NAME

wpa_supplicant —

WPA/802.11i Supplicant for wireless network devices

SYNOPSIS

wpa_supplicant [-BdhKLqstuvW] [-b br_ifname] -c config-file [-C ctrl] [-D driver] [-f debug file] [-g global ctrl] -i ifname [-o override driver] [-O override ctrl] [-P pid file] [-N -i ifname -c config-file [-C ctrl] [-D -driver] [-p driver_param] [-b br_ifname] ...]

DESCRIPTION

The wpa_supplicant utility is an implementation of the WPA Supplicant component, i.e., the part that runs in the client stations. It implements WPA key negotiation with a WPA Authenticator and EAP authentication with an Authentication Server. In addition, wpa_supplicant controls the roaming and IEEE 802.11 authentication/association support of the wlan(4) module and can be used to configure static WEP keys based on identified networks.

The wpa_supplicant utility is designed to be a “daemon” program that runs in the background and acts as the backend component controlling the wireless connection. It supports separate frontend programs such as the text-based wpa_cli(8) program.

The following arguments must be specified on the command line:

-i ifname: Use the specified wireless interface.
-c config-file: Use the settings in the specified configuration file when managing the wireless interface. See wpa_supplicant.conf(5) for a description of the configuration file syntax and contents.
Changes to the configuration file can be reloaded by sending a SIGHUP to the wpa_supplicant process or with the wpa_cli(8) utility, using “wpa_cli reconfigure”.

OPTIONS

The following options are available:

-b: Optional bridge interface name.
-B: Detach from the controlling terminal and run as a daemon process in the background.
-d: Enable debugging messages. If this option is supplied twice, more verbose messages are displayed.
-D: Driver name (can be multiple drivers: nl80211,wext).
-f: Log output to debug file instead of stdout.
-g: Global ctrl_interface.
-h: Show help text.
-K: Include key information in debugging output.
-L: Display the license for this program on the terminal and exit.
-N: Start describing a new interface.
-o: Overrides driver parameter for new interfaces.
-O: Override ctrl_interface parameter for new interfaces.
-p: Specify driver parameters.
-P: File in which to save the process PID.
-q: Decrease debugging verbosity (i.e., counteract the use of the -d flag).
-s: Send log messages through syslog(3) instead of to the terminal.
-t: Include timestamp in debug messages.
-v: Display version information on the terminal and exit.
-W: Wait for a control interface monitor before starting.

HISTORY

The wpa_supplicant utility first appeared in FreeBSD 6.0.

AUTHORS

The wpa_supplicant utility was written by Jouni Malinen <j@w1.fi>. This manual page is derived from the README file included in the wpa_supplicant distribution.