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My company has a guest wifi network for use by non-company issued machines. Since getting my MacBook Air recently, I've wanted to bring it in and use it around the office.

I can easily connect to the (unsecured) guest wifi network but then the first time I try to access a website I get a login page where I need to use my company userid/password to gain access. This is kind of like it works in a hotel.

This works fine except if I put my machine to sleep and wake it up again, I need to re-login again. This re-login happens all day long. Very annoying. I'm wondering if I can configure my Mac to automatically login for me. Is there a way of configuring the wireless networking on my Mac to automatically pass my userid/password for when upon connecting?

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  • I think Fluid.app might have a chance at working here, but I'm having trouble finding the best way to test it to be sure.
    – Jason Salaz
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 5:33
  • Thanks for the idea - not sure I am getting how Fluid would help though.
    – Marplesoft
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 15:31

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If the login functions through a Webpage, it's probable that the closest you could come is to write a script to fill in the form for you.

If you're lucky, the login form might use a HTML GET request so you could to bookmark the page that logs you in. Pay attention to what redirects occur once you login. If you see something like this:
http://example.com?name=fred&pword=qwerty, you can bookmark that and go to it to log in automatically.
This is unlikely, though, because it isn't a very secure choice for your company. The form probably uses a POST request.

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  • Yeah I can see the url quite plainly. I guess I was wondering whether there is a formal protocol for logging into a system like this. But the other thing you made me think of is I could write a Safari extension to do the automatic login. However, if the first thing I want to do is run my mail client or anything non-browser based it will simply fail until I go to Safari and do this login. Which is annoying.
    – Marplesoft
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 15:31
  • @Marplesoft If you see the URL that logs you in, you can bookmark it. Just open that page to log in. However, if you see a normal URL (without the ?name=fred&pword=qwerty), you'll have to type it in manually.
    – Nathan Greenstein
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 15:41
  • Oh I see what you're saying. But yeah I think it's a form POST, not just URL query string that passes the userid/password.
    – Marplesoft
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 15:44
  • @Marplesoft If it's a post request, I don't believe you can automate it.
    – Nathan Greenstein
    Commented Mar 6, 2011 at 17:20
  • You actually can, it's quite simple really: superuser.com/questions/149329/…
    – XQYZ
    Commented Jun 16, 2011 at 19:03
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It is possible to do a POST request using curl from terminal. You need to figure out the key/values pairs that are being passed, and the action url, and then submit to that url.

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