Debian HOW-TO: Wireless

WARNING : This how-to is not up-to-date, please refer to this one (on Debian Etch) instead.

The first part, and the easiest, is to install the IPW2200 (Intel centrino b/g) driver.

For a laptop, I very much recommend to use a custom compiled kernel anyway.
And in doing so, you should use the latest kernel source avalaible (as of january 30th 2006, it is 2.6.15.1). You will need to enable those features:

Networking ---> (M) Generic IEEE 802.11 Networking Stack
(M) IEEE 802.11 WEP encryption (802.1x)
(M) IEEE 802.11i CCMP support
(M) IEEE 802.11i TKIP encryption

Device Drivers ---> Network device support ---> Wireless LAN (non-hamradio) --->
[*] Wireless LAN drivers (non-hamradio) & Wireless Extensions
(M) Intel PRO/Wireless 2200BG and 2915ABG Network Connection

Once it is done, you need to copy the intel wireless firmware is the right directory.

tar zxf /path/to/ipw2200-fw-2.4.tgz
more LICENSE
mv *.fw LICENSE /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware/

Then reboot...


Once rebooted, here comes the real work...

Install ifplugd:

sudo apt-get install ifplugd

I use Debian Sarge, but the wireless packages are somewhat not compatible with the latest intel drivers.

So, make sure you have the unstable repository in your /etc/apt/sources.list. For example, if you live in Montreal, this is the fastest server:

deb http://gulus.usherbrooke.ca/debian/ unstable main

Then update the repositories:

sudo apt-get update

Afterwards just install the wireless components:

sudo apt-get -t unstable install wireless-tools
sudo apt-get -t unstable install wpasupplicant

Then configure the files
/etc/network/interfaces
/etc/default/ifplugd
/etc/default/wpasupplicant
/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf
properly... with the help of wpa_passphrase (if you are to use wpa encryption).

In /etc/default/wpasupplicant, make sure you use the "wext" driver and not the "ipw" one!

Here is a site than can help for the configuration.

Make sure you disable the unstable repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list and run

sudo apt-get update

once again.