I am running Ubuntu Gnome 16.04, and this morning the Network Manager suddenly stopped showing any WiFi networks at all. One moment I was connected to a local wireless network, and the next I was not. Even worse, although the system recognises the wifi adapter, no wifi networks appear to show up.
"enp0s29u1u4c4i2" is an iPhone I am using as an access point to post this question, but usually there are only three devices (eno1, lo, wlp2s0). I am attaching the outputs of ifconfig, iwconfig and iwlist scan, all ran as sudo.
ifconfig
eno1 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 24:b6:fd:fc:9b:06
UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
Interrupt:20 Memory:e1c00000-e1c20000
enp0s29u1u4c4i2 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr da:cf:9c:c6:b7:a0
inet addr:172.20.10.2 Bcast:172.20.10.15 Mask:255.255.255.240
inet6 addr: fe80::6eaa:eff8:b247:91b4/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:6422 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:5985 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:4361666 (4.3 MB) TX bytes:964896 (964.8 KB)
lo Link encap:Local Loopback
inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0
inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host
UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:65536 Metric:1
RX packets:2653 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:2653 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1
RX bytes:209742 (209.7 KB) TX bytes:209742 (209.7 KB)
wlp2s0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr e0:06:e6:02:40:ae
UP BROADCAST MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:7
TX packets:0 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:0 (0.0 B) TX bytes:0 (0.0 B)
Interrupt:17
iwconfig
lo no wireless extensions.
enp0s29u1u4c4i2 no wireless extensions.
eno1 no wireless extensions.
wlp2s0 IEEE 802.11abg ESSID:off/any
Mode:Managed Access Point: Not-Associated Tx-Power=200 dBm
Retry short limit:7 RTS thr:off Fragment thr:off
Encryption key:off
Power Management:off
iwlist scan
lo Interface doesn't support scanning.
enp0s29u1u4c4i2 Interface doesn't support scanning.
eno1 Interface doesn't support scanning.
wlp2s0 No scan results
According to lspci, my network controller is a "Broadcom Corporation BCM43228 802.11a/b/g/n". I had some issues getting the OS to recognise it right after installing 16.04, but I solved them long ago by switching the default drivers. What can I do to start seeing wifi networks again?
Thanks!
Gonzalo
EDIT
As per Pilot6's suggestion, I am adding the output of lspci -knn | grep Net -A2
00:19.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection [8086:1502] (rev 04)
DeviceName: Onboard LAN
Subsystem: Dell 82579LM Gigabit Network Connection [1028:04a9]
Kernel driver in use: e1000e
Kernel modules: e1000e
--
02:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM43228 802.11a/b/g/n [14e4:4359]
Subsystem: Dell Wireless 1530 Half-size Mini PCIe Card [1028:0011]
Kernel driver in use: wl
Also, here's the result of running the wireless info script mentioned by @eldergeek: http://paste.ubuntu.com/23143090/
Best Answer
For 16.04 all you need to do is make sure restricted drivers are checked in your software and updates sources and issue the command
sudo apt-get install bcmwl-kernel-source