Penguin

The term WirelessEthernetBridge generally refers to a device that bridges between a WirelessEthernet segment (802.11) and a WiredEthernet segment (802.3). Generally you will have one RJ45 port and one antenna connection.

Some examples of a WirelessEthernetBridge

See EthernetBridge

Setting Up A Compaq WL200 Wireless Card as a Wireless Access Point

Note: These notes are Debian Specific.

  1. Download the latest kernel source - I used 2.4.20 at the time of writing.
  2. Grab all relevant wireless patches to your chosen kernel from http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Jean_Tourrilhes/Linux/Tools.html.
  3. apt-get install wireless-tools
  4. Grab hostap from http://hostap.epitest.fi. I'm using version 2002-10-12.
  5. Grab pcmcia-cs from http://pcmcia-cs.sourceforge.net, and uninstall the existing package if it's installed (apt-get remove pcmcia-cs --purge).
  6. Unpack your kernel, and patch with the wireless extensions patches. Configure it - ensure you DISABLE pcmcia support and ENABLE wireless LAN support and 802.1d ethernet bridging. Make dep bzImage modules modules_install, install the image, and update your boot loader.
  7. Boot your new kernel - makes life easier! :)
  8. Unpack pcmcia-cs and hostap. Change into the hostap source directory, and copy drivers/* into /path/to/pcmcia-cs-x.x.x
  9. Change into your pcmcia-cs directory and make config, then make all, then make install.
  10. Edit /etc/defaults/pcmcia and add PCIC_OPTS='irq_mode=1 fast_pci=1'
  11. Edit /etc/modutils/aliases and add alias wlan0 hostap_cs, then run update-modules.
  12. OK, /etc/init.d/pcmcia start should now start your WL200 in AP mode! :) You can modify the startup options in /etc/pcmcia/wireless.opts
  13. To create a bridge, modify /etc/network/interfaces:

auto br0
iface br0 inet static

address 192.168.1.1
network 192.168.1.0
netmask 255.255.255.0
broadcast 192.168.1.255
bridge_ports wlan0 eth0
up \
/sbin/iwconfig wlan0 essid wlug && \
/sbin/iwconfig wlan0 channel 1 && \
/sbin/iwconfig wlan0 mode Master

Hope this helps someone out there.