WiFi - KanoComputing/kano-settings GitHub Wiki

Introduction

Kano OS system is network ready from first boot, with ipv4 support. This document explains the various options you have to network the system to the outside world.

Kano OS supports at least the following connectivity devices:

  • Ethernet
  • Kano Wireless wifi dongle
  • Android USB

Ethernet

Ethernet connectivity should always be ready functioning. Simply plug the network cable to a dhcp-ready network and Kanux will acquire a DHCP lease automatically.

USB devices

Kano OS should also play nice with Android and iPhone USB tethering devices. Simply plug the usb cable, enable tethering, and Kanux will acquire a DHCP lease automatically.

Wireless

Wireless is enabled out of the box, and as soon as you plug Kano usb wifi dongle. At bootup, if a wireless network is in range with ssid "kanux" WPA-PSK encryption enabled with passphrase "kanuxpass", it will be connected to automatically.

You can setup your wireless router, or you can also put your mobile device in "Wireless tethering" mode. Note that Kanux fully supports the wireless dongle provided. Other wifi dongles should work as well but have not been fully tested.

If you need to connect to other wireless networks, open the "Wifi" app icon in the Extras folder, or execute "sudo kano-wifi" from the command line.

Once you successfully connect to a wireless network, it will be remembered, so next time you boot Kanux it will automatically connect to the network if it is in range.

IMPORTANT: Please note that plugging the wireless dongle while the RaspberryPI is functioning will almost certainly cause a hardware reset. This is a hardware limitation on the RaspberryPI device itself present as of the time of this writing.

IPv6 support

The kernel has built-in support for IPv6 networking but is disabled by default. To enable it, either "modprobe ipv6" or add "ipv6" in the file /etc/modules and restart the system. More information can be found here and here

kano-connect

This script attempts to find an open wireless network and connect to it. Additionally it is capable of reconnecting to secure networks associated to by kwifiprompt.

Usage:

  • Case 1: Attempt connection to the strongest wireless non-secure network
    sudo kanoconnect.py wlan0

  • Case 2: Attempt connection to a specified open network
    sudo kanoconnect.py wlan0 essidname

  • Case 3: If the last cached network is found during scan, try to connect to it (secure / unsecure)
    sudo kanoconnect.py -c wlan0

It might take some time for this script to finalise, depending on the wireless networks in range, their signal strength and response times to acquire a DHCP lease.

Portions of this code are extracted from the project pywilist

The script needs root permissions. It is good to trigger it from /etc/network/interfaces post-up event.

kano-wifi

This script is a guided, interactive step-by-step process to connect to a wireless network. Sets return code to 0 if connected, anything else meaning an error occurred.

Exit codes:

  • 1 need root privileges
  • 2 no wifi dongle connected
  • 3 a connection attempt is already in progress

Proxy

For full information check the proxy wiki page