xref: /openbsd/share/man/man4/an.4 (revision 5af055cd)
1.\"	$OpenBSD: an.4,v 1.42 2015/02/28 05:47:36 mlarkin Exp $
2.\"
3.\" Copyright (c) 1997, 1998, 1999
4.\"	Bill Paul <wpaul@ee.columbia.edu>. All rights reserved.
5.\"
6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
8.\" are met:
9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
10.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
12.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
13.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
14.\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
15.\"    must display the following acknowledgement:
16.\"	This product includes software developed by Bill Paul.
17.\" 4. Neither the name of the author nor the names of any co-contributors
18.\"    may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
19.\"   without specific prior written permission.
20.\"
21.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY Bill Paul AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
22.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
23.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
24.\" ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL Bill Paul OR THE VOICES IN HIS HEAD
25.\" BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR
26.\" CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF
27.\" SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS
28.\" INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN
29.\" CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE)
30.\" ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF
31.\" THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.
32.\"
33.\" $FreeBSD: src/share/man/man4/an.4,v 1.5 2000/03/02 14:53:45 sheldonh Exp $
34.\"
35.Dd $Mdocdate: February 28 2015 $
36.Dt AN 4
37.Os
38.Sh NAME
39.Nm an
40.Nd Aironet Communications 4500/4800 IEEE 802.11FH/b wireless network device
41.Sh SYNOPSIS
42.Cd "an* at pcmcia?"
43.Cd "an* at pci?"
44.Cd "an* at isapnp?"
45.Sh DESCRIPTION
46The
47.Nm
48driver provides support for the Aironet Communications 4500, 4800
49(aka Cisco 340), and Cisco 350
50IEEE 802.11 wireless network adapters.
51This includes the ISA, PCI, and PCMCIA varieties.
52The 4500 series adapters operate at 1 and 2Mbps (FH) while
53the 4800 and 350 series can operate at 1, 2, 5.5, and 11Mbps (DS).
54The ISA, PCI,
55and PCMCIA devices are all based on the same core PCMCIA modules
56and all have the same programming interface.
57However, unlike the
58Lucent WaveLAN/IEEE cards, the ISA and PCI cards appear to the
59host as normal ISA and PCI devices and do not require any PCMCIA
60support.
61.Pp
62ISA cards can either be configured to use ISA Plug and Play
63or to use a particular I/O address and IRQ
64by properly setting the DIP switches on the board.
65(The default switch setting is for plug and play.)
66The
67.Nm
68driver has Plug and Play support and will work in either configuration,
69however when using a hard-wired I/O address and IRQ, the driver
70configuration and the NIC's switch settings must agree.
71PCI cards
72require no switch settings of any kind and will be automatically
73probed and attached.
74.Pp
75All host/device interaction with the Aironet cards is via programmed I/O.
76The
77.Nm
78driver encapsulates all IP and ARP traffic as 802.11 frames, though
79it can receive either 802.11 or 802.3 frames.
80.Pp
81These are the modes the
82.Nm
83driver can operate in:
84.Bl -tag -width "IBSS-masterXX"
85.It BSS mode
86Also known as
87.Em infrastructure
88mode, this is used when associating with an access point, through
89which all traffic passes.
90This mode is the default.
91.It IBSS mode
92Also known as
93.Em IEEE ad-hoc
94mode or
95.Em peer-to-peer
96mode.
97This is the standardized method of operating without an access point.
98Stations associate with a service set.
99However, actual connections between stations are peer-to-peer.
100.It monitor mode
101In this mode the driver is able to receive packets without
102associating with an access point.
103This disables the internal receive filter and enables the card to
104capture packets from networks which it wouldn't normally have access to,
105or to scan for access points.
106.El
107.Pp
108The
109.Nm
110driver can be configured to use hardware
111Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP).
112It is strongly recommended that WEP
113not be used as the sole mechanism
114to secure wireless communication,
115due to serious weaknesses in it.
116.Pp
117The
118.Nm
119driver can be configured at runtime with
120.Xr ifconfig 8
121or on boot with
122.Xr hostname.if 5 .
123.Sh EXAMPLES
124The following
125.Xr hostname.if 5
126example configures an0 to join network
127.Dq mynwid ,
128using WEP key
129.Dq mywepkey ,
130obtaining an IP address using DHCP:
131.Bd -literal -offset indent
132nwid mynwid
133nwkey mywepkey
134dhcp
135.Ed
136.Sh DIAGNOSTICS
137.Bl -diag
138.It "an0: failed to allocate N bytes on NIC"
139The driver was unable to allocate memory for transmit frames in the
140NIC's on-board RAM.
141.It "an0: device timeout"
142The Aironet card failed to generate an interrupt to acknowledge a transmit
143command.
144.El
145.Sh SEE ALSO
146.Xr arp 4 ,
147.Xr ifmedia 4 ,
148.Xr intro 4 ,
149.Xr isapnp 4 ,
150.Xr netintro 4 ,
151.Xr pci 4 ,
152.Xr pcmcia 4 ,
153.Xr hostname.if 5 ,
154.Xr ifconfig 8
155.Sh HISTORY
156The
157.Nm
158device driver first appeared in
159.Fx 4.0 .
160.Ox
161support was added in
162.Ox 2.7 .
163A version of the driver based on the one in
164.Nx
165was added in
166.Ox 3.9 .
167.Sh AUTHORS
168.An -nosplit
169The
170.Nm
171driver was written by
172.An Bill Paul Aq Mt wpaul@ee.columbia.edu
173and ported to
174.Ox
175by
176.An Michael Shalayeff Aq Mt mickey@openbsd.org .
177Later the
178.Nx
179version of the driver by
180.An Atsushi Onoe
181was subsequently ported to
182.Ox
183by
184.An Jonathan Gray Aq Mt jsg@openbsd.org .
185.Sh CAVEATS
186Scanning for access points is not currently supported.
187