I have a Linux host and can't bridge connections via a wireless NIC

Using bridged networking with wireless host connections on Linux hosts is a troublesome known issue. Using NAT networking is a much easier method of bringing network access to your guests.  The bridged networking problem seems to affect most of the wireless chipset drivers, and this problem seems even worse at kernels 2.6.19 and newer. However, the same hardware and different distribution with a different kernel/driver may or may not work.

You may encounter the following type of errors:

bridge-ath0: enabling the bridge
bridge-ath0: can't bridge with ath0, bad header length 88
bridge-ath0: interface ath0 is not a valid Ethernet interface
bridge-ath0: can't bridge with ath0, bad header length 88

Or
vmnet-detect[1420]: Unable to initialize the daemon

There is a patch for vmnet module that may help this. See the community links below. Not recommended if your skills are at the "I can follow How-Tos"-level.

Thread: http://communities.vmware.com/thread/95630
Message: http://communities.vmware.com/message/761031#761031

A older fix for some Ubuntu versions that may be of help if you are using Madwifi drivers: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=285846

If you're using an NDIS-driver, there's no point in trying this fix. Some of the linux wifi drivers are also not complete and will not make you do this, even if it works in windows.

If you are using kernel 2.6.24, you might find this useful: http://groups.google.com/group/vmkernelnewbies/browse_thread/thread/a7474ee9a37ddbbf