knetworkmanager won't connect to hidden WiFi AP using WEP

[cardonator]

Binary package hint: network-manager

First off, what I'm using:

Kubuntu Karmic 9.10 Beta, last updated 10:30pm MDT
Wireless card is an Atheros ar928x (yes, I know)
This is a laptop, HP G70

I'm having an issue with not being able to connect to my router which is a Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 running the Tomato firmware. I don't think this matters.

I have SSID broadcasting turned off, WEP 64 bit with a hex key turned on.

I am using knetworkmanager to try to connect. The process I use is as follows (using the taskbar icon).

Click network manager
Click "Connect to Other Network..."
Click "Connect to Other With..."
Click "Connect" button
-- This brings up the Add Network Connection dialog --
Change connection name to my wireless network name
Check "Connect Automatically"
Click "Wireless" tab
Type my SSID into the SSID box
Click the "Wireless Security" tab
Change "Security" drop down to "WEP"
Change "Key Type" drop down to "Hex key"
Type in my hex key
Click "OK"

With NetworkManager running in no-daemon mode I get the following Warning:
NetworkManager: <WARN> user_connection_get_settings_cb(): user_connection_get_settings_cb: Invalid connection: 'NMSettingWireless' / 'ssid' invalid: 1

Nothing else happens. I have tried opening various dialogs and clicking the connection and it never does any pulse. dmesg shows nothing and there are no other messages on the console from no-daemon NetworkManager.

If I can provide other info, do let me know. I'm happy to provide any information.

[Tony Espy (awe)]

Does your SSID include any non-alphanumeric characters?

[cardonator (bcardon)]

Nope it is Universe.

[Tony Espy (awe)]

OK, just confirmed with Karmic Beta on my Macbook Pro(3,1) which also has an AR5008 chipset.

Can you connect to the same WEP AP if it broadcasts it's SSID? I'm going to try that next, before updating...

[Tony Espy (awe)]

Once I re-enabled SSID broadcast and rebooted, my system connected just fine.

Seems pretty broken to me ( unless there's a less-obvious way to connect to hidden networks in Kubuntu ).

[cardonator (bcardon)]

Yeah, with the SSID on it connects just fine.

[ahenric (ahenric)]

I had the same problem: after upgrading from Kubuntu Jaunty amd64 to Kubuntu Karmic Beta amd64, I couldn't connect to my wireless (rtl8187 usb stick). My SSID was always hidden, and in Jaunty this never was a problem. I just made the SSID public and I can connect.

I did try by the way also Wicd, the gnome network manager and the default knetwork manager, but all could not connect to the hidden SSID. So it doesn't seem to be just an issue with the default network manager. There is some underlying problem.

[cardonator (bcardon)]

Just tried this on another network with the same result, except I had connected to it previous to upgrading to 9.10 and before I could even check the connection after turning on SSID, the wireless had connected.

This is really sad. 9.04 shipped with this exact same problem in Kubuntu...

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

if you say that network-manager-gnome does not work either its a driver issue. If you say -gnome works, but knetworkmanager doesn't it's a knetworkmanager issue.

[Tony Espy (awe)]

No, the Gnome version works fine ( at least for me ). Just re-booted using the Karmic Beta Live CD and was able to connect with no trouble.

One note, earlier while playing around with Kubuntu, it did connect to the hidden network, but I'm not sure how I triggered it. It may have connected coming out of suspend? I tried to reproduce several times and couldn't get it to happen again.

[cardonator (bcardon)]

I'm not sure about this current issue, but at release in 9.04 I was able to get the wireless to connect to my hidden SSID by connecting to it in Gnome or from the command line prior to logging in to kdm. I guess it just recognized the current connection that way. I don't have them installed side by side currently, I figured that doing so wouldn't be a very good test.

So are you saying you connected to a hidden wireless network booting off the live CD instead of having Kubuntu actually installed?

[cardonator (bcardon)]

Oh, nevermind. You're saying you used a Gnome Live CD and it worked fine.

[Tony Espy (awe)]

I've noticed a few things... when the user enters the details in the "Add Network Connection" dialog, and then clicks OK, a new Connection object is created in knetwork-manager, which I can see with d-feet ( DBUS debugger ), however it looks like knetwork-manager never sends an ActivateConnection message to NetworkManager, as I never see a new ActiveConnection object created for the new network.

If I compare to Karmic Beta on Ubuntu, when I click OK on the "Connect to Hidden Wireless Network" dialog, I see both the new Connection object in nm-applet, and a new ActiveConnection object in NetworkManager ( even if the hidden network doesn't really exist ).

Note, with Kubuntu, if I click on "Connect to Other.." again, I can see the new hidden network listed. If I click on it, it still fails to trigger an activation, whereas clicking on another network that was found during scanning will always trigger an activation attempt.

[Tony Espy (awe)]

Two other things...

I don't see any invalid ssid log messages from NetworkManager.

The knetwork-manager Connection objects I examined with d-feet seem to include a few properties which don't show up in the objects in nm-applet. The properties are: 'mode' ( set to infrastructure ), and 'autoconnect' ( set to 0 for all Connections ).

[rkhalloran (rkh)]

Kubuntu 9.10 NBR on Asus EEE 1005HA netbook. knetworkmanager fails to find my home wireless network with hidden SSID (no non-alphanumeric characters within). Creating manual entry with WPA2-PSK passphrase info still fails to connect.

Installed network-manager-gnome; doing pkill NetworkManager and starting nm-applet allows me to enter SSID and WPA2 passphrase, then successfully connect. Passphrase info does not persist between restarts. Success of GNOME applet suggests problem is with knetworkmanager.