Adventures in Technology: Episode #3 part V.
Steph attempts to add a Nomadix Gateway to an 802.11b WLAN – the saga is almost at end.
When we last visited our little project, it was decided (educated guess actually) that we needed a second static IP for subscriber side of the Nomadix box. The subscriber static IP address needed to be on the same subnet as the network static IP address. John obtained the second static IP and now we’re ready for the next round of testing.
I sat down with my laptop – I verified that the cable modem was still working properly by plugging it directly into my PC. Then I plugged the cable modem into the Nomadix box, inserted the wireless card into my PC and major hooray! All the green blinky lights on the AP and Nomadix box blinked in unison and I was able to surf the web! Big, big hoorah.
So we now pick up the action live – I can surf the web, but the Nomadix box should have displayed a login screen prior to my surfing – but it didn’t. My regular home page came up with no authentication required. Time to call John.
John is extremely excited that I actually have web access. But puzzled as to why I didn’t have a login screen. So he’s going to make a few tweaks see what happens the next time I try to surf.
Cool – I get the Nomadix login screen – a very nice clean little screen I might add. So I log in and away we go.
Our next step is to see if we can get the Nomadix login screen to come up on a regular and predictable basis. Easier said than done. I got the splash login screen once and now we can’t get it to come up again. The Nomadix box tracks users by their MAC addresses (each network interface card has its own MAC address that is assigned by the manufacturer).
Interesting note: The Nomadix box is reporting four active IP addresses (4 different computers). John postulates that folks nearby have wireless cards in their PC’s and are attaching to the network. They probably don’t even know it.
In an attempt to start anew we did an ipconfig /release to release the Nomadix assigned IP We then did an ipconfig /renew to get a new address from the Nomadix. Unfortunately try as we may, we could not get a new IP address. So we pulled my wireless card from my PC and re-inserted it. Still no IP address – we’re worse off than we started! How typical.
So – in desperation we rebooted the access point. Viola – we now have a valid IP address.
Note to self: Our Orinoco access point is a flaky piece of crappola.
To force me back to the Nomadix login, John deleted my profile from the Nomadix. And viola, I got the logon screen. Progress is being made!
As John says, in some respects the documentation is very good but in other respects it is clueless.
Next weirdo thing – every time after logging in on the Nomadix screen, I end up, on of all places, a Google error page. Sheesh. After much foraging through the documentation, John found a small vague entry relating to “home page redirection. He performed the recommended fix, and viola, after I login, I’m directed to my home page. Yea!
Our next goal is to see if we can setup a timeout limit– i.e. if a connection is not active for a set amount of time, have the Nomadix box delete the user’s profile. Again, very fuzzy documentation. The only reference John has found to timeout parameters was in relation to a RADIUS server. But just for grins, we’re going to give it a try. John sets the timeout limit for 30 seconds.
I removed Hewey’s (my PC) wireless card for 30 seconds to ensure there was no network activity. I reinserted it, Hewey froze for about a minute (argggh) and then came back to life. But when I called up my browser, I didn’t get the login screen – the Nomadix box still saw me as a valid user. So, unless we’re connected to a RADIUS server, we can’t figure out how to get a login timed out. We do plan on deploying with a RADIUS server, but it would be nice if we could figure out how to timeout a login without RADIUS.
So – what’s our status? We have a couple of outstanding issues:
- We can’t set a timeout limit – once you’re logged on, you’re logged on forever.
- Our access point is very flaky. We’re going to need to replace it.
Plan of action:
- Things are to the point where I, plus a few others can start user testing our current configuration. So, for this week, I will work for a few hours each day from the coffee shop. I’ll get a few others to try it also.
- I will order a new access point.
- John will continue to try to figure out how to set a timeout limit.
- If all goes well, we’ll setup a small load test for next week.
It's never ever easy, but we're getting close!
3:09:49 PM 
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