Hi guys, Firstly, I want to justify the moral perspective of what it is I am trying to achieve. I recently moved next door to a pub and the pub advertise free wifi. Buy a pint and you get the WEP key. So I have the key and I can very easily connect to the wifi from the comfort of my living room. I don't do any heavy downloading and or 'questionable usage' stuff so I can't see the harm in using their wifi indefinitely. I buy a lot of pints there. But I have a few of devices (laptop, pc, xbox etc) and I like having my own network infrastructure. What I would like to do is grab the wifi and pump it into the WAN port on my wireless router and then connect my devices to my wireless network. I've done some research and I'm confused about what device I need in order to do this. Do I need a Wireless Repeater? Do I need a Wireless Bridge? Will one of these "wireless gaming adapters" attached to my router do the trick? I obviously don't want to buy the wrong thing so I need this clarified. Also, is there anything I'm overlooking with regards to the topology? Cheers in advance!
You need a bridge/client-bridge. Yes one of those gaming adapters would work. If your router can be flashed with DD-WRT, that would work too, as a single device. Set up a VLAN/subnet so your hardware doesn't show up to everyone connecting to the WiFi network. However, ethically, I have to say this is a bad idea and I definitely don't agree with what you're doing. Apart from using a resource, without paying for it. WOuld you go into their garden and siphon water from a hose? Yes, they pay for unlimited water, so you taking some doesn't harm anyone, right? So would you do that?
Yes, wireless bridge plugged into the router. Don't know about gaming adapters as I don't do games. Now for the thing I'm really curious about. Is said pub the Coach & Horses in Bedford Street? Benjamin Satchwell? Tavistock Inn? Even if it isn't any of the above, how many pubs are there in your publicly-posted location that offer free wifi? That little back story has a lot of information in it for anyone remotely local. I'd doubt if the landlords visit bit-tech but the world's full of closet geeks. Ethics are always debatable, but you're possibly interfering with a small, local business. If you were "borrowing" the connection of a company the likes of Sony, I wouldn't really care. But these people probably use the same internet connection as the hotspot does; and maybe they want to watch some YouTube just as you're getting the latest 4.6GB god-knows-what.iso
Thanks for clarifying this all for me. I've got my eyes on one of these. There's a cheap one going on eBay. Reckon it'd do the trick? I think it might. With regards to the ethical issues, I really don't want to start having a debate about it. I'm not going to name the pub for my own reasons regarding my personal privacy and as my original post said, I don't heavy download so I won't be affecting their traffic.
just seems tight to me. your pinching someone else's internet connection. granted you may not abuse it, but streaming and using xbox will take up some bandwidth. how about if someone just comes into your house and borrows your TV while they have a pint bought at the pub. The fact that you need to hide which pub it is means you dont want them to know your piggybacking on their network. stop been so tight and buy your own god damm internet.
Sigh. How am I pinching something that's free? If my sofa was positioned 6 feet to the left then I'd be inside the pub and there wouldn't be an issue here. The reason I'm not naming the pub is because it would be tantamount to giving out my address and why on Earth would I want to do that on a public forum? I used to run an unsecured WAP before I moved and encouraged my neighbours to use it. I know for a fact that they did. Not that this is the point but I never considered it an ethical issue that they were using my internet connection for free - they never abused it and I won't abuse this one. Anyway, lock this thread or something. Thanks for the advice but the last thing I wanted was to spark a debate. -1 for socialism.
hmmm maybe you should ask your pub landlord if you can share the connection. if you go to the pub alot im sure he would be fine with it. i didnt mean to start a debate sorry
