Linux Distro For Linksys WRT54G

scubacuda writes "Here is a tiny Linux distro for the Linksys wrt54g (d/l the distro here). In just a few seconds, you can give your access point's ramdisk syslog, telnetd, httpd (with cgi-bin support), vi, snort, mount, insmod, rmmod, top, grep, etc." Interesting -- "The script installs strictly to the ram disk of the box. No permanent changes are made. If you mess something up, power-cycle it."

article in case of slashdotting...

[Anonymous Coward]

yeah i was looking and i hit refresh and his counter jumped about 200 hits in a couple seconds so heres the article in case slashdot kills another site:

Jim Buzbee
September 05 2003

Mini wrt54g distribution Version 0.1

This is a mini Linux distribution for the Linksys wrt54g. In about 20 seconds, you can install a small set of Linux tools to your access point's ramdisk.

Upon completion of the installation, you will have a system with basic tools such as syslog, telnetd, httpd (with cgi-bin support), vi, snort, mount, insmod, rmmod, top, grep, etc.

To install, modify the script wrt54g.sh for your ip address and password. By default the script uses Java to move files to the wrt54g. If you would prefer wget, uncomment the wget lines in the script. I had a problem with older version of wget translating escaped characters before passing the URL on to the server. Your mileage may vary.

The distribution has been tested on firmware version v1.30.7, Jul. 8, 2003. The installation has been tested on Linux and OSX

The script installs strictly to the ram disk of the box. No permanent changes are made. If you mess something up, power-cycle it.

Upon successful execution of the script, you will be able to telnet to your box and start exploring its capabilities. Note that there is no login prompt, you telnet directly in as root. Be careful.

An alternate web server is installed on port 8000 of the box.

The nfs drivers are not loaded by default If you would like to mount a nfs disk, insmod the drivers from /var/modules/ in the following order : sunrpc.o, lockd.o, nfs.o then mount your disk.

To run snort, execute the following command on the box : /var/bin/snort -c /var/etc/snort.conf &

The snort configuration file should be changed for your network configuration and needs. Snort logs will be written to /var/log/snort

If you wish to change the files sent to the box, untar distro.tar and add or subtract files. Normally you should not run the install script more than once for a power-cycle of the box. i.e. if you want to run the install again, reset the wrt54g first.

I have attempted to limit all changes to the ram disk, but there are no guarantees that you will not damage your unit by using these tools.

Download the distribution
Visit my wrt54g snort page
Thanks to Ross Jordan, C. J. Collier, Ben Grech and others who did the heavy lifting in figuring out how to get new code on the box

Jim Buzbee [e-mail]

consolevision roxors!

Re:telnetd?

[suwain_2]

If you read carefully, it logs you in directly as root -- you're never even prompted for a username / password. It's not meant as a publically-accessible box by any means. (Granted, wireless + root access to anyone seems a little scary...)

ssh/telnet isn't an issue, in this case. It's silly to encrypt something when anyone can get root on it.

Sigh

[curmudgeon]

But still no linux driver for the corresponding WPC54G PCMCIA card?

Re:ssh tunneling? bad idea use VPN

[Splork]

ssh tunnels are very bad performance. what you want is a VPN.

unfortunately you can't replace the kernel on the box with one that supports cool things because of the proprietary broadcom driver.

(here's to whoever takes the time to write a thunking layer for the linksys 2.4.5 broadcom driver to let it work with modern 2.4.22+ kernels!)

wrt54g.tar.gz Mirrors (posted Anon)

[Anonymous Coward]

wrt54g.tar.gz (1.07MB) mirrors

Posted anon, I'm no whore. :)

www.sk3tch.com/wrt54g.tar.gz [sk3tch.com]
www2.sk3tch.com/wrt54g.tar.gz [sk3tch.com]
www3.sk3tch.com/wrt54g.tar.gz [sk3tch.com]

Link to file

[BenFranske]

The article has already been posted, if the file becomes unavailible due to the /. effect a temporary mirror of the file is availible at: http://lightntrax.com/ben/wrt54g.tar.tar [lightntrax.com]

Re:Well this means...

[interiot]

Note that code is not available for everything. In particular, the seattle group [seattlewireless.net] wasn't able to find publicly-avilable drivers for the 802.11g radio.

Re:ssh tunneling? bad idea use VPN

[interiot]

The "ssh tunnels are very bad performance" statement may be elaborated a bit more on this page titled "Why TCP Over TCP Is A Bad Idea" [sites.inka.de].

Re:Well this means...

[SuperFlaco]

Looks like Linksys is doing the right thing and providing the source [linksys.com] now.

Re:More constrained by memory

[MbM]

I tried an nfs mounted swapfile with only minimal success. It'd get further but it would go into some heavy swapping flooding the network, durring which time the access point was very unresponsive; just not practical for actual use.

Not that easy..

[Anonymous Coward]

You'd need the router's password, and to be on the local network, too...

Uses:

[elgaard]

1. AirSnort, already working.

2. Something like the MIT rootnet.
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/08 /29/232022 8
By having the routing in the AP, it would participate in the roofnet without a server. Servers use more electricity and are noisy.

3. Security for open accesspoints.
You might leave our accesspoints open to share it with others. But you might want some extra security:
a) Block port 25 for others so they don't send spam and get you blacklistet.
b) Some VPN/SSH tunnels for privacy.
c)Traffic shaping. You would like to reserve some bandwidth for yourself.

Re:does it still function as an AP

[klasikahl]

It does, here.

Words of Caution about the WRT54G

[pridkett]

I own one of these little guys and I must say it's a neat little box. However, please be aware of the following issues that you might run into with it:

1) it runs quite hot. make sure it gets plenty of air. we had ours sitting on the carpet with the DSL modem on top and it would frequently over heat. Moving the modem off and setting the wrt54g on a board seemed to fix this.

2) it requires that you have good wiring. you may be shocked to know this, but if you live in an old house (like many college students) your wiring has a good chance of being miswired. The wrt54g will not work with wiring faults (even though many devices work just fine). the solution is to put a good surge protector or UPS between the device and the outlet. this seems to fix everything.

3) the dhcp implementation is a little funky and sometimes seems to reply with a DHCP NAK on an address request when it otherwise shouldn't.

All that aside, it's a great little box. It works well with my 802.11b card in the laptop and manages the wired stuff just fine. I can't comment on 802.11g because there aren't any cards with linux support out there (except maybe the minipci card in the wrt54g, but that's a binary driver).

I've gotten some interesting stuff to run on it, mainly some simple home automation stuff for a pervasive computing environment that was part of my research, but it's nice having everything together. Although, truthfully you're probably still better off with an EPIA board and a 256 meg stick of ram.

Re:Sigh

[Anonymous Coward]

Alternatively, people could always call Broadcom and ask to have the drivers released for this chipset. Like, the ones they use to test with that are in the CVS..... Directly copied from their website: Bill Blanning Senior Director of Corporate Communications voice: 949-450-8700 email: [e-mail] or Customer Service and Sales voice: 949-450-8700 They recently put drivers links on their front page for some of their other products.

Re:More constrained by memory

[BJH]

No. There are patches out there that allow it to be done over the network block driver (nbd) - for example, this one [uc3m.es].

Re:Every piece of Linksys Hardware I've ever bough

[Pharmboy]

I have owned many, many pieces of Linksys gear, and while they may not be the "performance leaders", I have never seen one just die. I can't help but to wonder about the power situation in your home.

I would suggest getting some better UPS protection for your routers and switches. You would be surprised at how bad typical electrical service is, and routers and switches tend to stay on 24/7, thus pretty vulnerable. I run everything on UPS. Monitor, routers, hubs, everything. I live in the country (terrible for spikes and brownouts) and have all kinds of gear that is old beyond usefullness, but still works. Even an old UPS that doesn't hold a charge is better than none, since most spikes/brownouts only need about 5 to 10 seconds of power before returning to normal.

This doesn't change the fact that they may be more delicate that you care for, but my guess is you have a power problem.

iptables?

[CapS]

Will running Linux on this router allow you to use iptables? If so, then perhaps this could be used as a 'real' firewall with stateful packet inspection, rather than just NAT.

Of course, I'd prefer that this Linux OS be changed so it accepts a root password, but other than that, this could be a a great alternative to the default Linksys software.

Prices

[nolife]

Lowest price search results [pricegrabber.com] from pricegrabber.com. Lowest I could find on Pricewatch was $103 + shipping.

Amazon has it for $100 [amazon.com] after rebate with free shipping.

There was a new firmware [linksys.com] put out about 6 weeks ago. Here's the details. [linksys.com]

Another hackable WLAP

[ae]

Another wireless access point that runs Linux is Netgear [netgear.com] WG602 [netgear.com]. You can find some very limited information about it here [jungo.com].

Is anyone working on something similar for this device?

Re:Well this means...

[hacker]

Except that they're not. They are providing the upstream source, not the Linksys-modified sources. This is akin to Sony providing the source for their PS2 development kit by pointing to gnu.org for gcc and binutils. Where is the actual source to the actual code running on the WRTG? Nowhere.

In fact, some of the sources they link to aren't even GPL.

Re:Would this work with other Linksys routers?

[Duwke]

According to the Seattle Wireless group, it's quite easy to set up zeroconf.

Rendezvous: If anyone is interested in advertising the box's webserver using rendezvous, executing this command either through the "ping hack" or the shell interface did the trick for me : /usr/sbin/mDNSResponderPosix? -p 80 -t _http._tcp. -n "Linksys Web Server" & -jbuzbee

http://www.seattlewireless.net/index.cgi/LinksysWr t54g