2012-06-28 - Re: [GRASE-Hotspot] Splash screen activation

Header Data

From: Timothy White <ti***8@gmail.com>
Message Hash: f2c38d1d4d1adba466e3c0169fcfb9b72908b3c9174c719809eed2c733a9b796
Message ID: <CAESLx0J60YUoL1D3ewJKAwKhUXOtsbXALFmdLbVM2ho5_pMKMQ@mail.gmail.com>
Reply To: <4FEC3F38.701@radez.hr>
UTC Datetime: 2012-06-28 04:38:32 UTC
Raw Date: Thu, 28 Jun 2012 21:38:32 +1000

Raw message 

Hi Drazen.

I think you misunderstand how a captive portal hotspot works. It can
only intercept your "web" requests from a browser, to a standard port
80 webserver. (So not HTTPS). All other traffic is denied access until
you are authenticated.

So in other words, the only way to get the login screen, is to try and
access a web page. Some operating systems, will detect after
connecting to the wireless network, that a captive portal is in use,
and will notify the user that they don't have full access to the
internet, and further login details may be required, and give the user
a "link" that will open the login page in a browser. This is an
Operating System feature, and outside of our control.

Its unfortunate that this is how it works, however this just isn't any
other way to do it. It happens that web server requests are easy to
"redirect" to the captive portal. When your mail server makes a
connection to a server, there is no facility for it to detect that it
needs to login to the network before it can access the server.

I hope that makes sense. I've not had much sleep due to traveling
interstate at the moment, so I hope it is clear.

In the future, I intend to investigate all the methods that different
operating systems use to detect captive portals, to improve user
notification for Grase Hotspots.

I hope you'll find that even with this limitation (out side of our
control), that the Grase hotspots are suitable for you.

Tim

On Thu, Jun 28, 2012 at 9:25 PM, Drazen <dr***a@radez.hr> wrote:
> Hi everybody, hi Tim.
> Recently I made two installations of Grase, at home and at work. For
> curiosity, one is running on ViaEpia miniItx with CPU C3 1Ghz (an older
> model) and second one at Intel/Atom miniITX. Both installation runs
> several AP devices on LAN side by use of switch box.
> I will skip glorification of your work Tim, since it is assuming. That
> is why I am here.
>
> First I noticed that splash window will not popup automatically whenever
> any network program at client machine try to request internet address.
> E.G. Skype, mail client as two most important ones.
> It is assumed that when any program trying to reach network/internet
> destination, hotspot should response to start client's default browser
> automatically and then bring up splash login page.
> This is tested by XP/W7/Linux and Android clients.
>
> My appologize if this topic already discussed earlier. I am new at this
> list, not feel comfortable with it yet.
>
> Regards
> Drazen
>
>
>
>
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