Wow, I’m sitting here at 11:45 at night (PST 1/30/2009) with no Internet [this post has been delayed going live until an Internet connection was established]. The hotel we are staying at (The Anaheim Park Hotel at Harbor and 91 in Fullerton) had advertised when reservations were made much earlier that they had free Internet. Alas, they do not. I called the front desk and asked about this, and they told me their free Internet was broken and that they have been trying to fix it. I told them I was a networking expert and might be able to help, to which they replied something to the extent of “we already have networking experts who have been working on it for a few days, but thanks”. This was an obvious lie because it would not take any “networking expert” more than a day to fix this kind of problem, but I did not feel like pushing the issue.
The pay for wireless-Internet service for the hotel is done through Wayport, and it has been very finicky. When I tried to get on earlier tonight the process was breaking after my credit card was submitted for processing. I submitted it 5 or 6 times over a period of time and it broke at the same place each time with an error message something to the extent of “there was an error processing your request. Please try again”. Later on, I couldn’t even get past the main Wayport page to any other section. All pages were returned as zero byte files with no header, which was confirmed through packet sniffing.
0030 48 54 54 50 2f 31 2e 31 20 33 HT TP/1.1 3
0040 30 34 20 4e 6f 74 20 4d 6f 64 69 66 69 65 64 0d 04 Not M odified.
0050 0a 45 78 70 69 72 65 73 3a 20 53 61 74 2c 20 33 .Expires : Sat, 3
0060 31 20 4a 61 6e 20 32 30 30 39 20 30 37 3a 35 33 1 Jan 20 09 07:53
0070 3a 33 37 20 47 4d 54 0d 0a 4c 61 73 74 2d 4d 6f :37 GMT. .Last-Mo
0080 64 69 66 69 65 64 3a 20 57 65 64 2c 20 31 31 20 dified: Wed, 11
0090 41 70 72 20 32 30 30 37 20 31 34 3a 33 32 3a 34 Apr 2007 14:32:4
00a0 34 20 47 4d 54 0d 0a 4d 49 4d 45 2d 56 65 72 73 4 GMT..M IME-Vers
00b0 69 6f 6e 3a 20 31 2e 30 0d 0a 44 61 74 65 3a 20 ion: 1.0 ..Date:
00c0 53 61 74 2c 20 33 31 20 4a 61 6e 20 32 30 30 39 Sat, 31 Jan 2009
00d0 20 30 37 3a 34 38 3a 33 37 20 47 4d 54 0d 0a 53 07:48:3 7 GMT..S
00e0 65 72 76 65 72 3a 20 41 4f 4c 73 65 72 76 65 72 erver: A OLserver
00f0 2f 34 2e 35 2e 30 0d 0a 43 6f 6e 74 65 6e 74 2d /4.5.0.. Content-
0100 4c 65 6e 67 74 68 3a 20 30 0d 0a 43 6f 6e 6e 65 Length: 0..Conne
0110 63 74 69 6f 6e 3a 20 6b 65 65 70 2d 61 6c 69 76 ction: k eep-aliv
0120 65 0d 0a 0d 0a e....
I blame the fact that the server is “AOLServer” :-).
So, anyways, I called the front desk who had a “technician” come up and he told me to call Wayport. He also told me they did not provide free Internet anymore, and hadn’t for a while, directly contradicting the front desk representative....
So I called the provided Wayport tech support number... which gave me a beeping error signal. I think it was an invalid phone number beeping, but it could have been a busy signal. I tried multiple times, and got the same error response each time, so I couldn’t get through to technical support that way. I tried the general Wayport phone number, and went to the tech support section that way, which asked me to leave a voice message. How crappy and unprofessional :-\. I am giving up for the night in hopes that I can get online in the morning.
I had contemplated getting a Verizon Aircard (wireless Internet for computers over wireless phone waves) for this 10 day trip, but decided I probably wouldn’t need it as most places would provide wireless. How wrong I was. I wish I had now, as it would have been especially helpful at airports and many other times. I have had previous experience with using Verizon Aircards over many months and was very very pleased with the service. Even an iPhone might have been nice... if only it wasn’t only AT&T >:-(.
