On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 4:15 PM, John W. Linville <linville@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > For roaming "seamlessly", simply using the same ssid and encryption > info won't matter much if the AP's aren't bridged. Most consumer > APs out of the box use a routed NAT configuration. This means that > when you switch between APs you will get a different IP address and > connection disruptions will result. To avoid that, you need to make > sure the APs are bridging between wireless and ethernet, and further > you must ensure that both APs plug into the same bridged segment > on the ethernet side. Somewhere on that network there needs to be > a single (or several coordinated) DHCP servers so that the same IP > address is equally valid on the wireless sides of either AP. In the > best cases the APs will runn IAPP or something similar to smooth the > wireless handoffs between the two APs, but in practice that is not > entirely essential. In my case the APs are connected to a single LAN on the wired side and the dhcp server is run on a Fedora machine such that the ip address is tied to the MAC of the wireless NIC on any one machine - hence the ip that I am given and maintain within the house is the same whichever AP a wireless laptop connects to. > > As for the inital AP selection...you assert that it is illogical to > select an AP you know over a stronger AP you may not know. I'm not Not quite - in my case both APs have been registered on the laptop and it is certainly possible to define two separate "connections" in NM both with the same ssid and encryption plus password (in my case WPA-Personal with AES encryption) - but with different bssid where each corresponds to the hardware address of the AP in question. So even if both are defined to a specific laptop in the list of "known" connections to NM the laptop always appears to attempt to connect to the one it was last connected to - and where that signal is weak, with the near AP being both already known to the machine and strong the connection icon seems to spin and is very iffy about whether it might connect or not - but the logic would say it should now the near strong and already known connection would be the one it should attempt to connect to - surely? So the near strong signal is certainly not one that is unknown to the laptop's NM list in this case. I would be less concerned about the roaming but certainly in this case the initial connection should go to the near and strong signal as it is already defined in the system - but it appears this is not the case! > sure I agree. So long as the known AP remains serviceable, there is no > particular reason to switch to another AP simply because he registers > a stronger signal. In a perfect world you could easily determine > which AP is "better" simply by the signal strength of a beacon, > but in reality a number of factors can effect real world "better"-ness. > > I would only consider the AP selection issue a bug if NM insists on > using an unreachable AP even when the other is reachable. In either This is exactly the case - and the main source of irritation - and I believe others have verified this behaviour on their own systems. > case, if you want to roam between the APs you should ensure that > they are both bridging the wireless connections to the same ethernet > subnet.[1] Which is indeed the case at home - I can't vouch for whether this is the case on the system at work but I could find out! > > John > > [1] There are other potential configurations for roaming, including > mobile IP and the like. If you (i.e. anyone reading) feels like > trying to explain them in an email then feel free. :-) > -- > John W. Linville The truth will set you free, but first it will Would be great to see these issues tackled.... -- mike c -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines
