Bug 148354 - iwscan on Prism2 PC-Card does not show hidden cells
Summary: iwscan on Prism2 PC-Card does not show hidden cells
Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX
Alias: None
Product: SUSE Linux 10.1
Classification: openSUSE
Component: Network (show other bugs)
Version: Beta 3
Hardware: Other Other
: P5 - None : Normal (vote)
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Joachim Gleissner
QA Contact: E-mail List
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Reported: 2006-02-06 11:24 UTC by Timo Hoenig
Modified: 2006-04-24 16:53 UTC (History)
0 users

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Found By: Other
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Blocker: ---
Marketing QA Status: ---
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Description Timo Hoenig 2006-02-06 11:24:23 UTC 
NM does not show hidden, un-encrypted networks for which it received information from nm-applet or KNM.

Hidden, encrypted networks are found once NM got details from the applets.
Comment 1 Timo Hoenig 2006-02-06 16:13:57 UTC 
Seems to be hardware-specific.

It is a Prism2 PC-Card (Linksys, Instant Wireless Network PC Card) using hostap as driver.

Some debug info:

- pccarcctl eject & insert: iwlist doesn't show anything
- once NM is running: iwlist shows broadcasting networks (due to a scan issued by NM?).  All hidden cells are _not_ shown.
- once I've connected to _one_ hidden network manually: iwlist shows _all_ hidden cells

Joe, does this ring a bell for you?  Driver issue?
Comment 2 Joachim Gleissner 2006-02-09 16:24:12 UTC 
> - pccarcctl eject & insert: iwlist doesn't show anything
Probably due to the interface being down.

> - once NM is running: iwlist shows broadcasting networks (due to a scan issued by NM?).  All hidden cells are _not_ shown.
> - once I've connected to _one_ hidden network manually: iwlist shows _all_ hidden cells
Yes, I can reproduce this. But it doesn't suffice to connect to a hidden wlan to get the list of hidden APs. You need to use wpa_supplicant to get that effect. I think it is caused by a different kind of scanning wpa_supplicant performs compared to iwlist. However, is it important for NetworkManager to get that list? I guess NetworkManager uses it to detect already known hidden WLANs?
Comment 3 Robert Love 2006-02-13 15:58:38 UTC 
Comment #2: Correct.  NM takes the list of non-broadcast AP's and finds BSSID's that the user has connected to in the past.  It then shows them in the scan list.
Comment 4 Joachim Gleissner 2006-03-23 12:57:22 UTC 
It seems using the orinoco driver it's even worse, it does never show hidden cells, regardless whether it is associated to a hidden one or not. I'm still investigating that, but it may be possible that this is an firmware issue and can't be fixed in the driver.
Comment 5 Timo Hoenig 2006-03-28 13:17:01 UTC 
Assigning to the one who knows :-)

Changing severity to normal.
Comment 6 Joachim Gleissner 2006-04-24 16:53:37 UTC 
I seems the Prism2 firmware does behave like that. I tried also a newer firmware version, but it does not help either. I fear we have to live with it.