Problem with connecting FreeBSD 8.3 to wireless network

[Manish Jain]

On 28-Oct-12 05:53, Polytropon wrote:
> On Sun, 28 Oct 2012 05:47:46 +0530, Manish Jain wrote:
>>
>> On 28-Oct-12 01:49, Polytropon wrote:

>> I don't mind
>> pulling in and building a few more ports as long as it is not the whole
>> GNOME2 metaport.
>
> It could very well be the whole Gnome 2 metaport. :-(


Hi All,

After reading all the replies to my earlier post "Problem with libpng + 
Mozilla applications on FreeBSD 8.3", I finally summoned up the courage 
to build the GNOME2 metaport from the ports directory. Since this would 
not be possible within my lifetime with my usual internet connection, I 
paid for and succeeded in getting temporary access to a wireless network.

Win XP connects to the network pretty smoothly, so there was much reason 
for hope that things would go smoothly on my FreeBSD 8.3 installation 
too. I tried configuring the Atheros device to the network as explained 
in the FreeBSD handbook. But I am having usual rate of success, which is 
not very high. All the required modules are present in the kernel, as 
can be seen below :

# kldload ath
kldload: can't load ath: File exists

# kldload wlan_tkip
kldload: can't load wlan_tkip: File exists

But dmesg returns no output for ath0 :

# dmesg | grep -i ath

<Empty output>

ifconfig returns the following output :

# ifconfig
bge0: flags=8843<UP,BROADCAST,RUNNING,SIMPLEX,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
	options=c019b<RXCSUM,TXCSUM,VLAN_MTU,VLAN_HWTAGGING,VLAN_HWCSUM,TSO4,VLAN_HWTSO,LINKSTATE>
	ether b8:88:e3:45:63:b1
	inet6 fe80::ba88:e3ff:fe45:63b1%bge0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x2
	nd6 options=3<PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV>
	media: Ethernet autoselect (none)
	status: no carrier
lo0: flags=8049<UP,LOOPBACK,RUNNING,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 16384
	options=3<RXCSUM,TXCSUM>
	inet 127.0.0.1 netmask 0xff000000
	inet6 ::1 prefixlen 128
	inet6 fe80::1%lo0 prefixlen 64 scopeid 0x4
	nd6 options=3<PERFORMNUD,ACCEPT_RTADV>
tun0: flags=8051<UP,POINTOPOINT,RUNNING,MULTICAST> metric 0 mtu 1500
	options=80000<LINKSTATE>
	inet 10.0.0.1 --> 10.0.0.2 netmask 0xffffff00
	Opened by PID 767

Since there is no mention of ath0, I did not expect creating the wlan0 
pseudo-device would be a simple matter, and I was right :

# ifconfig wlan0 create wlandev ath0
ifconfig: SIOCIFCREATE2: Device not configured

Manually trying to create the pseudo-device ath0 presents equally 
unpleasant output :

# ifconfig ath0 create
ifconfig: SIOCIFCREATE2: Invalid argument

pciconf does show my device, but I do not know how to make use of the 
information (please refer the last few lines of the output) :

# pciconf -lv
hostb0 at pci0:0:0:0:	class=0x060000 card=0x06491025 chip=0x01048086 
rev=0x09 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = bridge
     subclass   = HOST-PCI
vgapci0 at pci0:0:2:0:	class=0x030000 card=0x06491025 chip=0x01068086 
rev=0x09 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = display
     subclass   = VGA
none0 at pci0:0:22:0:	class=0x078000 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e3a8086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = simple comms
ehci0 at pci0:0:26:0:	class=0x0c0320 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e2d8086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = serial bus
     subclass   = USB
hdac0 at pci0:0:27:0:	class=0x040300 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e208086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = multimedia
     subclass   = HDA
pcib1 at pci0:0:28:0:	class=0x060400 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e108086 
rev=0xc4 hdr=0x01
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = bridge
     subclass   = PCI-PCI
pcib2 at pci0:0:28:1:	class=0x060400 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e128086 
rev=0xc4 hdr=0x01
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = bridge
     subclass   = PCI-PCI
ehci1 at pci0:0:29:0:	class=0x0c0320 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e268086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = serial bus
     subclass   = USB
isab0 at pci0:0:31:0:	class=0x060100 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e5e8086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = bridge
     subclass   = PCI-ISA
atapci0 at pci0:0:31:2:	class=0x01018f card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e018086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = mass storage
     subclass   = ATA
none1 at pci0:0:31:3:	class=0x0c0500 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e228086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = serial bus
     subclass   = SMBus
atapci1 at pci0:0:31:5:	class=0x010185 card=0x06491025 chip=0x1e098086 
rev=0x04 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Intel Corporation'
     class      = mass storage
     subclass   = ATA
bge0 at pci0:2:0:0:	class=0x020000 card=0x06471025 chip=0x16b514e4 rev=0x10 
hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Broadcom Corporation'
     class      = network
     subclass   = ethernet
none2 at pci0:2:0:1:	class=0x080501 card=0x06471025 chip=0x16bc14e4 
rev=0x10 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Broadcom Corporation'
     class      = base peripheral
     subclass   = SD host controller
none3 at pci0:2:0:2:	class=0x088000 card=0x06471025 chip=0x16be14e4 
rev=0x10 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Broadcom Corporation'
     class      = base peripheral
none4 at pci0:2:0:3:	class=0x088000 card=0x06471025 chip=0x16bf14e4 
rev=0x10 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Broadcom Corporation'
     class      = base peripheral
none5 at pci0:3:0:0:	class=0x028000 card=0x661711ad chip=0x0032168c 
rev=0x01 hdr=0x00
     vendor     = 'Atheros Communications Inc.'
     class      = network


For completeness, the information I captured from Windows for the 
network was :

wifi network name : tpkm 3
authentication : wpa-psk
encryption : tkip
key : "XXXXXXXXXX"

Any help in getting my FreeBSD box to connect to the wireless network 
would be greatly appreciated. Those in a position to help but smugly 
choose not to may soon start experiencing a dramatic decline in their 
good fortunes.


Thank you &
Regards,

Manish Jain
bourne.identity at hotmail.com