Connecting your laptop


The Math Department has a number of facilities and rules for connecting users' own laptops or PCs to our network. Please follow these guidelines. They are designed to give you access while protecting our network from attacks. DoIT reserves the right to block access to the campus network from any computer which causes problems for other users.

Before connecting your computer to our network please check with the computer staff. They will need your computer's hardware MAC address if you use a wired connection. The instructions below assume you have a valid Math Dept account. You will have to authenticate to use our print and file services.

If you want to print to Math Dept Printers from your laptop, your laptop MUST be connected to the internet via a wired connection in Van Vleck. To print from your office you must purchase the appropriate type of cable (from DoIT e.g.) or else use the free wired connections in our computer labs: 322 and 101B. DO NOT UNPLUG an existing cable to use with your laptop!

Wireless and DHCP Access

  1. Wireless access is available throughout Van Vleck. DoIT's Wireless network covers the campus. The link shows you the locations of their Access points and rules for connecting.
    2. Set your computer to get an IP no automatically (through DHCP)
  2. Wired Connections: any computer can connect to the internet through the free wired connections in our labs, rooms 322 and 101b. There is a laptop table and one free ethernet cable in each of these labs.

Configuring E-Mail

If your computer is connected to our departmental network (i.e. you have a 144.92.166.X IP number), you can use mailhost.math.wisc.edu as both your incoming and outgoing mailserver. All computers configured by the Math Department's IT staff have this set up. If you are configuring your own computer please follow the instructions for setting up Wiscmail but use mailhost.math.wisc.edu as your incoming mail server.

Linux

  1. Linux users are not allowed to NFS mount their home directories to their computers.
  2. To use our printers, copy the /etc/printcap file from one of the linux PCs in our labs and install lprng.

Macintosh

  1. Macintosh (Mac OS 10.x) users can mount their home directories and print via Samba. (click on the word samba to find out how.) Leopard users should click on this link instead.

Windows

  1. File server: Windows users should right-click on network Neighborhood and select connect to network drive then type \\smbhome.math.wisc.edu\your_username where your_username is your Math Dept username.
  2. Printing: Use the Print setup Wizard, but instead of browsing for the printer, type \\printserver1\queue where queue=3..8 or a(101b),b(b127),c(101). You will be prompted for your Math Department username and password.
More complete instructions (with pictures) can be found here