Disable wireless on startup

Question

I use Ubuntu 10.04 and I see, that every time when I start it enables Wireless Connectivity.
I know, that there is a topic about it on Ubuntu forums, but I think I will get old before I get an answer there (if there is one).

I would like to disable it by default, but to have possibility to enable or disable it later.

UPD: I'm looking how to disable Wireless adapter. Something like Fn + ... in Windows, but in windows it remembers the last state. In Ubuntu wireless adapter is always enabled at startup.

Re-UPD: Picture with what I'm talking about:

When I press Fn + F2 it disables those diodes and Wireless + Bluetooth.

Answer 1

There are so many ways to disable the card, the simplest i would say would be put a

sudo ifdown wlan0 

in your /etc/rc.local above the exit 0, this should disable the wireless card (replace wlan0 with your wireless interface card)

if you want to enable / disable on a keyboard press reading http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1287673 explains how to link a keyboard event to a script. If you want it to toggle when you push keys you will have to add some logic to the script. Though the simplest might be to have one key to enable and another to disable.

down script

    #!/bin/bash
    IFACE=wlan0
    ifconfig ${IFACE} down

and up script

    #!/bin/bash
    IFACE=wlan0
    ifconfig ${IFACE} up

Answer 2

You can stop it connecting to specific connections automatically quite easily.

1. Right click the Network Manager notification applet
2. Click Edit Connections...
3. Under the Wireless tab, click edit on the connection(s) you want to disable by default and click edit.
4. Uncheck Connect automatically
5. Click apply, close the window, rinse and repeat.

When you want to connect, just left click the applet and select an access point.

Note: This doesn't power off the wifi card and it'll still be searching for wireless access points. This might not be what you're looking for. But if it is, great!

Note 2: If your connection drops, it won't automatically reconnect.

Answer 3

I use wicd instead of NetworkManager. It remembers wi-fi state after reboot/next boot. Don't know how, but it does. :)

If you don't need some NM features, use wicd. It's easyer to use and control.

Answer 4

If your FN+F2 do not work in Ubuntu (it should, mine does in an Asus EeePC netbook), then i really reccomend you using Jupiter. Its a sweet, well polished notification area applet.

With it, you can enable and disable Bluetooth and WiFi separately, as well as other nice controls for notebooks and netbooks. It remembers the state after reboot and even remember the state per power source (meaning it can always turn WiFi ON when you plug in power, and automatically turn it OFF when you are on battery). And you can bind all actions to keystrokes.

A nice review, and some screenshots: http://www.webupd8.org/2010/06/jupiter-take-advantage-of-asus-super.html

Official project page: http://www.jupiterapplet.org/

PPA (for automatic updates in APT/Synaptic/Software Center: https://launchpad.net/~webupd8team/+archive/jupiter

Wiki (great thecnical documentation): http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/jupiter/index.php?title=Main_Page

Answer 5

Wireless can be enabled or disabled using rfkill tool. Here is solution based on it, that will allow to save state and restore it at system startup.

Step 00: creation of file to store wifi state

cd /usr/local/etc
sudo touch .wifistate
sudo chmod 666 .wifistate

Step 01: script

    #!/bin/bash
    IFACE="wlan1"
    STATE_FILE="/usr/local/etc/.wifistate"

    STATE="$(iwconfig $IFACE | grep Tx | cut -d '=' -f2 | grep off)"
    if [ "$STATE" ]
    then
       rfkill unblock wifi &&
       echo 1 > "$STATE_FILE" &&
       echo "Wireless enabled"
    else
       rfkill block wifi &&
       echo 0 > "$STATE_FILE" &&
       echo "Wireless disabled"
    fi
    exit 0;

Step 10: making script executable

chmod +x <script name>

Step 11: modifying Ubuntu startup script

open /etc/rc.local in any text editor (must be edited as root) and add following code
before exit 0; line:

    FILE="/usr/local/etc/.wifistate"
    if [ -r "$FILE" ]
    then
       if [ $(cat $FILE) -eq 0 ]
       then
          rfkill block wifi
       fi
    else
       rfkill block wifi
    fi

Done, now script from step 01 may be linked to keyboard event. After first use it will write 0 or 1 in .wifistate file, and on system startup rc.local script will take attempt to read this value and, if it is 0, disable wifi.
If .wifistate file does not exist, by default wifi will be disabled at startup.

Answer 6

Create session on startup application such as:

Settings >> Preference >> Startup Application

Add then fill command :

dbus-send --system --type=method_call --dest=org.freedesktop.NetworkManager /org/freedesktop/NetworkManager org.freedesktop.DBus.Properties.Set string:org.freedesktop.NetworkManager string:WirelessEnabled variant:boolean:false

false means off but it can be to enable by fn+F2 or something else.

Answer 7

try sudo iwconfig wlan0 txpower off

replace wlan0 with eth2 or whatever is your wifi interface.

this will disable your wifi antenna and save power, but it doesn't prevent Network Manager from trying to connect so you might want also to disable network manager's wifi auto connect settings as described by Oli.

Answer 8

Try looking under 'System > Preferences > Network Connections > Wireless' and make sure none of the listed wifi spots are set to auto connect. This will not stop wireless starting, but will stop it from making any connections.

Answer 9

Install sysv-rc-conf then run it as root and make sure there is an X at runlevels S 0 1 2 for wpa-ifupdown or simply type sudo sysv-rc-conf --level S012 wpa-ifupdown on after installing.

Answer 10

Whatever the reason is for what you're trying to disable it, I'm not sure if it works for every laptop, but it worked for me: with a plugged LAN cable Ubuntu ignores the wi-fi, thus making you able to sorta "turn it off" prior to system loading.

Answer 11

Run sudo lshw -c network and look for the name of the driver for your wireless card. Run lsmod | grep DRIVERNAME to show the exact name of the driver. Then add a line to /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf that says blacklist EXACTDRIVERNAME. This will stop the wifi module from being loaded at boot time. Run sudo modprobe EXACTDRIVERNAME at any time to restart the wifi.

This works quite effectively, but is not the best solution. It does not disable the Wireless card. It just prevents the OS from using it, but it may still be on, consuming battery power.