When I log in using KDE, wireless works fine, but when I log in using IceWM (which I prefer), I’ve no wireless. All of the information I can find on the net says to open NetworkManager in the system tray, but this option doesn’t appear under IceWM.
For that matter: my Linux box is also a Samba server, and I’d like for Wifi to be configured and active whenever the box is up and can find the Wifi router, even if I’m not logged on.
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James Kanze
You should be able to use the KDE or GNOME applets in IceWM too. Either run “plasma-windowed org.kde.networkmanagement” or “nm-applet” respectively.
And there are text mode clients: nmtui and nmcli.
For that matter: my Linux box is also a Samba server, and I’d like for Wifi to be configured and active whenever the box is up and can find the Wifi router, even if I’m not logged on.
That’s easy: just configure the connection as “system connection”, i.e. enable the option “Allow all users to connect”. The connection will then be established during boot already, and should be available when you login even in text mode.
Another option would be to switch to Wicked Service instead of NetworkManager. But then you have to set up the connection in YaST.
Both options would also apply to IceWM of course.
I’m not sure if I have tested this with 13.2.
My file “$HOME/.icewm/startup” (runs automatically on icewm startup) contains, among other lines:
/usr/lib/polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1 &
nm-applet &
That gives me an icon in the tray for configuring wifi. You would probably have to install those. Maybe you can do the equivalent with the KDE applet. While I normally use KDE, I prefer the Gnome applet for NetworkManager, because the KDE applet is going to open “kdewallet”.
“nm-applet” comes from the package NetworkManager-gnome, and the polkit program comes from polkit-gnome.
Thanks. This works for IceWM. (I had to chmod -x the file. I hadn’t realized this, and lost a little time figuring out why it wasn’t getting executed.) I still have to enter the password each time, however. There must be some way of getting the system to memorize it.
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James Kanze
AFAIK, nm-applet uses gnome-keyring to store the password, so you probably have to start this too first.
Or, set up the connection as “system connection” as I already suggested, then the password will be stored by NetworkManager itself in /etc/NetworkManager, and you don’t even need a NetworkManager frontend (or login at all) to connect.
Adding the commands in .icewm/startup seems to solve this issue.
[QUOTE=wolfi323;2702964]
That’s easy: just configure the connection as “system connection”, i.e. enable the option “Allow all users to connect”. The connection will then be established during boot already, and should be available when you login even in text mode.
/QUOTE]
I don’t seem to have any such option. I do have an option to store the password either for just this user, or for all users, but regardless of what I select, the password isn’t stored, and I have to enter it each time.
Getting it to connect on start-up isn’t essential; I don’t use the samba server that much, and I can just log in when I want to use it. (To tell the truth, I’m not happy about the idea of running a server of any kind over Wifi, which can come and go.) On the other hand, I would very much like to not have to re-enter the password each time.
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James Kanze
The option is called “All users may connect to this network” in nm-applet. If you enable this the password should be stored system-wide and the connection will be established during boot already.
I have the wireless connections on all my systems configured that way, works fine since years…
You might have to enter the password in nm-applet’s connection editor directly for it to be saved, no idea. I always use KDE’s applet to setup my connections.
You could use that as well, in particular for a system connection it doesn’t matter anyway how you set it up. You can use all the NetworkManager frontends interchangeably (only the password storage for user connection is handled by the applet itself and different between them).
Actually, no. It used to do that. But at present it is stored in “/etc/NetworkManager/system-connections” but flagged to be for the particular user (unless set as a system connection). And the polkit agent seems to handle the permissions needed, without any special authentication prompts.
I have not checked this with the newest NetworkManager for Gnome 3.16.
Well, when I last used nm-applet in IceWM on 13.2 and tried to connect to a VPN (which I configured as user connection in KDE), ot asked me for the gnome-keyring password… (and it didn’t accept my user password nor an empty one so I had to cancel and use KDE’s plasmoid instead)
But you are talking about Tumbleweed, right?
And the polkit agent seems to handle the permissions needed, without any special authentication prompts.
Yes, polkit is desktop-agnostic. And the “authentication agent” is mainly needed for presenting a (root) password dialog I think.
Anyway, you could also run /usr/lib64/kde4/libexec/polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1 if you prefer the KDE dialog, even if you intend to use nm-applet…
I have not checked this with the newest NetworkManager for Gnome 3.16.
Me neither.
My most recent test was with Tumbleweed, but before the latest NetworkManager release.
In practice, I set my connections to be system-connections, so I don’t see the problems that people. However, in earlier trials in Tumbleweed, in opensuse 13.1, and I think in 13.2, after setting up a connect in Gnome, I see the network key saved in “/etc/NetworkManager/system-connections”, with a tag indicating the user that set it up. I don’t see anything related in Gnome keyring. And, if I set it up in Gnome (for just the one user), it continues to work for that user in Icewm and (I think) in KDE. But that isn’t the way that KDE normally sets it up. Normally, KDE puts the key in kwallet.
I can’t really compare what I am doing with the OPs problem, because I do have Gnome installed and maybe there’s an additional part of Gnome needed that I wasn’t aware of.
I do the same…
However, in earlier trials in Tumbleweed, in opensuse 13.1, and I think in 13.2, after setting up a connect in Gnome, I see the network key saved in “/etc/NetworkManager/system-connections”, with a tag indicating the user that set it up. I don’t see anything related in Gnome keyring.
Well, I just tried to configure a VPN connection (in IceWM with nm-applet), and after clicking on “Save”, I get immediately asked for a password for the new keyring (this was with a fresh user account, so no keyring existed yet)
And the same happens when I setup a wireless user connection, if I enter a password in the connection editor.
This is on 13.2.
But as I now noticed, there is an option to choose to save the password for this user or for all users in the security settings in nm-applet’s connection editor, as kanze mentioned (it is a button in the passphrase field, I overlooked that first). So I suppose the former stores it in gnome-keyring, and the latter in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections.
If I choose “Save password for all users” there I do not get asked for the keyring password, only when it is set to “Save password only for this user”.
VPN might be handled a little differently.
I was just experimenting with Tumbleweed 20150330. And WiFi handling is weird.
I logged into Gnome and made the first connection there. As previously mentioned, the network key was saved into a file in “/etc/NetworkManager/system-connections”. I could login to Icewm and still use the network. I could login to KDE and still use the network.
After a reboot, my first login was to KDE. This time, it prompted me for the kdewallet password. And it did not connect to WiFi till after I had given that.
[Additional note: I should have mentioned that this was a fresh install of Tumbleweed, but I kept the old “/home” file system and had previously setup WiFi in KDE there. So the “kdewallet” request was probably due to previously saved information].
After this, I tried again with Gnome. Now Gnome prompts for the WiFi password every time, and does not save it. Rechecking the file in “/etc/NetworkManager/system-connections” for that network, I see that the key has been removed from the saved settings.
So it seems that there is some incompatibility between the way that Gnome handles WiFi and the way that KDE handles it.
Yet to test: what if I delete all WiFi configuration. Then start again and configure only with Gnome or Icewm? I’m guessing that it will still work in KDE, and as long as KDE does not have any native configuration for that network maybe it won’t mess it up. (Or maybe not).
Making everything a system-connection does avoid this incompatibility problem.
No, that’s what I though first too.
But it behaves the same with a wireless connection.
As I wrote, there is an option to save the password “for all users” or “for only this user”.
This controls whether nm-applet saves the password in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections, or in the gnome-keyring.
And plasma-nm unconditionally saves a user password, i.e. when no other user is allowed to use the connection, in kwallet.
That option can be reached by clicking on the symbol in the password input field:
http://susepaste.org/images/65112560.png
Note that I ran it in KDE here, in IceWM it would look slightly different.
The same button exists in the password dialog you get when connecting if the password isn’t saved already.
For VPN no such option seems to exist, nm-applet seems to behave like plasma-nm in this case: if more than one user is allowed to use the connection the username/password is saved in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/, in the keyring otherwise.
And if the password is saved for this user only, i.e. in gnome-keyring/kwallet, it is removed from /etc/NetworkManager/system-configurations.