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Grex > Micros > #255: Mac wireless internet networks. | |
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| 25 new of 86 responses total. |
gull
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response 25 of 86:
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Sep 14 14:56 UTC 2004 |
It's been years since I used a Mac, so I'm not sure where you'd find
that information.
Every wireless network device I've seen has some ability to measure
signal strength. It's necessary anyway for several functions of the
802.11b protocol -- the ability to choose the closest access point on
the network, for example. Since the capability is built into the card's
radio modem, reporting it to the user as well isn't too difficult. Most
cards I've seen have the ability to measure signal strength, noise
level, and "link quality", though not all drivers report all of these
values to the user.
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rcurl
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response 26 of 86:
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Sep 14 17:53 UTC 2004 |
Makes sense. Does a computer shift among nearby (open) access points
if signal strength varies? (I wrote "open" as a user would have to
specify the SSID and WEP Key to access my Base).
I'm rather pleased how my network now functions. As I've said, I have two
computers on a wired ethernet LAN and this network is hooked wirelessly into
the Base Station, which is on Comcast's high speed internet access. For the
first time my wife and I don't have to contend for time on the internet!
"Modern Living".
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rcurl
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response 27 of 86:
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Sep 15 05:41 UTC 2004 |
I just discovered the "Network Utility" in OSX. This seems to be telling
me a lot about the activity on differnt parts of my network - if I can
figure out what the jargon means. I start with looking for a meaning for
Ethernet Interface (fw0) [or en0], and Network Utility Help comes up with
nothing for Interface, fw0 or en0. Who were they writing thost "Help"
pages for? (And the Utility says "Link Speed" is 10 mb for en0 - which
isn't a *speed*...) Sigh.....
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gull
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response 28 of 86:
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Sep 15 20:21 UTC 2004 |
Re resp:26: It depends on the network setup being done properly, but
yes, it's possible to roam around and have the computer switch from one
access point to another. This relies on the access points all being
part of the same network, though. Automatic, seamless hand-offs from
one network to another aren't possible because of the IP address and
routing changes.
Re resp:27: Okay, I don't know MacOS X, but I'll see if I can help you.
fw0 and en0 are the names of interfaces. In BSD (which OS X is based
on) devices traditionally get names in that format, where the two
letters mean something about the type of the advice. For example, my
FreeBSD system has two DEC ethernet cards, de0 and de1. (The de stands
for DEC Ethernet, apparently.) A little Googling suggests that en0 is
the Mac's ethernet interface, and fw0 is FireWire.
"10 mb" probably means 10 megabits per second.
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prp
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response 29 of 86:
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Sep 15 22:44 UTC 2004 |
en0 is the built-in ehternet, and en1 is the Airport card. Assuming
you have an airport card.
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gelinas
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response 30 of 86:
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Sep 15 23:34 UTC 2004 |
"ifconfig -a" is a useful command, in Terminal.
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gull
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response 31 of 86:
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Sep 16 14:09 UTC 2004 |
Does OS X have any equivalent of Linux's 'iwconfig' command, for
displaying wireless-specific information?
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prp
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response 32 of 86:
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Sep 17 00:25 UTC 2004 |
From the System Profiler:
AirPort:
Interface: en1
Type: AirPort
IP Address: 207.75.135.18
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Broadcast Address: 207.75.135.255
Router Address: 207.75.135.5
DNS Servers: 172.22.22.27
Domain: wccnet.org
Ethernet Address: 00:30:65:2a:16:7c
From Network Utility:
Hardware Address 00:30:65"2a:16:7c
IP Address(es): 207.75.135.18
Link Speed 11Mb
Link Status Active
Vendor Apple
Model Wireless Network Adapter (802.11)
Sent Packets 3181
Send Errors 0
Recv Packets 54381
Recv Errors 0
Collisions 0
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rcurl
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response 33 of 86:
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Sep 17 05:19 UTC 2004 |
That computer has an Airport card. Mine doesn't.
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prp
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response 34 of 86:
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Sep 18 19:35 UTC 2004 |
You can get the same information for en0, the built-in ethernet,
as for en1, the airport card.
re 51: What sort of information does iwconfig provide?. The command
iwconfig is not there, but the information may be somewhere.
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prp
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response 35 of 86:
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Sep 18 20:16 UTC 2004 |
Back to Comcast Modems, I heard that they they have problems with more than
15 computers on the ethernet network. Motorola says the modem works with
up to 32 computers.
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gull
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response 36 of 86:
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Sep 20 03:09 UTC 2004 |
Re resp:33: I thought we were talking about a wireless network?
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rcurl
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response 37 of 86:
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Sep 20 07:24 UTC 2004 |
Right - my ethernet LAN (2 computers) connects wirelessly to the internet.
Neither computer has an Airport card - the LAN has a wireless adapter, but
its not an Airport card. The router, however, is an Airport base.
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gull
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response 38 of 86:
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Sep 20 15:53 UTC 2004 |
Oh, okay. In that case, you're not going to get signal strength
information from your computer directly. You'll have to get it from the
wireless bridge on the LAN. Maybe it has a built-in webpage you can
look at?
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rcurl
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response 39 of 86:
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Sep 20 18:40 UTC 2004 |
It has a built-in webpage for configuring the SSID and security parameters
but it only shows field strength if one configures the Airport base to
transmit its SSID - which isn't adviseable. But I think you've put your
finger on it - I can't have my pie and eat it too.
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rcurl
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response 40 of 86:
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Jan 11 16:52 UTC 2005 |
(Further to the above stuff....) For security on my wi-fi Internet access
I have made it a Closed Network and implemented 128 bit WEP. I now think I
can also implement Access Control to the Apple Extreme Base Station by
listing there the permitted MAC addresses.
As described previously, I have a wired LAN with a PowerMac G4 and an
iMac, connecting to the Base Station with a wireless ethernet Adapter. I
can find a MAC address on the G4 but not on the iMac (neither has an
Airport card installed), while the Adapter itself has a MAC address. Is
the latter all I need to list on the Base Station to permit access for
both of the computers on the LAN?
I realize that if I have a visitor for whom I would like to permit access
to my Internet connection from their laptop, I would have to enter their
MAC address into the Base Station as well as the security parameters into
their computer. This doesn't happen often, however.
(The reason I don't just try it is that if I lock myself out of the Base
Station by something I do - which I did several times in setting up the
system - , it takes a while to reset the Base Station to its default
settings and the Adapter for that, so I can access it to reset the
security options.)
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blaise
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response 41 of 86:
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Jan 12 18:49 UTC 2005 |
That's why I like having a wireless router that has an ethernet switch
built in -- if I lock the wireless portion, I can adjust the
configuration with a wired system. (Right now I'm using a Netgear
802.11b router; I hope to upgrade to a Linksys 802.11g router soon. The
reason I want to switch to Linksys is that their firmware is open
source, so I can add things like IPv6 support.)
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rcurl
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response 42 of 86:
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Jan 12 18:55 UTC 2005 |
The reason I have my wireless setup is so I would not have to run an
ethernet cable from the LAN, which is in a different part of the house
from the cable termination point.
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rcurl
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response 43 of 86:
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Jan 23 07:29 UTC 2005 |
Further to my #40 (and, more specifically):
Question was: do I have to enter both the computer MAC address and the
Adapter MAC address into the Apple Extreme Base Station Access Control
list?
New Question: what formats of the MAC (hardware) address are allowable.
I've seen them written as 04:05:a6:..., as 04.05.a6...., and as 04 05
a6.... Does it, then, not matter what the delimiter is, even just a space?
(I gather that case is not important - correct?)
(I found the iMac MAC (hardware) address.)
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gull
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response 44 of 86:
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Jan 23 22:59 UTC 2005 |
I'd guess just the MAC address of your wireless adapter. I'm assuming
the "computer MAC address" is the MAC address of its ethernet adapter.
I'm not absolutely sure, though; if you're doing some kind of bridging,
you may need to enter both.
MAC addresses are written out with various delimiters, but the wireless
access points I've used seem to want them entered with the delimiters
left out, as a single string of hexadecimal digits.
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twenex
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response 45 of 86:
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Jan 24 01:07 UTC 2005 |
Sorry to muddy the waters, but mine wants hex digits separated into pairs by
colons.
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rcurl
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response 46 of 86:
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Jan 24 07:43 UTC 2005 |
Are they case sensitive, too?
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gull
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response 47 of 86:
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Jan 24 14:29 UTC 2005 |
I doubt it, but God only knows what someone out there is programmed.
All of my wireless access points have had odd, sometimes amusing
firmware bugs. (But then, I buy cheap crap.)
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gull
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response 48 of 86:
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Jan 24 14:29 UTC 2005 |
What someone out there *has* programmed, rather.
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rcurl
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response 49 of 86:
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Jan 24 19:36 UTC 2005 |
http://www.erg.abdn.ac.uk/users/gorry/course/lan-pages/mac-vendor-codes.htm
l
has some info about the MAC address, viz:
"Ethernet MAC
"Ethernet hardware addresses are 48 bits, expressed as 12 hexadecimal
digits (0-9, plus A-F, capitalized). They might be written unhyphenated
(e.g., 123456789ABC), or with one hyphen (e.g., 123456-789ABC), but should
be written hyphenated by octets (e.g., 12:34:56:78:9A:BC). This gives a
theoretical 281,474,976,710,656 addresses. This is more than 56,000 MAC
addresses for each person on the planet!"
Note that it says "A-F, capitalized". Yet in both my iMac and G4 their MAC
addresses are shown with the letters in lower case, while the iMac has
the address hyphenated with dots and the G4 with colons (and the Adapter
uses the format stated in the quote above).
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