[pkg-wpa-devel] Re: new mode 3 proposal Was: Bug#360387: wpasupplicant: please support the "old" daemon mode as an configuration option

[Joerg Platte]

Am Sonntag, 2. April 2006 21:07 schrieb Joachim Breitner:
Hi!

> I have to second this wishlist bug. Just two weeks ago, I was active on
> the pkg-wpa-devel mailinglist, until it was agreed that mode 3 should
> still be possible, so I am a bit dumbfounded to see it removed now.
>
> The big advantage of this is that
>  a) you can have different ifupdown settings for different locations. I
> have quite complex stuff configured there (e.g. different VPNs to be put
> up, modifying /etc/ld.preload for tsocks, etc).

I'm using different VPN's, SMTP-relays, proxy-settings, /etc/apt/sources and 
DNS modifications...

>  b) cat /etc/network/run/ifstate says what devices are _really_ up, not
> what wifi devices are sitting and waiting for access points.

Yes.

>  c) /e/n/interfaces configs refer to _networks_, not hardware, which
> makes a log of sense IMHO

Yes. As mentioned in another mail, wireless and wired networks can use the 
same configuration entry. There's no need to make a difference here, as long 
as wpa_supplicant can manage the network configuration by its own.

> A possible further way, which might neatly integrate into ifupdown, just
> crosses my mind:
> Why not use wpasupplicant as a mapping script, from ifupdowns POV? For

Possible, but still has some disadvantages (see below).

> every different WLAN I would want to connect to, I have a separate
> virtual device in /e/n/i, kind of like with guessnet. ifupdown calls
> some script as a mapping script, which will fire up wpa_supplicant and
> wait, until wpa_supplicant could connect to one of these defined
> networks, and then return to ifupdown the virtual interface name of the
> associated network. A possible /e/n/i might then look like this:
>
> auto wifi0
>
> mapping wifi0
>   script /usr/lib/wpa-ifupdown-mapping
>
> iface wifi0-home dhcp
>   wpa-driver madwifi
>   wpa-ssid homezone
>   wpa-key-mgmt WPA-PSK
>   wpa-psk 000102030405060708090a0b0c0d0e0f101112131415161718191a1b1c1d1e1f
>   up echo I'm home| mail -s Hi honey at my.family

Good idea. But what happens, if the connection is lost and can be 
reestablished in another network? Will dhcpd then try to get a new address? 
What happens to VPN-connections? With ifplugd (my current configuration) the 
interface is shut down and brought up again after reassociation. And then all 
additional settings can be reapplied.

regards,
Jörg