How to enter a hex key for wifi on an iphone

[Juan I. Cahis]

Dear friends:

I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.

But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
that the hex characters are ASCII characters.

Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)

[David Empson]

Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:

> Dear friends:
>
> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>
> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>
> Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?

Try entering the hex key with a prefix of 0x (that's a zero digit and
lower case X).

For your example it would be

0xAFECDEFEAC

(For reference, that syntax is how you enter a hex number in the C
programming language, and all programming languages based on it.)

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[Jolly Roger]

In article <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>,

Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:

> Dear friends:
>
> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>
> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>
> Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?

It sounds like your router is set to use WEP encryption. Have you
considered switching to the more secure WPA encryption?

--
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

[Todd Allcock]

At 29 Sep 2011 22:17:05 -0300 Juan I.Cahis wrote:
> Dear friends:
>
> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>
> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>
> Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?
>

I think the device is supposed to figure that our based on the encryption
type. (e.g
hex if WEP, text if WPA).

Try changing the case. IIRC, lowercase fails for WEP.

[Juan I. Cahis]

Dear Jolly & friends:

Jolly Roger <jolly...@pobox.com> wrote:
> In article <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>,
> Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>
>> Dear friends:
>>
>> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
>> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>>
>> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
>> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>>
>> Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?
>
> It sounds like your router is set to use WEP encryption. Have you
> considered switching to the more secure WPA encryption?

Unfortunately, I am not allowed to change the router parameters.

--
Enviado desde mi iPad, Juan I. Cahis, Santiago de Chile.

[Jolly Roger]

In article
<1442323638339075847.852120jiclbchSINBASURA-attglobal.net@news-central.g
iganews.com>,

Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:

> Dear Jolly & friends:
>
> Jolly Roger <jolly...@pobox.com> wrote:
> > In article <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>,
> > Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:
> >
> >> Dear friends:
> >>
> >> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
> >> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
> >>
> >> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
> >> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
> >>
> >> Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?
> >
> > It sounds like your router is set to use WEP encryption. Have you
> > considered switching to the more secure WPA encryption?
>
> Unfortunately, I am not allowed to change the router parameters.

Yes, that is unfortunate, as WEP is not secure and can be easily
compromised.

On Mac OS, Apple requires you to enter the WEP hex string prefixed with
a dollar sign character, like so:

$4e85b79a70ff314e85b7be13c1

Have you tried this?

[Todd Allcock]

At 30 Sep 2011 15:48:56 +0100 Peter wrote:

> However, lots of routers also support text keys for WEP, though the
> hashing algorithm is not really well standardised.


I understand that, but in my experience, they either offer a UI to select
whether it's text or hex, else they just assume any 10 digit key composed
only of hex characters is automatically hex.

[BreadW...@fractious.net]

Michelle Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> writes:

> In article <j65mm6$al6$1...@dont-email.me>,

> Todd Allcock <elecc...@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:
>
>> I understand that, but in my experience, they either offer a UI to select
>> whether it's text or hex, else they just assume any 10 digit key composed
>> only of hex characters is automatically hex.
>

> Doesn't that depend on whether it's zero or not? Hex zeros are different
> from text zeroes.

AAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

(Haven't heard from that guy in a long while. Annoying as he could
be, I hope he's okay.)

--
Plain Bread alone for e-mail, thanks. The rest gets trashed.

[Todd Allcock]

At 30 Sep 2011 17:54:39 -0700 Michelle Steiner wrote:
> In article <j65mm6$al6$1...@dont-email.me>,
> Todd Allcock <elecc...@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:
>

> > I understand that, but in my experience, they either offer a UI to
select
> > whether it's text or hex, else they just assume any 10 digit key
composed
> > only of hex characters is automatically hex.
>

> Doesn't that depend on whether it's zero or not? Hex zeros are
different
> from text zeroes.
>

???

Not on any PC or handheld device I've ever used!

[Doug Anderson]

Lewis <g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> writes:

> In message <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>

> Juan I Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:
> > Dear friends:
>
> > I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
> > hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>

> Don't use shitty WEP or plain WAP encryption on wifi. It is worse than
> useless.

It isn't his choice. Sometimes you need to use a wifi network when
you are the guest, and you can't get your host to reconfigure the
network to suit your preferences.

[gree...@neo.rr.com]

On Sat, 1 Oct 2011 05:22:53 +0000 (UTC), Lewis
<g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

>In message <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>
> Juan I Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:

>> Dear friends:
>
>> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
>> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>

>Don't use shitty WEP or plain WAP encryption on wifi. It is worse than
>useless.
>

>> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
>> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>

>It used to be you could enter 0xAFECDEFEAC but I don't think iOS
>support crappy encryption protocols, so I have no confidence it will
>work.

I've been reading these posts and am confused by the example. The OP
said hexidecimal (often just called hex) is made up of the letters A
thru F. In fact, it is made up of the 16 characters 0 thru 9 and A
thru F (16 possible character - base 16). Why does the example not
include any characters from 0 thru 9? It seems less secure to only
use 6/16th of the available hex digits. It is still a legitimate key,
but perhaps that is why the key entry app doesn't recognise it as hex.
I never tried it myself and have since moved away from WEP for the
obvious reasons.

A few posts refer to a text zero vs a hex zero. I hadn't seen the
earlier posts about that, but a hex zero corresponds to 4 binary bits
of 0000. A text zero corresponds to the ascii character for zero - 8
bits of 00110000. Those two are clearly different if the program
looking at the data thinks the user is entering text when in fact they
are entering hex. Perhaps a hex value that happens to be all A thru F
is interpreted as a text pass phrase. As other have pointed out, some
WEP implementations allowed a text passphrase that was then hashed
into the actual key value.

[Jolly Roger]

In article <kg1e87pl0b8mb1ok1...@4ax.com>,

gree...@neo.rr.com wrote:

> A few posts refer to a text zero vs a hex zero.

Oh god. Here we go again...

[Jolly Roger]

In article <yobd3eh...@panix1.panix.com>,
BreadW...@fractious.net wrote:

> Michelle Steiner <mich...@michelle.org> writes:
>
> > In article <j65mm6$al6$1...@dont-email.me>,
> > Todd Allcock <elecc...@AnoOspamL.com> wrote:
> >
> >> I understand that, but in my experience, they either offer a UI to select
> >> whether it's text or hex, else they just assume any 10 digit key composed
> >> only of hex characters is automatically hex.
> >
> > Doesn't that depend on whether it's zero or not? Hex zeros are different
> > from text zeroes.
>
> AAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!
>
> (Haven't heard from that guy in a long while. Annoying as he could
> be, I hope he's okay.)

I hope he's ok too. That said, in all likelihood, the guy electrocuted
himself and is no longer on this Earth.

[Juan I. Cahis]

Dear friends:

gree...@neo.rr.com wrote:

>On Sat, 1 Oct 2011 05:22:53 +0000 (UTC), Lewis
><g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:
>
>>In message <eq5a87llhbcrvmn37...@4ax.com>
>> Juan I Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>>> Dear friends:
>>
>>> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
>>> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>>
>>Don't use shitty WEP or plain WAP encryption on wifi. It is worse than
>>useless.
>>
>>> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
>>> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>>
>>It used to be you could enter 0xAFECDEFEAC but I don't think iOS
>>support crappy encryption protocols, so I have no confidence it will
>>work.
>
>I've been reading these posts and am confused by the example. The OP
>said hexidecimal (often just called hex) is made up of the letters A
>thru F. In fact, it is made up of the 16 characters 0 thru 9 and A
>thru F (16 possible character - base 16). Why does the example not
>include any characters from 0 thru 9?

I didn't say that hex digits were from A to F only, what I said is
that the password of this network only contains the hex digits from A
to F, see above. I don't have any possibility to change the password,
I am not the owner of the router, and it is configured as I wrote in
the example.

[Wes Groleau]

On 09-30-2011 08:37, Jolly Roger wrote:
> On Mac OS, Apple requires you to enter the WEP hex string prefixed with
> a dollar sign character, like so:
>
> $4e85b79a70ff314e85b7be13c1

I have never had to do that on any Mac OS or iOS,
with WEP or WPA.

--
Wes Groleau

There are two types of people in the world …
http://Ideas.Lang-Learn.us/barrett?itemid=1157

[Jolly Roger]

In article <j68ioi$vv2$2...@dont-email.me>,

Wes Groleau <Grolea...@FreeShell.org> wrote:

> On 09-30-2011 08:37, Jolly Roger wrote:
> > On Mac OS, Apple requires you to enter the WEP hex string prefixed with
> > a dollar sign character, like so:
> >
> > $4e85b79a70ff314e85b7be13c1
>
> I have never had to do that on any Mac OS or iOS,
> with WEP or WPA.

Well that's the way it works with WEP 128-bit hexadecimal keys in Mac OS
X, IME.

I didn't say anything about WPA for a reason.

[Jolly Roger]

In article <1v8f879lk94atgg9n...@4ax.com>,

And have you tried using the 0x or $ prefixes???

[Chris Blunt]

>> Juan I Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:
>>> Dear friends:
>>
>>> I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
>>> hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>>>>

>>> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
>>>>that the hex characters are ASCII characters.

Did you try converting the hexadecimal value of the number into its
decimal equivalent and entering that?

Chris

[Wes Groleau]

On 10-01-2011 23:56, Jolly Roger wrote:
> Wes Groleau<Grolea...@FreeShell.org> wrote:
>> On 09-30-2011 08:37, Jolly Roger wrote:
>>> On Mac OS, Apple requires you to enter the WEP hex string prefixed with
>>> a dollar sign character, like so:
>>>
>>> $4e85b79a70ff314e85b7be13c1
>>
>> I have never had to do that on any Mac OS or iOS,
>> with WEP or WPA.
>
> Well that's the way it works with WEP 128-bit hexadecimal keys in Mac OS
> X, IME.

My memory says I didn't need that (and in fact never heard of it till
today) back when I was stuck with WEP.

But I am not at all interested in reconfiguring my router
to verify that memory. :-)

[Wes Groleau]

On 09-29-2011 21:17, Juan I. Cahis wrote:
> But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
> that the hex characters are ASCII characters.

Maybe the misinterpretation is on the other end.

[Jolly Roger]

In article <j68tcf$g49$2...@dont-email.me>,

Wes Groleau <Grolea...@FreeShell.org> wrote:

> On 10-01-2011 23:56, Jolly Roger wrote:
> > Wes Groleau<Grolea...@FreeShell.org> wrote:
> >> On 09-30-2011 08:37, Jolly Roger wrote:
> >>> On Mac OS, Apple requires you to enter the WEP hex string prefixed with
> >>> a dollar sign character, like so:
> >>>
> >>> $4e85b79a70ff314e85b7be13c1
> >>
> >> I have never had to do that on any Mac OS or iOS,
> >> with WEP or WPA.
> >
> > Well that's the way it works with WEP 128-bit hexadecimal keys in Mac OS
> > X, IME.
>
> My memory says I didn't need that (and in fact never heard of it till
> today) back when I was stuck with WEP.
>
> But I am not at all interested in reconfiguring my router
> to verify that memory. :-)

Perhaps it depends on the router. I'm not bothering to switch back to
WEP to test it either. *shrug*

[Juan I. Cahis]

Dear Jolly & friends:

Jolly Roger <jolly...@pobox.com> wrote:

I have just done a test with a friend's iPad-2, and it connected to
the network without any problem, simply typing the password as in the
example!!!!

But doing exactly the same in my iPhone-4, the device fails to
connect. And both devices have the same release of iOS: 4.3.5, so I
conclude that there is a bug in the version of iOS 4.3.5 for the
iPhone, but not in the same version for the iPad.

I will wait for iOS 5.0, I understand that it will be released next
Tuesday, am I wrong?

[Doug Anderson]

That is possible, but not the only reasonable conclusion. The two
devices may simply be configured differently, though I don't have a
suggestion about how.

[JF Mezei]

Michelle Steiner wrote:

> It will be announced on Tuesday, and they'll tell us the release date,
> which should be within two weeks afterwards.

For the USA.

If it is to be a unified model for both Verizon and AT&T, it will be
quite a challenge to handle the product launch and have enough stock
available. If they are to include other networks as well, the challenge
will be even greater.

In the past, Apple launch with AT&T first and then added more and more
countries as the rush for AT&T subsided.

But with a simulnaneous launch of all networks in the USA, Apple may
have a hard time to keep up with domestic demand and this may hinder
international launches.

Remember that more iPhones are sold outside the USA than inside the USA.

Of course, if Apple has been stacking containers and containers full of
the new devices for a few months, it may be able to rush a lot of
inventory out on day 1.

Launching this close to christmas may not allow Apple to reap all of the
"christmas buying" benefits if the iPhone isn't yet available worldwide.

[David Empson]

JF Mezei <jfmezei...@vaxination.ca> wrote:

> Michelle Steiner wrote:
>
> > It will be announced on Tuesday, and they'll tell us the release date,
> > which should be within two weeks afterwards.
>
> For the USA.

The question is about iOS 5, which will be released world-wide to
upgrade any existing iPhone 3GS or iPhone 4, iPod touch 3rd or 4th gen,
or iPad 1 or 2.

Availability of any new iPhone or iPod Touch model announced on Tuesday
morning (US time) is a separate question.

Michelle's estimate of "within two weeks" seems reasonable for iOS 5
being available. I wouldn't bet on it being released this Tuesday,
because there was a (rumoured) beta release of iTunes last Friday which
still had known issues with some aspects of iCloud.

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[JF Mezei]

Lewis wrote:

> iOS as never been limited in its release to US only that I know of. iOS 5 will roll out world wide at the same basic time.
>

Correct. But new phone models are released at differet dates for
different countries.

While an IOS update can be released worlwide at the same time, (or
staggered by a few days) I am not sure if a totally new release that
coincides wth a new phone announcement is made available worldwide all
at the same time.

Apple has the technical ability to make the IOS release match that of
the phone for each country. Or it can just stagger availability over a
period of a couple of weeks to reduce load on its servers.

[David Empson]

Lewis <g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

> In message <1k8kpo5.93c7bx1oxoug7N%dem...@actrix.gen.nz>

> iCloud is not supposed to be ready until later in the year, right? I
> though I read something about January? iCloud delays shouldn't delay iOS
> 5, at least not necessarily.

Now that we have the announcement, iOS 5 and iCloud will be released the
same day: Wednesday 12 October (US time).

I expect that iOS 5 depends on iCloud for online syncing, so they had to
be released together. Upgrading to iOS 5 may force migration from
MobileMe to iCloud.

> I suspect very strongly that iOS 5 will be available tomorrow, or Friday
> at the latest.
>
> Er.. tody, i guess.

It turned out that it wasn't.

The iOS 5 GM is available to developers today.

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[David Empson]

JF Mezei <jfmezei...@vaxination.ca> wrote:

> Lewis wrote:
>
> > iOS as never been limited in its release to US only that I know of. iOS
> > 5 will roll out world wide at the same basic time.
> >
>
> Correct. But new phone models are released at differet dates for
> different countries.

Which has nothing to do with Juan's question in this subthread. He was
wondering if upgrading his existing devices to iOS 5 might fix a
problem, and when that upgrade would be available, not wanting to buy a
new iPhone.

> While an IOS update can be released worlwide at the same time, (or
> staggered by a few days) I am not sure if a totally new release that
> coincides wth a new phone announcement is made available worldwide all
> at the same time.
>
> Apple has the technical ability to make the IOS release match that of
> the phone for each country. Or it can just stagger availability over a
> period of a couple of weeks to reduce load on its servers.

The servers are already distributed over the world. Apple uses the
Akamai server network for all their software distribution. Sometimes it
takes an hour or three for some of the nodes to catch up, but the
release will be available the same day everywhere.

Every previous iOS release has been worldwide, as an upgrade for
existing devices. The new iPhone model that comes with the new major
version of iOS typically starts to be available (in selected countries)
a few days after iOS itself is released.

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[Juan I. Cahis]

Dear friends, upgrading to iOS 5.0 corrected the problem, thanks a
lot.

Juan I. Cahis <jiclbchS...@attglobal.net> wrote:

>Dear friends:
>

>I want to connect my iPhone to a WiFi network whose key is a ten
>hexadecimal digit string from the range A to F, like AFECDEFEAC.
>

>But it has been impossible to succeed, apparently, the iPhone thinks
>that the hex characters are ASCII characters.
>

>Do you know how to enter them as hex digits?