[Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Hi.

Announcing an initial release of an app that launch a browser when you connect to certain WLANs. It works for me - I use it on a daily basis and perhaps this is what you've been looking for.

Download/Install: http://repository.maemo.org/extras-d..._0.0.3_all.deb (it's in Extras-devel)
More info: http://wifi-assistant.garage.maemo.org/

http://wifi-assistant.garage.maemo.o...shot-popup.jpg

/ Fredrik

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Have you thought of porting Conler to Fremantle?
http://thekondor.net/projects/conler/
http://repository.maemo.org/extras/p...urce/c/conler/

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Nope. I just needed something to get me on the company's WLAN. Conler seems to require more from the user - I intend to keep Wifi Assistant really simple. At least for now. :)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Thanks for this, this will save some time when I connect to my company's Wi-Fi and that pesky web agreement.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

i needed this so bad, thank you for making my life easier.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Is there a possibility to define the browser in which the page should be opened, cause opera remembers the protal login credentials?

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

thanks for starting this.
I do have 3 requests, maybe for future versions, if you feel like it :)

In sequence of difficulty I guess :

- as a previous poster said, leave the choice to the user for which browser to use. Some browser cache input field better than others. That already helps the persistancy issue for passwords/user IDs/emails

- could you give for each BSSID the option of entering a specific curl command string ? That would also solve the password saving issue and no full-blown webbrowser (with delays) has to be started. Would save system and user time for repeating logons.

- more difficult, can you include the MAC address in the list for the APs ? To have a more granular control as not all access points with the same SSID 'behave' the same : eg. 'semi open/free' ones in a pub or office as opposed to pure commercial ones outside. I guess for grouping purposes, then a higher level 'entity' would have to be entered, like "Office Watford" or "Wetherspoons" or "BT Lounges", collecting all MAC addresses belonging to a certain SSID, with a specific behaviour.

Just some thoughts ...

Thanks again.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Not at this moment, though I guess it should be fairly easy to add support for this. Perhaps you could help me and tell me what the name of the executable binary is, and what arguments I need to pass? (You might even know if there's a better way to start the browser, such as through dbus?)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Have a look at the homepage for the browser-switchboard tool.

It also contains the sources. I'm sure there's plenty of info in it.

To start a browser via dbus command : see here

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Sure. I'm not sure how to populate that list. I do have three ideas:
* default - always available
* python built in - always available
* curl - if there's an executable with this name
* opera - if there's an executable with this name
* others?
I also intend this to be configurable per SSID and to have a "default" browser.

My backlog contained "individual URL per SSID", which could look like "http://myisp.net/portal/?user=xxx&pass=yyy" but I guess that might not be enough. I'm thinking that I'll stick with this for any SSID setting where the "default" browser is selected. If curl is chosen, any number of additional arguments could be added.

I see your point. I'd like to keep this app fairly simple and keep details or advanced features out of sight as long as possible.
What I'd like to do in this case is to change the overall algorithm and add a new button somewhere: "Create setting for specific MAC(s)", where you could specify MAC addresses instead of a single SSID, and set all options.
When a connection is established, the algorithm would try to match on MAC before matching on SSID. Would that work for you?

Thanks for sharing your thoughts! :)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

glad to share my thoughts :)

I guess our posts crossed, all the browser starting stuff should be in post #9.

UI design is a black art by itself, I guess for true usability scrutiny we should run every program against Steve Jobs and let him approve/tear it apart. For mere humans like me, as long as it's usable, it's good enough for me as a start.

On the 'settings per MAC' option, allow then to copy settings from an already existing entry, so it minimizes the extra work. That would be the poor man's solution.
Design wise of course it's worse than the true grouping oriented approach. But the standard (SSID only) way of working is at least 'easy' for normal users. For this, allow a descriptive name to be given to each 'advanced, MAC linked'
definition as the SSID is not sufficiently unique anymore. See the grouping approach creeping in ... ??? :D

Full solution, maybe the switch to an advanced grouping based approach could be hidden in the global settings menu entry ? With a bit of a warning so people know to stay out or continue if they really want it (like me) ?

That would prevent advanced exposure and allow flexibility as well.

Again just some thoughts of mine ... Dangerous, all this thinking in one day :D

Happy to play tester for this, if you decide to give the solution a try ! I have plenty of strange wifi situations around (hence the request) and currently 4 browsers to start on my N900.
Opera, Chromium, Fennec and MicroB.

ps. For one of my projects I worked (weekdays only) in Orebro for a year ... My only exposure to Sweden (together with the obligatory visits to Stockholm) but I liked it a lot. Only winters were soo dark ...

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Great app, thanks for this. It seems to work just fine, though, as far as I can tell, the network-profiles (e.g. network A) are not saved/shown until connected to it in the list. However, I'd have few suggestions as improvements.

1. Add support for networks with spaces between them (e.g. This Is My Network). So far I've been able to use this app in non-spaced network only (e.g. mynetwork).
2. Allow users to define the usable address by network. If I'd add Google to open on every network I'd just get redirected and thus not really saving up any time.

That's about it though. :)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Ah, yes. The list only contains those networks that you've been connected to, and either answered yes or no to in the popup - the list only contains networks that we have a yes/no setting saved for.

If you would like this to change, please tell me what you expected or how you want to see it work.

Great! Those two requests are actually on my roadmap (in that order). :)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Great! Early testing is extremely welcome. I'll post a link in this thread here whenever I get something new out. (Have lots to stuff to take care of the next 14 days or so, have two kids, speaking engagements coming up shortly - don't expect it all to happen very soon!)

Ah nice! If you ever visit Sweden again I hope you get a chance to experience the West coast (Göteborg/Gothenburg), aka the Best coast. ;)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

really nice example on how to use curl syntact to do pretty powerfull things using a 'simple' commandline here

Only problem, curl seems to be in one of the Fremantle SDK repositories according to some posts here but I couldn't find it. It seems on my N900 I have libcurl3 installed but there is already libcurl4 out there.

I rather have the the 'curl' executable, the libcurl apprach is too programming centric by itself and not usable for this purpose. Or is there an easy 'act as curl' API call into libcurl ???

Anyone has an idea ? Maybe I should request this in the programming section ....

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

It should be fairly easy to compile cURL for Fremantle. I compiled it for Diablo with minimal issues http://www.box.net/os2008/1/38267044/393488254
You may also have luck with the armel package from Debian http://packages.debian.org/lenny/armel/curl/download but of course that is "not recommended" (in my experience either it won't install due to version dependencies or it'll install but segfault or it will just work without issues)

Obviously results may vary.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

There's a new manual build available for early testing at http://wendt.se/software/maemo/wifi-..._0.9.0_all.deb which fixes the "space in network name" issue.
Almost every line of code's been refactored (modified in some way) and there might still be on or two rough cuts in there. Known things I need to fix before releasing 0.9.0 properly:
* There's no upgrade/migration script so your settings will be ignored.
* The daemon doesn't show popups until you change this in the menu > Settings > Show popup when connected ...
* If you add a network using Menu > Add Network, and the list was empty when you started the program, it will not appear (the GUI won't update) after you hit Save. Just restart the program and you'll see it, and that it's actually saved.

Steps to install if you want to try it out (as root):
initctl stop wifi-assistant
apt-get -y remove wifi-assistant
rm wifi-assistant*
wget http://wendt.se/software/maemo/wifi-assistant_0.9.0_all.deb
dpkg -i wifi-assistant*deb

Thanks in advance for any bugs you identify and report! :)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Cool stuff Fredrik.

One bug: the daemon isn't started at install time, only when hildon-desktop/home restarts; usually at boot.

One must-have (so much so I might start hacking on it): per network URLs. Virgin Trains in the UK are currently doing free wifi, but after connection to virgintrainswifi you need to open http://virgin.passengerwifi.com/startsession.php. Since this is the only one I'm using currently, it works quite well. But you could imagine a similar one for The Cloud's Get online button.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

The bug with not starting the daemon after install should already have been fixed in the next version (which I've not had time to release). The version currently in git also supports the possibility of having individual URLs per WLAN SSID (and base station MAC) - but there's no GUI for that level of configuration yet. To get it working, you need to insert a URL for the SSID in gconf.

I've been working two jobs since October 4th and I'm teaching ("Agile Web Developer") which currently eats up all my awake hours of the day. :P

I'd be happy and greatful to let you release a new version (the debian control file needs to be fixed, I got the version line wrong, apart from that it's complete and I've been using it for months) or add more GUI configuration code. If I remeber correctly, the are unit tests that already tests that you can have different URLs per SSID.

SCM: https://garage.maemo.org/scm/?group_id=1777

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

I have a problem wid my wifi.It doesn't searches the nearby wifi.
Will the above commands will help me......

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

No. Wifi Assistant will not help you with that problem.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Then wats the solution......pls help me

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

It's off-topic for this thread, which is about a utility to open web pages when certain networks are connected to.

I suggest you open a new thread, or call Nokia Care.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Just a question out of curiousity - is there no automatic redirection taking place if you try access http://wendt.se/ or any similar non-Virgin web site before logging in at startsession.php?

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Is there some de facto "standard" what password would work, if someone wants to keep open WLAN access point but still has encryption set ON?

They are changing the law in my country, to allow connect all un-protected WLAN-networks without needing to ask permission. It is assumed by the new law, that anyone is capable to set up encryption and password if wants to keep his/her WLAN private only. If the WLAN is open, it is assumed the owner lets others to use it.

But I think, there should also be standard password to try if someone wants to provide also public WLAN access point, but still wants random "customers" to use encrypted connections.

If not such standard exist, RFC-draft:
I'd suggest "guest" as a password, or if longer needed "guestguestguest" and if only numbers, then 48378, or if longer deciman or hexadecimal needed, then repeating until enough 4837848378483. "48378" is "guest" in T9-code.
(Right now I do not remember what all kind of passwords would be needed in all WPA,WPA2,WEP,*.)

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

I've just pushed version 0.9.1 out (waiting for the build as I write this, and also waiting for Bugzilla team to add a new version to the product).
If you feel you can't wait, install the .deb file from https://garage.maemo.org/frs/?group_id=1777

This is a stabilization and bug fix release. Among the fixes (spaces in SSID/Network names have been fixed as well):
* fixed Bug #11198 - list of network names are not sorted
* fixed Bug #11199 - about dialog doesn't show program version
* fixed Bug #11209 - "no settings" displayed after adding a new network
* fixed Bug #11210 - launch dialog is disabled after installation
* "silent" support for per SSID URL in GConf

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

To manually set a URL for a specific network name in gconf (that's where wifi assistant settings are saved), this is what you'd need to do:

0. Ctrl+Shift+X opens a terminal
1. Find the name used to store settings for the network you're after (I'm using limbergwendt here as an example)

~ $ gconftool-2 --all-dirs /apps/maemo/wifi_assistant
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/Telia__Internet
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/CSWLAN
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/skerrywendt
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/limbergwendt2
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/limbergwendt
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/NOMAD
/apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/default_settings

2. Now set the URL to open (http://wendt.se/) for the network in question (limbergwendt):

~ $ gconftool-2 --set --type=string /apps/maemo/wifi_assistant/limbergwendt/options/url 'http://wendt.se/'

Done.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

As a summary: Wifi Assistant has nothing to do with setting up the network link (GSM PIN, WPA keys etc). I wrote it to scratch my itch which was that at work, whenever my phone was disconnected for 30 minutes or more, the next time it connected, all web requests where intercepted and redirected to a Captcha test page which had to be completed before any connections were passed on to the Internet.

Never heard of any "standard" passwords. You might want to look at http://www.fon.com/en/ for a solution to share Wifi with peers. They might have defined their "standard" password?

Interesting. What country is this?

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

There's redirection, but if I connect to that URL it's the equivalent of clicking the "I agree to the T&C" button; meaning the connection is established and things like IM & Modest can connect through without further interaction.

That's why I want per-network URLs, so that I can customise it to the URL necessary to auto-connect through and actually get online.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

If you don't want to wait, you should be able to download and use the deb file here: http://maemo.org/packages/package_in...stant/0.9.1-2/

And if you do and you find that it works well, please vote thumbs up. If not, please report here in this thread or register a bug in Bugzilla: https://bugs.maemo.org/enter_bug.cgi...fi%20Assistant

You're old settings will not survive (basically you'll get asked once more whenever you connect to a new network, but that's about it).

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Upgraded to latest version and set the url in settings but new SSIDs still open with wifi-assistant garage page.
gconf seems to be a mess of keys under /apps/maemo/wifi-assistant and /apps/maemo/wifi_assistant so:

Seems to work.
Still seems to be a single key under wifi-assistant though...

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Yes. If I've had the time, I would have prefered to package a proper update script, that transfer all "old" settings to the new layout in gconf. I don't have much time so I prioritized a release instead with more solid software and ability to change the URL opened based on SSID.
My guess is that the install-script contains an incorrect key - the application uses only one gconf "root" path/directory, which is /apps/maemo/wifi_assistant.

Yes, you've just identified a bug and I verified that the install-script uses an incorrect path - thanks a bunch! :)
(I'll write a fix now right away, but I can't push publicly until a new SSL certificate is in place for vcs.maemo.org (version control system) - the certificate expired on new years eve and although reported some time ago it's still not fixed ...)

As a side-note, I'm "shutting down" the garage page in favor of http://wiki.maemo.org/WifiAssistant

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Thanks Fredrik, much appreciated.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

It seems to set an event that is not in the new release of Maemo. Please verify dependecies, and make it depend on WiFi only. My N900 hangs after a call has been completed and reboots with a message related to the "custom" kernal - where no modifications have been done, but installed the WiFi Assistant.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Weird, the app is merely registering a listener - the only signal sent out is the one to launch a browser.
I have not been using Maemo and my N900 because there's something wrong with the hardware. I have since made the switch to Android. The source for the app is completely free and if anyone wants to have a go at it, please do so - I'll be happy to answer questions and there are plenty of unit tests for the code I've written. The parts you are referring to, however, needs to be tested with a full complete system.
I don't have working hardware to test on any longer, and Nokia went straight to hell with Microsoft so I don't intend to look their way (unless they change strategy). Sorry. :(

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Is this app still supported?

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Well, my dear device started having issues with connectivity during phone calls so I had to get something new pretty quick, and sadly I went Android. I'd love to have an N9 in my pocket, but until Nokia drops the Windows fanboi flag I'll put my money somewhere else.

Regardless, the app's source is free and if anyone wants to jump in and improve it or fix things, please just go ahead.
I can't really do much development since my device is non-functional and the development environment I had setup is long gone as well.

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Would it be possible to port this app to run on N9?

Re: [Announce] Wifi Assistant
 

Yes, by all means. It would probably be a complete re-write, but it's not a very complicated thing to write.
I would port it right away if I only had an N9. :-)