EDIMAX EW-7612UAn V2 THE ONLY (?) GNU Linux WIFI WLAN Adapter that works OUT OF THE BOX on all GNU Linux systems (ODROID RASPBERRY AND Desktop GNU Linux)

 

ONLY BUY FROM HARDWARE VENDORS THAT SUPPORT FREE & OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE!

(release the sources for their drivers and documentation for their hardware)

“Currently there are only a few modern wifi chipsets readily available that work with free software systems.

For USB wifi devices this list includes the

Wifi has always been a problem for free software users. USB Wifi cards are becoming less free. With the older 802.11G standard many USB wifi cards had free drivers and did not require non-free firmware. With 802.11N there is only one chipset on the market, from Atheros, which is completely free.

One company which specializes in free software and sells 802.11N USB wifi cards, ThinkPenguin.com, has indicated the availability of free software supported 802.11N USB wifi cards is disappearing. Solving this problem will require more demand than currently exists.

src: https://wiki.debian.org/WiFi

… one just reinstalled (of course with LVM + encrypted partition) the giada f300 (very fine machine unfortunately “they” stopped building it).

screw Realtek, what one wants is should work out of the box with recent Linux kernels on Open Source drivers only:

Recommended tested Hardware – Superb Wifi WLAN Adapter Chipset Atheros AR9285 Mini PCIE for GNU Linux Debian 10 Ubuntu and Trisquel 8.0 test run on Lenovo t440 and LibreBooted Lenovo x60s

(the wonderful galaxy background images are missing if one uses the minimal core version and not the full version (comes with LibreOffice and all))

Even with closed source blob drivers AND the gnome network manager under MATE Desktop one is unable to connect to any WIFI network.

Workaround: “manual” bash terminal connect version BUT the problem is (again) that “network manager” tries to take over control and resets the connection every 10minutes or so.

so if one wants to utilize the manual bash terminal connect to wifi way, which works, even in Debian 10 Buster, one probably needs to uninstall any network manager.

dpkg -l|grep network|grep manager
ii  gir1.2-networkmanager-1.0:amd64       1.6.2-3+deb9u2                              amd64        GObject introspection data for NetworkManager
ii  network-manager                       1.6.2-3+deb9u2                              amd64        network management framework (daemon and userspace tools)
ii  network-manager-gnome                 1.4.4-1+deb9u1                              amd64        network management framework (GNOME frontend)

so hook up the LAN and use THE debug script(s (one has color (nice! one can instantly spot errors) the other allows one to scroll (also nice…)) to debug the problem.

what have one got?

apt-get install network-manager-gnome

cat /etc/debian_version 
10.1
root@debian10:~# hostnamectl 
   Static hostname: debian10
         Icon name: computer-laptop
  Operating System: Debian GNU/Linux 10 (buster)
            Kernel: Linux 4.19.0-6-amd64
      Architecture: x86-64


dmesg|grep rt2
[   17.239184] ieee80211 phy0: rt2x00_set_rt: Info - RT chipset 5592, rev 0222 detected
[   17.260075] ieee80211 phy0: rt2x00_set_rf: Info - RF chipset 000f detected
[   17.275119] usbcore: registered new interface driver rt2800usb
[   17.279153] rt2800usb 1-3:1.0 wlx24050fe57825: renamed from wlan0
[   17.814623] ieee80211 phy0: rt2x00lib_request_firmware: Info - Loading firmware file 'rt2870.bin'
[   17.815256] rt2800usb 1-3:1.0: firmware: direct-loading firmware rt2870.bin
[   17.815268] ieee80211 phy0: rt2x00lib_request_firmware: Info - Firmware detected - version: 0.36

error message of the day:

wlx24050fe57825: SME: Deauth request to the driver failed

full log: 2019.10 gnome-network-manager wifi problem wlx24050fe57825 SME Deauth request to the driver failed.txt

solution:

use terminal based wifi auth (tested)

# install tools and firmware (if not already)
# modify to add closed source evil to ones system
vim /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de/debian/ buster main contrib non-free
deb-src http://ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de/debian/ buster main contrib non-free

apt update
apt install firmware-ralink
apt-get install wireless-tools wpasupplicant; 
# what is the name of one's wifi adapter
iwconfig

wlx24050fe57825  IEEE 802.11  ESSID:off/any  
          Mode:Managed  Access Point: Not-Associated   Tx-Power=20 dBm   
          Retry short  long limit:2   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:off
          Power Management:off
         
lo        no wireless extensions.
eno1      no wireless extensions.

iwlist scan
wlx24050fe57825  Scan completed :
          Cell 01 - Address: 98:DE:D0:D6:18:9C
                    Channel:6
                    Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
                    Quality=68/70  Signal level=-42 dBm  
                    Encryption key:on
                    ESSID:"TP-LINK_189C"
                    Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 6 Mb/s
                              9 Mb/s; 12 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
                    Bit Rates:24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 48 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
                    Mode:Master

# if it says "busy" try:
# (warning: will reset all network connections!)
service networking restart


# check available drivers
wpa_supplicant

drivers:
  nl80211 = Linux nl80211/cfg80211
  wext = Linux wireless extensions (generic)
  wired = Wired Ethernet driver
  macsec_linux = MACsec Ethernet driver for Linux
  none = no driver (RADIUS server/WPS ER)

# generate passphrase conf
wpa_passphrase 'TP-LINK_189C' 'super_long_and_secret_pwd' > /etc/wpa_supplicant/example.conf

# connect to wifi
wpa_supplicant -B -D nl80211 -i wlx24050fe57825 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant/example.conf
# get ip address from dhcp router
dhclient wlx24050fe57825
ping yahoo.com
# HURRAY :) CELEBRATION!


# remove network manager
# (will reset one's connection every x minutes = connection lost)
apt-get --purge remove network-manager;
apt-get --purge remove network-manager-gnome;
apt-get clean;

# pack it all into a script
vim /scripts/wlan_connect_tp_link.sh 
wpa_supplicant -B -D nl80211 -i wlx24050fe57825 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant/example.conf
dhclient wlx24050fe57825 

or ceni (untested)

apt info ceni
Package: ceni
Version: 2.33-2
Priority: optional
Section: net
Maintainer: Dmitry Bogatov <KAction@debian.org>
Installed-Size: 133 kB
Depends: perl, libcurses-ui-perl, libexpect-perl, libterm-readkey-perl, ifupdown, wpasupplicant
Recommends: resolvconf
Suggests: wpagui
Homepage: https://github.com/fullstory/ceni
Download-Size: 46.7 kB
APT-Sources: http://ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de/debian buster/main amd64 Packages
Description: Curses interface to /etc/network/interfaces
 A Curses user interface for configuring network interfaces with ifupdown.
 Ceni can manage basic network interface ifupdown configuration stanzas for
 ethernet and wireless devices.

more privacy by mac randomization

this seems to be a pretty new feature also introduced to linux, makes sense… additional to this would disable ipv6, because ipv6 hates NAT and wants to be able to identify every single device on this planet.

“Starting in Android 8.0, Android devices use randomized MAC addresses when probing for new networks while not currently associated with a network. In Android 9, you can enable a developer option (it’s disabled by default) to cause the device to use a randomized MAC address when connecting to a Wi-Fi network.

In Android 10, MAC randomization is enabled by default for client mode, SoftAp, and Wi-Fi Direct.

MAC randomization prevents listeners from using MAC addresses to build a history of device activity, thus increasing user privacy.

Additionally, MAC addresses are randomized as part of Wi-Fi Aware and Wi-Fi RTT operations.” (src)

more info:

apt info network-manager
Package: network-manager
Version: 1.14.6-2
Priority: optional
Section: net
Maintainer: Utopia Maintenance Team <pkg-utopia-maintainers@lists.alioth.debian.org>
Installed-Size: 11.9 MB
Pre-Depends: init-system-helpers (>= 1.54~)
Depends: libaudit1 (>= 1:2.2.1), libbluetooth3 (>= 4.91), libc6 (>= 2.26), libcurl3-gnutls (>= 7.16.3), libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.43.2), libgnutls30 (>= 3.6.5), libjansson4 (>= 2.0.1), libmm-glib0 (>= 1.0.0), libndp0 (>= 1.2), libnewt0.52 (>= 0.52.20), libnm0 (= 1.14.6-2), libpolkit-agent-1-0 (>= 0.99), libpolkit-gobject-1-0 (>= 0.104), libpsl5 (>= 0.13.0), libreadline7 (>= 6.0), libselinux1 (>= 1.32), libsystemd0 (>= 221), libteamdctl0 (>= 1.9), libudev1 (>= 183), libuuid1 (>= 2.16), lsb-base, wpasupplicant, dbus, udev, adduser, libpam-systemd, policykit-1
Recommends: ppp, dnsmasq-base, iptables, modemmanager, crda, isc-dhcp-client
Suggests: libteam-utils
Breaks: ppp (>= 2.4.7-3~), ppp (<< 2.4.7-2+~)
Homepage: https://wiki.gnome.org/Projects/NetworkManager
Tag: implemented-in::c, interface::daemon, network::configuration,
 protocol::dhcp, protocol::ip, role::program, use::configuring
Download-Size: 2,373 kB
APT-Manual-Installed: no
APT-Sources: http://ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de/debian buster/main amd64 Packages
Description: network management framework (daemon and userspace tools)
 NetworkManager is a system network service that manages your network devices
 and connections, attempting to keep active network connectivity when
 available. It manages ethernet, WiFi, mobile broadband (WWAN), and PPPoE
 devices, and provides VPN integration with a variety of different VPN
 services.
 .
 This package provides the userspace daemons and a command line interface to
 interact with NetworkManager.
 .
 Optional dependencies:
  * ppp: Required for establishing dial-up connections (e.g. via GSM).
  * dnsmasq-base/iptables: Required for creating Ad-hoc connections and
    connection sharing.
    address configuration.
  * libteam-utils: Network Team driver allows multiple network interfaces to be
    teamed together and act like a single one. This process is called "ethernet
    bonding", "channel teaming" or "link aggregation".

apt info network-manager-gnome
Package: network-manager-gnome
Version: 1.8.20-1.1
Priority: optional
Section: gnome
Source: network-manager-applet
Maintainer: Utopia Maintenance Team <pkg-utopia-maintainers@lists.alioth.debian.org>
Installed-Size: 6,063 kB
Depends: libatk1.0-0 (>= 1.12.4), libayatana-appindicator3-1 (>= 0.4.90), libc6 (>= 2.14), libcairo2 (>= 1.2.4), libgdk-pixbuf2.0-0 (>= 2.22.0), libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.43.2), libgtk-3-0 (>= 3.10), libjansson4 (>= 2.0.1), libmm-glib0 (>= 0.7.991), libnm0 (>= 1.11.3), libnma0 (= 1.8.20-1.1), libnotify4 (>= 0.7.0), libpango-1.0-0 (>= 1.14.0), libpangocairo-1.0-0 (>= 1.14.0), libsecret-1-0 (>= 0.7), libselinux1 (>= 2.1.9), dconf-gsettings-backend | gsettings-backend, network-manager (>= 1.8), policykit-1-gnome | polkit-1-auth-agent, default-dbus-session-bus | dbus-session-bus
Recommends: notification-daemon, gnome-keyring, mobile-broadband-provider-info, iso-codes
Suggests: network-manager-openconnect-gnome, network-manager-openvpn-gnome, network-manager-vpnc-gnome, network-manager-pptp-gnome
Homepage: https://www.gnome.org/projects/NetworkManager/
Tag: implemented-in::c, interface::daemon, interface::graphical,
 interface::x11, network::configuration, protocol::dhcp, protocol::ip,
 role::program, suite::gnome, uitoolkit::gtk, use::configuring,
 x11::application
Download-Size: 1,030 kB
APT-Manual-Installed: yes
APT-Sources: http://ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de/debian buster/main amd64 Packages
Description: network management framework (GNOME frontend)
 NetworkManager is a system network service that manages your network devices
 and connections, attempting to keep active network connectivity when
 available. It manages ethernet, WiFi, mobile broadband (WWAN), and PPPoE
 devices, and provides VPN integration with a variety of different VPN
 services.
 .
 This package contains a systray applet for GNOME's notification area but it
 also works for other desktop environments which provide a systray like KDE
 or Xfce.
 It displays the available networks and allows users to easily switch between
 them. For encrypted networks it will prompt the user for the key/passphrase
 and it can optionally store them in the gnome-keyring.

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