(:title "Technotalk")

Today I decided to install Slackware 13.37 into my 3 years old Dell Studio 1435. Ran into the same problem since this laptop is using a Broadcom wireless chip. Here are some of pointers to overcome this.

Beware, I’m running this as root. This post assumes you’ve installed Slackware 13.37.

Wireless

Check what kind of network chip are you using.

#lspci
#09:00.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation NetLink BCM5784M Gigabit Ethernet PCIe (rev 10)
#0b:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY (rev 01)

Head over to Slackbuilds and download the Broadcom drivers. We’re gonna use this. http://slackbuilds.org/repository/13.37/network/broadcom-sta/

Install the broadcom-sta.

After installing, if you run the iwconfig command you’ll get something like this.

# iwconfig
lo         no wireless extensions.
eth0     no wireless extensions.
eth1     IEEE 802.11abg  ESSID:off/any
           Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.437 GHz  Access Point: Not-Associated
           Retry  long limit:7   RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
           Encryption key:off
           Power Management:off

Inside the installation DVD, install wicd which is part of the /extras directory.

Run wicd daemon to start wicd

# /etc/rc.d/rc.wicd start

Run Wicd Network Manager (a GUI application). In the Preferences we need to set these settings

Wireless interface : eth1

Now we can use Wicd Network Manager to connect to our wireless networks.

Putting it here as a reminder. Been having this problem (default installation) since 10.0. Mysql comes default with Slackware as far as I can remember, but somehow not configured by default. Try to run Mysql right after installing and major fail awaits you. So here’s a little short guide on what to do post installation of Slackware 13.1 with Mysql.

• su
• chmod 755 /etc/rc.d/rc.mysqld
• mysql_install_db
• chown -R mysql:mysql /var/lib/mysql
• chmod 755 /etc/rc.d/rc.mysql
• /etc/rc.d/rc.mysqld start
• /usr/bin/mysqladmin -u root password yourpassword
• mysql_secure_installation

I don’t know what triggered this problem, but somehow my sound got screwed. It was ok post installation until recently.

Keep getting this error everywhere where sound is needed (flash, mpg123 etc).

(snd_pcm_dmix_open) unable to open slave

After reading http://slackwiki.org/ALSA, I checked /proc/asound/cards file and found out there were 3 entries. Card 0 refers to USB sound (snd_usb_sound).

Solution?

Add this entry to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

blacklist snd_usb_sound 

 After reboot, sound is back to normal.

Update

Depending on the /proc/asound/cards and lsmod, some will have to use this entry in /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf

blacklist snd_usb_audio

IMHO, it’s how a Linux OS should be, simple and stable. Put whatever you want while knowing more about your hardware as you go. That’s the Linux I first encountered many years ago.

The philosophy is great even after all these years. Sure there are tweaks here and there to do, but remember, the learning process is worth it especially if you’re in the computer/IT industry.

After recent headaches, I’ve decided to ditch Ubuntu for my desktop and return to Slackware. I left Slackware when it was 10.0, after been introduced to Ubuntu 6.06 (Dapper Drake). Many things have been updated, some are still there. I’m using Slackware64 (64 bit) now on a AMD Phenom II X4 machine.

Slack Builds is great, it’s so simple and compiling a package by source is optimized for my machine, even the stock installation feels much more responsive than Ubuntu.

Slackware surely is a distro that feels like home to me.

If you’re looking for something stable, and don’t mind doing some reading, engaging with the community and do some tweaking, then Slackware is worth your time.