I wasn’t really sure how to word my question. You can reword it if you like.
I’m referring to public wifi, how before you can use it, a pop-up appears asking you to accept the use terms before granting you access.
Sometimes that window doesn’t pop up, and I can’t click the “accept” button to get access to the wifi my mac already says I’m connected to.
Is there a way to prompt this window to open from my end, or is that a network administrator issue?
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Cameron
I know exactly what you mean. Sometimes it just doesn't appear. I don't know of any way to force the issue. I think it may have to do with problems on the network end -- perhaps the connection doesn't complete because of a limitation or a weak signal. But I have seen this myself.
Usually, what I do is to choose the network and wait. I try not to do anything else during that time. I have seen the login window appear only to go away because I happen to be typing or clicking elsewhere.
If it doesn't appear after 30 seconds or so, I usually turn off wi-fi and then turn it on again. That usually does the trick. Sometimes I go to System Preferences, Network, Advanced (button) and remove the network entirely so I can re-add it fresh.
I suspect that sometimes there are networks that have limits on the number of connections and if it is full, you just won't see that login until a spot opens up. And that can look rather random. Even if there are only 3 people around, the network could still be holding spots for people that were there hours ago.
Sometimes, I need to turn off my VPN (a must-have for public networks) to get the connection going. I make sure I quit all my apps before doing so, especially Mail. Then I turn on the VPN after.
Sometimes I also have to take away my custom DNS server addresses (using Google's DNS). That's actually the only way I can get most in-flight wi-fi to work.
I have found that if I try to open a new page with safari, another website will appear instead of what tried to open and on this page, you can accept and proceed.
Colleen: One way to do it is to Copy from Maps as I do in this video. Then launch Preview. Choose File, New from Clipboard. Then use the Share button in Preview to "Add to Photos."
I travel a lot and see this frequently. Safari seems to be problem. When I open Firefox, I get the window and accept the terms. I then close Firefox and return to the Safari window. I may need to refresh the Safari webpage, but often whatever page I was trying to get to has loaded already. In any case it works just fine after accepting terms in FF.