iChat Ruining School Network?

[ajchapinjr.com]

Hey all... a little story time for you before I ask my question.

I'm currently a student in Vermont. Before I left for school in August, I ran down to Staples and bought a Linksys Wireless Access Point (not a router, because I was aware of the school's distaste for them). The first week of school, I plugged it in and everything worked fine. I called IT, told them I would like them to check it out and approve it ... if they didn't think it was all peaches, I would return it when I went home to Connecticut that first weekend. They approved of it because it wouldn't be serving IP addresses.

I ran it for weeks. Until last Tuesday, when I had a knock at the door. I said "Yeah, come in..." and I recieved a response of "It's IT. Open the door."

I opened the door, and a group of IT techs walked into my room and demanded that I hand over the wireless access point. I said "You approved of this in September," etc...but nothing worked. They wouldn't answer my questions, they only told me that my access point was "ruining the network," and that I'd have to speak with the head of IT when he returned from vacation. This really "grinded my gears." As you can imagine, I wrote a few angry emails.

Anyway, he returned today. I spoke with the head of IT about it, and he said he couldn't explain it but my access point began serving out IP addresses, and it was causing conflicts on the network. He told me that my $70 piece of equipment was useless. Which means I'm stuck with an access point I can't use and can't return.

Now, my roommate and I are both Apple junkies. Two MacBooks, an iMac, iPhones, iPods all over the place...needless to say, when Leopard came out we jumped on it. As you all know, the new iChat has a screen sharing feature on it. We used it quite a bit, just fooling around with eachothers Macs and with a few other Leopard-wielding friends on the net.

I'll jump straight to the point: Would the screen sharing feature in iChat turn my computer into sort of a "host" and serve an address/addresses? Or is this an issue with the wireless access point?

Or are the IT guys full of it?

I appreciate any feedback I can get.

 

[sndcj1]

There is no way that normal use of your computer (including screen sharing in ichat) would enable a dhcp server of any sort from your machine. That being said, I think it possible (but not likely) that someone could have attached to your accesspoint and had a dhcp server running on their equipment. Quick test for your accesspoint, though, if you power it up (no ethernet connection), and connect to it via your computer, do you get a usable ip? (ie not 169.x.x.x, and of course you have to be set to dhcp) If you do, you have a dhcp server in the accesspoint. If not, no server, no problem from your equipment. Side question, what was the model of the accesspoint?

 

[ajchapinjr.com]

Good questions...but I don't have the access point right now.

During our meeting, he said that if I provided him with the power supply he would toy around in the control panel and see if there was some setting he could enable/disable to make it acceptable for use.

It's not going to do me any good having it sit on a shelf, so why not let him try?

...I'll see where it goes.

 

[erikistired]

an access point can't give out ip addresses, it doesn't have a dhcp server. maybe they are confused because you have multiple addresses being served there? although you would anyway with multiple computers, you'll have 1 more because the hub (wap) needs one.

most IT people have a superiority complex (i know being a former IT person) so good luck.

 

[ajchapinjr.com]

IT will be by tmrw to check and see if either of us is hosting a DHCP server of some kind.

We'll see...

 

[JNB]

I call bollocks. Most IT "professionals" are not knowledeable in information technology nor professional. the VAST majority of edu IT weenies are there because they can't cut the mustard in the private sector. These are the people, around the US, that I deal with on a daily basis, and they never stop chapping my a$$ over stuff they have no clue about. Another MSCE/A+ paper cert nightmare.

In the future, any "declaration" of compliance or non-compliance you get from these fuzzbrains, get in writing. Make them prove that it is specifically your equipment that is causing the problem, including the why's and how's.

They aren't really IT, they're IS, as in information SERVICES, and they are there to SERVE the IT needs of the campus community, not act like some nonoderous fecal priesthood that owns the cloud surrounding the network infrastructure.

Yeah, these jerks get my goat, in a big way.

And to any uni IT folks in the MR community truly being productive and helpful, don't get your panties in a wad. I'm not taking about you. I'm talking about your coworkers. You know who they are.