Calling wicd users - need help with problem

English Applications
#1

I use wicd for my network management and am quite happy with it except for a few annoyances. I’ve posted my problems on the forum over at wicd but am not getting much response so am hoping someone here may be able to help.

I’m using opensuse 11.1, KDE4.2.4 and installed wicd 1.60 from the suse repo.
Everything seems to work fine apart from:

  1. Every time I boot up wicd is asking for my root password. I’ve done a search and found someone experiencing a similar problem but that was some time ago with version 1.5 so I’m not sure the solution applies any more.
    Output from ls -ahl /etc/init.d/wicd
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1.2K 2009-06-08 23:26 /etc/init.d/wicd

Output from sudo cat /etc/init.d/wicd

#! /bin/sh                                                   

### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides:       wicd-daemon
# Required-Start: dbus       
# Required-Stop:  $null      
# Default-Start:  3 4 5      
# Default-Stop:              
# Description: wicd, a wired and wireless connection manager.
### END INIT INFO                                            

WICD_BIN=/usr/sbin/wicd
test -x $WICD_BIN || exit 5

. /etc/rc.status
rc_reset        

case "$1" in
        start)
                checkproc $WICD_BIN
                if  $? = 0 ]; then
                        echo -n "wicd already running"
                        rc_status -v                  
                        rc_exit                       
                fi                                    
                echo -n "Starting wicd"               
                startproc $WICD_BIN                   
                rc_status -v                          
                ;;                                    
        stop)                                         
                echo -n "Shutting down wicd"          
                killproc -TERM $WICD_BIN              
                rc_status -v                          
                ;;                                    
        restart)                                      
                $0 stop                               
                $0 start
                rc_status
                ;;
        status)
                echo -n "Checking for wicd: "
                checkproc $WICD_BIN
                rc_status -v
                ;;
        *)
                echo "Usage: $0 {start|stop|status|restart}"
                exit 1
                ;;
esac

Output of ps -ef | grep wicd

root      5356     1  0 07:16 ?        00:00:12 python -O /usr/lib/wicd/wicd-daemon.py
root      5361  5356  0 07:16 ?        00:00:04 /usr/bin/python -O /usr/lib/wicd/monitor.py
{my username}     5386  5263  0 07:16 ?        00:00:02 python -O /usr/lib/wicd/wicd-client.py
{my username}    12723  6542  0 08:16 pts/1    00:00:00 grep wicd
  1. Every time wicd starts (after I’ve entered the root password) I get an error saying “Could not connect to D-bus interface. Check wicd log for errors” but wicd does connect to the network despite this. Also the tray icon doesn’t start unless I Alt-F2>wicd-client.
    Here is a copy of a wicd log file immediately after a cold boot and starting wicd. A few warnings in there.

2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: wicd initializing...
2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: ---------------------------
2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: wicd is version 1.6.0 410
2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: setting backend to external
2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: trying to load backend external
2009/06/29 07:48:31 :: successfully loaded backend external
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for pump
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for mii-tool
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for gksudo
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for ktsuss
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for resolvconf
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: trying to load backend external
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: successfully loaded backend external
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for pump
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for mii-tool
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for gksudo
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for ktsuss
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: WARNING: No path found for resolvconf
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Automatically detected wireless interface wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting wireless interface wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: automatically detected wired interface eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting wired interface eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting wpa driver wext
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting use global dns to False
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting global dns
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: global dns servers are None None None
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: domain is None
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: search domain is None
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: setting automatically reconnect when connection drops True
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: found wired_connect_mode in configuration 1
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Setting dhcp client to 0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Wireless configuration file found...
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Wired configuration file found...
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: chmoding configuration files 0600...
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: chowning configuration files root:root...
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Using wireless interface...wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: Using wired interface...eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: scanning start
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: ifconfig wlan0 up
2009/06/29 07:48:32 :: iwlist wlan0 scan
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: scanning done
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found 1 networks:
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found afterscript in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found psk in configuration {followed by long string of alphanumeric}
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found ip in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found disconnectscript in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found dns_domain in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found netmask in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found key in configuration 5un5eakerpr0pertie5
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found gateway in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found use_global_dns in configuration 0
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found dns3 in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found dns1 in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found use_settings_globally in configuration 0
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found use_static_dns in configuration 0
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found dns2 in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found beforescript in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found enctype in configuration wpa
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found automatic in configuration True
2009/06/29 07:48:35 :: found search_domain in configuration None
2009/06/29 07:48:37 :: ifconfig eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:37 :: ifconfig wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:37 :: iwconfig wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:37 :: GetCurrentNetworkID: Returning -1, current network not found
2009/06/29 07:48:42 :: ifconfig eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:42 :: ifconfig wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:42 :: iwconfig wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:42 :: GetCurrentNetworkID: Returning -1, current network not found
2009/06/29 07:48:47 :: ifconfig eth0
2009/06/29 07:48:47 :: ifconfig wlan0
2009/06/29 07:48:47 :: iwconfig wlan0
This repeats about 20 times.
  1. I connect to a network with hidden SSID. Every now and then when wicd finds the network on it’s own it displays the SSID as \x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00\x00. When I click connect it won’t connect saying incorrect password. I have to manually go “find hidden network” and then enter the ssid and then connect. Once it’s connected I see both SSIDs, the one I just entered (it displays the hidden ssid correctly) and the previous one with the strange \x00\ stuff - both showing as connected (naturally as they are both the same network really). Is this normal behaviour?
    Why display both once connected when it’s the same network?

Any help appreciated.

#2

Hi,
to solveproblem #1&2, you have to start the wicd service at boot time,


chkconfig wicd on

HTH

#3

Thanks for your reply. As far as I was aware the service does start at boot time because I don’t start it manually (i.e. after I’ve logged into the desktop wicd tries to log onto my network without me running it manually except for the wicd-client). Where can I check if it’s being started at boot?

What does the code do? I ran it in a terminal and got not feedback so not sure what it did.

To start wicd service at boot do I just put wicd in the boot.local file?

#4

Start Yast - System - Runlevel editor. Here you can set wicd to start at boottime. Most common in expert mode to start wicd are runlevels 2, 3 and 5
That’s the way to do it.

#5

Thanks. Do you know what that chkconfig wicd ok does?

#6

you can use chkconfig to enable or disable system services through CLI,
but you need to do it with root user,


su
chkconfig wicd on

“chkconfig wicd on” will configure the wicd service to be started on next boot time

you can read the man page for more details

HTH

#7

OK. I’ll haven’t rebooted yet. I’ll see how goes after I reboot.

#8

Ok, it’s been a couple of months since I brought this up, but I still haven’t managed to resolve this satisfactorily. For some reason I just cannot get the wicd service to start properly. I’ve tried Knurpht’s way

Start Yast - System - Runlevel editor. Here you can set wicd to start at boottime. Most common in expert mode to start wicd are runlevels 2, 3 and 5
That’s the way to do it.
but I get an error back saying
/etc/init.d/wicd start returned 7 (program is not running):

Any idea why YAST cannot start the wicd service? I’m running wicd 1.6.1 installed from this repo

http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/system:/wicd/openSUSE_11.1/

I’ve tried doing an unconditional update on wicd but it didn’t help. I’d appreciate any help from other wicd users here.

#9

To solve this you have to start Yast, go to System Services and select the ADVANCED (or EXPERT, I don’t remember) mode.
Then select the wicd service and check runlevels 2, 3 and 5.
You probably tried starting the service in simplified mode, because I had the same error message.

Using the advanced gui it works, although in my case it messed up something at boot. In fact boot started saying “failed” at the start of DHCP4 client, and (bigger problem) it freezes a few lines later, at the “Starting NFS client services: sm-notify idmapd” step.
It stays there three or four minutes, then boot resumes. I can’t understand why this happens.

#10

I tried starting it in expert mode but I still get the same error message saying

/etc/init.d/wicd start returned 7 (program is not running):

Don’t know why this happens. Wicd has always been a little tempramental on my system. Sometimes it will refuse to start after booting, then ask for root password and say something about the daemon failing to start. It then seems to put some rubbish in the wired config file which I need to firs remove before wicd client will start.

I’m going to be switching to 11.2 during Xmas so not that bothered.

#11

Don’t worry. Select runlevel 3 and 5 and enable the service.
Then reboot, and wicd will work, even though it will say the service is not running.