For basic information see kernel documentation and the IWD documentation of Arch Linux.

Compiling IWD and starting it

Compilation instructions:

git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/libs/ell/ell.git
git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/network/wireless/iwd.git
sudo apt install libtool libreadline-dev libdbus-glib-1-dev python3-docutils subversion
cd iwd
./bootstrap
./configure --prefix=/usr --localstatedir=/var --sysconfdir=/etc --disable-systemd-service
make

Starting IWD now would give problems with D-Bus:

mathy@mathy-VirtualBox:~/wifi/iwd$ sudo ./src/iwd 
Wireless daemon version 1.30
Name request failed
D-Bus disconnected, quitting...

We need to let systemd know how to handle iwd D-Bus message and permissions:

# copy src/iwd-dbus.conf to $DATADIR/dbus-1/system.d
# -m : then chmod the new file to 644
# -c : this parameter is apparently ignored
sudo /usr/bin/install -c -m 644 src/iwd-dbus.conf `pkg-config --variable=datadir dbus-1`/dbus-1/system.d

After this it's important to reboot. Otherwise the updatedated D-Bus config may not be loaded. Now we can start IWD:

# Disable Wi-Fi in your network manager
sudo modprobe mac80211_hwsim radios=4
sudo rfkill unblock wifi
sudo ./src/iwd -i wlan1

In a second terminal we can execute the following to control the IWD client:

sudo ./client/iwctl

Execute help for a list of commands.

Enterprise networks

The IWD Arch Linux documentation contains examples how to configure networks. For interprise networks, IWD supports loading .pem files but not .crt files, and it currently only supports RSA certificates (not ECC).

Access Point Mode

IWD has experimental support for AP mode. To create a network called testnetwork, create a file called /var/lib/iwd/ap/testnetwork.ap with the following content:

[Security]
Passphrase=password123

[IPv4]
Address=192.168.250.1
Gateway=192.168.250.1
Netmask=255.255.255.0
DNSList=8.8.8.8

To use a different SSID you have to change the name of the above file. To make IWD switch to AP mode and create this network, run ./client/iwctl and execute:

device wlan0 set-property Mode ap
ap wlan0 start-profile testnetwork