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"«A change after 2.6.24 broke ndiswrapper by accidentally removing its access to GPL-only symbols,» noted Pavel Roskin, offering a patch to address the issue. Linux creator Linus Torvalds was unimpressed, «I'm not seeing why ndiswrapper should be treated separately. If it loads non-GPL modules, it shouldn't be able to use GPLONLY symbols» [...] «Ndiswrapper itself is *not* compatible with the GPL. Trying to claim that ndiswrapper somehow itself is GPL'd even though it then loads modules that aren't is stupid and pointless. Clearly it just re-exports those GPLONLY functions to code that is *not* GPL'd.» [...] « So stop blathering. ndiswrapper has one purpose, and one purpose only: to load non-GPL'd code. So OF COURSE it shouldn't touch GPLONLY functions. »"
Hardware manufacturers often don't release specifications of their products to the open source community, so programs like ndiswrapper become necessary. This video demonstrates how to use Windows wireless drivers in Linux using ndiswrapper.
I often see Linux users complain their wireless network card doesn’t work on Linux at the forums,indeed , some wireless network cards can’t work/work well on Linux. Auto-NDISwrapper would be one of the solutions for those complaints.
Wifi-radar is a tool intended to configure easily your interface wifi, and will allow you to connect to your wifi network. Wifi-radar is available in the menu Xfce, in the Network submenu.
If any process ever cried out for a graphical interface, it is using NDISwrapper to enable wireless devices to run on GNU/Linux using Windows drivers. The process is often torturous, especially for first-time users, who are unsure whether any problems are due to NDISwrapper's limitations or their own inexperience.