CAPTIVE PORTAL SETUP:

Enhance your customer experience while managing internet usage with a captive portal on your network. This solution is perfect if your mobile internet is metered or if you wish to provide specific information to customers without giving them full internet access. Meanwhile, you and your employees can still enjoy unrestricted internet access. A captive portal is an efficient way to directly present information to customers without the need for browser instructions.

However, there are certain limitations. A connection to the internet, or at least an active Ethernet port, is required. The captive portal typically serves a static HTML page, which can include links to other webpages and external JavaScript functions, but it's limited to displaying non-interactive content.

For Raspberry Pi users, Nodogsplash is a compatible, free service for creating a captive portal. Here’s how to install it:

1. Install the necessary library:

   sudo apt-get install libmicrohttpd-dev

2. Clone and install Nodogsplash:

   git clone https://github.com/nodogsplash/nodogsplash.git cd nodogsplash make sudo make install

3. Configure Nodogsplash:

   • Edit the configuration file:

     sudo nano /etc/nodogsplash/nodogsplash.conf

   • Set the GatewayInterface (e.g., wlan0 for wireless LAN) and GatewayAddress.

4. Set up the service:

5. sudo cp ~/nodogsplash/debian/nodogsplash.service /lib/systemd/system/ sudo systemctl enable nodogsplash.service sudo systemctl start nodogsplash.service sudo systemctl status nodogsplash.service

Customize your captive portal's splash page (splash.html) to display the desired information and control internet access. The access point's configuration can be easily modified through the web interface at the default IP address (10.3.141.1). The Lighttpd web server delivers the webpage, ensuring a smooth user experience.