Steps to install hostap drivers in Fedora Core 2
I recently ran into alot of problems getting the hostap-drivers installed onto the Fedora Core 2 installation on my laptop. After a few days of hacking at the problem and plenty of web surfing forums and mailing list archives I came up with a way to get the drivers installed and working correctly. I’ve put together a quick HOW-TO so that others won’t have the same headaches that I ran into.
First make sure that your kernel and kernel-sourecode packages match.
[yum list kernel kernel-sourcecode] will tell you what versions are currently installed. If only the kernel is listed as being install [yum install kernel-sourcecode] will load the correct kernel-sourcecode onto your machine.
Go into the kernel source tree (/usr/src/linux-2.6.x-xxx) and issue the following commands:
make oldconfig (this will generate the .config file to match the currently running kernel)
You will have to modify the Makefile and make a small change to it. Using vim or your favorite text editor find the line that has EXTRAVERSION = -1.XXXcustom and delete the “custom” from the end of the version number (leave the numbers intact). Save the modified Makefile and quit back to the shell.
Issue:
make modules
make
[cd /usr/local/src] to leave the kernel source tree as we’re done with it and go to the local source code directory.
[wget http://hostap.epitest.fi/releases/hostap-driver-0.1.3.tar.gz] to download the hostap driver.
tar xfz hostap-driver-0.1.3.tar.gz to extract the driver source code. Then go into the hostap source code directory
cd hostap-driver-0.1.3
Modify the hostap-driver Makefile to reflect your FC2 installation. Using vim or your favorite text editor change the KERNEL_PATH= line to reflect your installation. For example [KERNEL_PATH=/usr/src/kernel-2.6.6-1.435] Save the modified Makefile and exit back to the shell.
Issue:
make && make install
If no errors occurred during compilation or installation then the hostap-driver has been installed and is ready to go. Restart the pcmcia services [service pcmcia restart] and then plug in you prism2/2.5/3 based WiFi card and be free of wires.
Tip: it’s a good idea to watch your kernel messages before plugging in the WiFi card. [tail -f /var/log/messages]
Hi Ponderous,
Can you let me know what you did AFTER what you describe, i’ve installed the drivers, but can’t get any further with the setup on fc2.
Thanks in advance.
Regards,
Morgan.
I’m doing this on my desktop. Is there a service restart command for the pci device.
Also when i run make install i get the error “Unresolved symbols in /lib/modules/2.4.22-1.2115.nptl/pcmcia/hostap_cs.o but the file changes there are about 5 or 6 of them..
I used the RPM packages for HostAP from atrpms.net. I had no problem loading the modules, but after spending too much time on it I found out that my pcmcia card didn’t support “monitor” mode so I haven’t actually made real use of it yet…