Dies connecting to wireless with ERROR:nm-utils.c:1231:nm_utils_security_valid: assertion failed: (have_ap)

[Jani Uusitalo]

This is a laptop where I've previously connected to another wireless network (over a different router of the same model) successfully.

Now with a different router operating in another broadband connection, when I try to connect to the wifi it provides, nm-applet disappears from indicator area. If I run it from the command-line it outputs this:

jani@amilo:~$ nm-applet
Gtk-Message: Failed to load module "canberra-gtk-module"
** Message: applet now removed from the notification area
** Message: No keyring secrets found for ElisaKoti48/802-11-wireless-security; asking user.
**
ERROR:nm-utils.c:1231:nm_utils_security_valid: assertion failed: (have_ap)
Aborted

Note that it doesn't actually ask me for the key but apparently fails when trying to do so. With the previous wireless network I was in, the key *was* requested, and the file describing that connection is still in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/.

After doing the above once, there's also a definition for the non-functioning connection in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/, and all subsequent tries to start nm-applet immediately end in the error and the applet vanishing. If I delete the definition it has created for this non-functioning connection, the applet does appear again, but again when I try to connect to this network, it dies and won't come back until I rm the definition file.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: network-manager-gnome 0.9.1.90-0ubuntu6
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-6.12-generic 3.2.0-rc6
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-6-generic i686
ApportVersion: 1.90-0ubuntu1
Architecture: i386
Date: Sun Dec 25 10:11:43 2011
EcryptfsInUse: Yes
IfupdownConfig:
 auto lo
 iface lo inet loopback
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release i386 (20111012)
InterestingModules: b44
IpRoute:
 default via 192.168.100.1 dev eth0 proto static
 169.254.0.0/16 dev eth0 scope link metric 1000
 192.168.100.0/24 dev eth0 proto kernel scope link src 192.168.100.12 metric 1
NetworkManager.conf:
 [main]
 plugins=ifupdown,keyfile

 [ifupdown]
 managed=false
NetworkManager.state:
 [main]
 NetworkingEnabled=true
 WirelessEnabled=true
 WWANEnabled=true
 WimaxEnabled=true
RfKill:
 0: phy0: Wireless LAN
  Soft blocked: no
  Hard blocked: no
SourcePackage: network-manager-applet
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to precise on 2011-12-09 (15 days ago)
nmcli-con:
 NAME UUID TYPE TIMESTAMP TIMESTAMP-REAL AUTOCONNECT READONLY DBUS-PATH
 Wired connection 1 2b1c0532-9770-4a0f-b8a0-340de92c20c0 802-3-ethernet 1324800498 su 25. joulukuuta 2011 10.08.18 yes no /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Settings/1
 Elisa-16a0 be1db15c-11f9-46df-abf1-c06be1e7c0bd 802-11-wireless 1324650234 pe 23. joulukuuta 2011 16.23.54 yes no /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Settings/0
 ElisaKoti48 2d08fb6a-35f3-4cca-b2a1-624a62ecc720 802-11-wireless 0 never yes no /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Settings/4
nmcli-dev:
 DEVICE TYPE STATE DBUS-PATH
 eth0 802-3-ethernet connected /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Devices/0
 eth1 802-11-wireless disconnected /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager/Devices/1
nmcli-nm:
 RUNNING VERSION STATE NET-ENABLED WIFI-HARDWARE WIFI WWAN-HARDWARE WWAN
 running 0.9.3.0 connected enabled enabled enabled enabled disabled

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

This being an assertion I guess a backtrace is not so useful, but here it is anyway.

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

FWIW, my system-connection file contains:

[802-11-wireless-security]
key-mgmt=none

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

I am using the ipw2200 driver, so this is not broadcom/b44 specific. Using WEP encryption.

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

Of course not limited to WEP either, it happens if I click on any encrypted network in the neighbourhood (most of them WPA, I presume).

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

When using the Network applet from System Settings, NetworkManager writes this to syslog:

<info> (eth2): device state change: prepare -> config (reason 'none') [40 50 0]
<info> Activation (eth2/wireless): access point 'SQT-14490' has security, but secrets are required.
<info> (eth2): device state change: config -> need-auth (reason 'none') [50 60 0]
<info> Activation (eth2) Stage 2 of 5 (Device Configure) complete.
<warn> No agents were available for this request.
<info> (eth2): device state change: need-auth -> failed (reason 'no-secrets') [60 120 7]
<warn> Activation (eth2) failed for access point (SQT-14490)
<info> Marking connection 'SQT-14490' invalid.
<warn> Activation (eth2) failed.
<info> (eth2): device state change: failed -> disconnected (reason 'none') [120 30 0]
<info> (eth2): deactivating device (reason 'none') [0]

The Network settings dies later if I leave it open:

kernel: [10425.006749] gnome-control-c[10284]: segfault at aaaaaac2 ip b005ff29 sp bfcf9580 error 4 in libnetwork.so[b0054000+15000]

I therefore reassign to NetworkManager, this is not limited to nm-applet.

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

I can work around this using nm-connection-editor to set up the connections. But why doesn't everybody have this problem? Am I missing some package? What is the agent in the Ubuntu session that should register itself to dbus to take care of secrets (ref http://projects.gnome.org/NetworkManager/developers/migrating-to-09/ref-migrating.html)? I have one "/usr/bin/gnome-keyring-daemon --daemonize --login" process running.

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

The agent should usually be nm-applet, or the gnome-shell equivalent. There's no real need for gnome-keyring anymore, especially with new connections being system-wide by default (and thus not even needing an agent), unless you set them as not system-wide yourself.

The backtrace could actually tell us a bit more about what NM is trying to achieve, but it's missing big chunks. Could you make sure you have network-manager-gnome-dbgsym or libnm-gtk0-dbgsym installed before you try to reproduce it again?

What seems weird to me is that there normally shouldn't be such cases where (have_ap) doesn't exist; since it *has* to be passed by whatever is trying to know about valid security protocols (nm_utils_security_valid checks whether WPA, WPA2, WEP, etc. are supported by your hardware).

Maybe there's some other bug you're running into that could explain this?

[Jani Uusitalo (uusijani)]

Mathieu, here's a backtrace hopefully with what you requested for (with network-manager-gnome-dbgsym installed).

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

Mathieu, thanks a lot for looking in to this! See attached backtrace, it has most symbols. Still, I see gnome-keyring involved though :)

[Tormod Volden (tormodvolden)]

Interesting is that when I run my installation on another computer (from a USB drive) it works fine. The other computer is faster for one thing, another is that the wifi card appears as wlan0 there, but as eth2 on this failing one. Can this make any difference?

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

Yes, we're been able to identify this as a potential issue with the ipw2200 driver; see bug 908380. I'll mark this as a duplicate of it.