> From: Laurie McDonald <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > I thought this may be of interest to my son, but apparently its old hat. > Begin forwarded message: >>>> From: Gordon Campbell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>>> Since I know there are a few other staff/students at Curtin on the >>>> mailing list, I thought I'd drop out the bit of news that Apple >>>> laptops can now access Curtin's Wireless without requiring a special >>>> Cisco PCMCIA card. There's details here >> Why in the world would Curtin not support Apple wireless laptops in >> the first >> place? UWA always has, they are the easiest of all platforms: >> ------ >> Dr Chris McDonald E: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Computer Science & Software Engineering W:
I wish Curtin had made it easier for Macs, but our Networks guys were paranoid about security so went down the proprietary Cisco route back in the days when the insecure WEP standard was pretty much the only other choice. That meant that not only Apple's Airport was not supported but neither were intel's Centrino and other brand wireless cards. It sucked frankly. It's only now that WPA has provided a much more secure standard combined with Curtin finally being able to upgrade the network infrastructure that we have easy access via any brand of WPA-capable WiFi card. ps. I remember many of my friends who are staff at UWA complaining that Macs weren't initially supported either when the UWA wireless network was first being trialed, but evidently UWA's network guys got their act together a lot sooner. *sigh* :-( pps. And yes, it takes five simple steps on the Mac to connect to Curtin's WiFi LAN while Windows PCs require 28 steps (some with multiple sub-steps) covering 3 pages of info. I still haven't got my WiFi capable Windows Mobile 2003 SE PDA to connect to WPA WiFi. It's amazing how Apple continually shows up every other platform in the ease of use department - you'd think the others would learn! -Mart ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Martin Hill, Digital Media Specialist Information Management Services, Curtin University of Technology mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED], web: http://is.curtin.edu.au/ims.cfm Mb: 0401-103-194 wk: (08)9266-3101
