Getting Wifi Working With Ubuntu Edgy On My Powerbook

See my post from yesterday on how I setup a dual-boot of Mac OS X and Ubuntu Edgy on my Powerbook. Geoff Arnold left me a comment asking if the wireless connection worked. It didn't. I went a googling.

I found another wonderful HOWTO: from nickm (thankyou!). Specifically How to: Broadcom Wireless cards. It doesn't fall into the "Just Works(TM)" category, but it gets the job done. At least for me.

I suggest reading the HOWTO: in full, but if you want to skip to the chase, here are the steps I had to do. I'm not sure whether the modprobe was needed. I did it anyhow.

• Verify you have a Broadcom wireless card.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % lspci | grep Broadcom\ Corporation
        

• Make sure you have access to the other Ubuntu repositories.
  I'd already edited /etc/apt/sources.list by hand to do this for building Orca from CVS, but you can follow the intructions on the second heading from this page to ensure you have the universe enabled.

• Copy your windows driver to your desktop.
  I used the one here.

  This is the part where I silently went WTF! I've got a PPC machine here! But I guess firmware is universal.

  The file was saved under ~/Desktop

• Install bcm43xx-fwcutter.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % sudo apt-get install bcm43xx-fwcutter
        

• Extract your Cards firmware from the driver - part 1.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % sudo bcm43xx-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware ~/Desktop/wl_apsta.o
        

• Make the directory for the firmware - part 2
  (This from Fernando Cassia -- thanks -- I don't remember having to do this step, so your mileage may vary).

  Run the following command in a terminal window:

        % sudo mkdir /lib/firmware/`uname -r`
        

• Extract your Cards firmware from the driver - part 3.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % sudo bcm43xx-fwcutter -w /lib/firmware/`uname -r` ~/Desktop/wl_apsta.o
        

• Install Network Manager.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % sudo apt-get install network-manager-gnome
        

• Ran modprobe.
  I ran the following command in a terminal window:

        % modprobe bcm43xx
        

• Bookmark the HOWTO webpage and Reboot.

When I'd rebooted into Ubuntu and logged in, I ran:

System->Administration->Networking

from the gnome-panel menu, clicked on the "Wireless connection" entry and then clicked on the 'Properties" button. I ticked the "Enable this Connection" checkbox and filled in my wireless Network name and Network password and clicked on the OK button (then the Close button of the parent window).

The network connection was then automatically configured and my wireless network was working!

[Technorati Tag: Ubuntu]

[Technorati Tag: Wireless]

[Technorati Tag: Powerbook]

( Nov 21 2006, 10:21:58 AM PST ) [Listen] Permalink Comments [12]