The mailing list for users of the eduroam Configuration Assistant Tool (CAT)

[Vlad Mencl <vladimir.mencl AT reannz.co.nz>]

Hi,

Just wondering, would AirDrop (Apple's close range file transfer 
protocol) possible help here?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AirDrop

Sending the .mobileconfig file from a OSX device (MacBook) to an iPad?

Cheers,
Vlad


On 31/03/21 09:14, Martin Pauly wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On 30.03.21 06:41, Stefan Winter wrote:
> > The CAT installer for "Apple device" works just fine with iPads
> > (with the Apple file format "mobileconfig", not eap-config).
> sure, we have been using the .mobilconfig profiles all the time :-))
>
> > Is the issue about having no offline way to get the corresponding
> > .mobileconfig file onto the iPads? 
> yes, this is the problem at hand.
>
> > Naively I would think you'd be able to use some sort of USB connection?
> No, they don't. Or sometimes, they do, sort of. AFAIK, hooking up a USB 
> stick
> to an iPad via USB-OTG is not supported at all. If you connect the
> Lighnting-USB(male) cable to a PC, all kind of funny things can happen,
> depending on Apple's idea of a "security compartment" for each app,
> your version of libimobiledevice on a Linux PC and so on.
> (e.g. with Windows I get photos and videos, with Linux I get all
> _other_ files). But I never managed to pull a .mobileconfig through
> simple file transfer and use it afterwards. Even on macOS,
> everything is strictly tied to Apple's MIME type. On macOS, you
> may at least download it and use it later from your Downloads folder.
> In the background, some magic keeps track of the MIME type that
> was present at download time (similar to the resource fork in
> the file system used in Mac OS <10).
>
> For CAT on Android, reality turned out to be strikingly similar,
> despite intended otherwise by you, Gareth (developer), and others.
> E.g. the Android intent to trigger installation by file extension 
> .eap-config
> had stopped working at some point. So I asked Gareth to add a
> File/open dialog to the app, and so he did, cf.
> https://github.com/GEANT/CAT-Android/issues/13
> Our support students found this to be very helpful, e.g. on SIM-less 
> tablets.
>
> > FWIW, geteduroam AFAIK does not preload anything. It downloads the 
> > eap-config file for the selected institution in real-time.
> Yes, and here we have our circular dependency again. Adding a similar
> dialogue to geteduroam will be a feature request, but I think I should
> pursue this on the specific list when more basic things are settled.
> What caught my attention was the fact that getedurom on iOS obviously
> does a good job in injecting correct WiFi settings into the system
> without having to rely on Apple's MIME type requirements.
> So this might open up a way to simply transfer a .eap-config file via
> said Lightning-USB cable, and open it from the app. But this is really
> about geteduroam and should go on the specific list.
>
> Cheers, Martin

--
Vladimir Mencl
Senior Software Engineer

Research & Education
Advanced Network NZ Ltd

M +64 21 997352
E  vladimir.mencl AT reannz.co.nz
www.reannz.co.nz