# NetworkManager + hidden ESSID + frontend quirky, need help.

## DrSlony

Hey

I would like to use NetworkManager to connect to my hidden WPA2 wireless access point at home. Currently I use wpa_supplicant.

I've read this guide, but it only left me with more questions and doubts and a NetworkManager that wouldn't connect to my ESSID:

http://en.gentoo-wiki.com/wiki/NetworkManager

Would someone please explain what I need to install, what I need to add to the default runlevel, and what I need to remove from my default runlevel to get NetworkManager running, along with a frontend, preferably for KDE4?

I'll go through the guide again now and point out some questions.

First, emerge net-misc/networkmanager. Which use flags do I need to enable? I assume I need dhcpcd. What about dhclient?

Next, emerge kde-misc/knetworkmanager

I read that knetworkmanager was a standalone frontend, and there is already one included in KDE4 as a plasma widget. This appears to be not true. The only plasma networkmanager widget I can see (right-click on the desktop and select Add Widgets) is NetworkManagement, which disappears when I emerge -C knetworkmanager. There is no shortcut in the k menu to anything that might look like a frontend for NetworkManager, so it seems clear that knetworkmanager is in fact the plasma widget and there is no other NetworkManager frontend for KDE4.

I have networkmanager and knetworkmanager installed, now I need to run some services, and possibly remove some. Here are the services I have:

```
overkill ~ # rc-update -v show | sort

                acpid |                                               

            alsasound |                                               

            bluetooth |                                               

             bootmisc |                                 boot          

          consolefont |                                 boot          

           consolekit | default                                       

             cpufreqd |                                               

         cpufrequtils |                                               

          crypto-loop |                                               

                cupsd |                                               

                 dbus |                                               

                devfs |                sysinit                        

        device-mapper |                                 boot          

               dhcpcd |                                               

                dmesg |                sysinit                        

             dmeventd |                                               

                 fsck |                                 boot          

           git-daemon |                                               

                  gpm |                                               

             hostname |                                 boot          

              hwclock |                                 boot          

              keymaps |                                 boot          

            killprocs |                        shutdown               

                local | default                              nonetwork

           localmount |                                 boot          

                  lvm |                                 boot          

       lvm-monitoring |                                               

                 mdev |                                               

              modules |                                 boot          

             mount-ro |                        shutdown               

                 mtab |                                 boot          

                mysql |                                               

         mysqlmanager |                                               

               net.lo |                                 boot          

             netmount | default                                       

            net.wlan0 |                                               

            net.wlan1 |                                               

              network |                                               

       NetworkManager |                                               

                 nscd |                                               

              numlock |                                               

              pciparm |                                               

           portagexsd |                                               

               procfs |                                 boot          

              pwcheck |                                               

            pydoc-2.7 |                                               

            pydoc-3.1 |                                               

                 root |                                 boot          

               rsyncd |                                               

            saslauthd |                                               

            savecache |                        shutdown               

                slapd |                                               

                 sshd |                                               

          staticroute |                                               

             svnserve |                                               

                 swap |                                 boot          

              swclock |                                               

               sysctl |                                 boot          

                sysfs |                                               

            syslog-ng | default                                       

         termencoding |                                 boot          

     udev-dev-tarball |                                               

           udev-mount |                                               

       udev-postmount | default                                       

                 udev |                sysinit                        

              urandom |                                 boot          

           vixie-cron | default                                       

                  xdm | default                                       

            xdm-setup |
```

Which should I remove, which should I add? Just "rc-update add NetworkManager default"?

That's what I did yesterday, and here are the problems I had:

I have two wireless cards - the one in my laptop (wlan1, weak) and an external usb one (wlan0, strong). I want to use only wlan0. When I fired up alt+F2 > Network Connections > wireless > add > scan, I see two interfaces, both called "WLAN Interface". They are named identically, but based on the fact that only a few networks were found, I know that only the laptop's wireless card (wlan1) is being used in that scan. The other card (wlan0) is very strong and finds over 15 networks. Even when I change the interface to the other one, I still see only those same few networks. This means that I can not get that frontend to use wlan0 in the scan. Why?

See this screenshot:

http://i.imgur.com/SO3c6.jpg

Note: This is merged from two screenshots. The first had only wlan0 (above), and the second only wlan1 (bottom).

Next is the problem with my hidden network. That plasma widget seems quirky at best. Sometimes when I unticked "enable wireless" a "hidden network" option would appear in the "Connections" right half of the panel. The instruction in that box said to type in the name of the hidden network and hit enter. When I did, nothing happened. I couldn't get that hidden network box to show today for this screenshot. Quirky.

I tried connecting to any of the other secured and non-secured networks. Please note that the plasma widget would show 15 or more networks, so it was clearly using the powerful wlan0, while when I clicked on any of these networks and the "Available Networks - KDE Control Module" window pops up it only seemed to use wlan1 even though I tried both interfaces.

What would happen is that when I click on e.g. OpenNet1 then the "Edit Network Connection" window would pop up where you enter a connection name, SSID, etc. I clicked OK to create this connection, the window would close, but nothing else would happen. Every time I clicked on that network, or any network, the same thing. The settings window pops up, I click ok, and nothing. Only once, somehow, I managed to connect to an open network, the other times no visible attempt was even made. The best I can make of it is that that network I managed to connect to was seen by my weak wlan1, so despite the widget showing me networks seen by powerful wlan0, it seem only capable of using those networks reported by the "scan" button, which seems to only use wlan1, despite showing two (identically named) interfaces, "WLAN Interface" and "WLAN Interface". Quirky.

I wrote a lot but I did so to be clear. All help much appreciated!

----------

## Jaglover

If it's your home AP why don't you fix it? You do know hiding AP is not a security measure, but violates standards? In fact, you cannot hide an AP, if you do you cannot use it any more, turning off particular features does not hide it but makes accessing it harder, for legit users, you are experiencing this right now.

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## DrSlony

I don't know whether turning off SSID broadcasting breaks any standards, but that is not what the majority of this thread is about. I quite clearly wrote that I couldn't use NetworkManager to connect to any network, secured or not, and all of them were broadcasting their SSIDs, except for that one time when I did manage, somehow, to connect to an unsecured network.

----------

## DrSlony

Nobody knows at least which services I should stop and which I should run, whether I need dhclient, or how to get that scan window "WLAN Interface" to not only show two of them but to actually use wlan0 as well, or just wlan0?

ps. I stopped hiding my ESSID.

----------

