Comment 30 for bug 263106

For everyone who's following this thread, this message contains instructions for what is either an instant solution, or failing that: the very-near-future solution.

No worries Mark! Honestly, this sort of thing drives me up the wall...a "computer", by definition, is supposed to take input from somewhere, feed it into an equation, and then *always* output the correct result. Computers just aren't computers anymore, when they fail us... So for myself, it's back to a custom kernel, like the "old" times in the '90s. As for everyone else:

If your NIC worked in Hardy, it will work in Karmic, just about guaranteed. Karmic is linux-2.6.31, and b43 works just fine in linux-2.6.30. As linux-2.6.31 is still in pre-release, I wouldn't recommend tracking the Koala's kernels... There's still one thing I haven't tried -- The soon-to-be-released Jaunty 2.6.28-14:

http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/l/linux/linux-image-2.6.28-14-generic_2.6.28-14.47_i386.deb

I'm linking to them directly so that no one has to enable to "proposed" repository. These kernels are currently in jaunty-proposed. I haven't looked at the 2.6.28-13 to 2.6.28-14 patch very closely, so I don't know if the B43 driver in this kernel is from linux-2.6.30; however the kernel team is working hard to backport a functional b43 driver! Now is the perfect time to test this new kernel, and help the kernel team shake out any remaining bugs with the backport of a better b43 driver.

Oh yeah, here's the hack I use, because I don't use Network Manager:

1. put b43 in your /etc/modules. My BCM4318 takes so long to initialise after it gets the firmware that it ignores the networking commands it gets from /etc/rcS.d/S40networking.... But /etc/modules is the easiest place to load the firmware early (trust me, I've been tinkering with custom initrd images for the last hour)
2. You're half-way there. If you use Network Manager, than that's it! 'hope it works for you.
3. If you don't use Network Manager, wicd, etc, and have your networking info permanently stored in /etc/network/interfaces (this is the opposite of a "roaming" network profile), then you might want to try making these modifications to /etc/rc.local

first, remove that exit 0 line if you still have it -- it's no longer useful.
then add the following towards the end of the file:
ifdown wlan0; sleep 2; ifup wlan0 &

Obligatory car analogy: when you jump in your car in the morning in the middle of winter, turn the key, and your car doesn't start -- oh, your hear the engine try, but it turns over just once before going back to sleep...well, the "ifdown wlan0" is when you back off on the starter, "sleep 2" waits for two seconds, and then "ifup wlan0" gives it another go. Yeah, it's a hack, but at least it works reliably for me... 'hope it works for you.

WHOA!?! Jaunty-auto-update popup. linux-image-2.6.28-14 was just released...if it didn't fix b43, make post the latest of all the logs you're supposed to. Last-minute post-release minor bugfixes are quite common 2.6.28-14.46 to .47, and maybe a .48 if it's needed.