Wifi initialisation fails on captive-portal hotspots

[vpelletier]

Having bought a kobo while traveling, I discovered it was not readily functional (this alone is very annoying). I could easily get access to hotspots which my android phone had no problem to deal with (directing to the captive portal page so I could login). Kobo does not, and just stays on the wifi list (or on the wep/wpa password input page on secured networks). So I had to get access to a computer on which I could install software and which I trusted enough to input credentials on, or I would just have been flying for with a nice e-ink brick.

[crinkly]

I have the same problem I some times can not get a connection in my own house, all other equipment works OK I have to down load from my computer CRINKLY

[KevinHowell]

I seem to have a similar problem. The purchases I have made appear on my ereader but are locked. It keeps asking me to go to the 'shop' and 'update library' and this only requests a wifi setup. My Kobo refuses to connect to any wifi network, even at home. Even connecting via my computer does not appear to unlock any of the books I have purchased. Is there a solution to this problem? Is there any telephone help I could get for this? My contact email is 'kevin.howell@babcockinternational.com'.

[vpelletier]

In my original report, the problem was upon initialising the device over a captive portal. ie, wifi network which redirect all pages to some "please identify yourself to access internet" (and sometimes pay) until logged-in. I haven't tried to use a captive portal wifi for further use of my kobo (my home wifi is not a captive portal, and my kobo is working fine on it) but I believe the problem disappears in such case thanks to the (experimental) embedded web browser allowing to complete such authentication. Such browser is not available during initial setup, which cause the bug I'm reporting here.

Maybe you should consider opening a separate bug report for the problem you encounter, unless you have a captive portal wifi which cannot be unlocked by using kobo's web browser.

[Mutisk-zz]

I think this behavior is within the closed-source parts of the Kobo. It calls home each time it connects to a wifi network. I can verify that it get an IP and replies to pings until it decides that the host it's trying to contact is not responding.

Then the software stupidly assumes that since the host is not contactable, the best action is to shut down wifi to save power. This is not user friendly at all. Leave the decision to the user, so that internet on hotels, airports and trains (any captive portal solution) can be used with the device.

Still present in 2.8.1. Any official stance on this issue would be appreciated.