Raspberry Pi 3b+ WiFi hotspot with hostapd Failed to start Advanced IEEE 802.11 AP and IEEE 802.1X/WPA/WPA2/EAP Authenticator

Question

I have this:

/etc/default/hostapd

DAEMON_CONF="/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf"

/etc/hostapd/hostapd.conf

interface=wlan0
driver=nl80211
ssid=HOTSPOT
hw_mode=g
channel=6
ieee80211n=1
wmm_enabled=1
ht_capab=[HT40][SHORT-GI-20][DSSS_CCK-40]
macaddr_acl=0
auth_algs=1
ignore_broadcast_ssid=0
wpa=2
wpa_key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
wpa_passphrase=asd
rsn_pairwise=CCMP

/etc/dhcpcd.conf

interface wlan0
    static ip_address=10.255.255.1/24

static domain_name_servers=8.8.8.8 8.8.4.4

/etc/dnsmasq.conf

interface=wlan0
    dhcp-range=10.255.255.100,10.255.255.124,255.255.255.0,24h

/etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

country=US
ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
update_config=1

/etc/network/interfaces

auto lo
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet dhcp

allow-hotplug wlan0
iface wlan0 inet static
    address 10.255.255.1
    netmask 255.255.255.0
    network 10.255.255.0
    broadcast 192.168.5.255

and on first boot I get multiple issues but I am not sure what is the issue:

1. hostapd_free_hapd_data: Interface wlan0 wasn't started

and because of that I think that I get this

2. Failed to start Advanced IEEE 802.11 AP and IEEE 802.1X/WPA/WPA2/EAP Authenticator.

This fixed the issues and I was able to see the wifi hotspot running.

I fix it unblocking the wifi adapter: sudo rfkill unblock wifi

but I need it running from the first time and not having to do this. What is the issue and how do I solve it without running rfkill to unblock, I suspect the problem is either wpa_supplicant OR the fact that I was somehow turning off the interface in my setup. Also after running rfkill list phy0 wireless LAN soft blocked: yes shows up, so how do I enable it?

Answer 1

I prefer to use systemd-networkd so I can only help with Setting up a Raspberry Pi as an access point - the easy way and I haven't used EAP authentication so far in my home network. Have a look at the examples at the end of /usr/share/doc/wpa_supplicant/examples/wpa_supplicant.conf.

Purging rfkill is not the right solution. rfkill unblock wlan will persistent enable WiFi.

Answer 2

SOLVED:

The problem I made was there because I was mounting and chroot-ing into the image using qemu, and changing the /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf file directly, and for some strange reason that file was not being read or whatever by system and rfkill blocked wlan0 because contry was not set. What I did is let the system update wpa_supplicant.conf file itself by copying it into boot partition as follows: /boot/wpa_supplicant.conf so boot loader or whatever updated the file and solved the issue with rfkill, another issue was that the hotspot did not show up, so I added country_code=US to the hostapd.conf file as well.