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Ask Slashdot: Setting Up a Wireless Catch-and-Release
First time accepted submitter SSG Booraem writes "I'm on the IT committee at my church. We've recently added wireless access points to our Family Life Center, but the committee chair isn't comfortable with allowing unrestricted access to our network. We host a lot of guests during the week for Upwards basketball practices and on Saturdays for games, so we want to restrict internet access to the Sunday school classes held in that building. Unfortunately, neither he, nor I, know anything about setting up a wireless catch-and-release like in hotels. If anyone could point me at good documentation, I would be very grateful."
Honestly, just use something like open-mesh, it has all the software available to do just that without too much hassle. Additionally they're more easily spaced throughout the building with less interference than you would normally get.
Use enterprise WPA2 with keys. Give each client device a key. Charge $5 to provide a key. Church members who are donating will probably reduce their donation by $5 that month in order to pay for the key.
You can revoke keys individually.
Disclaimer: I don't know what I'm talking about, you might need expensive hotspots to do that, but for large building with more than one hotspot, you probably want special hotspots with decent handover as folk move from one hotspot to another.
blog.sam.liddicott.com
You're trying to set up one of those hotel style "Welcome to our network give us all your money to see the internet" pages to let only your sunday school students reach the internet? Or are you trying to block the guests off your network complete? Since this is tagged as wireless why not just use WPA2 and set up your students, classes, or whatever with access?
Not sure what the point of one of those hotel pages is here.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
Try to flash a Linksys:
http://www.polarcloud.com/tomato
http://www.dd-wrt.com/site/index
http://coova.org/
If the access point is only meant to be used by the Sunday school, and they only meet at certain times. why not just switch the AP off when the Sunday School meeting isn't running?
These comments are my personal opinions and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the other voices in my head.
try Easy Hotspot - http://easyhotspot.inov.asia/ obviously depending on exactly what you want to do... (we run the authentication system as a VM but it'll work nicley on a cheap PC) also we're using DDWRT on our access points so only using the easyhotspot system as an authentication system.
Try a google search for "Captive WiFi Portal".
That's the term you want. Get yourself a DD-WRT compatible router and install one of these packages: http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Captive_Portal
"Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
It's called a captive portal, and it's not the solution you're looking for. Depending on AP it'll be easier to setup time of day access or only give the WPA2 passpoem to churchgoers.
Seems like you could just set a password and post it somewhere in a room that is not accessible to guests. Change the password every week.
Restrict the wireless router's use to Sunday mornings during class. Don't operate it during the week.
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
Who knew such unabashed idiocy and bigotry would exist on slashdot? He's asking a tech question for a NPO and you retort with such drivel?
Use something like the Meraki MR16 - It sounds like you aren't the most technically savvy in this regard, and even if you were this makes life easy. There are other ways to do this, but this is probably the easiest I've seen. www.meraki.com
At my church we have a pretty simple policy: the network is protected with WPA2 encryption, it has an easy-to-remember password, and we give it to everyone who needs it. Make sure staff knows not to tell the password to your basketball guests, etc. We change the password about once a year, and let the new password spread organically. It works pretty well. People in the congregation ask each other for the password (or more likely, ask someone whom they know is on the tech-savvy side) and so those who need it are able to get back on. Another thing that you can do is give the network an essid name like "Sunday School Only" -- that will make your guests less likely to try to gain access, and also the Sunday School patrons will know that they should feel free to ask for the password.
Hi, latest BSD mag 1/12 has this article Home Brew Captive Portal With OpenBSD:
Have you ever used a public wireless network that has a splash screen such that you have to agree to certain terms before going to the Internet? The author of this article will show you step by step how to build one of those using OpenBSD’s Packet Filter (pf).
What I think the OP wants is to give people Internet access without simultaneously giving them access to the organization's LAN. He also doesn't want to invest in new hardware, seeing as how they've just done that.
So: how to set up the WLAN APs to block IP packets directed to anything except the gateway (or the Internet) itself?
I can set up a guest wifi network on my router that has a separate WEP/WPA key and does not allow access to the other wired/wifi network unless I specifically say it can. Its a Netgear DGND3300v2 if thats any help...
I only please one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either. - Scott Adams
No, you're not going to answer because you're an absolute idiot. Log in and post that dumb azz crap. Not to mention you had to see the dozens of other a$$ hats who posted the same stupid thing, but no you had to anonymously post exactly the same crap because....??? Fail. Go back to playing your PS2, and mom should have dinner ready in a few minutes. Try not to complain about the free food in your free house.
You want to get your hands on a patron saint of wifi figurine to put on top of your router.
If you mod me down the terrorists will have won
I sure agree with you, it hurts to see how a good place to exchange information is slowly dying and becoming less and less worth our attention.
Just make the pass phrase a biblical quote. Change it each week and you kill 2 birds. How likely is it that the basketball players will have a bible handy AND your religious classes will have an incentive to read it to find the reference.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Use enterprise WPA2 with keys. Give each client device a key. Charge $5 to provide a key. Church members who are donating will probably reduce their donation by $5 that month in order to pay for the key.
You can revoke keys individually.
Disclaimer: I don't know what I'm talking about, you might need expensive hotspots to do that, but for large building with more than one hotspot, you probably want special hotspots with decent handover as folk move from one hotspot to another.
That sounds like a great quick-get-the-job-done solution but here's the 'but': adminstration.
Most churches have an admin - one business admin. I don't know how to put it kindley so here's a prediction of what will happen based upon what I've observed with other things that these adminstrators do:
You will be constantly dealing with folks who's key doesn't work. Keys that still work when they shouldn't and a constant searching for keys.
It will be one cluster fuck.
Volunteer IT person?
They turnover fast: they have work projects that take all their time up, can't deal with church committees, they find mega paying jobs on another coast, etc .....
This thread makes me embarrassed to be an atheist...
Yup, the amount of atheist bigotry and unpleasantness here is incredible. Now in their defense, these people are probably Americans who endure a lot of religious bigotry in their daily lives. They are just trying to fight back, but this doesn't really help at all.
Gravitation is a theory, not a fact.
http://coova.org/
Ubuntu Server + CoovaChilli + DD-WRT = an easy and free captive portal system
WARNING: this is not a drop-in solution, some customization and piecing-together required. Throw FreeRADIUS or CoovaRADIUS into the mix for easier user-level authentication.
Seriously? Just because some religious people behave like dicks to people of different beliefs to them doesn't mean that you have to join in. He asked a technical question, the fact that it's related to a church is irrelevant.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
I've used MikroTik hardware in the past to build wifi hotspots for customers. It's pretty easy to use, very friendly command line. You want something like this in an enclosure something like this. They're reasonably robust, and once configured properly, will do what you want (and a whole lot more should you want to change the setup in future) for a good long time.
Forwarding from superuser.com:
http://superuser.com/questions/183105/hotel-like-wifi-manager (recommends AnchorFree, SputNik)
http://www.macinstruct.com/node/188
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captive_portal
NB: The message above might reflect my opinion right now, but not necessarily tomorrow or next year.
What's that?>/a>
I think it's something like Pray for a man and you save him once. Teach him to pray for himself and you save him for a lifetime.
I sure agree with you, it hurts to see how a good place to exchange information is slowly dying and becoming less and less worth our attention.
Yes, that happened ever since "I'm too lazy to Google it and perform basic research" turned into the exact same thing as "I really need a community of experts to offer me advice".
... but you know what the REAL difference is? If you really need a community of experts to offer advice it's because you are doing something new and interesting and unique. If you're doing what every hotel and coffee-shop across the country already does on a daily basis ... then it's time to stop being lazy and research it yourself.
Not that Slashdot does anything but try to shut you up with a downmod for pointing it out
Wrighting? Apparently we need to start you off with a picture book.
If you mod me down the terrorists will have won
actually, they are linked on the site but not on each particular model's page in the database (i think they gave up on updating the links)
1) on the front page click "router database"
2) then on the sub-menu that opens, above the line where you type the router model, click on "Other downloads" ( http://dd-wrt.com/site/support/other-downloads )
result: you're now viewing the ftp space, mapped on the website
e.g.
ftp://ftp.dd-wrt.com/others/eko/BrainSlayer-V24-preSP2/2011/
is mapped on http at:
http://dd-wrt.com/site/support/other-downloads?path=others%2Feko%2FBrainSlayer-V24-preSP2%2F2011%2F
root@127.0.0.1
Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Just because churches operate as tax exempt non-profits doesn't mean they can't afford to pay someone to do the work. If your church doesn't have a member that is in the IT business (and willing to do the work for free) then hire a local tech company to set it up for you. Support the local nerd economy!
Keep the Classic Slashdot.
What's that?>/a>
I think it's something like Pray for a man and you save him once. Teach him to pray for himself and you save him for a lifetime.
actually its more like 'pray for a man and he easily ignores you, brainwash a man and he will pray with you'
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
Are you talking about religion or a certain politic party?
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Posting up here, because it's quite a bit of scrolling before you see answers that don't have something to do with peoples anti-religion bigotry. I do not care what your beliefs are, nor do I think it's my place to comment on them when replying to a technical question.
Why don't you set up a guest wifi? Have the internal wifi that's for your private network, and a guest wifi where you publish the key for people to use, but set up a rule so it's only enabled on Sunday from 7am until 1pm? That should cover the Sunday school's hours, and it won't be there at all during the week, when you don't want people accessing the wifi. It will also segregate your internal network from the wifi you're providing for people to use, which will help secure your private files, or any fileserver you're running.
And if you're hosting some kind of event, like a Parish council meeting, where you want to give people access to the 'net, just turn the guest wifi on manually during the event.
It'll be cheaper, and easier than setting up a catch-and-release system, as a fair number of wireless routers have that ability these days, and if it doesn't, you could always install Tomato or DD-WRT to have access to it.
For the asker, maybe is something new and interesting. Not everyone knows how to proper configure wireless internet. And about Google, many times the Google results throws you exactly here or in some obscure forum, where the first response is "Search in the google, moron!". Interesting infinite loop problem.
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
Give a man a fish and he's gone for a night. Show him how to use the 'net and he won't bug you for weeks.
Somehow, I don't think they're a non-prophet organisation.
I'm always amused by some of the comments here as it shows a profound ignorance (not yours). Heck anyone who has seen Bill Maher's "religulous" will hear senior vatican officals saying something like "Its all hooey, people need their stories." Even senior officals in the anglican community say the same thing:
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/12/29/my-take-the-3-biggest-biblical-misconceptions/
The whole bible being taken literally is a recent phenominom. One should be taking the central message from the bible, not viewing it as a historical truth, a set of laws etc.
As for myself, I am religious but I don't push my faith on other people, nor do I want them pushing other people's faiths on me.
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
Religion does not imply belief in a god. You are confusing religion with theism.
I read write up and first thing I thought of was run Linux with IPTABLES/CHAINS. Force proxy through squid set the ACL to only allow surfing during the required hours. What's hard about that? You could even get freaky and set your internal network on a different address and ADD ROUTE for the Guests, then again it would require some reading on the posters part and a bit of googling.
I wish you the best of luck in setting this up and administering the network.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
Providing an internet connection which a user then misuses does not make you a criminal. Otherwise ISPs could not function.
maybe I should have post about how atheists like Stalin and Mao killed many millions of people?
You like way too many other people just don't get it point so I will spell it out for you.
Guess what PEOPLE do really great things. Some PEOPLE do really crappy things. The people that do the worst things will use anything they can as an excuse for their acts. It doesn't matter if it is a member of the KKK, or a Bigot on Slashdot bashing someone for going to church. They will find some way that makes them feel like they are better than someone else and give them an excuse to attack.
Then you have the other less than pleasant people that are jumping down this guys throat for even asking this question when he or she could just Google it. Well maybe but it is NOT the authors fault that it is on Slashdot. THE EDITORS DECIDED THAT THIS WAS A QUESTION WORTH ASKING. So those that are complaining about this being a stupid thing to ask should really be complaining to the editors for not well editing what ends up on Slashdot.
So what it comes down to is if YOU HAVE NOTHING TO SAY THAT WILL HELP ANSWER THE QUESTION THEN DO NOT POST. IF YOU THINK THIS QUESTION IS STUPID THEN BLAME SLASHDOT. IF YOU DO NOT CHOOSE TO GO TO CHURCH THEN PRETEND THAT HE IS ASKING ABOUT SETTING IT UP AT A FREAKING HO TRAIN CLUB!
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.