University VPN

Connecting to the University VPN
Sometimes you will need to connect to the university Virtual Private Network, or VPN, from home. Quite often you'll have to do so to access journals when you're at home, or to access some of the services your department may offer.

Begin by opening Internet Connect from the Applications folder.


You'll probably be greeted with a Summary screen a bit like this:


From the file menu, choose "New VPN Connection..." and at the prompt, choose PPTP:


Under Configuration, choose "Edit Configurations..."


You'll need to fill in the following information:

Description: Lancaster University
Server Address: vpn.lancs.ac.uk
Account Name: Your ISS Username
Account Password: Your ISS Password
Encryption: Automatic (128 bit or 40 bit)

Select the OK button.

I also find it useful to make sure that "Show VPN status in menu bar" label is ticked.

To connect to the VPN, open Internet Connect, select the Lancaster VPN connection you just created, and click Connect.

You will need to set the Proxy server settings for the VPN (PPTP) connection in System Preferences - You can find instructions on how to do so at http://lumacintosh.blogspot.com/2007/06/proxy-settings.html

Proxy Settings

Proxy Settings within Lancaster University
To increase the speed of web access, and reduce the amount of bandwidth the university uses at any one time, several proxy servers are in place on campus. Here's a quick guide on how to set them up.

From the Apple Menu at the top of the page, choose "System Preferences..."


When System Preferences loads, select "Network" under the "Internet & Network" group:


I recommend that you create a new Location for Campus if you haven't done so already. To do so, click on the Drop-Down box next to where it says "Location" and choose "New Location...". When prompted type in Lancaster or something else appropriate.

You'll need to do the following for each connection you plan to use. In my case, I use a macintosh laptop and so I often use both the "Built-in Ethernet" and the "Airport" connections. I've entered proxy-server settings for both of these.

Double click on the connection you want to enter settings for and from the tabs at the top, choose "Proxies".


The easiest way to enter the proxies settings is to select "Using a PAC file" from the "Configure proxies" drop-down list and then entering
http://wwwcache.lancs.ac.uk/ into the "PAC File URL".


Alternatively, you can enter the following settings under the HTTP, HTTPS and FTP proxy servers spaces:

Server: wwwcache.lancs.ac.uk
Port: 8080



Once you've entered all of the settings, click the "Apply Now" button.

Connecting to Lancaster Wireless

Connecting to Lancaster University Wireless Networks
You may have noticed that there are several wireless networks available at Lancaster University, perhaps you've never been sure which is the best to use.
On the official university wireless network, you'll probably see four wireless networks. The best one of these to use is the eduroam wireless network.

Why is it the best network to use?
The main reason that you should use eduroam is that it is a secured wireless network, but on a Macintosh, you can also set your computer to automatically connect to the eduroam network whenever your computer is in range and log into it. In comparison, the lancaster network does not encrypt your network data so someone could potentially listen in to anything you send over the network. You'll also find that the lancaster network wants you to log into it regularly, and doesn't always work well with Safari.

How do I set it up?
There are a few very simple steps to set up the eduroam network:

1) Load up the Internet Connect program from the Applications menu
2) From the File menu, choose New 802.1X connection
3) Fill in the settings as suggested below:
Description: Lancaster
User Name: Your ISS Username
Password: Your ISS Password
Wireless Network: eduroam
Authentication: Make sure that only the TTLS box is ticked.


4) Now click OK.

The first time you connect to the eduroam network, you'll be asked if you're sure you want to accept the Wireless Network security certificate. So that you aren't asked every time, you can set your laptop to Always Trust this certificate (Screenshots forthcoming).

That's all there is to it :)

Connecting to your network Homestore

Connecting to your University Home Drive
As a mac user at Lancaster, you may be wondering how you can connect to your 'H' drive to get access to all of your documents. Some instructions are provided at http://www.lancs.ac.uk/iss/pclan, but these don't cater for Macintosh OS X at present.

The easy way
Back in about 2004, I put together a piece of Apple Script to automatically connect to your ISS homestore. In 2006 it was made widely available via the ResNet CD so I've put it on my website at http://www.andrewrn.co.uk/downloads/software/lancs-filestore.dmg. Simple download the dmg file, copy the file into your Applications folder, and eject the disk.
To use, just double click on the icon as you would for any other piece of software.

To disconnect the drive, select the icon on your desktop and drag it to the trash can in the dock.

The manual way
You'll need to have a look at http://www.lancs.ac.uk/iss/pclan and type your username into the box to find your folder number - write this down as you'll need it in a minute.
As an example, my username is nicols so my folder number is 57.

Open Finder and at the menu at the top, choose 'Go' and then 'Connect to Server...'









In the box that comes up, type in one of the following:

smb://homes1.lancs.ac.uk/[0-19]/[username]
smb://homes2.lancs.ac.uk/[20-39]/[username]
smb://homes3.lancs.ac.uk/[40-60]/[username]

If your folder number was from 0-19, choose the top line. If your folder was from 20-39, choose the middle line. If your folder was from 40-60, choose the top line.

Since my folder number is 57, I go for the bottom line:

smb://homes3.lancs.ac.uk/57/nicols

Now click on the 'Connect' button. Your computer should now connect to your network home directory at the folder number will show up on both your Desktop and in the Finder window.