Re: Need help setting up a home LAN

[Paul E Condon <pecondon@mesanetworks.net>]

On 20110502_111609, Camaleón wrote:
> On Mon, 02 May 2011 02:35:54 -0600, Paul E Condon wrote:
> 
> > The web interface on the router no longer works with iceweasel. It did
> > work fine a few hours ago but now I can only get a one line message
> > (folded here for email): "Please upgrade to a version 4 or higher
> > browser so that you can use this setup tool (and see lots of great sites
> > on the Internet!) " Iceweasel in Squeeze seems to be version 3.5.18 of
> > Firefox. I find it scary that they can know that and shut be down late a
> > night for a violation of their vision of their own importance.
> 
> It's just a (crazy, IMO) javascript routine. And I think it's crazy 
> because most of the embedded web servers on those devices just serve very 
> basic html formatted pages so there is no need to force the user to 
> upgrade the browser in order he can operate with it :-/
> 
> Most sure you can also manage the router via telnet but on these days 
> that should not be needed at all. 
>  
> (...)
>  
> > Anyway, I can't have a router that can have its administrative interface
> > shutdown without warning in the middle of the night. I'll have to solve
> > that before I can respond to your suggestions.
> 
> I was going to suggest that (first solve the router's management 
> issue) :-)
> 
> Greetings,
> 
> -- 
> Camaleón

It is crazy to write such misleading error messages. I did, in fact,
have JavaScript disabled because some earlier error messages made me
try to shut down all extraneous features in the hope of getting
more stable behaviour. After I posted to this list, I downloaded
Firefox 4.0.1, and tried with it and still got the same message. 
(The downloaded 4.0.1 found my .mozilla files and helpfully kept
Javascript disabled, so the suggested fix won't actually fix the
problem.) 

Now that I have it working, I'm still annoyed that such a verbose
error message could not use the word 'JavaScript'.  And all that
nonsense about great sites on the Internet! I use the Internet to try
to figure out where the next terrorist attack might come so that I
have a greater chance of being elsewhere. That is a major part of
being an informed citizen in the modern world, isn't it?

It is a very fancy user interface. Several independently scrollable
windows full of cryptic and misleading marketinggeek-speak. I think
what lead me to turn of JavaScript was that I tried the automatic
discovery of the ISP connection and it seemed to work, but the
connection was flaky. Turning on JavaScript got me back to a state
where I could examine the actual config. Then I discovered that
the autoconfig had given me a config that was simply wrong for my
ISP. Things settled down a lot after I put the correct magic 
numbers into tables. 

Thanks, Joe. You stopped my descent into madness.
-- 
Paul E Condon           
pecondon@mesanetworks.net