Bridging Wifi signal

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josefg
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Posts: 93
Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:07 pm

Bridging Wifi signal

Post by josefg »

Hi,

I would like to use a small unit running LMDE for capturing a Wifi signal (internet connection), and functioning as an access point for sending out that signal locally again, so other devices can connect to the internet. The unit has two WLAN adapters: one built-in, and one through a USB dongle.

Does anyone have advice on how I should go about to do this?

TIA

PS. I also plan to use the small device as a LAN file server.
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josefg
Level 2
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Posts: 93
Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:07 pm

Re: Bridging Wifi signal

Post by josefg »

I am making some progress. I use the USB wifi dongle (wlan1) to capture the foreign network, and I can emit my own wifi network through the built-in wifi antenna (wlan0) using hostapd. Although for now, hostapd needs to be started manually, and when I connect through it, I can't yet reach the foreign wifi to which the USB dongle (wlan1) is connected. Actually, I still need to get the local DHCP server to work correctly. For some reason, it's not allocating an IP address to the device that connects to my Access Point.
Last edited by josefg on Tue Jan 19, 2016 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
bigbenaugust

Re: Bridging Wifi signal

Post by bigbenaugust »

Sounds like you still need to bridge wlan0 to wlan1.

Would this Arch doc be of any assistance: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Network_bridge

iproute2 is on your LMDE2 machine, so I would look into those instructions.

As for the DHCP server, you have to make sure it is listening on the correct interface. It's been a VERY long time since I've had to deal with network bridging... and then it was going from parallel-line IP (PLIP) to a dial-up line!
josefg
Level 2
Level 2
Posts: 93
Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:07 pm

Re: Bridging Wifi signal

Post by josefg »

Thanks for the advice Ben.

Listening to the right interface solved the DHCP issue.
I'm still working on the bridging question. The instructions from the link to archlinux.org don't work as advertised on my system. I'll keep looking into it...
josefg
Level 2
Level 2
Posts: 93
Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2011 7:07 pm

Re: Bridging Wifi signal

Post by josefg »

The error I get whilst trying to bridge is:

Code: Select all

sudo ip link set wlan1 master mybridge
RTNETLINK answers: Operation not supported
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