Automatic Wireless Network Connections in Windows XP

Windows XP (either Professional or Home Edition) allows you to establish a wireless network connection to Wi-Fi network routers and access points automatically. This feature helps you to make wireless Internet / Wi-Fi network connections more easily with laptop computers and is highly recommended for those who roam between multiple locations.
Does My Computer Support Automatic Wireless Network Configuration?
Not all Windows XP computers with Wi-Fi wireless support are capable of automatic wireless configuration. To verify your Windows XP computer supports this feature, you must access its Wireless Network Connection properties:

1. From the Start Menu, open Windows Control Panel.
2. Inside Control Panel, click the "Network Connections" option if it exists, otherwise first click "Network and Internet Connections" and then click "Network Connections."
3. Finally, right-click "Wireless Network Connection" and choose "Properties."

In the Wireless Network Connection properties window, do you see a "Wireless Networks" tab? If not, your Wi-Fi network adapter lacks so-called Windows Zero Configuration (WZC) support, and the built-in Windows XP automatic wireless configuration feature will remain unavailable to you. Replace your wireless network adapter if necessary to enable this feature.

If you see a "Wireless Networks" tab, click it, and then (in Windows XP SP2) click the "View Wireless Networks" button appearing on that page. A message may appear on the screen as follows:

"Windows cannot configure this wireless connection. If you have enabled another program to configure this wireless connection, use that software… ."

This message appears when your wireless network adapter was installed with a software configuration utility separate from Windows XP. The Windows XP automatic configuration feature cannot be used in this situation unless the adapter's own configuration utility is disabled, which is generally not advisable.
Enable and Disable Automatic Wireless Network Configuration
To enable automatic configuration, ensure the "Use Windows to configure my wireless network settings" checkbox is checked on the Wireless Networks tab of the Wireless Network Connection properties window. Automatic wireless Internet / Wi-Fi network configuration will be disabled if this checkbox is unchecked. You must be logged on with Windows XP administrative privileges to enable / disable this feature.
What Are Available Networks?
The Wireless Networks tab allows you to access the set of "Available" networks. Available networks represent those active networks currently detected by Windows XP. Some Wi-Fi networks may be active and in range but not appear under Available networks. This occurs when a wireless router or access point has SSID broadcast disabled.

Creating a Peer-to-Peer Wireless Ethernet Network

To create a peer-to-peer wireless Ethernet network in Windows XP:

1.

Click Start, then click Control Panel. The Control Panel window opens. If your Control Panel is in Category View, click Network and Internet Connections. The Network and Internet Connections window opens.
2.

Click/Double-click Network Connections. The Network Connections window opens.
3. Right-click Wireless Network Connection, then click View Available Wireless Networks. The Connect to Wireless Network dialog box opens.

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Use Your Telnet Client to Retrieve a Web Page Using HTTP

Telnet is a remote terminal service used on the Internet. It's use has declined lately, but it is a very useful tool to study the Internet. In Windows find the default telnet program. It may be located in the Windows directory named telnet.exe. When opened, pull down the Terminal menu and select Preferences. In the preferences window, check Local Echo. (This is so you can see your HTTP request when you type it.) Now pull down the Connection menu and select Remote System. Enter www.google.com for the Host Name and 80 for the Port. (Web servers usually listen on port 80 by default.) Press Connect. Now type

GET / HTTP/1.0

and press Enter twice. This is a simple HTTP request to a web server for it's root page. You should see a web page flash by and then a dialog box should pop up to tell you the connection was lost. If you'd like to save the retrieved page, turn on logging in the Telnet program. You may then browse through the web page and see the HTML that was used to write it.

The Traceroute Program

If you're using Microsoft Windows or a flavor of Unix and have a connection to the Internet, here is another handy Internet program. This one is called traceroute and it shows the path your packets are taking to a given Internet destination. Like ping, you must use traceroute from a command prompt. In Windows, use tracert www.yahoo.com. From a Unix prompt, type traceroute www.yahoo.com. Like ping, you may also enter IP addresses instead of domain names. Traceroute will print out a list of all the routers, computers, and any other Internet entities that your packets must travel through to get to their destination.

The Ping Program

If you're using Microsoft Windows or a flavor of Unix and have a connection to the Internet, there is a handy program to see if a computer on the Internet is alive. It's called ping, probably after the sound made by older submarine sonar systems.1 If you are using Windows, start a command prompt window. If you're using a flavor of Unix, get to a command prompt. Type ping www.yahoo.com. The ping program will send a 'ping' (actually an ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) echo request message) to the named computer. The pinged computer will respond with a reply. The ping program will count the time expired until the reply comes back (if it does). Also, if you enter a domain name (i.e. www.yahoo.com) instead of an IP address, ping will resolve the domain name and display the computer's IP address. More on domain names and address resolution later.

How Does the Internet Work?

How does the Internet work? Good question! The Internet's growth has become explosive and it seems impossible to escape the bombardment of www.com's seen constantly on television, heard on radio, and seen in magazines. Because the Internet has become such a large part of our lives, a good understanding is needed to use this new tool most effectively.

This whitepaper explains the underlying infrastructure and technologies that make the Internet work. It does not go into great depth, but covers enough of each area to give a basic understanding of the concepts involved. For any unanswered questions, a list of resources is provided at the end of the paper. Any comments, suggestions, questions, etc. are encouraged and may be directed to the author at the email address given above.

Because the Internet is a global network of computers each computer connected to the Internet must have a unique address. Internet addresses are in the form nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn where nnn must be a number from 0 - 255. This address is known as an IP address.