hello,
I am not sure this is the right place to ask this question but I don't know where else to post it. so execuse me if it's not.
Ok, I have 2 of the Mikrotik RouterBoards hAP. with the currently latest nightly build (build 987). I managed to get one configured as a client of my home wifi router, and this is how it gets its WAN uplink. works great. Thanks for all the work done on this.
Now, the other router board, I am trying to do the same thing but trying to connect it to an OPEN network (one that doesn't not require a password) that is provided by my ISP in so many places (I managed to add the radios MAC addresses of the routerboard to my ISP for auto-login). but this still doesn't seem to work.
I left the password field blank in the UI. apparently this is not enough. what else should be done?
Thanks in advance.
I am not sure this is the right place to ask this question but I don't know where else to post it. so execuse me if it's not.
Ok, I have 2 of the Mikrotik RouterBoards hAP. with the currently latest nightly build (build 987). I managed to get one configured as a client of my home wifi router, and this is how it gets its WAN uplink. works great. Thanks for all the work done on this.
Now, the other router board, I am trying to do the same thing but trying to connect it to an OPEN network (one that doesn't not require a password) that is provided by my ISP in so many places (I managed to add the radios MAC addresses of the routerboard to my ISP for auto-login). but this still doesn't seem to work.
I left the password field blank in the UI. apparently this is not enough. what else should be done?
Thanks in advance.
Generally, the "open" network will require you to login via a browser. When attempting to access the internet, you may be re-directed to a "log in" page to accept conditions, etc. Thus, make sure this is the gateway you get routed out from the mesh network, and see if you can get to this page. The ISP, hotel, etc. may publish the direct URL to reach and login.
I used this once in a hotel, and after accessing Marriott's page to type in my room number, last name, etc. I was connected. Then all of my devices on the mesh node could get to the internet. The hotel only thinks it is one device. On the hAP ac lite, use one wireless to connect to the hotel internet, then the other wireless band can be a mesh LAN AP. I had a tunnel connecting back to my home QTH, so all my devices were on my home mesh network. No cables, other than power to the hAP ac lite.
For now, use a tablet or cell phone to look up the wifi AP SSIDs available to connect to.
Joe AE6XE
You are mainly correct about the first paragraph. it "usually" brings a log in page using a browser page. However, my ISP (cablevision, a.k.a Optimum) allows me to bypass that by pre-entering my MAC address of the device to my Optimum HotSpot account for auto-login.
That being said, I believe the connection to the WAN on the router board doesn't happen at all. there is no IP for the default route. and I am not prompted to enter a password (the ISP login page) or anything. It's like I typed a wrong network name (but I did not. I double checked that).
Here you go...
I also added a screenshot of the configuration page, and another for the network I want to join (as seen by my computer)
Thanks in advance for your help.
Are you able to edit the file /etc/config/wireless on the mesh node (telnet or ssh to the node and run 'vi')? If not, I can get you a different image tonight to test.
In this section:
config wifi-iface
option device 'radio0'
option network 'wan'
option mode 'sta'
option ssid 'optimumwifi'
option encryption 'psk2'
Can you change the 'psk2' to 'none', then reboot? Does this fix the issue? Right now, it is complaining a password of 8 characters minimum are required. So instead of saying encryption is psk2 with no password, we might have to say no encryption. I thought I had tested this to work without a password on one of my APs. Somehow a different behavior on your AP or I somehow missed testing this. It was a use case reported and known by early testers. Regardless, this can be resolved.
Joe AE6XE
Thanks a lot for your help. I did exactly what you said and I believe this got me connected. Or at least, I have a default route IP which corrosponds to the ISP IP pool. However, no WAN connection seem to happen. After SSHing to the node, pinging google.com shows "unknown host", pinging "8.8.8.8" halts for sometime with no error message until I ctrl+C.
I even tried to ping the defaullt gateway for the ISP, and using it as the WAN DNS servers instead of 8.8.8.8, and that also didn't pong.
I attached a newer support file for reference.
Confirm the mesh node has correctly received, the network definition:
inet addr: 25.211.59.205 Bcast:25.211.255.255 Mask:255.252.0.0
If so, then the mesh node has the information it needs to function.
Unfortunately, we'd have to look on the AP side to further diagnose. From the mesh node side, we have an IP address and can route, sending traffic to the AP. But what the AP does with the traffic, is a black box to the mesh node.
Joe AE6XE
You are right. ok, here is what I did. I used another AP I have to create an unsecured open network and configured the mesh node in the hAP router board to connect to it (still had to manually edit /etc/config/wireless to change the encryption to none, otherwise it won't work). and this actually worked.
However, going back to the ISP access point, I can't connect.
My feeling is that it's trying to force me to do the browser login thingy before I connect... even though I added Mac address of the wlan0 to my list of auto-login devices on the ISP. I may give them a call later to find why I can't connect.
But for now, you may want to edit the logic to change the encryption to 'none' if no password is provided.
Joe AE6XE