How Can I Support Wifi Issues
Understanding Internet Addressing
When using the Internet, you are assigned a unique Public IPv4 address, such as 132.53.38.190, or an IPv6 address, such as 2000:5b7b:3b13:f7d4:24b:a76e:3db6:1413. You can verify this information by visiting https://test-ipv6.com/. However, explaining and communicating these addresses, and even MAC addresses like 1a:ec:6a:8c:51:53, to individuals who are not technologically savvy can be complex and error-prone. Moreover, this method does not provide any historical data, particularly relating to past issues.
Navigating the Web
To access a website, such as https://kris.info, you first connect to a DNS server to convert the host segment (kris) combined with the Top Level Domain (info) of the URL into an IP address, like 226.195.56.80. Whenever your computer and browser makes web requests, it includes its type, for example:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 9.0; AOL 9.7; AOLBuild 4343.19; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/5.0; FunWebProducts)
Significance of Default Gateways
Typically, your default gateway is an automatically assigned address through DHCP. You are given a default gateway, such as 192.0.0.60, (although they typically end in .1 or .254, depending on the scope size), and this is the point where your computer sends all of its traffic to be routed further. For IPv6, detailed instructions can be found at how-to-fix-ipv6-connectivity/, but you can verify it on a Mac or Linux system using:
IPv4 Routes and the Host IPv4 Route Table (inc. VPN)
netstat -rn -f inet | egrep -i "default|0/1|128.0/1"
0/1 172.18.12.193 UGScg utun3 default 192.0.0.60 UGScg en0 128.0/1 172.18.12.193 UGSc utun3
Note: We are not just looking for the default but also for any VPN that overrides the public v4 address space.
IPv6 Routes and the Host IPv6 Route Table (inc. VPN)
netstat -rn -f inet6 | egrep -i "default|2000::/3"
If you have IPv6 active the above should return at least one route (as per below) via a known interface such as “en0 " on a Mac.
default fe80:b3b:e96a:297c:37fa%en0 UGcg en0 default fe80::%utun0 UGcIg utun0 default fe80::%utun1 UGcIg utun1 default fe80::%utun2 UGcIg utun2 2000::/3 utun3 USc utun3
Note: We are not just looking for the default but also for any VPN that overrides the public v6 address space.
Debugging DHCP for both IPv4 and IPv6
To get a look at the low level DHCP configuration (Mac/Linux):
ipconfig getpacket en0
...
domain_name_server (ip_mult): {189.253.60.61, 133.33.165.244}
end (none):
...
So, in the above we are not getting IPv6 DNS servers from the DHCPv4 reply but…
ipconfig getv6packet en0
DHCPv6 REPLY (7) Transaction ID 0x80940b Length 76
Options[4] = {
CLIENTID (1) Length 14: DUID LLT HW 1 Time 668691856 Addr 1a:ec:6a:8c:51:53
DNS_SERVERS (23) Length 32: 2606:4700:4700::1111, 2001:4860:4860::8844
DOMAIN_LIST (24) Length 0: Invalid
SERVERID (2) Length 10: DUID LL HW 1 Addr 0d:a3:74:d1:a9:c8
}
Fixing Issues with Wired or Wireless Connections
When it comes to transmitting data to your router, you might be using a wired or wireless (Wi-Fi) medium at the physical and data layer.
Resolving Problems on Apple macOS / OSX
Irrespective of whether you are using OSX/macOS versions like 10.13.7, 11.3.8, or 12.3.4, there are various troubleshooting tools available. However, these manual actions and scripts do not provide a set of correlated values over time. This is where automated remote troubleshooting becomes essential, particularly for teams that support remote work and Work From Anywhere (WFA).
Utilizing Built-in Scripts
One useful tool on OSX/macOS is the sudo wdutil info command, which provides a dump of current wireless settings to the CLI and can also be configured to generate specific troubleshooting logs. Furthermore, the sysdiagnose tool can be employed to generate a wide range of logs, although most are only point-in-time related to wireless, similar to wdutil.
Running sudo nohup /usr/bin/sysdiagnose -u & will execute the tool in the background and write logs to /var/tmp/<blah>.tar.gz. If you want to run it interactively (though there is minimal interaction), you can use the command sudo /usr/bin/sysdiagnose and it will display a privacy warning. When not run in the background, it should open Finder in the correct location, or you can navigate to /var/tmp or use Finder with Cmd+Shift+G to access the path. Keep in mind that the file sizes are approximately 300MB.
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