Handbook Talk:AMD64/Installation/Networking

Wireless drivers
The networking guide is outdated in the "Preparing for wireless access" section. Setup for Wireless networks using WPA or WPA2 protocol could be introduced here for convenience. Networking is often necessary during setup, and having this step integrated to the guide would be helpful for many, since WPA and WPA2 are becoming more commonly used protocols in WiFi routers.

For example, basic usage of wpa_supplicant and wpa_passphrase could be introduced in spirit of Sakaki's excellent guide here --Laurenzo (talk) 19:45, 19 September 2015 (UTC)


 * Is there a useful number of wifi drivers, firmware and wpa_supplicant on the minimal CD?
 * My advice on the forums is still that if you need WiFi to install, start off with SystemRescueCD.
 * Then add wifi later. The root of the problem being that the minimal ISO is too minimal.
 * Has that changed?
 * NeddySeagoon (talk) 21:16, 20 September 2015 (UTC)


 * No, I don't think the discussion here has changed at all. Wifi support is hard because a lot of the drivers require binary blobs (usually included in package). When using systemd (which is becoming more common these days, even on Gentoo) these binary firmware files need to be built into the kernel (a safety feature prevents firmware blobs from being loaded after boot). Our current installation media does not support any build-in firmware at this time and I do not believe we will ever do so. Doing so even (for the free blobs) would make our kernel huge. It would not be worth the extra effort.


 * Looking at this practically this is more of a RelEng issue than a handbook issue. Our installation media needs to support the chipsets/firmware in the first place to even make adding wiki instructions possible. Take it up on Bugzilla with RelEng if you'd like to persist, but I doubt there's much anyone can do.


 * Marking this discussion is done because it's not very possible to do this well due to the nature of most wifi chipsets and the extra manpower involved. Not to mention RelEng's necessary involvement before steps could even be described. --Maffblaster (talk) 21:06, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

Contradictory device naming in "Preparing for wireless access": eth0
Currently the example wireless device name in the "Preparing for wireless access" section is eth0, which is unlikely to ever happen. We should use wlan0 or an example from the predictable naming w1NsNpN scheme, where N will be some integer. I know it was some kind of copy-paste error, but seemingly I do not have the right to edit this page.

Updating deprected "Preparing for wireless access" instructions
The iwconfig commands on this page are deprecated.

I propose changing them to the equivalent iw commands. Perhaps also combining with the previous comment.

Info about a wireless device -  ->

Open (i.e. no password) network connection -  ->

WEP connection with hex key -

WEP connection with string key -