Headless network setup

If you are using a headless system and you aren’t using an ethernet connection, you face a chicken-egg issue of how to connect the device to WiFi via ssh when the device isn’t yet on the network.

You can get around this by saving a file called wp_supplicant.conf to the /boot directory of the device. This specifies the SSID name and password and will be used to auto-connect when the device boots.

For example:

country=GB
ctrl_interface=DIR=/var/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
update_config=1
network={
     ssid="SKYVL7XP"
     scan_ssid=1
     psk="WIFI_PASSWORD"
     key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
}

Related notes