I get better results.