Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

tv_m3i · 2018-01-30 10:51:38

Good morning,

I've just started using NetworkManager (and Arch!) and it's doing a very good job of detecting ethernet when I plug/unplug the ethernet adaptor. The `nmcli` tool nicely shows devices corresponding to my ethernet adaptor/wireless card and nearby wireless networks.

My problem is that I am unable to actually connect to any wireless network and never have been. I've tried connecting to a number of different WiFi networks (home, mobile hotspot, work) all with the same result. I've tried doing this in two ways:

1) With `nmcli`:

# nmcli dev wifi connect <SSID> password <password>
Error: Connection activation failed: (7) Secrets were required, but not provided.

2) `nmtui` > Activate a connection > Select my network > wait while it says "Connecting..." > enter password
- error dialog: "Could not activate connection: Activation failed: Secrets were required, but not provided"

As shown above, both of these fail with the error "Secrets were required, but not provided". However, I don't understand what this means. As the user, I don't think I was ever prompted for secrets, aside from a password which I entered in `nmtui`, and the error doesn't give me any indication of where else the secrets would come from (some config file?). The docs on the Arch wiki suggest that configuration is automatic. (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wireless_network_configuration#Automatic_setup suggests that I don't need to do any manual configuration of wpa_supplicant if I'm using a connection manager; i.e. NetworkManager with nmcli/nmtui.)

My immediate question is, what does this error mean? Then, how do I resolve it to successfully connect to a wireless network?

Information: I'm on a MacBookPro14,3 with a Broadcom BCM43602. Driver is brcmfmac. Linux kernel 4.14.13. Pacman 5.0.2, NetworkManager 1.10.3dev+38+g78ef57197, wpa_supplicant 2.6. NetworkManager.conf is empty. I have no file /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf.

Notes:
- I've read the man pages for NetworkManager and wpa_supplicant
- My friend was previously using Arch and NetworkManager and she was able to connect to the home network.
- My coworkers have no trouble connecting to the work network with macOS and Linux devices.
- I can connect to the work and home networks in macOS, Android, Windows, etc.

Small questions:
- the wpa_supplicant man page mentions "BSS". Is that the Wi-Fi network? (From https://www.freebsd.org/doc/handbook/ne … less.html)
- the wpa_supplicant man page says it "selects a BSS based on its configuration" but AFAIK I haven't given it any configuration. I'm selecting the network with the argument I pass to nmcli. My understanding is that nmcli talks to NetworkManager.service and NetworkManager sits between the network driver and wpa_supplicant. Am I confused here?

mrunion · 2018-01-30 12:51:58

Read the Wiki and follow it's instructions on manually connecting to a network. See where the process fails and then address the issue at that point:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wi … figuration

tv_m3i · 2018-01-30 23:11:26

Thanks!

I've followed the steps in https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wi … nual_setup and the `wpa_supplicant` command seems to contradict itself by showing an error message, returning 0, but failing to successfully perform the association.

# ip link set wlp3s0 up
# ip link show wlp3s0
2: wlp3s0: <NO-CARRIER,BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP> mtu 1500 qdisc fq_codel state DOWN mode DORMANT group default qlen 1000
    link/ether 00:40:5a:1e:a3:e9 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
# wpa_supplicant -B -i wlp3s0 -c <(wpa_passphrase MY_SSID MY_PW)
Successfully initialized wpa_supplicant
Failed to create interface p2p-dev-wlp3s0: -16 (Device or resource busy)
nl80211: Failed to create P2P Device interface p2p-dev-wlp3s0
P2P: Failed to enable P2P Device interface
# echo $?
0

There are no further logs in `journalctl -u wpa_supplicant`. How can I investigate the "-16 (Device or resource busy)" error?

Notes:
- Read the man page for iw
- Found https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=213013, which suggested that the problem was conflicting services, NetworkManager, and systemd-networkd. However, in my case, `systemctl list-unit-files --type=service | rg enabled` only shows autovt@.service, display-manager.service, getty@.service, lightdm.service, NetworkManager.service, and wpa_supplicant@.service
- Stopping wpa_supplicant.service and NetworkManager.service and re-running the wpa_supplicand command doesn't show the "P2P: Failed to enable P2P Device interface" error, but again, the association does not appear to have worked according to `iw dev wlp3s0 link`.

Slithery · 2018-01-30 23:17:26

Stopping the NetworkManager service doesn't necessarily bring the interface down. Disable all of the networking services, reboot, then try and connect manually.

tv_m3i · 2018-01-30 23:39:49

I've just restarted, verified that no networking services are enabled, and re-ran the commands. Now I simply get:

# wpa_supplicant -B -i wlp3s0 -c <(wpa_passphrase MY_SSID MY_PW)
Successfully initialized wpa_supplicant
# echo $?
0

But, the association still fails; `iw dev wlp3s0 link` prints "Not connected."

Adding the -dd flag prints out "nl80211: Failed to set interface 0 to mode 10: -22 (Invalid argument)."

Last edited by tv_m3i (2018-01-31 00:44:59)

br4no · 2019-09-13 20:26:05

Hello everyone!

!!!!!! Edit: sorry, wrong thread.... !!!!!!

I've recently finished a fresh new installation of archlinux + gnome. I only quite hardly remember how to setup everything around since I installed arch for the last time aprox 7 yeas ago... I came to exactly this problem, at least according to the nmcli log:

Error: Connection activation failed: (7) Secrets were required, but not provided.

I have only network manager installed, no other services to fight with.

In my case I've found the solution myself. The only thing I did is that I went to my router settings and changed SSID name from "Kralicek" to "kralicek" and voila I can connect. So, in my case the SSID cannot contain (or start with) upper case letter. I have tried also completelly different names which were starting with upper case. None of them worked and it always returned the above error. Whatever SSID starting with lower case works......

I hope that maybe I may save someones time by posting this comment even when the cause might be always different...

Can anybody explain why the naming can be an issue?

Thanks,
Bye

Last edited by br4no (2019-09-13 20:28:29)

WorMzy · 2019-09-13 20:38:33

Please don't necrobump and/or copy-paste your message into every topic vaguely relating to your problem.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Co … bumping%22

Closing.

Arch Linux

#1 2018-01-30 10:51:38

Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#2 2018-01-30 12:51:58

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#3 2018-01-30 23:11:26

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#4 2018-01-30 23:17:26

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#5 2018-01-30 23:39:49

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#6 2019-09-13 20:26:05

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

#7 2019-09-13 20:38:33

Re: Unable to connect to any wifi network with NetworkManager

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