WI(4)

📦
version 11.0 · 2 versions
, in nixpkgs unstable

💖 WI(4) — the wireless driver manual, but make it a group chat 💖

okay so this is WI(4) from the Kernel Interfaces Manual and bestie, it's literally the WaveLAN/IEEE and PRISM-II 802.11 wireless network driver page. grab a strawberry drink 🍓 and let's get into it.

✨ NAME ✨

wi — the WaveLAN/IEEE and PRISM-II 802.11 wireless network driver 🔥

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

wi* at pcmcia? function ?
wi* at pci? dev ? function ?

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so the wi driver is the one that holds it down for Lucent Technologies WaveLAN/IEEE PCCARD adapters (you may know them as WaveLAN II cards, iconic) plus a whole bunch of PCI/MiniPCI/PCCARD adapters that run on Intersil PRISM-II and PRISM-2.5 chipsets. 💅

quick heads-up tho: Lucent sells both ISA and PCMCIA WaveLAN/IEEE devices, but plot twist — the ISA product is actually a PCMCIA card sitting in an ISA to PCMCIA bridge adapter. so yeah, the wi driver is required for both the ISA and PCMCIA NICs, no way around it. also 🫶 some of the PRISM-II adapters only work at 3.3V, which means cardbus(4) support is required for those cards to set VCC correctly — even though they're 16-bit cards. like, yes, that's the rule.

the core of the WaveLAN/IEEE is the Lucent Hermes controller. all host/device interaction goes through programmed I/O with the Hermes, periodt. the Hermes supports 802.11 and 802.3 frames, power management, BSS, WDS and ad-hoc operation modes. the Silver and the Gold cards of the WaveLAN/IEEE also support WEP ✨. and get this — unlike the other IEEE 802.11 network cards, the WaveLAN Gold cards accept 104 bits key (13 characters) for WEP encryption. the Intersil PRISM-II controller supports WEP as well. slay.

the wi driver encapsulates all traffic as 802.11 frames, however it can receive either 802.11 or 802.3 frames. transmit speed is selectable between:

  • 1Mbps fixed
  • 2Mbps fixed
  • 2Mbps with auto fallback

for WaveLAN/IEEE Turbo adapters, speeds up to 6Mbps are available 🎀. for WaveLAN/IEEE Turbo 11Mbps adapters and PRISM-II adapters, speeds up to 11Mbps are available. ate.

🌸 special ad-hoc mode (Lucent only, iykyk) 🌸

the wi driver supports configuration of Lucent cards for special ad-hoc operation. in this mode, the nwid is ignored and stations can communicate among each other without the aid of an access point. note that this mode is specific to Lucent chips and not in the IEEE 802.11 specification 🙈.

careful bestie: due to changes in the implementation of this special ad-hoc mode, Lucent-based cards with different firmware revisions may not interoperate in this mode. this mode is no longer the default and must be selected using the ifconfig(8) (media option “adhoc,flag0”) utility.

🧚 IBSS mode (the standard one) 🧚

recent versions of Lucent and PRISM-II firmware support IBSS creation. IBSS is the standard IEEE 802.11 ad-hoc mode, fr fr. in this mode, the nwid should be specified. at least one node must be able to create IBSS. the IBSS mode is enabled by “adhoc” or “ibss” media option. IBSS creation is automatically enabled if supported 💜.

👑 infrastructure mode 👑

the wi driver defaults to infrastructure mode (i.e., using an access point).

🌈 hostap mode (AP era) 🌈

recent versions of PRISM-II firmware support operating as an 802.11 Access Point. in this mode, the Access Point station should set the nwid. this will create a standard 802.11 network, and the Access Point station will show up in an Access Point scan ✨. this mode is enabled using the “hostap” media option.

for more information on configuring this device, see ifconfig(8) and ifmedia(4) 🫶.

🎀 HARDWARE 🎀

cards supported by the wi driver include, and yes i'm listing every single one, bestie:

  • 3Com AirConnect 3CRWE737A
  • 3Com AirConnect 3CRWE777A
  • Alvarion BreezeNET
  • Lucent WaveLAN/IEEE 2.0Mb Bronze
  • Lucent WaveLAN/IEEE 2.0Mb Silver
  • Lucent WaveLAN/IEEE Turbo
  • Lucent WaveLAN/IEEE Turbo 11Mbps
  • Melco AIR CONNECT WLI-PCM-L11, WLI-PCM-L11G
  • Melco AIR CONNECT WLI-CF-S11G
  • Compaq WL100 11Mbps Wireless
  • Corega Wireless LAN PCC-11, PCCA_11, PCCB_11
  • DEC/Cabletron RoamAbout 802.11 DS High Rate
  • D-Link DWL-520 11Mbps PCI Card, Revs. A1,A2,B1,B2
  • D-Link DWL-520 11Mbps PCI Card, Rev. C1 — not supported, see atw(4)
  • D-Link DWL-520 11Mbps PCI Card, Rev. D — not supported, see rtw(4)
  • D-Link DWL-650 11Mbps WLAN Card
  • D-Link DWL-650 11Mbps WLAN Card, Rev. P — not supported (Prism 3 chipset)
  • D-Link DCF-650W CF Card
  • ELECOM Air@Hawk LD-WL11
  • ELSA AirLancer MC-11
  • Ericsson Wireless LAN
  • Farallon Skyline 11Mbps Wireless
  • Intel PRO/Wireless 2011 LAN PC Card
  • ICOM SL-1100
  • IO-DATA WN-B11/PCM
  • Intersil PRISM Mini-PCI
  • Linksys Group, Inc. Instant Wireless Network PC Card, CF Card
  • Linksys Group, Inc. Instant Wireless Network WMP11 PCI Card
  • Linksys Group, Inc. Instant Wireless Network WMP11v4 PCI Card — not supported
  • NCR WaveLAN/IEEE
  • NEC Wireless Card CMZ-RT-WP, PK-WL001, PC-WL/11C
  • PLANEX GeoWave/GW-NS110
  • Symbol Spectrum24 Wireless Networker PC Card, CF Card
  • TDK LAK-CD011WL
  • SMC EZ Connect 11M Wireless CF Card SMC2642W
  • SMC EliteConnect Wireless Adapter PC Card SMC2531W-B
  • Z-Com XI-626 PCI Card

also the original PRISM-I chipset is supported by the awi(4) driver 💅 (different driver, different vibe).

💀 DIAGNOSTICS 💀

  • wi%d: init failed — the WaveLAN failed to come ready after an initialization command was issued. 😭
  • wi%d: failed to allocate %d bytes on NIC — the driver was unable to allocate memory for transmit frames in the NIC's on-board RAM.
  • wi%d: device timeout — the WaveLAN failed to generate an interrupt to acknowledge a transmit command.

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

arp(4), ifmedia(4), netintro(4), pci(4), pcmcia(4), ifconfig(8), wiconfig(8)

HCF Light programming specification, http://www.wavelan.com.

⭐ HISTORY ⭐

the wi device driver first appeared in NetBSD 1.5. og behavior.

👑 AUTHORS 👑

the wi driver was written by Bill Paul <wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu>. king.

🙈 BUGS 🙈

the execution of wiconfig(8) while the interface is down can produce some error messages. minor inconvenience, not the end of the world, but now you know 🫶

✨ and that's the whole page, bestie ✨ this one came from the Debian crew and it's dated June 2, 2016 — so like, vintage, but make it wireless 💖🎀🦋

📦 where this page comes from
  • nixpkgs unstable: netbsd-source 11.0
  • Copyright (c) 1997, 1998, 1999 Bill Paul <wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu>. All rights reserved
  • 💖 girlified by deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash-1017 on : a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms