[SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

flintmecha · 2009-02-25 16:31:44

Whenever one tries to connect to my college's wireless internet, they first get directed to a log-in page. After signing in, the browser then directs them to their homepage or wherever they were attempting to go. From what I can gather, this service is called BlueSocket.

I have trouble whenever I try to connect with Arch. First of all, I had things set up to use net-auto and profiles with wlan0 set to DHCP, as described in the Wiki. I am sure I had this set up properly because, after powering up my laptop and running iwconfig when I'm on campus, I see that it is connected to the network, with correct ESSID and everything.

But whenever I open Firefox, it tries and tries and tries to load a page but nothing happens. What SHOULD be happening is I should be getting directed to the BlueSocket log-in page for the school network, but it never happens. To fix the problem, I'd have to do this:

rm /var/run/dhcpcd-wlan0.pid
dhcpcd wlan0

I then refresh firefox, and I'd get the log-in page and I'd be able to connect just fine.

I decided to get the networkmanager applet/daemon like what Ubuntu has, thinking it would make things easier to manage (and perhaps automate whatever needs to be done for me to connect to the network) but I still have the same problem, except now this is what I have to do:

rm /var/run/dhcpcd-wlan0.pid
ifconfig wlan0 down
ifconfig wlan0 up
dhcpcd wlan0

What I want is to get Arch set up properly such that when I take my computer to school and turn it on, I don't need to open a terminal to access the BlueSocket log-in so that I can sign into the wireless network.

Any thoughts?

Last edited by flintmecha (2009-04-02 21:11:47)

arew264 · 2009-02-26 01:57:30

This generally works the first time for Windows?
When the connection isn't working, could you save/post the output of `route`? This will show if dhcp is actually getting your laptop set up right. Check to see if /etc/resolv.conf changes between when your connection doesn't work and when it does.

genisis300 · 2009-02-26 02:40:34

have you tried using wicd? in my opnion it's much better than the gnome network applet

ralvez · 2009-02-26 02:58:15

In the College where I work we have the same setup. I connect with the WiFi but cannot access any network resources.
Then I open Firefox and type the URL of the authentication page. I then authenticate to the WiFi network and then close FF.
From there on I can access any network resources available in the network. So far I have been unable to figure out a way to automate this process but the sequence of events should work for you, assuming there are no other problems; of course.

R.

flintmecha · 2009-02-26 03:50:47

arew264 wrote:

This generally works the first time for Windows?

Yes.

I will try to remember to check route and resolv.conf tomorrow when I get to school.

flintmecha · 2009-02-26 12:36:47

Good morning,

Here's the output of route and the contents of /etc/resolv.conf upon initially connecting to the network when I cannot load the network authentication page:

$ route
Kernel IP routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask            Flags  Metric  Ref   Use   Iface
172.16.0.0      *               255.255.0.0        U      2       0       0   wlan0
default         172.16.0.0      0.0.0.0            UG     0       0       0   wlan0

$ cat /etc/resolv.conf
# Generated by NetworkManager
domain aug.edu
search aug.edu
nameserver 134.224.1.77
nameserver 134.224.1.11

And here's the same stuff AFTER I have got things working and I am at the authentication page to log into the wireless network:

$ route
Kernel IP routing table
Destination     Gateway         Genmask            Flags  Metric  Ref   Use   Iface
172.16.0.0      *               255.255.0.0        U       2      0       0   wlan0
default         172.16.0.1      0.0.0.0            UG      0      0       0   wlan0

$ cat /etc/resolv.conf
# Generated by dhcpcd from wlan0
# /etc/resolv.conf.head can replace this line
search aug.edu
nameserver 134.224.1.77
nameserver 134.224.1.11
# /etc/resolv.conf.tail can replace this line

I see the main things that changed were the Gateway for the "default" detination and hte fact that "domain aug.edu" is removed from resolv.conf.

Last edited by flintmecha (2009-02-26 12:44:56)

ph0tios · 2009-03-02 07:28:53

I've used things like this before. Try using a static IP and setting the gateway instead. It usually fixes the problem.

scottuss · 2009-03-02 08:20:30

ph0tios wrote:

I've used things like this before. Try using a static IP and setting the gateway instead. It usually fixes the problem.

I don't think that would help, particularly when such authentication systems sometimes require DHCP (I have used some that would not allow static IP addresses, and others where static technically worked, but the IT policy stated that using a static IP address was against terms of service)

flintmecha · 2009-03-30 21:07:18

I'm sad to report that I've made no progress.

What's really frustrating is that this laptop connects flawlessly when I boot into Windows. And when I'm at home, Arch flawlessly detects and connects to my WEP-secured home network. It only has problems with my university's network, and the only thing I can blame is that blasted BlueSocket authentication.

Here's somewhat of an update on info I've discovered. Originally, before I tried to start using NetworkManager (thinking it would somehow make this easier) and I was just using netcfg2/network profiles/net-auto as outlined here and here, I had 'network' and 'net-auto' prefixed with the @ in my DAEMONS=() list in rc.conf so that they'd start in the background. After experimenting with NetworkManager for some time I went back to the "manual" way and this time, when I uncommented 'network' and 'net-auto', I left off the @. So now, as Arch boots, I see the following:

:: Scanning for networks                              [BUSY]  (this takes a while)
:: school up                                          [BUSY]  (also takes a while)
wlan0 timed out:
            - DHCP lease attempt failed               [FAIL]
:: Starting network                                   [BUSY]
SIOCADDRT no such process                             [FAIL]

I can only ASSUME I have been getting these errors from the very beginning, but I never saw them because these were prefixed with the '@' - also I can only ASSUME this is highly related to my troubles.

Another thing to note: some things appear to work correctly all the time. For instance, wlan0 always gets the correct ESSID assigned. And whenever I manually run dhcpcd wlan0 I am successfully assigned an IP. When I do ifconfig, I see that wlan0 has an IP address. I spend a long time after booting up doing seemingly hundreds of variations and iterations of 'ifconfig wlan0 up/down', 'dhcpcd wlan0', etc etc.. sometimes I can get to the authentication page after a few minutes, other times I swear it takes maybe 45 min to an hour. It doesn't seem to be anything that I am doing that allows me to connect, but rather just waiting a random amount of time.

Again, booting into Windows, I can connect without a hitch. In Arch, as soon as I finally get the BlueSocket page to appear and I log in, I have zero internet problems as long as the laptop is on.

Here are my current settings, so to speak:
rc.conf

...
INTERFACES=(wlan0)
wlan0="dhcp"
gateway="default gw 192.168.0.1"
ROUTE=(gateway)
..
AUTO_NETWORKS=(auto-wireless wlan0)
..
DAEMONS=(syslog-ng net-auto network !dhcdbd !networkmanager alsa netfs crond hal fam mpd samba gdm)
     #dhcdbd and networkmanager are !'ed because I was using them together at one point, but not currently)

/etc/network.d/school (the connection I'm having trouble with)

CONNECTION="wireless"
DESCRIPTION="ASU connection"
INTERFACE=wlan0
SCAN="yes"
SECURITY="no"
ESSID="WAASU"
IP="dhcp"
DHCP_TIMEOUT=60  #the "school up" portion of my boot-up was taking a long time even before I did this

ifconfig wlan0 (currently, I have a working connection at school)

wlan0     Link encap:Ethernet  HWaddr 00:23:4D:DA:7C:0E  
          inet addr:172.16.20.97  Bcast:172.16.255.255  Mask:255.255.0.0
          inet6 addr: fe80::223:4dff:feda:7c0e/64 Scope:Link
          UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST  MTU:1500  Metric:1
          RX packets:23696 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:6706 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000 
          RX bytes:5402441 (5.1 Mb)  TX bytes:1094990 (1.0 Mb)
          Interrupt:17 Memory:f4300000-f4310000

iwconfig

wlan0     IEEE 802.11g  ESSID:"WAASU"  
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.437 GHz  Access Point: 00:01:F4:EC:D8:E6   
          Bit Rate=54 Mb/s   
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:51/100  Signal level:-63 dBm  Noise level:-96 dBm
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:0

Last edited by flintmecha (2009-03-31 12:12:06)

flintmecha · 2009-04-01 18:22:12

Success!

I added DHCLIENT="no" to the school network profile and now everything seems to be working as it should - net-auto and network start without problems, and I have no issues getting to the network's authentication page.

Last edited by flintmecha (2009-04-02 21:12:07)

Arch Linux

#1 2009-02-25 16:31:44

[SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#2 2009-02-26 01:57:30

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#3 2009-02-26 02:40:34

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#4 2009-02-26 02:58:15

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#5 2009-02-26 03:50:47

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#6 2009-02-26 12:36:47

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#7 2009-03-02 07:28:53

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#8 2009-03-02 08:20:30

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#9 2009-03-30 21:07:18

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

#10 2009-04-01 18:22:12

Re: [SOLVED] Trouble with BlueSocket on school network, DHCP

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