Bug 219785 – intermittent problems with gentoo-sources 2.6.25-r1, ndiswrapper, and default routing tables.

• Product: Gentoo Linux
• Status: RESOLVED TEST-REQUEST

[Description Bob Raitz 2008-04-29 23:45:11 UTC]

Approximately fifty percent of the time when using ndiswrapper with gentoo-sources 2.6.25-r1, the default routing table is incomplete causing lack of wireless network functionality. Sometimes, after an amount of time passes, the routing table will fix itself, and the interface works properly again.

Reproducible: Sometimes

Steps to Reproduce:
1. boot using gentoo-sources 2.6.25-r1, ndiswrapper, and BCM4318 PCMCIA adapter
2. enter 'route' at command prompt. 
3. route displays only the following:
Kernel IP routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask         Flags Metric Ref    Use Iface
loopback        127.0.0.1               255.0.0.0       U     0      0        0 lo

Actual Results:  
When the routing table comes up as such, sometimes by entering the line 'route add default gw 192.168.0.1', the wireless interface comes up. Sometimes, I get the reply: SIOCADDRT: Network is unreachable. Once again, sometimes it fixes itself over a short period of time (five to ten minutes). Sometimes it doesn't fix itself, and the network remains unreachable.

Expected Results:  
My expectation is that since the gentoo-sources kernel 2.6.22-r10 brings up the wireless interface, gentoo-sources-2.6.25-r1 should be able to as well.

This situation effects two different laptop machines. The machine most affected by this problem has the following emerge --info settings:

gen_tosh ~ # emerge --info
Portage 2.1.5_rc6 (default-linux/x86/2007.0, gcc-4.2.3, glibc-2.7-r2, 2.6.25-gentoo-r1 i686)
=================================================================
System uname: 2.6.25-gentoo-r1 i686 Intel(R) Celeron(TM) CPU 1066MHz
Timestamp of tree: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 05:00:01 +0000
distcc 2.18.3 i486-pc-linux-gnu (protocols 1 and 2) (default port 3632) [enabled]
ccache version 2.4 [enabled]
app-shells/bash:     3.2_p33
dev-java/java-config: 1.3.7, 2.1.5
dev-lang/python:     2.5.2-r2
dev-python/pycrypto: 2.0.1-r6
dev-util/ccache:     2.4-r7
sys-apps/baselayout: 2.0.0
sys-apps/openrc:     0.2.2
sys-apps/sandbox:    1.2.18.1-r2
sys-devel/autoconf:  2.13, 2.62
sys-devel/automake:  1.4_p6, 1.7.9-r1, 1.8.5-r3, 1.9.6-r2, 1.10.1
sys-devel/binutils:  2.18-r1
sys-devel/gcc-config: 1.4.0-r4
sys-devel/libtool:   1.5.26
virtual/os-headers:  2.6.17-r2
ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86 ~x86"
CBUILD="i486-pc-linux-gnu"
CFLAGS="-march=pentium3 -O2 -pipe"
CHOST="i486-pc-linux-gnu"
CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/kde/3.5/env /usr/kde/3.5/share/config /usr/kde/3.5/shutdown /usr/share/config"
CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/env.d /etc/env.d/java/ /etc/fonts/fonts.conf /etc/gconf /etc/gentoo-release /etc/php/apache2-php5/ext-active/ /etc/php/cgi-php5/ext-active/ /etc/php/cli-php5/ext-active/ /etc/revdep-rebuild /etc/terminfo /etc/udev/rules.d"
CXXFLAGS="-march=pentium3 -O2 -pipe"
DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles"
FEATURES="ccache distcc distlocks parallel-fetch sandbox sfperms strict unmerge-orphans userfetch"
GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://distfiles.gentoo.org http://distro.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/distributions/gentoo"
LANG="en_US.UTF-8"
LC_ALL="en_US.UTF-8"
LDFLAGS=""
LINGUAS="en"
MAKEOPTS="-j256"
PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages"
PORTAGE_RSYNC_OPTS="--recursive --links --safe-links --perms --times --compress --force --whole-file --delete --stats --timeout=180 --exclude=/distfiles --exclude=/local --exclude=/packages"
PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp"
PORTDIR="/usr/portage"
PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/usr/local/portage"
SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage"
USE="X a52 aac aalib acl alsa arts avi berkdb bitmap-fonts cairo cdr cli cracklib crypt cups dbus dlloader dri dv dvd dvdr dvdread eds emboss encode esd fam ffmpeg firefox flac fortran gdbm gif gpm gstreamer gtk hal iconv ipv6 isdnlog jpeg kde kdexdeltas kdgraphics lame ldap libg++ live mad midi mikmod mp3 mpeg mudflap ncurses nls nptl nptlonly ogg opengl openmp oss pam pcre pdcre pdflib perl php png ppds pppd python qt3 quicktime readline reflection sdl session slang slp spell spl ssl swat tcpd truetype truetype-fonts type1-fonts udev unicode vidix vorbis wifi win32codecs wxwindows x86 xml xorg xscreensaver xv zlib" ALSA_CARDS="ali5451 als4000 atiixp atiixp-modem bt87x ca0106 cmipci emu10k1      emu10k1x ens1370 ens1371 es1938 es1968 fm801 hda-intel intel8x0 intel8x0m    maestro3 trident usb-audio via82xx via82xx-modem ymfpci" ALSA_PCM_PLUGINS="adpcm alaw asym copy dmix dshare dsnoop empty extplug file hooks iec958 ioplug ladspa lfloat linear meter mulaw multi null plug rate route share shm softvol" APACHE2_MODULES="actions alias auth_basic auth_digest authn_anon authn_dbd authn_dbm authn_default authn_file authz_dbm authz_default authz_groupfile authz_host authz_owner authz_user autoindex cache dav dav_fs dav_lock dbd deflate dir disk_cache env expires ext_filter file_cache filter headers ident imagemap include info log_config logio mem_cache mime mime_magic negotiation proxy proxy_ajp proxy_balancer proxy_connect proxy_http rewrite setenvif so speling status unique_id userdir usertrack vhost_alias" ELIBC="glibc" INPUT_DEVICES="keyboard mouse evdev" KERNEL="linux" LCD_DEVICES="bayrad cfontz cfontz633 glk hd44780 lb216 lcdm001 mtxorb ncurses text" LINGUAS="en" USERLAND="GNU" VIDEO_CARDS="i810"
Unset:  CPPFLAGS, CTARGET, EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS, INSTALL_MASK, PORTAGE_COMPRESS, PORTAGE_COMPRESS_FLAGS, PORTAGE_RSYNC_EXTRA_OPTS

[Comment 1 Bob Raitz 2008-04-29 23:48:22 UTC]

Below is the result of route when the network is up and running properly;

gen_tosh ~ # route
Kernel IP routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask         Flags Metric Ref    Use Iface
192.168.0.0     *               255.255.255.0   U     0      0        0 eth0
loopback        localhost       255.0.0.0       UG    0      0        0 lo
default         192.168.0.1     0.0.0.0         UG    2004   0        0 eth0

[Comment 2 Bob Raitz 2008-05-15 07:01:12 UTC]

UPDATE: This problem remains with the 2.6.25-gentoo-r3 kernel as well.

Blessed be!
Pappy

[Comment 3 Robert Piasek (RETIRED) 2008-05-20 15:09:04 UTC]

(In reply to comment #2)
> UPDATE: This problem remains with the 2.6.25-gentoo-r3 kernel as well.
> 
> Blessed be!
> Pappy
> 

I believe that your network is wireless network is backgrounded
(
http://roy.marples.name/openrc
OpenRC has many features. Here's a list of the key ones:
...
Services can be re-entrant (important for the network being configured in the background)
...
)

and you don't have a valid routing table until the connection comes up and authenticate itself.

Can you please check if that's the case and post some logs?

Rob

[Comment 4 Bob Raitz 2008-05-20 17:24:33 UTC]

(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #2)
> > UPDATE: This problem remains with the 2.6.25-gentoo-r3 kernel as well.
> > 
> > Blessed be!
> > Pappy
> > 
> 
> I believe that your network is wireless network is backgrounded
> (
> http://roy.marples.name/openrc
> OpenRC has many features. Here's a list of the key ones:
> ...
> Services can be re-entrant (important for the network being configured in the
> background)
> ...
> )
> 
> and you don't have a valid routing table until the connection comes up and
> authenticate itself.
> 
> Can you please check if that's the case and post some logs?
> 
> Rob
> 
Well, if that's true, then I'd have the exact same problem when running a .22 family kernel...which I don't. When running on a .22 kernel, the wireless starts and runs, and the routing table is ready to go immediately. I don't have to wait ten minutes or more for the wireless adapter to become active, or for the routing table to come up properly, either.

Which logs do you want to see? I'll send all I can.

Blessed be!
Pappy

[Comment 5 Bob Raitz 2009-07-22 05:56:13 UTC]

I believe it might be time to kill this bug due to attrition. At this point, I no longer use ndiswrapper. If this is still an issue for someone, or if there is a champion for it, then leave it open. If there isn't, close it. I've long since been using b43.

[Comment 6 Samuli Suominen (RETIRED) 2009-09-27 14:32:14 UTC]

If this is still supposed the problem with 2.6.30 (current stable gentoo-sources) and/or ndiswrapper-1.55-r1 please reopen the bug.