Creating a wireless ad-hoc network on linux is a fairly simple task. The only problem might be with the wifi device drivers as some may not support this feature. Make sure the normal wifi connection ( connection to an access point) works. If you have two Machines A and B this is what you would do.
Step 1: Change wifi interface configuration to ad-hoc
On both machines.
1 2 | iwconfig wlan0 mode Ad-hoc iwconfig wlan0 essid MyWifi |
You can also set other options such as encrypting with the iwconfig command. Check man iwconfig
In my case, the mode change command gives a resource busy error if wlan0 interface is up. That is, if you can see wlan0 when you do ifconfig, then your wifi interface is up. Here is what I get:
1 2 | Error for wireless request "Set Mode" (8B06) : SET failed on device wlan0 ; Device or resource busy. |
The only way I found around this problem is to do the iwconfig commands before I configure the wifi interface with ifconfig.
Step 2: Set the IP addresses
On Machine A:
1 | ifconfig wlan0 192.168.1.1 netmask 255.255.255.0 |
On Machine B:
1 | ifconfig wlan0 192.168.1.2 netmask 255.255.255.0 |
You can choose different IP addresses but make sure you have the right subnet mask.
You should be set. You can now ping.
The ping did not work in my case. Suggestions?
You will need to give me more details about your setup such as your wifi cards