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NAME

       Wicd - Wired and Wireless Network Connection Manager

THEORY OF OPERATION

       Wicd  is  designed  to  give  the user as much control over behavior of
       network  connections  as  possible.   Every  network,  both  wired  and
       wireless,  has  its  own profile with its own configuration options and
       connection behavior.  Wicd will try to automatically  connect  only  to
       networks the user specifies it should try, with a preference first to a
       wired network, then to wireless.

       For wired connections, users have many  options  for  determining  what
       network  settings  to use.  Wicd allows creation of an unlimited number
       of wired profiles, each of which has its own unique settings.  The user
       can  choose  to  automatically  connect  to a selected default profile,
       choose a profile from a pop-up window every time wicd connects, or have
       wicd automatically choose the last profile used to manually connect.

       For  wireless  connections,  users  can  select  any number of wireless
       networks to automatically connect; wicd will choose the  one  with  the
       highest signal strength to try to connect.

       If  the  user chooses, wicd will try to automatically reconnect when it
       detects that a connection is lost.  If the last known connection  state
       is wired, wicd will first try to reconnect to the wired network, and if
       it is not available, wicd will  try  any  available  wireless  networks
       which  have automatic connection enabled.  If the last known connection
       state is wireless, wicd will first try to reconnect to  the  previously
       connected  network  (even  if  that  network  does  not  have automatic
       connection enabled), and should that fail, it will  try  both  a  wired
       connection  and  any  available  wireless networks which have automatic
       connection enabled.

       Wicd uses built-in linux wireless-tools, such as ifconfig and iwconfig,
       to  get  and  configure network info.  There is some flexibility in its
       use of DHCP, providing support for dhclient, dhcpcd,  and  pump.   Wicd
       uses  wpa_supplicant  to  handle  all wireless encryption settings, and
       uses a template-based system to create the configuration files used  by
       wpa_supplicant.   These  templates can be edited, and new templates can
       be created by the user and imported into wicd, allowing  connection  to
       networks with uncommon encryption settings.

STRUCTURE

       Wicd  has two major parts: the daemon, which runs with root privileges;
       and the user interface, which runs with normal  user  privileges.   The
       two  parts  run  as  separate  processes  and  make  use  of  D-Bus  to
       communicate.

       The daemon is  responsible  for  making  and  configuring  connections,
       reading  and  writing  configuration files and logs, and monitoring the
       connection status.  The daemon’s job is split  between  two  processes:
       wicd-daemon.py  and  monitor.py.  All the connection status monitoring,
       as well as the auto-reconnection  logic,  takes  place  in  monitor.py.
       Everthing else is done by wicd-daemon.py.

       The  user  interface  (stored  in wicd-gtk), which is made up of a tray
       icon, a main GUI window, and its child dialogs, gets configuration  and
       network info from the daemon either by querying it using the methods in
       the daemon’s dbus interface or by receiving signals  emitted  from  the
       daemon  over  D-Bus.   Any  configuration  changes  made  in  the  user
       interface are passed back to the daemon,  which  actually  applies  the
       changes and writes them to configuration files.

       Since  the user interface just queries for connection and configuration
       info from the daemon, it is possible to run wicd  without  the  GUI  at
       all.   Also,  the daemon is started by wicd’s init script during system
       startup (before any user logs in), making it possible to use wicd  with
       "headless" machines.

USAGE HINTS

       Choosing Alternate Tools
       Wicd  supports  several  alternatives regarding the networking tools on
       linux.  In the "External Programs" tab of the Preferences menu, you can
       choose  your  preferred  DHCP  client, link detection tool, and routing
       tool if the defaults aren’t suitable for your  particular  distribution
       or system.

       Custom Scripts
       If you need to run any custom commands before or after connecting to or
       disconnecting from a network, Wicd supports  this;  however,  you  will
       need to have a graphical sudo helper installed (currently supported are
       kdesu, gksu, and ktsuss). Also see /etc/wicd/scripts/ in FILES.
       If you do not have a graphical sudo helper installed,  you  still  have
       the  ability  to  use  custom scripts, but you will have to set them up
       manually.   See   wicd-wired-settings.conf(5)   and/or   wicd-wireless-
       settings.conf(5) for more information on how to do so.

       Automatically Connecting to Networks
       Wicd  uses  the  BSSID  to  recognize a particular network (and thus to
       decide whether it should automatically connect to it).  If you are on a
       network  that  has many different access points which all have the same
       ESSID (many universities have such networks), there is an option in the
       "Advanced  Settings"  to  "Use  these settings for all networks sharing
       this essid."  With this option enabled, Wicd will autoconnect  to  that
       network, regardless of which node it sees.

FILES

       /etc/wicd/manager-settings.conf
       This file contains global settings for Wicd.
       See this file’s own man page for more information about it.

       /etc/wicd/wired-settings.conf
       This file contains settings related to the wired interface.
       See this file’s own man page for more information about it.

       /etc/wicd/wireless-settings.conf
       This file contains settings related to the wireless interface.
       See this file’s own man page for more information about it.

       /etc/wicd/dhclient.conf.template
       This  is  used  to  replace /etc/dhclient.conf during Wicd activity, if
       you’re using dhclient(1) as DHCP client. See dhclient.conf(5) for  more
       information.

       /etc/wicd/encryption/templates/
       This  directory  contains  various  templates  for encrypted (WEP, WPA,
       etcetera) connections.  If none of them fit your needs, you may  create
       your  own and add it to this directory.  If you do this, please contact
       the authors (see below) of Wicd.

       /etc/wicd/scripts/
       Dropping a script in  the  relevant  directory  will  cause  it  to  be
       executed  when  the  specified  event  is  preformed upon connection or
       disconnect from or to any network. Please note that pre/post disconnect
       scripts   may   be  executed  multiple  times  on  already-disconnected
       interfaces.
       The scripts will be passed different parameters, depending if  Wicd  is
       acting  on  a  wired  or a wireless network. In the former case, "wired
       wired wired" will be passed (three times, just for  compatibility  with
       the  wireless  case).  If Wicd is acting on a wireless network, it will
       pass "wireless ESSID BSSID" to the script.
       Available directories are:
       /etc/wicd/scripts/predisconnect
       /etc/wicd/scripts/postdisconnect
       /etc/wicd/scripts/preconnect
       /etc/wicd/scripts/postconnect

       /var/lib/wicd/configurations/
       This  directory  contains  individual  configuration  files  for   each
       encrypted network you set up in Wicd.

       /var/log/wicd/
       This  directory  contains logfiles of Wicd’s activity.  Please refer to
       the log if you are having connection or other problems.

SEE ALSO

       wicd-manager-settings.conf(5),    wicd-wired-settings.conf(5),    wicd-
       wireless-settings.conf(5),       dhclient.conf(5),      wicd-curses(8),
       ifconfig(8),  iwconfig(8),  wpa_supplicant(8),  route(8),  ip(8),  mii-
       tool(8), ethtool(8), dhclient(8), dhcpcd(8), pump(8).

WICD AUTHORS

       Adam Blackburn <compwiz18@gmail.com>
       Dan O’Reilly <oreilldf@gmail.com>
       Andrew Psaltis <ampsaltis@gmail.com> (curses client)

MANPAGE AUTHOR

       Robby Workman <rworkman@slackware.com>

                                  wicd-1.7.0