configuring wireless on command line interface

Solution 1:

You will need the wpasupplicant package in order to connect to a network secured with wpa or wpa2.

Listed by order :
1 : sudo iwlist scan

2 : sudo iwconfig <interface> essid "my network"
iwpriv <interface> set AuthMode=<WPA2PSK or WPA2AES>
iwpriv <interface> set <WPA2PSK or WPA2AES>='WPA PASSPHRASE'

3 : sudo iwconfig <interface> essid "my network"
ifconfig <interface> inet <ip> netmask <mask> then set a route to your gateway route add <destination> gw <gateway ip>

Solution 2:

nm-tool or sudo iwlist scan will show you all available wireless networks.

There's a cnetworkmanager package that ought to let you control Network Manager from the command line. I've never used it myself.