[Tfug] Anybody try "wicd" as a replacement for Network Manager?

[Jim March]

On Nov 7, 2007 3:59 PM, Ryan Cresawn <jrcresawn at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> By the way, I am very pleased with Wicd so far.  Network Manager was
> giving me a lot of trouble before and it's great to have replaced it
> with something that works.  It would be nice if Ubuntu would drop
> Network Manager and go with Wicd.
>
> Ryan

The problem with Wicd is that it's "too geeky".

Example: under preferences, you can pick your WPA supplicant.  Mine
defaulted to "wext" with my Intel WiFi, and it seems to work.  But
there's a ton of other choices.  And I sometimes try alternate WiFi
devices (USB, PCMCIA) in order to test them as possibilities for
clients...I tried switching to one, identified it OK in iwconfig but I
had no idea which WPA supplicant type to pick.  Some were obviously
wrong (I know MadWiFi is for Atheros stuff) but others, I don't have a
clue.

And in the "testing" version (currently 1.3.4) we can have scripts
kick off on network connect or disconnect.  Cool, except "Aunt Millie"
wouldn't know WTF to do there and would either yell for help or punch
in God only knows what...

In other words, we need a Wicd "fork" that's simplified for non-geeks.
 Or at a minimum, be able to go from "standard settings" where it
picks the card and WPA supplicant for you, or "advanced" where you get
the current controls.

In other words, Wicd will at present trigger needless support issues
unless there's some serious handholding available up-front.

The people on THIS mailing list can all cope with Wicd no sweat, and I
heartily recommend it.  But I can see that it's just not ready for the
mainstream quite yet.

Jim