IP address disappears
I adapted this script to provide a portable Wi-Fi hotspot running on a Raspberry Pi (NOOBS 1.4.0) with two Wi-Fi dongles. I had a lot of problems, sometimes with DHCP not working and sometimes with the wireless GUI reporting "Could not get status from wpa_supplicant".
It appears to be due to the IP address disappearing on one or other of the interface when either hostapt or udhcpd loads. The solution is to edit /etc/default/ifplugd and setting:
INTERFACES to "" (was "auto") HOTPLUG_INTERFACES to "" (was "all")
My thanks to sirlagz for the solution which can be found here:
http://sirlagz.net/2013/02/10/how-to-use-the-raspberry-pi-as-a-wireless-access-pointrouter-part-3b/