Greetings to the Intrepid who have just installed FreeBSD11.1. Perhaps one or more of you have already found out how to establish a simple wireless connexion therein; I have not. The new version is different from its forebears.
In order to obviate trouble, I chose the dvd1 iso, FreeBSD-11.0-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso, because it is stated to make life easier for those who have not mastered the intricacies of FreeBSD. I burnt it as an iso on a Windows machine and the checksums agree. All that I can say is that this iso is as cryptic as any other iso, but that, wonder of wonders, mounting usb media works perfectly without any configuration on my part, and so does X and Xfce4, as long as one puts dbus_enable="YES" and hald_enable="YES" into /etc/rc.conf. Yea, verily, X does not need hald_enable, so as to enable HAL, but Xfce and some other programmes like it. But the only sure way to ensure pleasant behaviour from X under various applications, including Xfce, is to toss linux_load="YES" into /etc/rc.conf as well. Those three little lines of code save weeks of agony.
Sound and video do not seem to work, either, but I have not addressed those issues yet, being presently preoccupied with
THE WIRELESS.
In the installation procedure from the disc, which seems to be runniing bdinstall, which, if one does not know, one may run again after removing the installation disc, by enterng bdinstall in the command line, my ISP was found, and I selected Ipv4 and DCHP, so as to be able to detect signals in my hectic perambulations as a student, and ultimately use the gui in Xfce, wifimgr, which may be added by simply entering pkg add wifimgr in the command line. I have used wifimgr for five years on older versions with not one piece of trouble.
I did not enable Ipv6 because it always seems to want revenge for some unknown transgression.
Now, it may be useful to add that one ought to connect hard internet through an ethernet (which ought to be spellt aethernet) to the computer before one begins the installation; it makes life easier for those unskilled at configuring the wireless.
After reboot, one normally follows the instructions in the Handbook, https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/network-wireless.html, by scrolling down to a section, entitled, 30.3.2. Quick Start, where there is a box with a grey background that normally conatins all that one needs to know in order to establish the wireless connexion.
So, in my innocence, I entered % sysctl net.wlan.devices, and detected my device, ath0. As some may have heard, ifconfig no longer displays the wireless device, which, in my case, happens, as sysctl confirmed, to be ath0.
I then entered % cat /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf, but was told that no such file existed, and so, agreeably to the instructions, I entered % vi /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf (I am used to vi), and created wpa_supplicant.conf, into which I entered
network={
ssid="myssid"
psk="mypsk"
}
For the uninitiated, ssid means the name of the network, something that one will find somewhere that looks similar to NETGEAR111, or LINKSYS111. psk means the password to one's wireless system, such as such a high-security one as iLove?configur123times.nogood/bah\&c
I saved this configuration, and made sure that it was correct by entering % cat /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf. And it was correct.
I then entered % vi /etc/rc.conf, and, agreeably to the instructions, entered
wlans_ath0="wlan0"
ifconfig_wlan0="WPA SYNCDHCP"
and saved this configuration, confirming its salvation by entering % vi /etc/rc.conf. And it was correct.
But I noticed something unusual in /etc/rc.conf that I had never seen in versions older than 11.1, namely, a line ifconfig_alc0="WPAD". Entering % ifconfig informed me that this novelty had to do with the hard-wired ethernet. SInce the ethernet was working, I decided to leave well enough alone and get on with it.
I next rebooted the computer, % shutdown -r now, and noticed, in the reboot, that the ethernet, alc0, was active, but the wireless, ath0, was not.
Fiddling with commenting and uncommenting the various appropriate lines in /etc/rc.conf, I find that nothing makes a difference, save that commenting out either or both of the two lines for ath0 produced a noxious TIMEOUT ERROR.
With the ethernet cable removed, % ping www.freebsd.org produces
ping: cannot resolve www.freebsd.org: Host name lookup failure
which, of course, means that the wireless, wlan0, is not working.
After six hours of looking at every possible posting and piece of instruction to be found in perpetual searching of the Web, I came to the conclusion that it would be better to submit this vexatious issue to the learned, rather than to upset the status quo by irreparable amateurish surgery.
Any help would be most gratefully received.
In order to obviate trouble, I chose the dvd1 iso, FreeBSD-11.0-RELEASE-amd64-disc1.iso, because it is stated to make life easier for those who have not mastered the intricacies of FreeBSD. I burnt it as an iso on a Windows machine and the checksums agree. All that I can say is that this iso is as cryptic as any other iso, but that, wonder of wonders, mounting usb media works perfectly without any configuration on my part, and so does X and Xfce4, as long as one puts dbus_enable="YES" and hald_enable="YES" into /etc/rc.conf. Yea, verily, X does not need hald_enable, so as to enable HAL, but Xfce and some other programmes like it. But the only sure way to ensure pleasant behaviour from X under various applications, including Xfce, is to toss linux_load="YES" into /etc/rc.conf as well. Those three little lines of code save weeks of agony.
Sound and video do not seem to work, either, but I have not addressed those issues yet, being presently preoccupied with
THE WIRELESS.
In the installation procedure from the disc, which seems to be runniing bdinstall, which, if one does not know, one may run again after removing the installation disc, by enterng bdinstall in the command line, my ISP was found, and I selected Ipv4 and DCHP, so as to be able to detect signals in my hectic perambulations as a student, and ultimately use the gui in Xfce, wifimgr, which may be added by simply entering pkg add wifimgr in the command line. I have used wifimgr for five years on older versions with not one piece of trouble.
I did not enable Ipv6 because it always seems to want revenge for some unknown transgression.
Now, it may be useful to add that one ought to connect hard internet through an ethernet (which ought to be spellt aethernet) to the computer before one begins the installation; it makes life easier for those unskilled at configuring the wireless.
After reboot, one normally follows the instructions in the Handbook, https://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/network-wireless.html, by scrolling down to a section, entitled, 30.3.2. Quick Start, where there is a box with a grey background that normally conatins all that one needs to know in order to establish the wireless connexion.
So, in my innocence, I entered % sysctl net.wlan.devices, and detected my device, ath0. As some may have heard, ifconfig no longer displays the wireless device, which, in my case, happens, as sysctl confirmed, to be ath0.
I then entered % cat /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf, but was told that no such file existed, and so, agreeably to the instructions, I entered % vi /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf (I am used to vi), and created wpa_supplicant.conf, into which I entered
network={
ssid="myssid"
psk="mypsk"
}
For the uninitiated, ssid means the name of the network, something that one will find somewhere that looks similar to NETGEAR111, or LINKSYS111. psk means the password to one's wireless system, such as such a high-security one as iLove?configur123times.nogood/bah\&c
I saved this configuration, and made sure that it was correct by entering % cat /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf. And it was correct.
I then entered % vi /etc/rc.conf, and, agreeably to the instructions, entered
wlans_ath0="wlan0"
ifconfig_wlan0="WPA SYNCDHCP"
and saved this configuration, confirming its salvation by entering % vi /etc/rc.conf. And it was correct.
But I noticed something unusual in /etc/rc.conf that I had never seen in versions older than 11.1, namely, a line ifconfig_alc0="WPAD". Entering % ifconfig informed me that this novelty had to do with the hard-wired ethernet. SInce the ethernet was working, I decided to leave well enough alone and get on with it.
I next rebooted the computer, % shutdown -r now, and noticed, in the reboot, that the ethernet, alc0, was active, but the wireless, ath0, was not.
Fiddling with commenting and uncommenting the various appropriate lines in /etc/rc.conf, I find that nothing makes a difference, save that commenting out either or both of the two lines for ath0 produced a noxious TIMEOUT ERROR.
With the ethernet cable removed, % ping www.freebsd.org produces
ping: cannot resolve www.freebsd.org: Host name lookup failure
which, of course, means that the wireless, wlan0, is not working.
After six hours of looking at every possible posting and piece of instruction to be found in perpetual searching of the Web, I came to the conclusion that it would be better to submit this vexatious issue to the learned, rather than to upset the status quo by irreparable amateurish surgery.
Any help would be most gratefully received.