On Thu, 2006-01-12 at 21:12 -0500, Claude Jones wrote: > On Thu January 12 2006 8:56 pm, Edward Dekkers wrote: > > Claude Jones wrote: > > > I know this is like waving a red flag, but, my downstairs neighbor > > > accesses my wireless LAN through a Win98 machine connected to a MS USB > > > access point. Since the .wmf fiasco, he's now convinced it's time to dump > > > Windows and try Linux. Has anyone succeeded in getting Linux to talk to > > > the USB MS access point? > > > > Could you give more information, > > > > what exactly is a MS USB access point? > > > > I've not really seen an access point with USB used in that way before, > > they usually have an ethernet port. > > > > Sorry - it's a Microsoft branded USB access point. Actually, there are a fair > number of networking devices made now with USB connectivity. On my Linux box, > which does firewalling and dhcp for my LAN, I have a D-Link wireless access > point on my LAN port which connects with cat5 to the ethernet port. There are > two Windows machines on the LAN using these USB access points to connect, and > that works fine. I imagine the drivers for this USB device are totally > proprietary, and not worth hacking for Linux, but I thought I'd ask. This does not sound like an access point. It sounds like a wireless NIC using a usb interface. I assume you actually have a wireless access point (you said your neighbor accesses your LAN) and he has the wireless USB interface. Terminology is critical. An access point by definition allows many wireless devices to connect. My Linksys wireless router is an access point. The USB NIC makes the PC a wireless device, not an access point. There are several wireless PCI cards that work under Linux, and many more that work under Linux by using the ndiswrapper package. > -- > Claude Jones > Bluemont, VA, USA >
