blog/Automatically_locate_and_install_required_firmware_packages_on_Debian__Isenkram_0_4_.html

   1 <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
   2           "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
   3 <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" dir="ltr">
   4   <head>
   5     <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />
   6     <title>Petter Reinholdtsen: Automatically locate and install required firmware packages on Debian (Isenkram 0.4)</title>
   7     <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/style.css" />
   8     <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/vim.css" />
   9
  10
  11   </head>
  12   <body>
  13     <div class="title">
  14  <h1>
  15      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  16
  17  </h1>
  18
  19 </div>
  20
  21
  22     <div class="entry">
  23       <div class="title">Automatically locate and install required firmware packages on Debian (Isenkram 0.4)</div>
  24       <div class="date">25th June 2013</div>
  25       <div class="body"><p>It annoys me when the computer fail to do automatically what it is
  26 perfectly capable of, and I have to do it manually to get things
  27 working.  One such task is to find out what firmware packages are
  28 needed to get the hardware on my computer working.  Most often this
  29 affect the wifi card, but some times it even affect the RAID
  30 controller or the ethernet card.  Today I pushed version 0.4 of the
  31 <a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/isenkram">Isenkram package</a>
  32 including a new script isenkram-autoinstall-firmware handling the
  33 process of asking all the loaded kernel modules what firmware files
  34 they want, find debian packages providing these files and install the
  35 debian packages.  Here is a test run on my laptop:</p>
  36
  37 <p><pre>
  38 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
  39 info: kernel drivers requested extra firmware: ipw2200-bss.fw ipw2200-ibss.fw ipw2200-sniffer.fw
  40 info: fetching http://http.debian.net/debian/dists/squeeze/Contents-i386.gz
  41 info: locating packages with the requested firmware files
  42 info: Updating APT sources after adding non-free APT source
  43 info: trying to install firmware-ipw2x00
  44 firmware-ipw2x00
  45 firmware-ipw2x00
  46 Preconfiguring packages ...
  47 Selecting previously deselected package firmware-ipw2x00.
  48 (Reading database ... 259727 files and directories currently installed.)
  49 Unpacking firmware-ipw2x00 (from .../firmware-ipw2x00_0.28+squeeze1_all.deb) ...
  50 Setting up firmware-ipw2x00 (0.28+squeeze1) ...
  51 #
  52 </pre></p>
  53
  54 <p>When all the requested firmware is present, a simple message is
  55 printed instead:</p>
  56
  57 <p><pre>
  58 # isenkram-autoinstall-firmware
  59 info: did not find any firmware files requested by loaded kernel modules.  exiting
  60 #
  61 </pre></p>
  62
  63 <p>It could use some polish, but it is already working well and saving
  64 me some time when setting up new machines. :)</p>
  65
  66 <p>So, how does it work?  It look at the set of currently loaded
  67 kernel modules, and look up each one of them using modinfo, to find
  68 the firmware files listed in the module meta-information.  Next, it
  69 download the Contents file from a nearby APT mirror, and search for
  70 the firmware files in this file to locate the package with the
  71 requested firmware file.  If the package is in the non-free section, a
  72 non-free APT source is added and the package is installed using
  73 <tt>apt-get install</tt>.  The end result is a slightly better working
  74 machine.</p>
  75
  76 <p>I hope someone find time to implement a more polished version of
  77 this script as part of the hw-detect debian-installer module, to
  78 finally fix <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/655507">BTS report
  79 #655507</a>.  There really is no need to insert USB sticks with
  80 firmware during a PXE install when the packages already are available
  81 from the nearby Debian mirror.</p>
  82 </div>
  83
  84       <div class="tags">Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram</a>.</div>
  85
  86
  87     </div>
  88
  89
  90
  91
  92     <div id="sidebar">
  93
  94
  95
  96 <h2>Archive</h2>
  97 <ul>
  98
  99 <li>2016
 100 <ul>
 101
 102 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
 103
 104 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
 105
 106 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
 107
 108 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
 109
 110 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
 111
 112 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (1)</a></li>
 113
 114 </ul></li>
 115
 116 <li>2015
 117 <ul>
 118
 119 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 120
 121 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 122
 123 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
 124
 125 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
 126
 127 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 128
 129 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
 130
 131 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
 132
 133 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
 134
 135 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
 136
 137 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 138
 139 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
 140
 141 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 142
 143 </ul></li>
 144
 145 <li>2014
 146 <ul>
 147
 148 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 149
 150 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
 151
 152 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
 153
 154 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 155
 156 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
 157
 158 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 159
 160 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
 161
 162 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
 163
 164 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 165
 166 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
 167
 168 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 169
 170 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
 171
 172 </ul></li>
 173
 174 <li>2013
 175 <ul>
 176
 177 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
 178
 179 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
 180
 181 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
 182
 183 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
 184
 185 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 186
 187 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
 188
 189 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 190
 191 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 192
 193 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 194
 195 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
 196
 197 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
 198
 199 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 200
 201 </ul></li>
 202
 203 <li>2012
 204 <ul>
 205
 206 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 207
 208 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
 209
 210 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
 211
 212 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
 213
 214 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
 215
 216 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
 217
 218 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
 219
 220 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 221
 222 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
 223
 224 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
 225
 226 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
 227
 228 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 229
 230 </ul></li>
 231
 232 <li>2011
 233 <ul>
 234
 235 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
 236
 237 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 238
 239 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
 240
 241 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 242
 243 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 244
 245 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 246
 247 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 248
 249 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 250
 251 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
 252
 253 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 254
 255 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 256
 257 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
 258
 259 </ul></li>
 260
 261 <li>2010
 262 <ul>
 263
 264 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 265
 266 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
 267
 268 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
 269
 270 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
 271
 272 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 273
 274 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
 275
 276 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
 277
 278 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
 279
 280 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
 281
 282 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 283
 284 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
 285
 286 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
 287
 288 </ul></li>
 289
 290 <li>2009
 291 <ul>
 292
 293 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
 294
 295 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
 296
 297 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
 298
 299 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
 300
 301 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 302
 303 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
 304
 305 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
 306
 307 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 308
 309 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
 310
 311 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 312
 313 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 314
 315 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 316
 317 </ul></li>
 318
 319 <li>2008
 320 <ul>
 321
 322 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
 323
 324 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 325
 326 </ul></li>
 327
 328 </ul>
 329
 330
 331
 332 <h2>Tags</h2>
 333 <ul>
 334
 335  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
 336
 337  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
 338
 339  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
 340
 341  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
 342
 343  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
 344
 345  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (15)</a></li>
 346
 347  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
 348
 349  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
 350
 351  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (130)</a></li>
 352
 353  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (156)</a></li>
 354
 355  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
 356
 357  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (15)</a></li>
 358
 359  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (22)</a></li>
 360
 361  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
 362
 363  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (320)</a></li>
 364
 365  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
 366
 367  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
 368
 369  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (27)</a></li>
 370
 371  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
 372
 373  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (17)</a></li>
 374
 375  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
 376
 377  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
 378
 379  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (12)</a></li>
 380
 381  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (19)</a></li>
 382
 383  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
 384
 385  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
 386
 387  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
 388
 389  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
 390
 391  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
 392
 393  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (38)</a></li>
 394
 395  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (7)</a></li>
 396
 397  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (275)</a></li>
 398
 399  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (181)</a></li>
 400
 401  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (26)</a></li>
 402
 403  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
 404
 405  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (60)</a></li>
 406
 407  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (92)</a></li>
 408
 409  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
 410
 411  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
 412
 413  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
 414
 415  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
 416
 417  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (9)</a></li>
 418
 419  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
 420
 421  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (4)</a></li>
 422
 423  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
 424
 425  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (46)</a></li>
 426
 427  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
 428
 429  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (4)</a></li>
 430
 431  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (49)</a></li>
 432
 433  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (4)</a></li>
 434
 435  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (10)</a></li>
 436
 437  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (36)</a></li>
 438
 439  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (2)</a></li>
 440
 441  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
 442
 443  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
 444
 445  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (57)</a></li>
 446
 447  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
 448
 449  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (38)</a></li>
 450
 451 </ul>
 452
 453
 454     </div>
 455     <p style="text-align: right">
 456  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
 457 </p>
 458
 459   </body>
 460 </html>