Things to do wi fi

Understanding Wi-Fi and How It Works

Former Lifewire writer Melanie Uy has 5+ years’ experience writing about consumer-oriented technology and is an expert telecommuter.

Chris Selph is a CompTIA-certified technology and vocational IT teacher. He also serves as network & server administrator and performs computer maintenance and repair for numerous clients.

In This Article

Wi-Fi is a wireless networking protocol that devices use to communicate without direct cable connections. It’s an industry term that represents a type of wireless local area network (LAN) protocol based on the 802.11 IEEE network standard.

From the user’s perspective, Wi-Fi is internet access from a wireless-capable device like a phone, tablet, or laptop. Most modern devices support Wi-Fi so that the devices can join a network to gain internet access and share network resources.

Wi-Fi is the most frequently used means of communicating data wirelessly in a fixed location. It’s a trademark of the ​Wi-Fi Alliance, an international association of companies involved with wireless LAN technologies and products.​

How Wi-Fi Works

The easiest way to understand Wi-Fi is to consider an average home or business. The main requirement for Wi-Fi is a device that receives and transmits a wireless signal, usually a router, but sometimes a phone or computer.

In a typical home or small business, a router receives and then transmits an internet connection coming from an internet service provider outside the network. It delivers that service to nearby devices that can reach the wireless signal. Most homes have one router and multiple devices, including smartphones, desktop and laptop computers, tablets, and smart TVs, that receive their internet connection via Wi-Fi from that router.

In some cases, a user without a router can set up a phone or computer as a Wi-Fi hotspot so it can share the device’s wireless or wired internet connection with other devices, similar to the way a router works.

No matter how Wi-Fi is used or its source of connection, the result is always the same: a wireless signal that lets other devices connect to the main transmitter for communication, entertainment, file transfers, voice messages, or other data transmission.

Is Wi-Fi Free?

There are tons of places to get free Wi-Fi access, such as in restaurants and hotels, but Wi-Fi isn’t free in all cases. That’s because for Wi-Fi to work, the router or other device transmitting the signal must have an internet connection, which isn’t free.

For example, if you have internet service at your house, you pay a monthly fee to keep it coming. If you use Wi-Fi to connect your iPad and smart TV to the internet, you don’t pay for the internet for those devices individually. The incoming line to the home router costs whether or not you use Wi-Fi.

Many home internet connections don’t have data caps, which is why it’s not a problem to download hundreds of gigabytes of data each month. However, phones often have data caps. Phone users look for free Wi-Fi signals and use Wi-Fi hotspots whenever they can to keep down their cellular data usage volume.

It has become increasingly easy to access free hotspots, particularly in large cities. The trick is to find one near where you want to use it.

Wi-Fi Hotspots

If your phone has a data cap and you allow other devices to connect to your phone as a hotspot to access the internet, your data cap applies to any data moving through the main phone. This activity can quickly push a cellular data plan over its limit and accrue extra fees.

You can also share your internet connection with other devices to create a wireless hotspot from your computer. You can do the same with apps, such as with the Wifi Hotspot Portable app.

Set Up Wi-Fi Access

To set up Wi-Fi at home, you need a wireless router and access to the router’s admin management pages to configure the correct settings such as the Wi-Fi channel, password, and network name. Some of this information is provided by your internet service provider.

It’s usually straightforward to configure a wireless device to connect to a Wi-Fi network. The steps include ensuring that the Wi-Fi connection is enabled and then searching for a nearby network to provide the proper SSID and password to make the connection.

Some devices, such as older laptops, don’t have a built-in wireless adapter, in which case, you can buy a Wi-Fi USB adapter.

Advantages of Using Wi-Fi

Most computers and mobile devices sold in the U.S. are equipped with wireless capabilities, including Wi-Fi. The benefits of using Wi-Fi over a wired connection include:

• Convenience: Wi-Fi makes it possible for devices to connect to the internet wherever they can locate a Wi-Fi signal. Those locations are increasing all the time.
• Productivity: Wi-Fi can keep workers in near-constant contact with the office and each other.
• Expandability: Buy another tablet? No problem. Enable Wi-Fi in its settings, and it’s good to go.
• Mobility: Users aren’t tied to the office or home for their communication needs.

Disadvantages of Using Wi-Fi

The advantages of using Wi-Fi outweigh the disadvantages, but there are some disadvantages.

• Range: A Wi-Fi signal reaches a limited range, which may not cover your entire home or office.
• Security: Because wireless signals travel through the air, they can be intercepted. Using encryption technology minimizes the danger.
• Disruption: Large metal objects, such as a refrigerator, can block a Wi-Fi signal in your home. A microwave oven can disrupt the signal.

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5 things you can do with WiFi without internet access

I have to admit, this is a situation I find myself in way more than I should. In my defense, sometimes I just don’t get the notification from my internet service provider politely reminding me to pay up in time to avoid being disconnected. Also, maybe I am a true Kenyan, meaning we are as ‘last-minute’ as they come. So your internet subscription expired and you haven’t paid for your Home Internet and you’re cut off from the web. Maybe you’ve paid but for some reason, it takes your ISP a few too many hours to complete your transaction and restore your connection. In the meantime, here are a couple of things you can do with your WiFi network without internet access.

How to create a WiFi network

To create a WiFi network, you need a WiFi router or a Wireless Access Point(WAP). Chances are that you already have one. It’s the same device that your Internet provider sells to you to access the internet. For most of our readers in Uganda, Kenya or Nigeria, the MiFi is the closest to a freely available WiFi router.

A MiFi isn’t primarily used as a WiFi router. It’s mostly useful as a way of access mobile internet through the Simcard, then sharing that internet wirelessly via WiFi. So its WiFi capabilities are not that strong. However, it can work as an Access Point for other devices to connect wirelessly.

If you don’t have a MiFi, even your smartphone can create a WiFi network. This is easily done by creating a Mobile Hotspot. Again, the objective is to share your mobile internet with other devices, but you can still just use it as a plain old WiFi Access Point.

Otherwise, if you really want to do something seriously with your WiFi network without internet, then you want to invest in a dedicated WiFi router such as those from TP-Link, Cisco, Netgear, Asus, Linksys, D-Link, Xiaomi etc.

Set up a Home Server

Last year, David did a nice piece on Network Attached Storage (NAS). I’ll be honest with you, I am yet to try my feet in this awesome world of creating my own personal “internet” but it sounds like something that can be super helpful, especially when you have a number of users in the same network, with say, similar preferences. Like David said in his post, when your computer’s hard drive is full and you need more storage space, most of us go combing through the storage, deleting unnecessary files to free up space.

Setting up a Home Server could be the better solution as you won’t need to lose anything. Also, these files are available to you on demand, provided you’re connected to the network with the NAS. There is an old detailed post by Wired that explains in lengthy details how to Set up and run a home server.

Share files

So many different ways to do this. In my little experience, t he easiest and probably the fastest way that I know is by using an app called Shareit by Lenovo. Simply install it on both your laptop and pc, after that it’s a very straightforward process of sharing files, just make sure the laptop and pc both are connected to the same network by WiFi.

As mentioned, there are so many similar applications that let you use your home network to sling files across PCs and Android devices. ShareIt is another super popular one that works well, even cross-platform. Find one that works for you and give it a go!

Stream your own media

In line with the above mentioned, you might want to use your WiFi network to stream your media across your different devices. For instance, you downloaded that super heavy TV Show on your desktop PC over the past several days, day and night. Being that heavy, it defeats the purpose, copying it all onto your Laptop for those lazy Saturday binges. For this, you can create a Homegroup with your Windows PCs on the network and share the drives.

When you’re on your laptop, simply open up “Network” and you’ll see all the networked drives on the network, including your desktop’s so you can go ahead and play the video files as if you’re watching right from your laptop’s hard drive.

Host a LAN party and enjoy gaming

I’m no gamer, but back in the day, I remember just how much fun it was to LAN-Play Need For Speed Hot Pursuit. I am meant to understand that since then, online gaming has become the way people play games together. Let’s face it though, the kind of internet speeds and latency we get in this neck of the woods don’t quite allow us to participate in such.

However, if you are able to find one of the said titles that allow you to LAN play, this could be such an awesome way to Pete your skills against your friends as much of the downsides of using the web to the game like poor latency and unsteady speeds are alleviated. I will talk to my gamer-friends and prepare you guys a list of games that support LAN-Play. I can bet they aren’t exactly recent.

Control your computer remotely

Think of those lazy weekends when you just don’t want to move a muscle; or those lazy cold nights when you are comfortably enjoying a movie on your couch or bed, and you wished you didn’t have to leave your comfort zone to change the volume or skip tracks. So, you may think, “Can I use my Android phone as a mouse?”

Yes, this is possible, and the best part is, you don’t even need to be on the internet to get this done. Provided your docked PC and your Android phone are on the same WiFi network, this is totally possible with the help of a few third-party apps.

On Linux, my favorite one is KDE Connect. It integrates your Android phone with GNOME Shell seamlessly and the integration is more than just skin deep. This is a must-have Gnome extension for all y’all running Ubuntu, Linux Mint, and many other supported distros.

On Windows, Chrome Remote Desktop, KiwiMote, and PC Remote are just a few of the popular solutions for this. We will prepare a much more in-depth guide of doing this in another post.

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