Monkeys Typing Shakespeare

Yeah, yeah, I’ve gotten really nerdy in these posts — it’s what I do to support the SIMIProject. So, I’ve finally decided to start jotting down solutions for IT problems that I’ve had to deal with.

This one was a really pain in a monkey’s butt:

After successfuly destroying my trusty Treo 650 after three years, I decided to go BlackBerry. Wow! I’m surprised I converted so easily. The Curve is just plain sweet. I chose this model because I was already with T-Mobile for the uber cheap monthly plans they offer and something caught my eye: t-mobile@home. This is the service that lets you use the wi-fi on the Curve to place and receive calls — basically, unlimited calling wherever you can hook up to a wi-fi connection for the added fee they charge ($20).

Excited as I was, I set up my phone and started playing with the connection features. Then… wuh? huh? The little UMA symbol that tells me I’m getting free calling switches to Edge — NOT free calling. Booooo! Lame! I spent hours googling the issue. I spent hours on the phone with various T-Mobile tech support people. “Well, we don’t support alternative solutions other than our own hotspots or the T-Mobile routers.” Boooooooo!

The problem I was having was that the phone would bounce between UMA and Edge even if I was sitting right next to the wi-fi router. In fact, sometimes it wouldn’t bounce to UMA at all. The only way I could get UMA to stick was to turn off the T-Mobile service on the phone (cool feature, by the way). Well, after dealing with two @home specialist (the second one called me by mistake not realizing that I just spent an hour on the phone with his colleague) I got my answer. It seems, the second @home specialist (who called me by mistake) knew a LOT more about this service than the first (I love talking to tech support people who know what they’re talking about — mostly).

It turns out that the Curve will choose whichever signal is STRONGER — not which service is FREE’ER. Seems logical enough. So, there you go. The phone is doing what it is SUPPOSED to be doing. Wouldn’t it have been neat if the first three T-Mobile tech support people had told me that?

A few additional things I learned along the way:

1. You can test the quality of your internet connection using the FREE java applet at http://myvoipspeed.visualware.com/ (make sure you see the applet moving on the lower half of the page — you don’t need to buy the software on the top half).

2. You can use that site to help optimize your router settings. Play around with the various features on your router and retest until you get all green lights on the test. If you can’t, your Internet connection could be the problem.

3. The UMA feature was designed for users who have craptastic t-mobile reception at home. The idea being, that your home wi-fi would always be stronger than the prevailing T-mobile signal. In markets like Los Angeles, you’ll get a battle royal on your phone and Edge will often win.

4. You need to make sure your firewall is not blocking ports 500 or 4500 (UDP).

5. The last guy I spoke to freakin’ LOVES his job and loves to share his wealth of info.

6. If you ask nicely, you can get lots of cool info that isn’t easily available to the general public like this from one of the @home Tech guys:

The HotSpot @Home service relies on the IPsec security protocol to provide secure calling over Wi-Fi. T-Mobile-branded wireless routers are configured to permit IPsec communications by default, but other devices may be configured to block IPSec. Similarly, the firewall policy on any router may have been configured (intentionally or otherwise) to prevent IPsec communications.

In order for IPsec to work, the following ports need to be allowed through the firewall in both directions:

• UDP port 500 (Internet Key Exchange or “IKE”)
• UDP port 4500 (IPSec/IKE NAT-T)

Many consumer-grade routers, including the T-Mobile branded Wi-Fi routers, include a simple check-box that will enable IPsec communications. This option is typically named ‘Enable IPsec passthrough’ or something similar.

For users of advanced corporate firewalls or home-built firewalls (typically running a UNIX-like operating system), IPSec may also require explicit rules to allow the following two protocols (independent of port) through the firewall:

• IP protocol 50 (Encapsulating Security Payload or “ESP”)
• IP protocol 51 (Authentication Header or “AH”)