Using the new madwifi-ng modules and ebuilds with latest udev and baselayout: net-wireless/madwifi-driver-0.1401.20060117 net-wireless/madwifi-tools-0.1401.20060117 +udev sys-fs/udev-081 sys-apps/baselayout-1.12.0_pre15 When the main madwifi module, ath_pci, along with its autoloaded companions (ath_hal, ath_rate_sample, wlan, ...) is loaded, and madwifi-tools is compiled with udev support, then an udev rule in /etc/udev/rules.d/65-madwifi.rules is applied to create the ath0, the useable wireless network interface. This works only the first time, after the computer is booted, when the module ath_pci is loaded. Upon unloading the ath_pci module the ath0 device is destroyed automatically, which is fine. The problem is: subsequent reloads of the ath_pci module don't recreate the ath0 device anymore. It has to be recreated by hand using wlanconfig, which, when working correctly, should be done automatically by the udev rule 65-madwifi.rules. I don't know if this is a problem with udev or madwifi. How to reproduce: 1. Boot Gentoo 2. modprobe ath_pci 3. ifconfig ath0 should show the ath0 interface 4. rmmod ath_pci ath_rate_sample ath_hal wlan_scan_sta wlan_tkip wlan (and possibly other) 5. ifconfig ath0 should show no ath0 interface 6. modprobe ath_pci 7. ifconfig ath0 still doesn't show ath0 interface, no matter the udev rules which do not seem to be applied for this subsequent module load. Portage 2.0.54 (default-linux/x86/2005.0, gcc-3.4.5, glibc-2.3.6-r2, 2.6.14-gentoo-r5 i686) ================================================================= System uname: 2.6.14-gentoo-r5 i686 Intel(R) Pentium(R) M processor 1700MHz Gentoo Base System version 1.12.0_pre15 dev-lang/python: 2.3.5-r2, 2.4.2 sys-apps/sandbox: 1.2.12 sys-devel/autoconf: 2.13, 2.59-r6 sys-devel/automake: 1.4_p6, 1.5, 1.6.3, 1.7.9-r1, 1.8.5-r3, 1.9.6-r1 sys-devel/binutils: 2.16.1 sys-devel/libtool: 1.5.22 virtual/os-headers: 2.6.11-r2 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86" AUTOCLEAN="yes" CBUILD="i686-pc-linux-gnu" CFLAGS="-march=pentium-m -mtune=pentium-m -O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer -fforce-addr -frename-registers -fprefetch-loop-arrays -falign-functions=64 -momit-leaf-frame-pointer -ftracer -fweb" CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/kde/2/share/config /usr/kde/3/share/config /usr/share/config /var/qmail/control" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/gconf /etc/env.d" CXXFLAGS="-march=pentium-m -mtune=pentium-m -O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer -fforce-addr -frename-registers -fprefetch-loop-arrays -falign-functions=64 -momit-leaf-frame-pointer -ftracer -fweb -fvisibility-inlines-hidden" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="autoconfig distlocks sandbox sfperms strict" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://mirror.switch.ch/ftp/mirror/gentoo/ http://gentoo.inode.at ftp://gentoo.inode.at/source" MAKEOPTS="-j2" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" USE="x86 X alsa apm bash-completion browserplugin cdr crypt cups doc dvd dvdread ethereal gcj gif gnome gtk gtk2 i8x0 jpeg latex logrotate madwifi mmx mp3 ncurses nls nptl nptlonly offensive opengl oss pcmcia perl png ppds radeon samba sse sse2 ssl tetex truetype truetype-fonts udev unicode usb userlocales wifi win32codecs xml xosd xprint xv xvid video_cards_radeon userland_GNU kernel_linux elibc_glibc" Unset: ASFLAGS, CTARGET, LANG, LC_ALL, LDFLAGS, LINGUAS, PORTDIR_OVERLAY
I can not reproduce that here: fangorn ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0: error fetching interface information: Device not found fangorn ~ # modprobe ath_pci fangorn ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:20:A6:4F:64:26 inet6 addr: fe80::220:a6ff:fe4f:6426/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:0 (0.0 b) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b) fangorn ~ # modprobe -r ath_pci wlan_scan_sta ath_rate_sample ath_hal wlan fangorn ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0: error fetching interface information: Device not found fangorn ~ # modprobe ath_pci fangorn ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:20:A6:4F:64:26 inet6 addr: fe80::220:a6ff:fe4f:6426/64 Scope:Link UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:0 (0.0 b) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b) Removing the ath_pci module and reinserting it does remove and readd the ath0 interface here. What is the full output of `iwconfig` after you've unloaded the madwifi kernel modules? Which version of udev are you using? Can you reproduce this with gentoo-sources-2.6.15-r1?
I use udev-081 and the problem I reported occured with gentoo-sources-2.6.14-r5. I now upgraded to gentoo-sources-2.6.15-r1 and voila, udev seems to do its job just right. I tried a few times now and everything seems to be in order: ringil ~ # modprobe ath_pci ringil ~ # iwconfig lo no wireless extensions. eth0 no wireless extensions. wifi0 no wireless extensions. ath0 IEEE 802.11a ESSID:"tunet" Mode:Managed Frequency:5.18 GHz Access Point: Not-Associated Bit Rate:0 kb/s Tx-Power:15 dBm Sensitivity=0/3 Retry:off RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Encryption key:off Power Management:off Link Quality=0/94 Signal level=-95 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0 Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0 ringil ~ # modprobe -r ath_pci wlan_scan_sta ath_rate_sample ath_hal wlan ringil ~ # modprobe ath_pci ringil ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:05:4E:4B:0A:7C UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:0 (0.0 b) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b) ringil ~ # iwconfig ath0 ath0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:"blah" Mode:Managed Frequency:2.437 GHz Access Point: Not-Associated Bit Rate:0 kb/s Tx-Power:17 dBm Sensitivity=0/3 Retry:off RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off Encryption key:off Power Management:off Link Quality=0/94 Signal level=-95 dBm Noise level=-95 dBm Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0 Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0 ringil ~ # modprobe -r ath_pci wlan_scan_sta ath_rate_sample ath_hal wlan ringil ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0: error fetching interface information: Device not found ringil ~ # modprobe ath_pci ringil ~ # ifconfig ath0 ath0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:05:4E:4B:0A:7C UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1 RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0 TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0 collisions:0 txqueuelen:0 RX bytes:0 (0.0 b) TX bytes:0 (0.0 b) Thanks a lot for the hint! I guess this is resolved now?
Yes, thank you for testing.
Closing as WORKSFORME :)