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[Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

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njbetavirp
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[Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#1 Post by njbetavirp »

I'm a linux fan. In fact, I'm a linux OS addict. I usually download linux OSs and creat persistent usb drives. After trying a linux distribution/desktop, I routinely install them. My PC has multiple HDs (mostly M.2 ssd). I enjoy Fedora, SuSe, Mint, and other Ubuntu forks. Most of my computer work is video editing with Kdenlive.

I've had a long-time interest in Debian. But I've never been able to get beyond the installation. I have never been able to get a WiFi connection enabled using Debian. I've followed dozens of support web pages addressing the issue. Apparently, I don't have the technical skills to get a Wifi connection working on Debian.

From my desk, Debian's void of any WiFi support, from a new installation, is a roadblock to using the well respected operating system.
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#2 Post by sunrat »

Wifi devices mostly need firmware added to function. If you are lucky that firmware may be available in the "unofficial" non-free install medium from here - https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unof ... -firmware/
Alternatively the firmware package can be written to a USB stick and added during installation, a less simple process.
A small number of less supported devices may need a driver module compiled and/or firmware sourced from upstream.

With the next release of Debian, Bookworm, a new non-free-firmware repository has been added and will be an install time option. Your request has already been fulfilled for in the near future. :wink: Experienced users can install Testing Bookworm now but it requires much more management and can have issues.

For now, if your wifi device can't be made to work during install, use an ethernet connection and configure wifi post-install. Ethernet devices are much more widely supported.
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#3 Post by njbetavirp »

Hot diggity, and thank you sunrat.
I finally made a Wi-Fi enabled, persistent Debian USB thumb drive! The 'non-free' ISO made my intel Wi-Fi adapter work. I used the MKUSB tool on the Mint OS to get the thumb's persistence working. I'm writing this booted to the Debian thumb. And when I re-boot any changes that I've made are saved.
I'm looking forward to Bookworm. I think Bookworm will let a lot people with my skill level, and without an ethernet option, start using Debian.
Thanks again!!

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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#4 Post by Jay Young »

I would like to add to this discussion, having just experienced wifi woes. We all know that wifi is tricky at best, and Debian must remain free and open source. As soon as someone makes an open source wifi radio, it will all work out.

However, I tried to re-install Debian on a system that had become corrupt for various reasons. This particular system is about 10 years old, and the wifi worked flawlessly for the past two years. I knew I needed intel wifi drivers, and when I saw there was an "unofficial" non-free install option I chose to use that.

The install went great, as usual, wireless network hard detected, it works, connected, no problems. But then on the dreaded reboot - no wifi. Of course not.

WHY CAN DEBIAN NOT COPY OVER THE CONFIG FROM THE INSTALL. JUST DO IT. This is so dumb. I don't care about the ethics, I just need it to work.

Then I went round and round trying various options from wpa, to networkmanager. I never could get systemd to make the wifi work correctly, but it worked just fine in the install. Why is this such a sticking point? It is rather frustrating that, after more than 200 years of use, a simple user like me has to resort to other distros, or other versions of Debian to get a simple thing like wifi working. 7 hours of reconfiguring an rebooting resulted in me shelving that system until I can devote even more days and hours into figuring out what broke the wifi.

TL;DR - Not having hardware function that works perfectly during install or liveCD after the fact is exceedingly dumb.

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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#5 Post by Random_Troll »

Jay Young wrote: 2023-06-05 19:05TL;DR - Not having hardware function that works perfectly during install or liveCD after the fact is exceedingly dumb.
And the Debian developers agree with you: https://www.debian.org/vote/2022/vote_003

FWIW I've used the non-free installer *many* times and it's always installed the firmware correctly for me. Did you check the install log?
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#6 Post by kent_dorfman766 »

Ah, hope springs eternal.

There will never be a an 802.11 WIFI FOSS radio. Why? Because the standards are licensed documents and after paying for them and committing the many man-years of implementation work, the entity who is developing the radio is going to want to be paid for the effort. Oh, as an afterthought, you also have the FCC in the states needing to approve any transmitter being developed for resale...they will want ot make sure it can only be used withing legal design specs...which is incompatible with the FOSS principles.

WIFI on linux has always been a bit of a PITA, but in fairness, its a whole lot easier now than it was in say...2005.

You need:
1) kernel driver for your specific NIC
2) non-free firmware blob for that specific NIC
3) config/admin software

In a pinch wpa_supplicant and nmcli can and does work to configure a WIFI connection, but admittedly the online docs suck...seriously suck.

nmcli must enable the radio, create/store/access a connection profile that stores the credentials in encrypted and hash-keyed format...Which is why copying the config from one machine to another probly wont work.

In my humble opinion, don't even attempt to use anything BUT the NetworkManager stack to achieve a connection. If you use a GUI connection manager then make sure it is a fron-end for NetworkManager, and disable that connman crap that the kiddies are enamored with these days.

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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#7 Post by Random_Troll »

kent_dorfman766 wrote: 2023-06-05 19:29In my humble opinion, don't even attempt to use anything BUT the NetworkManager stack to achieve a connection.
IMHO NetworkManager is a useless, buggy bloat monster :P

@OP: I can recommend iwd, it can be configured with iwctl(1) and it has a built-in DHCP client so it can be used as a standalone wireless network solution and if used as such it is the lightest and most secure way of connecting to the internet using Linux.

See also https://wiki.debian.org/WiFi/HowToUse#iwd
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#8 Post by kent_dorfman766 »

IMHO NetworkManager is a useless, buggy bloat monster :P
Won't argue that point, but it is the only way I've ever gotten WIFI to work under Linux with native drivers. Remember ndiswrapper? Barf!

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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#9 Post by Aki »

Hello,
Jay Young wrote: 2023-06-05 19:05 I tried to re-install Debian on a system that had become corrupt for various reasons. [..] The install went great, as usual, wireless network hard detected, it works, connected, no problems. But then on the dreaded reboot - no wifi. Of course not.
@Jay Young:
What is the installed Debian version ?
What is the name of the ISO file you used to install your Debian version ?
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#10 Post by sunrat »

Jay Young wrote: 2023-06-05 19:05... after more than 200 years of use, a simple user like me has to resort to other distros,
Congratulations on being the oldest person on the planet! :mrgreen:

Sorry, couldn't resist. :wink:
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#11 Post by BBQdave »

njbetavirp wrote: 2023-02-14 21:51I have never been able to get a WiFi connection enabled using Debian. I've followed dozens of support web pages addressing the issue. Apparently, I don't have the technical skills to get a Wifi connection working on Debian.
I've seen many posts in this forum, asking and addressing the same challenge... WiFi.

I was thinking about this and the cost of USB WiFi hardware, WiFi cards and so on. Coming at this challenge of network connection, a different thought: Router extender and ethernet cable connection.

If your hardware is challenging with WiFi, you could simply get a Router Extender (Booster) hardware and plug an ethernet cable into that and into your laptop. I recognize it may not be as convenient as wireless, but fairly portable in that the booster could be set up through out your home, just plug in your laptop ethernet cable.

I think back to my early home networks, and routers and switches and ethernet cables through out. I would just grab an ethernet cable and plug in to my laptop - through out my home :)

Back in the day, some homes even came with that space age feature of empty conduits in the wall and ethernet outlet covers - for your ethernet cables and home network :D
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#12 Post by Hallvor »

This is a howto for beginners on how to deal with that: viewtopic.php?t=151785 It has been there for a little more than a year.

The Docs, HowTos, Tips & Tricks section has a lot of information you may find useful.
[HowTo] Install and configure Debian bookworm
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#13 Post by Jay Young »

I will attempt to answer all the questions, and give a step by step rundown of what is happening. I brought the machine in question home, so I now have plenty of time and space to run through this.

I navigated to the website: https://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unof ... -firmware/ which was linked from the front page.

I chose [ISO] debian-live-11.7.0-amd64-standard+nonfree.iso the first time, which gave me all the problems. I elected to use a different file this time and chose

debian-bookworm-DI-alpha2-amd64-DVD-1.iso 2023-02-19 02:37

Noting that there is a file called firmware-bookworm-DI, which was from 2022, and the above which is from 2023. I elected to use the newest of the new. I don't know why there is a lack of clarity regarding which download someone might need, but perhaps I can contribute in that regard, because its very easy to choose the 2022 iso. Also it is quite confusing that one of the options ls labeled BD, but is for an EDU version; that point is mentioned no where else except for inside that particular image directory.

I understand that I probably should at some point re-test the previous install file, but I don't really have time for all that at the moment.

Using the graphical install option on my laptop, Configure the network detected my installed wireless card (Intel), listed about 40283854 SSID's. After selecting my home wifi network, entering the password, the installer was unable to connect. I used my cell phone hotspot, which is unsecure. It also was unable to get an address via dhcp. This, to me, shows that the installer firmware is loaded, the wireless card is working, and SSID's can be scanned successfully. However there seems to be a deeper issue with trouble connecting.

After trying several options, WEP/WPA2/WPA3/totally unsecure, nothing worked. The installer program would scan the hardware, find both the ethernet controller and the wireless card, could see every available wifi network in my neighborhood (about 130), and never connect to anything, always failing at the DHCP request screen.

I then downloaded debian-11.7.0-amd64-netinst.iso. from the direct top of the download page. This of course did not have the non-free firmware, but I already had that downloaded on another usb drive.
Of course, naturally, the part where the 11.7 installer says "please insert the disk containing the firmware you need to make this wifi work" doesn't, in fact, work. dmesg always reports it can see the usb drive. But the installer simply cannot see
any other drive because it never gets mounted because its dumb.

Now of course also, if the wireless card fails to find the firmware, and you switch consoles to tell it where the mounted usb drive is, or copy the files manually, one cannot return to the wireless network setup. it is LOCKED into ethernet unless it is rebooted - this is dumb. So finally, after running the installer again, manually mounting the second usb, manually running ethdetect, I got it to connect to my wireless network. No normal user should have to go through this. This is dumb.

Install base system, choose DE of choice, and unfortunately its almost impossible to connect to a wireless network without wrapper gui software. Quite difficult.
LXFE > Connman > working.

This post is pretty long, so I'm going to continue testing with the above method in the morning. I assume it will be exactly the same on similar intel hardware.

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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#14 Post by Random_Troll »

Jay Young wrote: 2023-06-07 01:55debian-bookworm-DI-alpha2-amd64-DVD-1.iso 2023-02-19 02:37
Why did you chose an ancient version of the bookworm installer? That version contains known bugs and should not be expected to work properly. Use the latest bookworm ISO image instead, if you want to test the installer.
Jay Young wrote: 2023-06-07 01:55I then downloaded debian-11.7.0-amd64-netinst.iso. from the direct top of the download page. This of course did not have the non-free firmware, but I already had that downloaded on another usb drive.
Of course, naturally, the part where the 11.7 installer says "please insert the disk containing the firmware you need to make this wifi work" doesn't, in fact, work. dmesg always reports it can see the usb drive. But the installer simply cannot see
any other drive because it never gets mounted because its dumb.
Did you follow https://wiki.debian.org/Firmware#Firmwa ... stallation?

Note that this procedure will be made obsolete by the bookworm release in 3 days. The official bookworm ISOs will include non-free firmware by default.
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Re: [Discussion] A suggestion to help newcommers. Add WiFi.

#15 Post by Jay Young »

Random_Troll wrote: 2023-06-07 06:02 Why did you chose an ancient version of the bookworm installer? That version contains known bugs and should not be expected to work properly. Use the latest bookworm ISO image instead, if you want to test the installer.

It seemed like that was the latest "Debian 12" non-free version. It doesn't seem that ancient, since most of the other builds of non-free are from April? Again, the directions and documentation have always been a bit lacking in clarity.

Yes, I did follow that page, the point being that I should not have to follow that page if the installer temporary system does its job correctly. I understand mounting an external secondary drive during install is a lot to ask, but still, I'm asking.

Anyhow, I will now download debian-live-11.7.0-amd64-standard+nonfree.iso from April and try that.

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