The Linux Wavelan drivers

Linux Wavelan drivers

Hardware supported

Patches

Drivers erratas

Wavelan links

My work with the Wavelan

The Linux Wavelan drivers are Open Source projects that had many contributors through their long life. I did contribute to them since 1996 thanks to Hewlett Packard sponsoring my work.

There was a time, almost now forgotten, when I was working with the Wavelan and Mobile IP with Manuel Rodríguez. But, the usual politics and lack of time prevented this project to go on. However, the work that I did on the Wavelan drivers and the Wireless Extensions has found it's way outside HP, and as the result of this work, I took over the maintaince of those two projects.

I'm still officially the maintainer if the ISA and Pcmcia Wavelan drivers for Linux, even if I've got no more time to maintain it (my Open Source life is kind of busy). So, if anybody want to volunteer to take the job (maintaining the drivers), I will be gratefull, meanwhile I will try to keep the errata list on this page up to date.

So far, Justin Seger from MIT *may* have taken over the maintainance of the Wavelan Linux Pcmcia driver. I wish him good luck and plenty of fun with it. Other pieces are still up for grabs.

The Wavelan drivers and the Wireless Extensions

I was the maintainer of the Wavelan Linux drivers (because I was the first one put my name in the Linux kernel to say so). Maintainer means only that I was trying the best I can to solve problems in the drivers and include other people patches on my page. By the way, if anybody wants to replace me, just send me an e-mail.

You will find the ISA driver in recent kernels, and the Pcmcia driver in recent Pcmcia package. Wireless Extension support is built in recent kernels as well (check your nearest supplier), and now distributions deliver to you kernels with Wireless Extension enabled !

There is no specific mailing list, news group or HyperNews server for the Wavelan drivers or Wireless Extensions (this is because there is no bugs and no problems, not that I'm too lazy :-).

The only remaining thing to install on your system is the Wireless Tool package (to manipulate Wireless Extensions).

Hardware supported by the driver

The Wavelan was a 915 MHz and 2.4 GHz radio LAN product made by NCR, AT&T and then Lucent, also distributed by Digital/DEC (under the name RoamAbout DS) and Hitachi. All those brands were selling basically the same hardware, which is now discontinued.

The driver ``wavelan'' as included in the Linux kernel has been tested with the following hardware :

Wavelan ISA 915 MHz (full length ISA card)
Wavelan ISA 915 MHz 2.0 (half length ISA card)
Wavelan ISA 2.4 GHz (full length ISA card, fixed frequency)
Wavelan ISA 2.4 GHz 2.0 (half length ISA card, frequency selectable)
Above cards with the optional DES encryption feature

The driver ``wavelan_cs'' as included in the Pcmcia package has been tested with the following hardware :

Wavelan Pcmcia 915 MHz 2.0 (Pcmcia card + separate modem/antenna block)
Wavelan Pcmcia 2.4 GHz 2.0 (Pcmcia card + separate modem/antenna block)

If you know of other hardware working with the drivers, send me a note...

On the other hand, the following hardware is NOT supported by the above drivers :

Wavelan IEEE Pcmcia 2.4 GHz (fully integrated Pcmcia card)
Wavelan IEEE ISA 2.4 GHz (above card in a Pcmcia/ISA bridge)
Non-Wavelan wireless LANs (many varieties)

I have written a specific page for the Wavelan IEEE MPL/GPL driver, for other wireless LANs and drivers, please check in my Linux Wireless LAN Howto.

Latest patches

The Linux kernel 2.4.0 has the very latest ISA driver, including SMP support.

The Pcmcia Package 3.1.24 has the very latest Pcmcia driver, including the latest SMP fixes. On the other hand, the driver included in kernel 2.4.X is not up to date.

No pending patches.

Driver general notes & erratas

Life is far from perfect, especially that I don't have much time to hack the drivers...

The Wavelan drivers contain extensive release notes and documentation in the source, in `wavelan.p.h' for the ISA driver and `wavelan_cs.h' for the Pcmcia driver. If you have problems with the driver, check there first. This also include many compilation options to play with...
To try the experimental roaming support of the Pcmcia driver, use a Pcmcia package later than 3.0.13, and set the wavelan_cs module option "do_roaming=1" in /etc/pcmcia/config.opts or do "iwconfig ethX mode managed".
Justin Seger is the *potential* new maintainer of the Wavelan Linux Pcmcia driver.

Other site of interest (Wavelan related)

I now have a dedicated page for the Wireless Tool package.
Justin Seger, potential maintainer of the Linux Wavelan Pcmcia driver.
Andreas Neuhaus is the maintainer of the Wavelan IEEE driver.
The Wavelan is now made by Lucent.
Digital (DEC) sell also the Wavelan, renamed RoamAbout DS.
My page on Wireless LANs and Linux.

Acknowledgments

(here is only a short list - more details may be found in the Wavelan headers)

I must thank Manuel Rodríguez for being such a fine guy and starting such a great project. Viva España !

Thank all the people here (HP Labs Bristol) to bear with me while working on the Wavelan.

Loeke Brederveld and Nico Valster from Lucent have given me much needed informations on the Wavelan hardware. Of course, the drivers wouldn't have been possible without all the people having contributed code to the drivers, especially Bruce Janson and Anthony D. Joseph the initial authors or respectively the ISA and the Pcmcia drivers for Linux.

The Linux community and its gurus have provided us an operating system beyond our wildest expectations. David Hinds, Linus Torvalds, David S. Miller and Alan Cox have been really helpful.

The Linux Wavelan driver users are wonderful !

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