Sabayon Linux 5.4 x86 E17 wi-fi [Solved]

[Peazy]

Hi all, so I just fired up the livecd of the version mentioned in the title, and it looks awesome. Really want to install it, but I was having what appears to be a somewhat common problem with connecting to wifi via wicd. I did some searching, and everything seemed to point me to a thread in this forum ( http://forum.sabayon.org/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=22410 ). After reading through it all, I get the feeling there is a solution. However, as with a poster near the end of the thread, I can't quite make sense of it all. Does anyone have a simplified version? I have some Linux experience with Debian based distros, but none with Gentoo based. Currently I'm accessing internet through Windows installed on this machine. Any help greatly appreciated!

[Fitzcarraldo]

Wicd is buggy, so use ConnMan instead. (I would have written "use either ConnMan or NetworkManager & nm-applet instead" but it seems that the latest version of NetworkManager is causing some people problems, although I have not tried it myself, so have not verified that yet). Open a Terminal window and enter the following commands:

Code: Select all

$ su
Password:  <--- Here you type the root user's password.
# rc-update del wicd default
# rc-update del NetworkManager default
# rc-update add connman default
# /etc/init.d/wicd stop
# /etc/init.d/NetworkManager stop
# /etc/init.d/connman start
# exit
$

(I've added commands to stop NetworkManager, but actually if you've installed freshly from the SL 5.4 E17 LiveCD then only Wicd is activated.)

I don't remember if ConnMan is installed on the SL 5.4 E17 LiveCD, so, if it isn't, before the above you need to do:

Code: Select all

$ su
Password:  <--- Here you type the root user's password.
# equo update
# equo install connman
# equo conf update
# exit
$

(Read the SL wiki article on Entropy to understand what that does.)

If you are actually using the SL 5.4 E17 LiveCD then the version of NetworkManager on that definitely works (I've used it), so you could use that instead of Wicd, and there would be no need to use ConnMan. In that case:

Code: Select all

$ su
Password:  <--- Here you type the root user's password.
# rc-update del wicd default
# rc-update add NetworkManager default
# /etc/init.d/wicd stop
# /etc/init.d/NetworkManager start
# exit
$ nm-applet &
$

[Peazy]

Excellent, thank you so much for the quick reply and clear instructions!

[Fitzcarraldo]

You're welcome.

By the way, if you were to use NetworkManager & nm-applet, rather than ConnMan, then you would do the following in SL E17 to autostart nm-applet every time you boot:

1. Click on Start > Settings > Settings Panel > Apps > New Application and create a Desktop Config File called nm-applet.desktop (you don't enter the ".desktop"; E17 adds that itself).
2. Click on Start > Settings > Settings Panel > Apps > Startup Applications
3. Scroll down the list until you find nm-applet, and click on it to select it.
4. Click the Add button to add nm-applet to the Startup Applications list.
5. Click Apply and Close.

But stick with ConnMan, at least until someone here can confirm whether or not the current latest version of NetworkManager in the Entropy repository really is problematic. Or just stay with ConnMan, as it works fine too.

[Peazy]

Hi there, so I do have everything up and running, but I did it slightly different than the instructions Fitzcarraldo posted. I chose to go the route of NetworkManager + nm-applet. In the above instructions, and keeping in mind that this is after the very first boot from doing a fresh install, rc-update del wicd default resulted in a "`wicd` is not in the runlevel `default`" message. The attempt to stop wicd resulted in a message saying it wasn't started, and the attempt to start NetworkManager resulted in a message saying it already was started. Again, I neither stopped nor started either of these prior, nor did I attempt to configure any network settings via wicd or otherwise. After logging of root, at this point I simply ran the "nm-applet &" command and it showed up just fine.

For the instructions on how to add it on startup, I did the following. The instructions to add the nm-applet.desktop worked fine, I added the /usr/bin/nm-applet and tested running the new "nm-application" via the Applications->Other->nm-applet (this menu entry appeard upon creating the .desktop). However, when it came to adding it on startup, nm-applet was nowhere to be found in the list. What I then did was perform a search for all *.desktop files--the newly created nm-applet.desktop was located in ~/.local/share/applications, and all the *.desktop files corresponding to possible entries in the list of available startup apps were located in /usr/share/applications. I (as root) simply copied the nm-applet.desktop file into this directory, and it then correctly appeared as a possible startup app. From there I added it, and it indeed works fine on boot now!

Just thought I would share my experience in case any other newcomers attempted the above; overall it worked great, so thanks again!