Nico's blog

wpa_supplicant and open wifi networks on FreeBSD

I struggled a bit to connect to an open wifi on my FreeBSD laptop

My FreeBSD Wifi setup

I haven't bothered installing a Wifi management tool on my FreeBSD Lenovo T440p laptop, since I want to keep the desktop environment as minimal as possible.

I successfully connect to protected Wifi networks, by updating my /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf file, with something like:

network={
    ssid="<SSID_NAME>"
    scan_ssid=0
    psk="<PASSWORD>"
    priority=100
}

and playing with the priority - highest priority wins (as in: 150 wins over 100).

Open Wifi networks

The problem

When trying the above with an open Wifi network, it would not connect.
What I did was just removing the line with psk.

The solution

It turns out you just need to play with the key_mgmt directive, and set it to NONE:

network={
    ssid="@Hyatt_WiFi"
    scan_ssid=0
    key_mgmt=NONE
    priority=50
}

Then restart your network with

service netif restart

And you'll be connected to the configured open Wifi network!

Tags: IT, FreeBSD