wpa_cli -i flag and p2p_disabled=1 config broken

[Raymond E Ferguson]

When connecting to wpa_supplicant with wpa_cli -i interface command, the connection hangs and never completes. This breaks various ifupdown integrations.

Also, when p2p_disable=1 is set in wpa_supplicant.conf, the directive is not honored.

I pulled the latest upstream hostap 2.6 source from git and built it using the same config file pulled from the deb source and tested to verify. Oddly the bug is actually in the wpa_supplicant binary as starting 2.6 with the right flags allows both the 2.4 and the 2.6 client to work correctly. However, starting the 2.4 daemon provided by artful causes both wpa_cli -i connection flags to fail.

Starting the packaged wpa_supplicant throws an odd warning as well, not the double prefix on the p2p-dev.

/sbin/wpa_supplicant -B -P /run/wpa_supplicant.wlp4s0.pid -i wlp4s0 -W -D nl80211 -c /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf
Successfully initialized wpa_supplicant
Could not read interface p2p-dev-wlp4s0 flags: No such device
Failed to create interface p2p-dev-p2p-dev-wlp4s0: -22 (Invalid argument)
nl80211: Failed to create a P2P Device interface p2p-dev-p2p-dev-wlp4s0
P2P: Failed to enable P2P Device interface

Also, in the presence of the p2p_disabled=1 flag, the 2.6 daemon provides the expected behavior of simply not creating the addition /run/wpa_supplicant/p2p-dev-wlp4s0 socket and unnamed device as seen by iw dev. However, the packaged version still creates both, apparently leaving p2p enabled.

root@mendota:~/code/hostap/wpa_supplicant# iw dev
phy#0
        Unnamed/non-netdev interface
                wdev 0x5e
                addr e0:9d:31:d6:45:f3
                type P2P-device
                txpower 0.00 dBm
        Interface wlp4s0
                ifindex 3
                wdev 0x1
                addr e0:9d:31:d6:45:f2
                type managed
                txpower 22.00 dBm
root@mendota:~/code/hostap/wpa_supplicant# ls -l /run/wpa_supplicant
total 0
srwxrwx--- 1 root dialout 0 May 4 12:49 p2p-dev-wlp4s0
srwxrwx--- 1 root dialout 0 May 4 12:49 wlp4s0

root@mendota:~/code/hostap/wpa_supplicant# wpa_cli -p /run/wpa_supplicant -i wlp4s0
wpa_cli v2.4
Copyright (c) 2004-2015, Jouni Malinen <email address hidden> and contributors

This software may be distributed under the terms of the BSD license.
See README for more details.

Interactive mode

Warning: Failed to attach to wpa_supplicant.
Could not connect to wpa_supplicant: wlp4s0 - re-trying ...

Note that 2.6 still allows a connection even when p2p_disabled is not set and the unnammed p2p dev and socket is created.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 17.10
Package: wpasupplicant 2.4-0ubuntu10
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.13.0-37.42-generic 4.13.13
Uname: Linux 4.13.0-37-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_modeset nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.20.7-0ubuntu3.8
Architecture: amd64
Date: Fri May 4 12:49:50 2018
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US
 TERM=screen.xterm-256color
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: wpa
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Roger James (rogerjames99)]

The p2p-disabled flag is not supported until wpa-supplicant 2.5+.