Wi-fi loves home, hates to travel

[fotonix]

This problem is common to 4 laptops (running LM 18.3), all differing hardware and generations, etc. All the machines are 100% happy when accessing wi-fi at home. Yet when we go to friends, the adventures begin. Sometimes you will see only old connections, no new ones - turning wi-fi off and on again often helps. More serious though is when you see a new wi-fi network, click on it to connect, and.. nothing (apart from embarrassment). Well, the busy cursor spins a while, NO dialogue is presented to enter a password for the (secured) wi-fi, and after a while some generic "disconnected" message appears. Where at home if I change the wi-fi network password, we all get a prompt, as expected. Is there a simple command to force refresh when away from home, or is there something else going on?

[smurphos]

Are you sure your friends WIFI networks are set up to accept connections from unknown machines? E.g my home wifi is configured to ignore connection attempts from devices not whitelisted by MAC address, albeit a determined wardriver could easily spoof a MAC address.

Could be other bad config options on their routers that work fine with their equipment but not yours (e.g. disabling support for the B/G standards, using a non-standard channel etc).

Do you have problems with 'public' wifi in coffeeshops etc?

[fotonix]

Thanks for the input. This happened over the Easter holiday and had me worried. Things have settled a bit and some projects are out of the way, so I am going to set aside a day to wander around the Library and a few wi-fi spots with 2 laptops and see what happens.

[AZgl1800]

you are not alone.

over the last couple of years, travelling and using motel WiFi systems, I have given up in disgust with Foreign WiFi signals....

I now use my Verizon MiFi on my cellphone data plan.

4.13.0-39-generic x86_64 (64 bit)
Desktop: Cinnamon 3.6.7 Distro: Linux Mint 18.3 Sylvia

[phd21]

HI fotonix,

I just read your post and the good replies to it. Here are my thoughts on this as well.

It would help to know more about your systems setup. If you run "inxi -Fxzd" and "lsusb" from the console terminal prompt on each computer, highlight the results, copy and paste them back here, that should provide enough information.

You should have no problems connecting to any WifI network as long as you have the correct login information, that your WiFi adapter supports the same protocol as the router (b/g/n/ac), and the hardware router is not overly restricted such as filtering out all devices but their own. Of course, that should be relatively easy to check and to add your devices if need be to the router even if its temporary.

If I am not mistaken, if you click the network manager system tray icon, there is an option to "refresh or rescan" to see available WiFi networks to connect with. You can also scroll up or down as there may be many WiFi networks available.

Is this happening to all 4 laptops when you are someplace else?

Also, you can get a low-cost but super convenient "mini travel portable WiFi hotspot router" which is powered by a computer's or tablet's USB port or equivalent USB 5volt adapter. Then when you go anywhere else, you can tell the "mini WiFi router" to connect to the host WiFi router, then you and all your WiFi-enabled devices, computers, smartphones, game consoles, TV sticks, etc... can connect to your own portable secure "WiFi hotspot" network using your own secure login information and your own encryption key password.

***** Amazon.com: GL.iNet GL-MT300N-V2 Mini Travel Router, Repeater Bridge, 300Mbps High Performance, 128MB RAM, OpenVPN Client, Tor Compatible $20us)
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B073T ... UTF8&psc=1

The "mini router GL-Inet" above works fantastically well with many excellent features, including "wisp", USB port, built-in UPnP/DLNA server, VPN options, etc... and it is only about 2 square inches (5.08cm sq.).

There are many other "mini travel portable WiFi hotspot routers" available too, see link below. Get one that is at least 300mbps or higher.

Amazon.com: travel router hotspot
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i ... MBY2KPKHCF


Hope this helps ...

NetworkManager_RescanWireless1.jpg