Cannot Access web through Vodafone R219h wifi access point

[Stuarte]

Hi,

A few weeks ago I had to do a complete reinstall of Debian Bookworm from a Debian Bookworm 12.5 Live ISO/DVD. Since then the laptop has not been able to access the web through the dongle (a Vodafone R219h) although the laptop can access the web through the local library access point. It seems that the laptop is using Network Manager to manage connections.I have read/worked through the Network Manager section of Debian Networking WiFi_HowToUse section of the Debian Wiki. The laptop still cannot access the web through the dongle.

In my investigations I found that both 20-wired.network and dhcp.network were both missing from /etc/systemd/network. I have re-instated both files. This has made no difference. There is a .nmconnection file for the dongle in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/. In System Settings/Network/Connections I have tried changing the dongle (access) Mode from Infrastructure (the original setting) to Adhoc and then Access Point. Neither of these changes made any difference.

Currently I have set Restrict to device to wlp7s0. Again this made no difference.

Previous to re-installing Debian, the laptop had no problem whatever in accessing the web through the dongle at home.

Could someone please point me in the direction of a fix for this problem ?

Stuart

EDIT: Whilst reading through the Network section of the Debian Wiki, I came across the "sudo nmcli d" command. With the dongle connected to a usb port, this gives the following output.

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stuart@localhost:~$ sudo nmcli d
DEVICE           TYPE      STATE                   CONNECTION                
enx001e101f0000  ethernet  connected               Wired connection 2        
wlp7s0           wifi      connected               VodafoneMobileWiFi-645C43 
lo               loopback  connected (externally)  lo                        
p2p-dev-wlp7s0   wifi-p2p  disconnected            --                        
enp19s0          ethernet  unavailable             --  

In an effort to get this problem fixed, I recently replaced wlp7s0 with enp19s0 in file /etc/systemd/network/20-wired.network. This made no difference so I put back wlp7s0.

Also, use of the "ip a" command gives the following output

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stuart@localhost:~$ ip a
1: lo: <LOOPBACK,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 65536 qdisc noqueue state UNKNOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/loopback 00:00:00:00:00:00 brd 00:00:00:00:00:00
    inet 127.0.0.1/8 scope host lo
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 ::1/128 scope host noprefixroute 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
2: enp19s0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc fq_codel state DOWN group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 78:84:3c:ff:8b:84 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
3: wlp7s0: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc noqueue state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 64:27:37:96:82:fb brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 10.190.96.149/25 metric 1024 brd 10.190.96.255 scope global dynamic wlp7s0
       valid_lft 3072sec preferred_lft 3072sec
    inet 10.190.96.188/25 brd 10.190.96.255 scope global secondary dynamic noprefixroute wlp7s0
       valid_lft 3084sec preferred_lft 3084sec
    inet6 fe80::efbc:cf7f:b0f5:ef8b/64 scope link noprefixroute 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
4: enx001e101f0000: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc fq_codel state UP group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 00:1e:10:1f:00:00 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet 192.168.0.130/24 brd 192.168.0.255 scope global dynamic noprefixroute enx001e101f0000
       valid_lft 83089sec preferred_lft 83089sec
    inet6 fe80::b01a:499:2bc4:f290/64 scope link noprefixroute 
       valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
stuart@localhost:~$ 

I have also replaced wlp7s0 with enx001e101f0000 in that same file. This also made no difference.

[Aki]

Hello,

[..] With the dongle connected to a usb port, this gives the following output.

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stuart@localhost:~$ sudo nmcli d
DEVICE           TYPE      STATE                   CONNECTION                
enx001e101f0000  ethernet  connected               Wired connection 2        
wlp7s0           wifi      connected               VodafoneMobileWiFi-645C43 
lo               loopback  connected (externally)  lo                        
p2p-dev-wlp7s0   wifi-p2p  disconnected            --                        
enp19s0          ethernet  unavailable             --  

You are trying to connect your computer's WiFi network device (what is it?) to the WiFi access point whose SSID is "VodafoneMobileWiFi-645C43", aren't you?

It would be better to disconnect the cable from the Ethernet port before trying to connect the computer's WiFi network card to the Vodafone R219h WiFi access point (connected to the Internet via a mobile operator).

Hope this helps.

--
note: please rename the subject of the first post from "Cannot Access web through Vodafone R219h wifi dongle after re-install" to "Cannot Access web through Vodafone R219h wifi access point"

[Stuarte]

Hi @Aki,

Thank you for your reply. Please accept my apologies for such a late response.

You are trying to connect your computer's WiFi network device (what is it?) to the WiFi access point whose SSID is "VodafoneMobileWiFi-645C43", aren't you?

The device is a vodafone-branded external dongle as shown at https://i.ytimg.com/vi/3MVY5X1ve6U/maxresdefault.jpg
The device is usually connected by wire to a usb port in order to keep the battery charged. There isn't anything connected to the ethernet port.

I am now getting a "Failed to start networking.service" very early in the boot up process. Executing "systemctl status networking" gives the following output.

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systemctl status networking
× networking.service - Raise network interfaces
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/networking.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Wed 2025-01-22 12:11:26 UTC; 2h 2min ago
       Docs: man:interfaces(5)
    Process: 2664 ExecStart=/sbin/ifup -a --read-environment (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
    Process: 2667 ExecStopPost=/usr/bin/touch /run/network/restart-hotplug (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Main PID: 2664 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
        CPU: 3ms

Executing "systemctl restart networking" gives the following output.

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stuart@localhost:~$ systemctl restart networking
Job for networking.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status networking.service" and "journalctl -xeu networking.service" for details.

And finally, executing "journalctl -xeu networking.service" gives the following output.

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stuart@localhost:~$ journalctl -xeu networking.service
Hint: You are currently not seeing messages from other users and the system.
      Users in groups 'adm', 'systemd-journal' can see all messages.
      Pass -q to turn off this notice.

This is followed by 27 empty lines and then a last line of "-- No entries --" at which point Konsole returns to its prompt.

My understanding

The system appears to be using Network Manager to control network connections.
Network Manager only controls those network interfaces not(!) mentioned in /etc/network/interfaces. Consequently this file contains only the following.

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# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

source /etc/network/interfaces.d/*

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

mtu=1452

I did a bit of reading on the Debian wiki about networking and ended up a bit confused. I have ensured that the laptop does have the correct driver installed for this dongle/hot spot (apparently this is the ath9k driver) by executing " lsmod | grep -e "ath9k" " which gave the following output.

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stuart@localhost:~$ lsmod | grep -e "ath9k"
ath9k                 143360  0
ath9k_common           24576  1 ath9k
ath9k_hw              512000  2 ath9k_common,ath9k
ath                    36864  3 ath9k_common,ath9k,ath9k_hw
mac80211             1175552  1 ath9k
cfg80211             1146880  4 ath9k_common,ath9k,ath,mac80211
rfkill                 36864  8 ath9k,bluetooth,cfg80211,sony_laptop
stuart@localhost:~$

I'm kind of "working blind" here. I'll continue to try and find a fix for this "Failed..." condition, I'm just not sure where to go from here.

Stuart

[Aki]

Hello,

[..]
I am now getting a "Failed to start networking.service" very early in the boot up process. Executing "systemctl status networking" gives the following output.

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systemctl status networking
× networking.service - Raise network interfaces
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/networking.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Wed 2025-01-22 12:11:26 UTC; 2h 2min ago
       Docs: man:interfaces(5)
    Process: 2664 ExecStart=/sbin/ifup -a --read-environment (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
    Process: 2667 ExecStopPost=/usr/bin/touch /run/network/restart-hotplug (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Main PID: 2664 (code=exited, status=1/FAILURE)
        CPU: 3ms

[..]
Network Manager only controls those network interfaces not(!) mentioned in /etc/network/interfaces. Consequently this file contains only the following.

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# This file describes the network interfaces available on your system
# and how to activate them. For more information, see interfaces(5).

source /etc/network/interfaces.d/*

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

mtu=1452

Remove the "mtu=1452" line from the file named /etc/network/interfaces, then test the following commands:

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sudo ifdown -a
sudo ifup -v -a

If they succeed, then the networking.service should start fine again:

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sudo systemctl start networking.service 

Hope this helps.