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    PF Sense as captive portal soloution

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    • S
      shnorkiller
      last edited by

      Hi All,

      I'm new to this forum, so please take this first post as a greeting message to everyone :)

      I am hoping someone can help me out and tell me if PF Sense is infact the correct soloution to what I'm trying to achieve, and if not, possibly point me in the right direction so i can do some further investigations and research.

      I'm trying to make a login page pop up on devices every (x) amount of minutes, I'm currently using Mikrotik to perform this, but unfortunately users have to return to their browsers every time they need to re-login, because the page doesnt popup (like it does the first time you connect to a hotspot network on an apple device). Would I be able to use PF Sense as a way to prompt a captive portal browser on android/iphones/mobile devices?

      If not, does anyone have any suggestions as to how I could go about achieving this.

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      • DerelictD
        Derelict LAYER 8 Netgate
        last edited by

        All the Apple devices do when you connect to a network is automatically make an http query to a known site on behalf of the user.  If they get "Success" back, they know they are connected to the internet.  If they get anything else, they bring up a light browser window and make the same query.  This time, they display the results to the user which is usually the portal login page.

        If the portal times out after that, Apple devices do not reprompt.

        To accomplish what you want, the portal device would have to be able to "push" a login page to the device.  That would mean a strange internet device would have to have the ability to push unsolicited notifications to the phone/tablet/laptop that would be displayed.

        Imagine the shenanigans if that were possible.

        Captive portals break the internet by design.  Are you sure you need one?

        Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA
        A comprehensive network diagram is worth 10,000 words and 15 conference calls.
        DO NOT set a source address/port in a port forward or firewall rule unless you KNOW you need it!
        Do Not Chat For Help! NO_WAN_EGRESS(TM)

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        • S
          shnorkiller
          last edited by

          Hi,

          Thanks so much for the feedback and knowledgable response.

          I am 100% certain that I need to push people a login page, is there anything you could recommend?

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          • DerelictD
            Derelict LAYER 8 Netgate
            last edited by

            Sure. Get everyone to install an app on their device that allows you to push notifications to them.

            Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA
            A comprehensive network diagram is worth 10,000 words and 15 conference calls.
            DO NOT set a source address/port in a port forward or firewall rule unless you KNOW you need it!
            Do Not Chat For Help! NO_WAN_EGRESS(TM)

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
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