Hey,
I have been using the network profiles initscripts from testing for
two weeks now, and have created a patch to fix some of the issues I
have had with them.
My setup includes, 1 wireless card, 1 ethernet card. There are two
wireless networks I frequent, a friend's and my school one. Frequently
at school I will be in areas of low reception. At home I use ethernet.
The first issue I found is that, if i stuck more than one wireless
network into the NET_PROFILES line, unless i set the one i was needed
to access as the last network, it would fail to connect to that
network. This was because, as both wireless networks use eth1, it
would connect fine, but then the scripts would try to connect to the
second network, causing the scripts to take down the first connection.
To fix this, the my patch includes a fix that prevents the network
scripts from attempting to connect to a network on an interface, if a
network is already connected, with an IP assigned.
This means that it will go through all the wireless networks as it
already does, in my NET_PROFILES and attempt to connect to them, one
by one, until it succesfully connects to one. Upon succesfully
connecting, it will not attempt to connect to any other networks on
that interface.
My second fix is to prevent the network scripts from attempting to get
an IP address via dhcp on a wireless network that it has not even
associated with yet. A wireless card cannot get an IP, unless it is
associated (connected) with an Access Point. The main reason for doing
this is that it causes a long, pointless delay on bootup, attempting
to gain an IP on a network it is not connected to or has no access to.
To fix that, i did a simple grep, for 00:00:00:00:00 which is the
default Access Point shown by iwconfig, when a wireless card is not
associated/connected. If it detects that is not connected, then it
does not run dhcp.
My third fix, is to help some connectivity issues some people may
have. When I am in areas of low connectivity of an Access Point at
school, my wireless card takes substantially longer to associate.
Currently the network scripts, set the wireless settings with
iwconfig, and attempt to get dhcp immediately. This method does not
work, as often the wireless card has still not associated with an
Access Point before the dhcp attempts to gain an IP.
To fix that I added an extra configuration option, WIFI_WAIT, in the
network profile. Rather than making it a static value in the netcfg, I
decided that a config option would be much more suitable, as my
friends network, where I always have good connectivity, associates
almost immediately. Having the ten second delay I need at school for
this network, adds a substantial amount of delay to my bootup.
WIFI_WAIT is 5 seconds by default in the patched template included in
the patch.
Another suggestion is that, by default the network profile scripts
arent bringing up lo, so maybe adding a loopback profile might be
good, as no lo causes problems.
I hope these help! I know bug fixes with patches are always better
than those without, so I did my best to fix the listed problems. The
fixes work for me, and I dont see any reason for them not to work for
you. Comments are appreciated!
Enjoy,
James Rayner
patch is in diff -Nau form, cd to / and patch -p1 <
/path/to/network-improved.patch.
patch is attatched, or available here.
http://iphitus.loudas.com/arch/network/network-improved.patch
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