Isolated LAN

Say "hi" here, and any general non PIC related chat.

Isolated LAN

Postby ric » Thu Sep 13, 2018 6:02 am

This is not a PIC question (although there is a PIC device indirectly involved ;) )
I want to set up a wi-fi LAN at a sports venue to allow participants to view a small number of web pages.
This LAN will not be connected to the Internet.

I have a NAT wifi router (it's a Linksys WRT54G with stock firmware, although I'm not averse to installing the open-source DD-WRT firmware into it)
I would like to set up DHCP in the router to allocate local IP addresses, and point to a Windows PC as the "Gateway", "Name Server", "DNS server" etc.
The aim is to run some software on this Windows PC that will serve up my web pages regardless of what web site a client attempts to browse to. This is very similar to what happens at Hotels or McDonalds when you connect to their wi-fi. Regardless of the address you browse to, you are directed to a log-in page before you get access to the Internet. I don't know if that's something built into some commercial routers, or how they do it.

I don't mind writing a bit of code to implement this, but really don't want to re-invent the wheel if most of the functionality is already available.
I'm guessing there may already be some packages to do all this.
(Some of them are probably used to hack into LANs by spoofing genuine websites. I'm certainly not trying to hack into anything :) )

So, what's the PIC involvement? This is at a car-club hillclimb venue. All the timing is done by a system I designed around a PIC16F1947. That's doing millisecond timing from four light beams, calculating split-times, run time, speed across the finish line etc. and sending it to a PC via a USB interface. This system is to make the results instantly available to any of the competitors with a smart phone.
Latest test project, an LED matrix display made from one reel of addressable LEDs. here
User avatar
ric
Verified identity
 
Posts: 659
Joined: Sat May 24, 2014 2:35 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
PIC experience: Professional 5+ years with MCHP products

Re: Isolated LAN

Postby KTrenholm » Thu Sep 13, 2018 6:09 pm

WRT54G?
That's a throwback! One of the first routers I owned.

You should be able to do what you want by setting up a web server on the router with a custom firmware. DD-WRT would be a good choice, or OpenWRT if you have a WRT54G model that supports it (not all of them do, some models just don't have the RAM/Flash to run OpenWRT). See: https://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/linksys/wrt54g).

This Page might have what you need to get started.
User avatar
KTrenholm
 
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Sep 10, 2018 3:57 pm
PIC experience: Professional 5+ years with MCHP products

Re: Isolated LAN

Postby jtemples » Thu Sep 13, 2018 9:08 pm

What you're describing is known as a "captive portal". Maybe something like this:

http://dev.wifidog.org/

(Probably won't run on a PIC16F1947 though!)
jtemples
Verified identity
 
Posts: 195
Joined: Sun May 25, 2014 2:23 am
Location: The 805
PIC experience: Professional 5+ years with MCHP products

Re: Isolated LAN

Postby ric » Thu Sep 13, 2018 9:13 pm

KTrenholm wrote:WRT54G?
That's a throwback! One of the first routers I owned.

This operation runs on a shoestring, so I reuse what's lying around whenever I can.
Just an FYI, here's a video I made showing what is involved when competing on the track.
(The first 2 minutes are just showing procedures for getting to the start line)
Latest test project, an LED matrix display made from one reel of addressable LEDs. here
User avatar
ric
Verified identity
 
Posts: 659
Joined: Sat May 24, 2014 2:35 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
PIC experience: Professional 5+ years with MCHP products

Re: Isolated LAN

Postby ric » Thu Sep 13, 2018 9:17 pm

jtemples wrote:What you're describing is known as a "captive portal". Maybe something like this:

http://dev.wifidog.org/

(Probably won't run on a PIC16F1947 though!)

Thanks John. It will be a Windows PC running the Portal, and updating the web page content automatically after each car has run. :)
Latest test project, an LED matrix display made from one reel of addressable LEDs. here
User avatar
ric
Verified identity
 
Posts: 659
Joined: Sat May 24, 2014 2:35 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia
PIC experience: Professional 5+ years with MCHP products


Return to Introductions and general chat

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 11 guests

cron