FreeBSD Wireless

Welcome to the FreeBSD 802.11 wireless protocol and driver overview.

If you're having problems with setting up a wireless connection on your machine then check out FAQ.

• 11a, 11b, 11g, 11n operating modes
• Half (10MHz) and Quarter (5MHz) support for supported chipsets
• WifiTDMA - TDMA support for supported chipsets
• WifiQos - WMM/WME - Wireless multi-media extensions
• WifiDFS - Dynamic Frequency Selection / Radar interoperability support
• Hostap, Station, WiFiAdhoc, Monitor modes
• Atheros 802.11a Turbo mode (on supported chipsets)
• Atheros 802.11g TurboG mode (on supported chipsets)
• WifiFastFrames - Atheros Fast-Frames support
• Multi-SSID hostap mode
• WEP, WPA support
• AES-CCMP, TKIP support
• Hardware encryption offload
• 802.11s WifiMesh - initial support, under development
• WifiAggressiveMode Support to improve best effort traffic performance in QoS BSSes
• WiFi80211n - 802.11n STA, Hostap modes
• WiFiDebugging - Quite extensive debugging, logging and statistics
• WifiPowerSave - client side power saving support for chipsets and drivers that support it
• RateControl - rate control API
• A-MSDU transmit support

• ath/ath_hal 802.11n TX aggregation/blockack support
• 802.11s mesh support
• Radar detection / TPC support
• Ralink 802.11n chipset support
• WiFiLockIssues - stack and driver locking and locking issues

Please see DeviceDrivers for further information. Please note, this isn't (yet) an exhaustive list.

• WiFiRegulatory - net80211 regulatory domain support
• Regulatory Requirements
• Per-driver support (TODO)
  • if_ath regulatory support (TODO)

These may have some funding available to implement. Please contact freebsd-wireless@freebsd.org if you think you're able to code up one of these!

Main ideas page: WifiIdeasPage. Unsorted ideas page: WifiTodoStuff.

• 80211ac - initial 802.11ac support

• Flesh out more 802.11n extensions to net80211
• Migrate the software A-MPDU management from various drivers (notably iwn(4), ath(4)) into net80211
• Migrate out the atheros sample rate module into net80211
• Teach if_ath and other drivers about the net80211 TX rate control code
• 802.11n DFS support
• 802.11h TPC support (driver support, related IEs)
• 802.11h channel survey support (RX signal strength histogram, related IEs)
• Channel steering support - ie, steering 2/5ghz capable clients to 5ghz SSIDs
• 802.11n IBSS support
• 802.11n mesh (11s) support
• 802.11 wireless access in vehicular environments support (802.11p)
• FixUpThings Fix up known things that we need for 802.11-2012 / 802.11ac-2013

Here's a variety of random developer notes!

• WiFiBringUp - Bringing up an 802.11 driver (currently only coveres bringing up 11n support)
• WifiTxNotes - net80211 transmit and receive path related notes, mostly to look at concurrency issues

Please contact freebsd-wireless@freebsd.org for any further information.