This entry contains archives of firmwares specifically for Atheros devices. They have been compiled and mostly tested by me. Don’t hold me responsible if it breaks your device. Do take note that you would need to install the webif and configure the wireless (/etc/config/wireless).

Installation of webif (x-wrt) can be found here

Revision 7219
Revision 7183

Decided to toy with OpenWRT kamikaze on the FON. Noticed that there is x-wrt for for it! So swapped out my dd-wrt on FON and put in the latest build of OpenWRT kamikaze!

First thing to do after placing the OpenWRT in? SSH back into the device and start editing the necessary configuration files.

root@OpenWrt: ~# vi /etc/config/firewall

add in the following 2 entries at the end of the file

accept:proto=tcp dport=22
accept:dport=80

Then edit the configuration file for network setting

root@OpenWrt: ~# vi /etc/config/network

mine looks like this

# Copyright (C) 2006 OpenWrt.org

config interface loopback
option ifname lo
option proto static
option ipaddr 127.0.0.1
option netmask 255.0.0.0

config interface lan
option type bridge
option ifname eth0
option proto dhcp
option hostname Fonera

save the file and then reboot the device!

This time hook it up to your main router so that it connects with the internet.

Now SSH into the router after it has rebooted (through the dhcp-ed address) and then issue the command

root@OpenWrt: ~# ipkg install http://downloads.x-wrt.org/xwrt/kamikaze/atheros-2.6/webif_latest.ipk

On the next reboot, you will have webif! Have fun with OpenWRT on FON.

Regularly check out if there are newer builds of x-wrt. You can force install it by

root@OpenWrt: ~# ipkg install http://downloads.x-wrt.org/xwrt/kamikaze/atheros-2.6/webif_latest.ipk -force-reinstall

Yes! It’s OpenWRT (kamikaze). Since it doesn’t come with webif (web interface) at the moment hence you will need to do all configuration through SSH. <caution>It is not for the faint hearted.</caution>

Preparation Steps
* You must be able to access SSH on your FON (code injection trick will work fine)
* You need a working TFTP server installed on your PC
* Putty
* Cross ethernet cable
* The required firmwares for OpenWRT (kamikaze) [firmware version] [changelog]
* http://ipkg.fonera.info/flasheo/openwrt-atheros-2.6-root.jffs2-64k
* http://ipkg.fonera.info/flasheo/openwrt-atheros-2.6-vmlinux.lzma

Step 0
Connect your FON router to the internet at the same time able to connect to the SSH of your FON. e.g. Placing the FON behind your current router. Or connecting through wireless.

Step 1
SSH into the FON router and execute the following commands

root@OpenWrt: ~# cd /tmp
root@OpenWrt: ~# wget http://fonera.info/camicia/openwrt-ar531x-2.4-vmlinux-CAMICIA.lzma
root@OpenWrt: ~# mtd -e vmlinux.bin.l7 write openwrt-ar531x-2.4-vmlinux-CAMICIA.lzma vmlinux.bin.l7
root@OpenWrt: ~# reboot

Wait for FON to boot.

Step 2
SSH into the FON router (again) and execute the following commands. The following commands configures your RedBoot for access via the ethernet port so that you can flash without a RS232-to-TTL convertor.

root@OpenWrt: ~# cd /tmp
root@OpenWrt: ~# wget http://fonera.info/camicia/out.hex
root@OpenWrt: ~# mtd -e “RedBoot config” write out.hex “RedBoot config”
root@OpenWrt: ~# reboot

Once the above procedures are completed, you can unplug the power cord of FON and connect your Fonera to your PC via a cross ethernet cable.

Configure your system to use an Internet Protocol (IP) address on the 192.168.1.0/24 network (but not 192.168.1.254 as your Fonera is configured to use this address for RedBoot). e.g. configure your system to use 192.168.1.100 and subnetmask 255.255.255.0. (for this guide I will use 192.168.1.100).

Test the connectivity by pinging 192.168.1.254, if everything is connected correctly, you would be able to get ping replies from the Fonera. Open up Putty and connect to 192.168.1.254, port 9000 using Telnet. If it goes well, you would see the “RedBoot>” prompt and you can proceed to the next step.

Make sure you have set up the TFTP server by now and the 2 files for flashing the firmware is located in the root folder of your TFTP server. It simply means that if you selected “C:\Downloads\” as the root folder for TFTP server, the 2 files you have downloaded earlier should be in “C:\Downloads\” as well. (C:\Downloads\openwrt-atheros-2.6-root.jffs2-64k and C:\Downloads\openwrt-atheros-2.6-vmlinux.lzma)

Step 3
After you see “RedBoot>”, the next step is to configure where it loads the firmware from. Issue the following command:

RedBoot> ip_address -l 192.168.1.254/24 -h 192.168.1.100

Now with all the configurations done, it is time to start flashing the router! Flashing will take 10 to 20 minutes so don’t be alarmed if it seems to be hanging.

Step 4
With your telnet connection you have established earlier on using Putty (connected to 192.168.1.254, port 9000), we will issue a few more commands to instruct the router to get the files from your TFTP server and start flashing. Do take note the 3rd command takes a very long time to complete and the leds on the router will stay on and hence gives the impression that the FON hung, but it isn’t. Take a break and go down to get some coffee, who knows it might be done when you are back.

RedBoot> fis init
RedBoot> load -r -v -b 0×80040450 openwrt-atheros-2.6-root.jffs2-64k
RedBoot> fis create -b 0×80040450 -f 0xA8030000 -l 0×00700000 -e 0×00000000 rootfs
RedBoot> load -r -b %{FREEMEMLO} openwrt-atheros-2.6-vmlinux.lzma
RedBoot> fis create -r 0×80041000 -e 0×80041000 vmlinux.bin.l7
RedBoot> fis load -l vmlinux.bin.l7
RedBoot> exec

Final step would be setting your system network to use DHCP instead of 192.168.1.100/24 earlier on. Wait for the FON to fully bootup and then connect your system to the FON through a cross cable. Check your IP configurations and FON should be using 192.168.1.1. So do a telnet to 192.168.1.1 and set the password for root account.

root@OpenWrt: ~# passwd root

So what’s next? SSH to your FON, logging in as root with the password you just set. Start doing the configurations you need by editing the files in “/etc/config”

Check out the trackbacks, a guide to add webif (web interface) to the OpenWRT has been written.

Got a piece of WRT54GS recently. It came with 32mb of ram. 16mb more ram than my current WRT54G! More ram = more stable? Something to be proven. At least, it is more stable for kismet.

After changing the firmware to OpenWRT (WhiteRussians), I was overwhelmed by the number of modified linux packages available for the system! I started installing lots of stuffs (using IPKG) and soon meet a deadend to my exploration. Insufficient disk space on the ‘/jffs’ mount. With some basic knowledge of Linux (knowledge courtesy of CS2106 – Operating Systems), I fiddled with samba and soon was on my way to explore more packages for the system. Below is my current disk status.

root@OpenWrt:~# df -h
Filesystem	Size	Used	Available	Use%	Mounted on
/dev/root	896.0k	896.0k	0	100%	/rom
none	7.0M	24.0k	7.0M	0%	/tmp
/dev/mtdblock/4	2.3M	1000.0k	1.3M	42%	/jffs
/jffs	896.0k	896.0k	0	100%	/
//192.168.168.10/ddwrt$	2.0G	14.5M	2.0G	1%	/tmp/samba

It is pretty simple to do all this.

Stuffs needed:

1.	Basic Linux knowledge (for SSH, editing of files and typing of commands)
2.	An available network share (full permission) with known username and password, server ip of the share and share name
3.	A WRT54G router with dd-wrt or openwrt firmware

Firstly, ensure that the needed packages for mapping network shares are installed

root@OpenWrt:~# ipkg list_installed | grep ^kmod-cifs
kmod-cifs – 2.4.30-brcm-5 – Kernel modules for CIFS support
root@OpenWrt:~#

If nothing is returned, install it

root@OpenWrt:~# ipkg install kmod-cifs

Try mapping the network share over,

root@OpenWrt:~# mkdir /tmp/samba
root@OpenWrt:~# mount -t cifs //<server ip>/<share name> /tmp/samba -o unc=\\\\<server ip>\\<share name>,user=<username>,pass=<password>

Now try writing to /tmp/samba and see if everything works fine. If you can write to and read from a file in /tmp/samba means that everything is working fine for you.

Bad news: stuffs on /tmp get wiped out every reboot. Means that samba folder would be gone and you would to type the two commands above everytime you reboot your router.

Good news: Custom startup script to the rescue!

You can either edit the startup script through the webif (web management) or through SSH. Add the following entries

1.	mkdir /tmp/samba &
2.	mount -t cifs //<server ip>/<share name> /tmp/samba -o unc=\\\\<server ip>\\<share name>,user=<username>,pass=<password> &
3.	echo dest smbfs /tmp/samba >> /etc/ipkg.conf &

Then type the following commands in the shell, just setting the PATH and LD_LIBRARY_PATH locations.

1.	root@OpenWrt:~# echo export PATH=$PATH:/tmp/samba/bin:/tmp/samba/sbin:/tmp/samba/usr/bin:/tmp/samba/usr/sbin >> /etc/profile
2.	root@OpenWrt:~# echo export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/lib:/usr/lib:/tmp/samba/lib:/tmp/samba/usr/lib >> /etc/profile

Remember to fill in the the required file denoted by < and > symbols. The last three commands is to allow you to install to your new samba drive as well as running applications off the samba drive. The startup script would help you run these everytime you reboot! Good news isn’t it?

Things to take note though, library files are best installed to jffs while others you can install onto your new samba (destination smbfs).

What do I meant by installing library files onto jffs? An example of installing a package (bitchx – IRC Client)

root@OpenWrt:~# ipkg info bitchx
Package: bitchx
Version: 1.1-1
Depends: libncurses
Status: install user installed
Section: net
Architecture: mipsel
maintainer: OpenWrt Developers Team
MD5Sum: 5d48b3a20fe8bc8849371a84ee5aed30
Size: 719661
Filename: bitchx_1.1-1_mipsel.ipk
Source: packages/net/bitchx
Description: popular IRC client

Successfully terminated.

Library packages starts with lib. Rule of (shadowandy’s) thumb, install libncurses (in this case) before installing bitchx package.

root@OpenWrt:~# ipkg install libncurses
root@OpenWrt:~# ipkg -d smbfs install bitchx

The first line without specifying the -d argument will install to /jffs by default. The second line has got ‘-d smbfs’ specified. Hence installation of the bitchx package will be onto /tmp/samba. Don’t understand why I do it this way? Try it yourself. Install everything onto smbfs will cause library linking problems. For simple packages, simply renaming works. For bigger ones, more stuffs need to be done inorder to make it work.

Time to explore more packages!