Internet Connection Problem

[ianp5a]

I searched quite a bit for this but cant find a solution
I've installed suse 10.3, 64 bit which detected my ASUS 130-g wifi card ok.
I'm trying to connect to my AVM Fritz Wifi Router connected to the internet.
-The router detects the mac address and assigns an IP address, as seen in the router configuration browser (on other PC).
-The router is set to accept any new devices. Wep 128bit is enabled
-The suse Firewall is off.
-Konqueror does not connect to any website.
I have been trying different settings in Yast "Network Devices" as I suspect I have set something wrong here. But I'm new to these settings.
I have tried ifup and KInternet settings which did not help.
A) What setting could be wrong?
B) How can I tell which bit is working?
Thanks

[Technarazzi]

I searched quite a bit for this but cant find a solution
I've installed suse 10.3, 64 bit which detected my ASUS 130-g wifi card ok.
I'm trying to connect to my AVM Fritz Wifi Router connected to the internet.
-The router detects the mac address and assigns an IP address, as seen in the router configuration browser (on other PC).

OK, so you're using the DHCP daemon running on the router to assign an IP address to the SuSE box. The WiFi card is successfully establishing connect with the wireless router, and has exchanged encryption keys and completed the DHCP handshake.

The next several questions are,
0. Does the SuSE box know what its IP address is (i.e., has it plumbed the WiFi interface)?
1. Does the SuSE box know what its default router is?
2. Does the SuSE box know what its DNS server is?

-The router is set to accept any new devices.

That's obvious otherwise it wouldn't be handing out IP addresses over DHCP.

Wep 128bit is enabled

I caution you that WEP is not secure. You need to be using WPA at minimum and preferably WPA2. Do not enter financial or other confidential data over the link until you have secured it to this level. But for now don't change it; you're succeeding at DHCP and that eliminates one possible problem. You can tighten security later.

-The suse Firewall is off.

That's non-obvious and a good place to start, but not a good place to stay. You're taking a security risk until you figure out how to configure the firewall to let only what you want through, but for the current exercise, again as with WEP, this is probably the best setting to avoid having multiple possible points of failure.

-Konqueror does not connect to any website.
I have been trying different settings in Yast "Network Devices" as I suspect I have set something wrong here. But I'm new to these settings.
I have tried ifup and KInternet settings which did not help.
A) What setting could be wrong?
B) How can I tell which bit is working?
Thanks

Question B holds the key; that you ask it shows you have the right instincts. You need to divide and conquer.

Second most important point to understand is that GUI apps make assumptions. You need to go to the command line to figure out where the GUI app made one or more wrong assumptions.

My three questions above are easily checked; for 0 use ifconfig and iwconfig from the command line to check the wireless and network configurations for problems, like the link dropping, or the interface not knowing what its IP address is. I use
# ifconfig -a
to look over my interface configuration, and
# iwconfig
to look over the wireless configuration. Please post the output from both here.

Note that the IP address of the wireless connection should appear in both outputs. Look them over. You should be able to spot it. Try pinging it:
# ping 192.168.1.100
The 192.168.1.100 is the IP address configured for your wireless card; if you've successfully spotted it, you'll see the answers to the pings, ending with the roundtrip time for the ping. Stop ping with Cntl-c; otherwise, it will mindlessly keep pinging forever. Post the first several lines of output from ping here, don't bother when it gets repetitive, a couple of the repetitive lines will suffice.

Next, check on 1 with
# route -n
This will show the kernel routing table. One of the entries (generally the last) will begin with 0.0.0.0. This is the default route; the gateway or gw entry is the gateway, and its flags will include G. It usually ends with 1, like this:
0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 UG 0 0 wlan0
That second entry in the Gateway column is the gate way; try to ping it:
# ping 192.168.1.1
Post the output from route and from the ping here. Again, stop ping with Cntl-c.

Finally, check on 2 with
# cat /etc/resolv.conf
and try pinging the addresses in it. Post the results of both the cat and the ping(s) here.

Just for grins, do
# grep dns /etc/nsswitch.conf
and
# cat /etc/hosts
and post the results here too.

Last but not least, you must be the user "root" to do any of these things. Look for the terminal app to bring up a terminal to do them; might be xterm, might be the Gnome Terminal or Konsole. If you're not logging in as root, you'll need to set user to root; do that like this:
$ su -
It will ask for the root password, and it will not echo it.

Most likely the problem lies within the results of one of these commands.

[ianp5a]

Thanks for your extensive repy.
WEP: I know. But I'll switch to no security if it would help clear up this problem. And as long as I have old devices connected I need WEP. And the Firewall will be back on as soon as I have established a connection.

Second most important point to understand is that GUI apps make assumptions. You need to go to the command line to figure out where the GUI app made one or more wrong assumptions.

Are you saying I cant do this with YAST?
I'm using Suse to learn its GUI. I believed that everything can be done with a GUI. Is this not the case?
There must be a way to answer the 3 questions with YAST.
Having to use the command line scares me right off using SUSE.

[Technarazzi]

You can probably fix it in the GUI, but the command line is where the information is, so you have to find it on the command line. I work the same way with Windows. Bring up a DOS window and try ipconfig /all and ping; the only difference is, you can find out about the wireless config on the command line in Linux, and there are files to print out that have the more complex config, whereas in Windows you're forced into using the GUI and messing with the registry.

Don't be scared of the command line; it will tell you what you want to know fast. I can find out what's wrong with the network config on either a Windows or a UNIX (including Linux) box on the command line in minutes; takes a lot longer messing with the GUI.

[ianp5a]

I'm mainly interested in Yast or other GUI tools. I need to know if they can do the job. If you say that Yast cant, then it shows why Linux is slow in getting accepted by people who want to get on with other things and not learn lots of commands.

I'm not scared of using the command line. I'm scared of what it says about the rest of the distro if they havn't built the GUIs properly. I'd then be expecting to have to use the command line a lot. Which is not what I want to do.

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to help me. And I have noted your 3 questions. I was previously unaware of those details. I shall look into those.

But I'm mostly keen to hear from people who use the YAST or similar tools.

[Technarazzi]

You're not listening. If you want some help, there it is. If you want someone to write fifteen pages of instructions for getting the information above over a two-hour period through the GUI, which you could have gotten in two minutes doing what I told you, good luck with that.

[ianp5a]

I'm at the stage where I have to decide whether I want to use Suse Linux or not. If it lets me down at this stage, then I don't want to go any further, and go back to stupid windows.

It is no good investing time and effort, if later, there is no help at the GUI level. This help is critical to Linux as it is with windows where this level of help is everywhere.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not ungrateful for the help you gave me. However, different people use Linux for different things. I am not interested in the technical background of the OS. I don't want to "learn Linux". You shouldn't have to, to use it for productive work.

And I still hope that YAST and other tools are ready for the mainstream. But this computer is for my daughter. She will have to look after it. I do not expect her to start typing in lots of commands. But I do not expect anyone apart from people who are particularly interested in computers to do so either.

[Technarazzi]

Let me explain something.

With wired networks and DHCP, the standards are all settled and it's easy to autoconfigure it. With wireless, there are lots of standards, and to accommodate that requires a lot of flexibility; the question isn't how easy is it, the question is, is it possible. There are five popular standards, and at least a dozen total; for wired networks, there're only two popular standards, one is dying, and the remainder are so rare you don't even need to know what they are. Dealing with a complex environment requires flexibility; but with flexibility comes complexity, and that means to figure out how to set it up (as opposed to how to use it every day) is complicated.

The computer I'm typing this on is a Gateway MP8708, running SuSE 10.2. I almost never use it hard-wired (only for large file transfers, and even that's getting rare). I am using WAP2, and it hasn't disconnected from my wireless network once in two months unless I powered it off or deliberately shut the wireless networking down. When I turn it on, it boots, it connects, and that's the end. I don't even remember what the YAST setup screens look like, it's been so long since I saw them.

It took me about three days to figure everything out I needed to know, and I had to install the right driver for my wireless hardware; once that was in there, and once I had everything set up, it JUST WORKS. Every time. If there's a problem, it's not on the computer.

I have to reconnect my Vista PC about two or three times a week, and my RedHat about twice a day. TBH, SP1 has made the Vista system about as good as this SuSE 10.2, but I've still had to reconnect twice since I installed it; I can't remember the last time I lost connect on this box. They use the same wireless hardware, too.

So the question is, do you want to deal with it once per box and have it just work thereafter, or deal with it on a regular basis ("Dad, the network is down again")? Me, I like stuff that JUST WORKS. And this is it. Up to you.

[ianp5a]

"It just works"

Are you are saying that YAST does not change the same settings as via a command line?

I don't even remember what the YAST setup screens look like

I need to know if there are sufficient people to help with YAST. If not, then it is a sign of current state of Linux. And I'll be forced to give up until things improve.

Wireless

The wireless appears to be working. And is connected to the Router. However I have not set anything in "Gateway", "Domain name" or "Hostname" and a few other things as I do not know what these refer to. Or if I need them at all. It has little to do with the UI.

[Technarazzi]

Are you are saying that YAST does not change the same settings as via a command line?

Not particularly, no, I'm not.

I need to know if there are sufficient people to help with YAST. If not, then it is a sign of current state of Linux. And I'll be forced to give up until things improve.

I recommend you stick with Windows.

The wireless appears to be working. And is connected to the Router. However I have not set anything in "Gateway", "Domain name" or "Hostname" and a few other things as I do not know what these refer to. Or if I need them at all. It has little to do with the UI.

If you don't know how networks work and don't want to learn, you probably shouldn't be using networks.

ETA: That's probably a little unkind, but it's kind of like someone telling you they want to learn to drive, but they're not interested in how to steer or what the accelerator or brake are; they just want to sit in the driver's seat and think where they want to go.