[intrepid] alpha 6 - WPA & WPA2 Personal won't authenticate short passwords

[Laura Cowen]

Binary package hint: network-manager

I enter my WPA password (13-char alphanumeric) when prompted. Network Manager tries to connect but fails to authenticate and re-prompts me for my password. However, it prefills the password box with a seemingly random 64-character password which is incorrect and I'm not sure where it got it from (the first time after installation, it just presented an empty text box but subsequent times it presents this unknown password).

I can connect to a different, WPA-authenticated access point that uses a 64-character password.

Is it validating the password entered and concluding that the 13-character password isn't valid? The 13-character password is valid (albeit less secure) and used to work on Hardy.

I'm on a Samsung Q35 laptop.

[Laura Cowen (lauracowen)]

Sorry. Just realised that I'd misremembered the roadmap and Alpha 6 is out. Will download now and re-check this on the latest updates.

[Laura Cowen (lauracowen)]

I've updated the description and title now that I've installed Alpha 6 (ignore my previous comment from 23 hours ago).

I've also installed all the outstanding updates available in Update Manager.

I just connected successfully to the 13-char password access point after having been connected to the 64-char password access point. However, when I disabled, then re-enabled wireless in Network Manager, then tried to connect to the 13-char password access point again, it repeated the behaviour described above (ie prompted me for a password with a password box prefilled with a random long password). I then successfully connected to the 64-char password access point.

[Laura Cowen (lauracowen)]

Mostly connecting okay now but every time I boot, the desktop comes up then the WPA password prompt comes up (with a duff password pre-filled) and I have to Cancel out of it before the wireless will connect.

[amias (amias)]

I have this issue also on my Dell Vostro 1710 in 64bit mode with 2.6.27-7-generic
also runnign intrepid which is fully upto date as of 28th Oct.

in lspci my card appears as .
Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 4965 AG or AGN [Kedron] Network Connection (rev 61)

if i disable wpa on the router and go unencrypted it works fine.

Let me know if you need logs

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

I am having the same issue on two laptops. A T30 and a T41 Thinkpad.

The T30 (mine) was upgraded using the network upgrade from 8.04 to 8.10. When using 8.04, Network Manager worked perfectly. No issues.
The T41 was built using a clean install of 8.10.

Both are up-to-date as far as updates go. On both systems, the behavior is as follows.

1) cold boot computer
2) login as user from main login screen
3) Network Manager fires up automatically
    a) blue swirl spinner spins
    b) bottom dot lights up green
    c) top dot does not light up
    d) 15-20 seconds pass
    e) Dialog box opens asking for my WPA password for my selected network.
        i) Password is already pre-filled (in HEX I think)
        ii) there is a cancel and "Connect" button
    f) If I click "Connect"
        i) a-b happens again
        ii) this time the connection comes up and I get the blue bars.
4) If I logout and then back in my connection comes up
5) if I reboot, the behavior described in #3 repeats.

Please let me know what log information I can provide to help troubleshoot this issue.

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

One last detail. Both the T30 and T40 laptops are using D-Link DWL-G650 PCMCIA wireless cards. Both have been used with linux before. AS above the T30 used the same card with 8.04 + Network Manager without this password prompting issue.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

sounds like a timeout issue. try the latest intrepid packages from http://launchpad.net/~network-manager/+archive please. those give your connection more time before asking for key.

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

Alexander: Thank you for your quick feedback on this. A few questions:

* Which intrepid packages should I download and install? All of them that I see in this link?
* If I install these packages, will "Update Manager" update them when a future update comes out?
* How long does it usually take for a fix like this to make it into the proposed or update streams?

I am moving from Fedora so I am still learning the Ubuntu way.

Thanks for your help.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

uuklanger, just add the lined to your sources.list (as the instructions) and upgrade your system. you should then get the new packages automatically. if you dont want to use the preview archvie in future you can then remove those sources again.

I usually take care that the versions are chosen in such a way that you will automatically go back to the next official upload.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

the time it takes until ithis gets rolled out depends on the importance, feedback and risk of that patch.

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

Alexander, the information above was clear to me. I added the source, upgraded, and am now running the development version.

Unfortunately, this has not corrected the problem. What I see a very long delay where Network Manager's blue spinner spins for a very long time. The lower ball is green but the upper does not change. After a while, it times out and I get the same password/connect dialog box as described above. When I click "Connect", the connection comes up. Since the correct password is already populated, I only need to click "Connect". Nothing additional needs to be entered.

My Access point is a Linksys using WPA2 Personal.

In my /var/log/wpa_supplicant.log, I see the following messages...

-- SNIP --
Authentication with 00:13:10:11:50:xx timed out.
Trying to associate with SSID 'linksys'
CTRL-EVENT-DISCONNECTED - Disconnect event - remove keys
Associated with 00:13:10:11:50:xx
WPA: Unsupported CCMP Group Cipher key length 32 (32).
RSN: Failed to configure GTK
Authentication with 00:13:10:11:50:xx timed out.
Trying to associate with SSID 'linksys'
CTRL-EVENT-DISCONNECTED - Disconnect event - remove keys
CTRL-EVENT-SCAN-RESULTS
CTRL-EVENT-SCAN-RESULTS
Trying to associate with 00:13:10:11:50:xx (SSID='linksys' freq=2422 MHz)
Associated with 00:13:10:11:50:xx
WPA: Key negotiation completed with 00:13:10:11:50:xx [PTK=CCMP GTK=TKIP]
CTRL-EVENT-CONNECTED - Connection to 00:13:10:11:50:xx completed (auth) [id=0 id_str=]
CTRL-EVENT-SCAN-RESULTS
-- SNIP --

I changed the name of my accesspoint and the last part of the MAC address. Beyond that it is a cut-paste.

I have had a few cases (before this update) where it would never let me connect at all. The dialog would continue to come up over and over. Log out/in would correct this.

Please let me know if I can provide any additional information. I am setup to take any updates you provide so feel free to use me for any testing/validation.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

honestly, i dont know what short password are. if it has 13 chars then its ok. the 64 character you see are ok too because thats the key built from your phrase and the ssid.

so what driver are you using? what wireless chipset?

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

I have a 13 char password now so I am not sure what the issue is there.

[ 29.296607] wifi0: Atheros 5212: mem=0xd4000000, irq=11

I am not sure what drive but it is a stock one that comes with Ubuntu 8.10. I didn't install anything extra.

What I am also finding odd is that is that is will not connect right after boot but usually (not always) the second connect attempt succeeds. As described above, this worked using the exact same hardware under 8.04.

Is there a parameter for nm-applet that tells it not to connect to anything? I am wondering if it is a timing or init issue. IF I can login in, and then have to manually select my network, that may prove this. Is there a command line parameter or a gconf setting to do this?

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

Just to be sure.. the only packages that self upgraded after my change above were...

ii libnm-glib0 0.7~~svn20081018t105859-0ubuntu2~nm4 network management framework (GLib shared li
ii libnm-util0 0.7~~svn20081018t105859-0ubuntu2~nm4 network management framework (shared library
ii network-manager 0.7~~svn20081018t105859-0ubuntu2~nm4 network management framework daemon

Did you expect others to get installed too?

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

uuklanger your issue is the well known atheros regression ... see bug 259157 ... this isnt your bug then. unless everyone here has atheros of course.

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

Alexander, understood. I will hop over to https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/network-manager/+bug/259157

Thanks for pointing me in this direction. I appreciate all your time and guidance.

[Murray Cumming (murrayc)]

I had the same inability to connect with WPA2-Personal to a Linksys WAG160NB (with latest firmware) though I can connect to other WPA2-Personal routers. It worked with Hardy. A colleague with Fedora Core 9 seems to have the same problem. A Nokia N810 has no problems connecting to the router.

We seem to have fixed it for both Ubuntu Intrepid and Fedora Core 9 by disabling WMM (Wireless QoS) on the Linksys WAG160NB router, as suggested on this bug:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/267063/comments/28

[Stephen Irons (stephen-irons)]

I have the same problem as described by the original poster.

In nm-connection editor, create a new network

Connection name: Wireless connection 1

Wireless tab:
SSID: Q9PDANE813
Mode: Infrastructure

Wireless security tab:
Security: WPA & WPA2 Personal
Password: A12B34C56D78E90F12

OK.

Close connection editor. Open it again.

Password has changed to a long string starting: 5e470696...

Open Seahorse, Passwords tab.

Network secret for Wireless connection 1/802-11-wireless-security/psk
Properties, show password.

It has the same long string starting: 5e470696...

Interesting that this is the same string obtained by

$ wpa_passphrase Q9PDANE813 A12B34C56D78E90F12
        network={
        ssid="Q9PDANE813"
        #psk="A12B34C56D78E90F12"
psk=5e470696...snip
}

So, nm-connection editor is storing the wrong thing in the keyring.

[Jeust (miguelvilhena)]

I have the issue discribed by the original poster.

My wireless router is a D-link 2740B and my laptop is a HP TX2000.

I'm using a hidden wireless network.

Adding to the findings posted before, i tried to use the system keyring to save and preserve the password of my wireless network, by denying the network manager the permission to change the saved password, but it did not work.

Though, after a reboot, the first time the network manager tries to connect to the network it uses the password i've set in the keyring, but still doesn't connect.

Afterwards i insert the the network password in the popup it presents me, and most of the times it connects, But still saves the hexadecimal representation of my password in the keyring.

[Jeust (miguelvilhena)]

I forgot to mention that my wireless interface is the broadcom's BCM4328 802.11a/b/g/n.

cheers

[Jeust (miguelvilhena)]

No one does anything and this a very anoying and time wasting bug.

Does anyone knows if debian has the same problem?

cheers

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

From what I understand the issue is more with the chipset and not with the driver. Best bet is what I did, Install wicd at http://wicd.net It is easy to install and it auto-updates like any other ubuntu package. I have been using it since 8.04 and am happy with it. The only lack is VPN support which I don't need.

For me, it is not a work around but a solution.

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

One thought... Ubuntu should consider including wicd in the next release as an alternate to NetworkManager. There are a lot of cards affected by this issue and this would resolve most of them.

[Jeust (miguelvilhena)]

thanks for the advice uuklanger!

Unfortunatly wicd has a issue with hidden wireless networks, like the one i'm trying to connect to.

But otherwise it seems to be a very good solution to this problem.

cheers

[uuklanger (uuklanger)]

Actually, I use it with a few hidden networks and WPA2. Works just fine for me.

[Jeust (miguelvilhena)]

Nice... for me it doesn't. I've tried to modify it, but it didn't work. Had to reinstall the network manager again.

The issue with wicd is the one talked here, in the wicd forums

http://wicd.net/punbb/viewtopic.php?id=296.

:(

[Seine_Lordschaft (seine-lordschaft)]

wicd does not solve the problem for me. Still the WLAN is not working.

I have installed wicd and removed the network manager package as requested by ubuntu. Took me some time to realise that one needs to use the synaptic package administration for that. I also de-installed the gnome network manager cause I thought this is the program in question to allow wicd to operate. Now wicd is up and running, but it doesn't find any wireless networks.

However, when I use "networks" under "system", there still is the old game of entering the new password and seeing how it is changed back to another 64-one. So the system does find the network but does not connect due to the password-change issue.

I think this is quite a critical issue for using ubuntu. If I can't connect to networks, I can't use the computer. All the other stuff like open office etc. is fine, but I can't invest more time to get my WLAN running. I'm afraid I will have to go back to windows soon.

[Seine_Lordschaft (seine-lordschaft)]

ok, stop - I just learned that our wireless LAN does not work at the moment!

Strangely, just after posting the earlier frustrated comment, wicd started to find various networks, including the one in my house. I couldn't connect, but which might be due to router problems. perhaps wicd is indeed a solution.

Nevertheless in this case it would be desirable if wicd would be the standard connector in ubuntu

[Pablo (itu-pablo)]

I have the same problem. When trying to connect to a hidden wlan using WPA2 and a 'short' (26 characters) alphanumeric password I cant connect. Network-manager keeps asking for the password (it seems it fails on authentication) and the password box gets filled with a 64 digit hex (which could be the passkey generated using the PSK and the SSID).

This did not happen before upgrading to Ubuntu 9.04. This does not happen if I change the wlan password to a 64 digit hex, in that case the password gets stored correctly and can (although some times it takes really long and a couple of retries) connect.

Workaround: I enter to password management, go to where the network's key is supposedly stored, and change the 64 digit hex to the original password I intended. I also took out network-manager's permission to write the password. This way it connects fine, so I assume the problem is a wrongfully storage of the wlan's PSK.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for network-manager (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]