WICD – better then Network Manager
I’ve been using WICD for the past week, and I think I like it better then Network Manager. It focuses on connecting your network interfaces to networks and does it right. IT doesn’t have the ability for VPN’s or anything else, it is merely I frontend to wpa-supplicant and iwconfig. I have had zero issues with connecting to wireless networks. It is actually connecting to them better then Network Manager was. My connections are stable, and I can switch between my wired network and my wireless without problems. (I had problems with NM b/c when I plug into a wired network, the BIOS throws the kill switch to the wireless radio, NM had problems finding it again after this).
The connection times are very quick, most of the time I am connected to my wireless before my gnome interface loads. It has a service that has to run, so it might even be connecting to it earlier then that … which would be very cool.
There is one issue though. When I first boot up my and if I have an ethernet cable plugged in, the WICD tray panel fails to load. And I am not sure why, I’d imagine though it might be loosely related to the same reason it won’t “auto connect” to the wired network when the cable is plugged in.
Besides that small issue, it WICD runs in a smaller footprint, has a better interface, and provides a stable Internet connection using the proven standards and tools already out there.
