Thursday, June 2, 2022

No internet connection in Debian Testing install

I installed Debian Testing on a separate partition on this computer recently and found I had no internet connection. I could connect to my router but not to any web sites. I had used the Debian Testing installer which does not contain non-free firmware, and selected not to configure wifi during install, as my wifi won't work without iwlwifi. However, I'd installed the package manually after the installation completed.

To cut a long story short, after a day of looking into it, I found that my /etc/resolv.conf file was a broken sim link. resolv.conf is used by Systemd and Network Manager to resolve IP addresses - hence no internet connections. I fixed it by editing /etc/resolv.conf  and adding the location of my access point, the router:

# Generated by NetworkManager
nameserver 192.168.2.1

I can't remember whether my internet connection started working right away, or I restarted Network Manager or rebooted. 

The file is apparently reset/overwritten by systemd-resolved/Network manager with an address from the DNS server, which in my case is the ISP via the router: the file now contains an entry for OpenDNS, which I'm guessing the ISP uses.

Anyway, I assume the problem occurred because I didn't configure the wireless connection during the install, but it might be a bug in the Debian testing installer.

LinuxHint 

Edit: added another link I used.

Red Hat Customer Portal

Edit: Corrected LinuxHint link and adding a link to a bug report I found at the time but forgot to add to this post.

resolv.conf symlink is broken








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