How to Get Wireless Network On Ubuntu Server

What you will need:
-A working Windows XP driver for the wireless card that you are going to use (the only files you will use are the .sys and .inf file for the driver) *note: if you only have an .exe for the driver, extract the .sys and .inf file from the .exe using winzip
*note: I am using the sudo text editor to edit the files stated in this tutorial. If it is not installed on your system you can install it with this command: sudo apt-get install nano

Download ndiswrapper from here: ndiswrapper on Sourceforge.net

Note: New ndiswrapper for kernel 2.6.30 -> http://osdir.com/ml/linux-kernel/2009-06/msg07326.html

extract the ndiswrapper file in your home directory
$ sudo tar -xzvf ndiswrapper-1.54.tar.gz

change to the extracted folder
$ cd ndiswrapper-1.54

install the file
$ sudo make
$ sudo make install

if ubuntu was able to detect the wireless card but could not use it, disable the native Ubuntu driver by editing the blacklisted drivers file /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

$ sudo nano /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist

add this to the end of the file:

#broadcom wireless driver that does not work
blacklist bcm43xx

copy the .sys and .inf files that came with the Windows driver into a folder in your home directory. Switch to that folder and enter this command

$ sudo ndiswrapper -i driver_name.inf

*replace driver_name with the proper name of the file

check to see that the driver is installed
$ sudo ndiswrapper -l

you should get a response similar to:
sis163u : driver installed
device (07D1:3C05) present (alternate driver: asix)

Set the ndiswrapper to load the new driver automatically type this command:

$ sudo ndiswrapper -m

Then edit the file /etc/modules

$ sudo nano /etc/modules

and adding this to the end of it

ndiswrapper

*make sure to press enter after typing that line

Restart your system and the driver should be fully functional

For further ndiswrapper reference, check the Ultimate ndiswrapper guide
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To get WPA working
Also see this guide here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=202834

Make sure wireless-tools is installed, if not:
$ sudo apt-get install wireless-tools

Verify your network devices is working and wireless networks are detected
$ iwconfig

$ sudo iwlist scan

Make sure wpa-supplicant is installed, if not:
$ sudo apt-get install wpasupplicant

Convert your WPA ASCII password to hex:
$ wpa_passphrase

When it says #reading passphrase from stdin, enter your WPA ASCII password
Copy down the value after “psk=” that is the hex version of your WPA ASCII password

Using dhcp and WPA here is what is added to the /etc/network/interfaces file

#The wireless interface
auto wlan0
iface wlan0 inet dhcp
wpa-ssid <SSID of your router>
wpa-ap-scan 1
wpa-key-mgmt WPA-PSK
wpa-psk <PSK that you wrote down>


*note wlan0 is the name of the wireless interface in this example

Restart the network
$ sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart

revoke read-permission from others on the file /etc/network/interfaces

$ sudo chmod 0=-r /etc/network/interfaces

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