Question

I’m relatively new to the routing topic, thus sorry about this stupid question.

In my campvan I have an RUTX11 installed (FW RUTX_R00.07.01.4) with an external antenna. All of my devices I carry with me are registered on the RUTX11 Wi-Fi network. If no Wi-fi is available, connection runs over the mobile interface (LTE, 4G, 3G…) On campsites (certainly this also applies also to Wi-fi in hotels) there are three kinds of free Wi-Fi offered:

1st: As customer you get the Wi-Fi code, this is the WPA passcode needed to connect to the provided campsite Wi-Fi. This works fin with the RUTX11. Just scan the networks, enter the passcode and done.

2nd: The campsite offers an open Wi-Fi, after connecting with an mobile phone, the mobile phone shows that logon is requested. One click and the mobile phone is redirected to a logon page, where the customer has just click to "Connect". That’s all to get free Wi-Fi access.

3rd: The same as 2nd, but it cost every day some coins.

I struggle with scenario 2.

It’s easy to create the connection – just scan and connect, but the browser (FireFox, Chrome) tells me then that logon is mandatory and offers an button "Logon" or "Connect". This button forwards the browser the following site: "https://www.btwifi.com:8443/home?CPURL=http://home.bt.com" telling me, page not found and offering buy-wifi-access.

My first attempt was to logon with my mobile phone, notice the MAC addressed used by this connection, and cloned the mobile phone MAC address by the Network ->  Interface <TheInterface> -> Advanced Settings: Override MAC address: nn:nn:nn:nn:nn:nn (BSSID). But this had not solved the issue.

My question is now, how to setup the RUTX11 for scenario no. 2?

Are any best practices available?

Comments

My first attempt was to logon with my mobile phone, notice the MAC addressed used by this connection, and cloned the mobile phone MAC address by the Network ->  Interface <TheInterface> -> Advanced Settings: Override MAC address: nn:nn:nn:nn:nn:nn (BSSID). But this had not solved the issue.

I am able to successfully perform the above with my RUTX11, but ONLY on firmware versions pre 00.07.

As of 00.07, there seems to be a bug which prevents the MAC override from actually working. Even the most recent version (Dec 2022), it doesn’t work. Have tested a bunch of firmware versions, and have concluded the above.

I downgraded my firmware to “RUTX_R_00.02.06.1” and access captive portals successfully using my iPhone MAC address (after accepting the captive portal from my iPhone first).

Hope this helps.

Answer 1

Hello,

If you are failing to connect the router to public hotspots using the links that were show, it might be that the providers are smarter than usual and they are checking the TTL of your packets and dropping them if they notice, that the TTL is not of a device that would be connected straight to Hotspot but via a router.

Also, you could try to trim the URL and just write the IP with port number (this works on our router hotspots).

Comments

Thanks for the reply. I tried it, but unfortunately it happened what sometimes happened to me and I haven’t got fixed it so far: 

Under Network -> Wireless using SCAN I’ve connected to the hotspot Wi-fi. The connection looks fine. Signal 57% and RUNNING.

Network -> Interfaces, at the end of the list, the hotspot interface recently crated is displayed. Status STOPPED and I don’t get it into status RUNNING.

Maybe my understanding is wrong that a wireless connection becomes visible in the interface list.

I would love to test the recommendation from you, because it looks promising, but I’ve no luck because the interface status remains STOPPED, even after a reboot.

What can I do to get the interface into RUNNING status?

Answer 2

I have had comparable experiences on my boat. I use a RUTX11 and a Ubiquity Bullet2 WLAN antenna at the WAN input. Whenever a hotspot in the harbor has a captive website upstream for manual login, there are problems. After a reboot of all devices I can sometimes reach the captive website and unlock it. This only works once after a dial-up attempt. The captive website forces the client to a different IP address than the one addressed. Maybe the firewall in the RUTX prevents the IP address of the captive website from being forwarded.

Unfortunately I have not found a working solution. Maybe the forum or teltonika can help here.

Answer 3

Since I'm on tour, there was a new firmware made available. The new FW RUTX_R_00.07.01.4 fixed the issue with the red interface status. And in addition it optional opend the logon page for the BT wi-fi system of the camp site. Due to the fact that I have meanwhile moved to another camp site, the open BT access is not longer for free. Next time I would have a open Wi-fi hotspot which is free for camp site members, I'll check again and would update it here. 

Thanks for the great support from all of you!

Answer 4

With your support, I was able to connect to the open wi-fi from our current campsite.
Unfortunately, the new forward-to-logon feature for the X11 does not work in this setup (see below).

Steps:
Step 1: In X11 administration connect to the open wi-fi from the campsite. (NETWORK -> WIRELESS: Scan WIFI 2.4 GHz, select the wi-fi from the campsite and select JOIN NETWORK)

Step 2: Move the automatically created network interface of the campsite up to position one. (NETWORK -> INTERFACES)

Step 3: Ignore the webpage automatically opened by X11 forwarding to www.msftconnecttest.com\redirect. This redirect jumps unfortunately to the logoff page from the wi-fi provider.

Step 4: Lookup the DNS server IP address assigned to the wi-fi connection (step 1).

Unfortunately, I haven’t found the assigned DNS server it in the admin UI. Hint welcome.
Workaround: Connect with a PC to the network and note down the assigned DNS server.

Step 5: Connect your PC back to your X11 (using DHCP)

Step 6: Note down the IP settings received from your X11 DHCP.

Step 7: Edit your IP settings by manual entering the DNS server address from your campsite wi-fi provide (see step 4).

Step 8: Open your web browser and go to any web page. The logon page from the campsite wi-fi provider appears. Here I had to enter the wi-fi code I got from the campsite to get free access to their wi-fi infrastructure.

Step 9: Remove the manually entered DNS server from step 7 by switching back to the DHCP from your X11.

@teltonika support: Where are the wi-fi assigned DHCP settings visible in the X11 web ui?