THIS THREAD IS NOT ABOUT GENERAL WIFI PROBLEMS. ONLY GET INVOLVED IF YOU CAN CONNECT MANUALLY BUT HAVE PROBLEMS CONNECTING AUTOMATICALLY AT BOOT TIME.

Sometimes (about 1/3 of the time) my wifi wouldn't connect at startup and I'd have to start it manually. It would also be really slow to connect sometimes. I had a rummage in the scripts and found the wlan_on_boot.sh script to be deeply flawed. I've played with it to make what I think are improvements, and since then it has connected very quickly every time. If anyone wants to try it, type this

cd /usr/sbin
sudo cp wlan_on_boot.sh wlan_on_boot.sh_backup
sudo kwrite wlan_on_boot.sh

and replace the contents with this

#!/bin/sh

# Initial version from Asus/Xandros distribution - Modified by cjdshaw

IFACE="ath0"

#if by any chance ath0 is not up yet - give it up to 10 second wait
i=0
while [ $i -lt 10 ]; do
    if [ -n "`ifconfig -a | grep $IFACE`" ]; then
        break;
    fi
    echo Waiting for $IFACE to be up - $i...
    sleep 1
    i=$((i+1))
done

TRIES=1
while [ $TRIES -le 3 ]; do
echo "Try $TRIES"
FOUND_ESSID=""
WLAN_FOUND=""
if [ -n "`ifconfig -a | grep $IFACE`" ]; then
    WLAN=`/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb --list | grep wlan  | sed 's/ .*//'`

    /sbin/ifconfig $IFACE up
    VOCAL_WLANS=""
    SILENT_WLANS=""
    SCAN=`iwlist $IFACE scan 2>/dev/null | grep ESSID | cut -d '"' -f 2 | sed 's/.*/"&"/'`
    for i in $WLAN ; do
        ESSID=`/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb -i $i -g WIRELESS_ESSID | cut -f 2 -d '='`
        if $(echo $SCAN | grep -q \""${ESSID}"\") ; then
            VOCAL_WLANS="$VOCAL_WLANS $i"
            echo "$i - $ESSID will be a high priority search"
        else
            SILENT_WLANS="$SILENT_WLANS $i"
        fi
    done
    WLAN="$VOCAL_WLANS $SILENT_WLANS"
    echo "WLAN list = $WLAN"

    for i in $WLAN ; do
    if $(/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb -i $i -g AUTO_START | /bin/grep -q onboot) ; then
        /sbin/ifconfig $IFACE down
        #assume it is ath0
        #DEVICEID=`/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb -i $i -g DEVICE_ID`
        #DEVICEID=${DEVICEID##DEVICE_ID=}
        #IFACE=`/usr/sbin/xangetdevices --udi $DEVICEID | grep Network\ Device`
        #IFACE=`echo $IFACE | sed 's/^.*=[ ]*\(.*\)/\1/'`

        ESSID=`/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb -i $i -g WIRELESS_ESSID | cut -f 2 -d '='`
        CHANNEL=`/opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-servicedb -i $i -g WIRELESS_CHANNEL | cut -f 2 -d '='`
   
        echo "wlan:$i iface:$IFACE essid:$ESSID channel:$CHANNEL"
       
        if [ -n "$CHANNEL" ]; then
            DELAY=5
            iwconfig $IFACE channel $CHANNEL
        else
            DELAY=15
            iwconfig $IFACE channel 0
        fi
        iwconfig $IFACE essid "$ESSID"
        /sbin/ifconfig $IFACE up

        while [ $DELAY -gt 0 ]; do
            sleep 1
            WLAN_FOUND=`iwlist $IFACE scan 2>/dev/null | grep ESSID | cut -d '"' -f 2 | sed 's/.*/"&"/'`
            echo "$DELAY. WLANs found:"
            echo "$WLAN_FOUND"

            MATCH_ESSID=`echo $WLAN_FOUND | grep \""${ESSID}"\"`
            if [ -n "$MATCH_ESSID" ]; then
                break;
            fi
            DELAY=$((DELAY - 1))
        done

        if [ -z "$WLAN_FOUND" -a -z "$CHANNEL" ]; then
            echo No vocal WLANs found. Trying next
            break;
        fi

        if [ -n "$MATCH_ESSID" ]; then
            echo "Connecting $i on $IFACE to $ESSID..."
            /opt/xandros/bin/xandrosncs-control -i $i start || ESSID=
            FOUND_ESSID="$ESSID"
            break
        fi
    fi

    done
   
    rm -f /tmp/onboot_*.scan
   
    if [ -n "$FOUND_ESSID" ]; then
        exit 0
    fi
fi
TRIES=$((TRIES + 1))
done

exit 1

Save and reboot

If it still doesn't work, let it boot, wait a few minutes, then copy the contents of /tmp/wlan_on_boot.log to this thread and I'll try to help. I'd also appreciate a message letting me know if it helped.

For the more technically curious, the changes I've made are
- Allowed the script to wait 10sec for the interface to come up. Old version tried to do this but forgot to sleep
- Tried the entire process up to three times. Sometimes connection will fail for no apparent reason. Retrying often fixes this
- Prioritised visible networks. Old script just blindly worked its way through your list, so if you had a lot of "On Boot" networks, it could take a really long time before it tried the one you had access to. This won't help speed up non-broadcast SSIDs, of course, but it also won't slow them down
- Tweaked ESSID handling. It should be more compatible with ESSIDs with unusual characters in them

Last edited by cjdshaw (2008-04-21 10:05:01 am)