4 ms·

Running a couple of online businesses that require us to have online access wherever we are (it's always when you decide to go away for a week that the site goe

by MehdiEG 14y ago

Running a couple of online businesses that require us to have online access wherever we are (it's always when you decide to go away for a week that the site goes down or an army of spammers targets your member), this is a problem we constantly run into whenever we go away, be in on holidays or for business. There's nothing like that yet as far as I know. Most hotels and B&B will indicate whether they've got wifi access. Typically, if wifi isn't mentioned, it means no wifi. But knowing that wifi is available isn't actually all that helpful. You'll often find that wifi is available but costs more than the room itself. Or, even more often, it just doesn't work or is unusably slow. So we always try to get a place with wifi but also always carry an unlocked MiFi with us. In the UK, you can get one for £50 on PAYG on Three and unlock it for a few quids. PAYG data topups in the UK on Three are reasonably priced (£15 for 3GB of data). When we go abroad, we first check this wiki to find local operators with decent PAYG data plans and we buy a local SIM card as soon as we land: http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com/wiki/Prepaid_SIM_with_data http://prepaidwithdata.wikia.com/wiki/Prepaid_SIM_with_data It's a hassle but if you really need internet access, that's the only option at the moment I'm afraid. There is definitely a niche for a way to identify hotels and B&B with free / reasonably priced and reliable wifi connection (and also cafés while we're at it - it's an incredible pain to find café with working wifi).

JoshTriplett 14y ago
> PAYG data topups in the UK on Three are reasonably priced (£15 for 3GB of data). When did that become "reasonably priced"?
- MehdiEG 14y ago
  I find it reasonably priced to be honest given how handy this is what I use it for. 3GB goes a long way actually. What would you find reasonable?
- pliny 14y ago
  It's reasonable for work and unreasonable for entertainment. If you just need to send emails and be able to restart your server then 3GB will basically last forever, not so if you want to torrent 1080p copies of Game of Thrones.
  - JoshTriplett 14y ago
    > It's reasonable for work and unreasonable for entertainment. If you limit yourself to what the Internet could do in the days of 56k modems, 3GB works just fine. However, I wouldn't exclusively call that "entertainment". It seems fairly unreasonable for heavyweight web applications as well, with piles of JavaScript and various rich content that includes more than just text and markup. It also won't nearly suffice for the purposes of pushing and pulling code via version control, which I do regularly for work. More to the point, it just seems unreasonable by the standards of non-cell Internet connections, and unreasonable even by the standards of cell Internet connections back when every provider offered "unlimited" plans. > If you just need to send emails and be able to restart your server then 3GB will basically last forever, not so if you want to torrent 1080p copies of Game of Thrones. There exists some middle ground there. If you want to view pages with heavyweight content, including the occasional video or large image, 3GB might last a couple of weeks at most. If you regularly do OS upgrades, download software packages, clone version control repositories, perform backups, and otherwise use it like any other computer professional would even without including entertainment, 3GB might last a few days. (This does not represent an off-the-cuff guess; I've measured this.) In any case, I intended my original comment simply to express astonishment that we've gone from "how dare 'unlimited' not mean 'unlimited'" to "3GB/£15 (3GB/~$25) seems pretty reasonable" so quickly. Apparently that sentiment did not go over well.
    - gte910h 14y ago
      I've done iOS app programming while riding in a car going 75 MPH through backcountry GA using only the tethered connection on my iPhone to push code updates. Honestly, only the editing of binaries hurt at all. I didn't push as often, but it was still fine when I did.
sehugg 14y ago
I concur with the above post -- we travel with a Cradlepoint router and Millenicom USB modem. You can securely bridge to wired ethernet if available (some routers bridge to wifi) and if anything looks fishy or flaky you can seamlessly switch to the modem. I've often thought it would be a cool idea if these websites had a tool which automatically assessed a property's wifi quality via a quiz and/or a series of tests. But if you have the modem, a landline becomes a luxury not a requirement.

by MehdiEG 14y ago

JoshTriplett 14y ago

> PAYG data topups in the UK on Three are reasonably priced (£15 for 3GB of data). When did that become "reasonably priced"?

MehdiEG 14y ago
I find it reasonably priced to be honest given how handy this is what I use it for. 3GB goes a long way actually. What would you find reasonable?
pliny 14y ago
It's reasonable for work and unreasonable for entertainment. If you just need to send emails and be able to restart your server then 3GB will basically last forever, not so if you want to torrent 1080p copies of Game of Thrones.
- JoshTriplett 14y ago
  > It's reasonable for work and unreasonable for entertainment. If you limit yourself to what the Internet could do in the days of 56k modems, 3GB works just fine. However, I wouldn't exclusively call that "entertainment". It seems fairly unreasonable for heavyweight web applications as well, with piles of JavaScript and various rich content that includes more than just text and markup. It also won't nearly suffice for the purposes of pushing and pulling code via version control, which I do regularly for work. More to the point, it just seems unreasonable by the standards of non-cell Internet connections, and unreasonable even by the standards of cell Internet connections back when every provider offered "unlimited" plans. > If you just need to send emails and be able to restart your server then 3GB will basically last forever, not so if you want to torrent 1080p copies of Game of Thrones. There exists some middle ground there. If you want to view pages with heavyweight content, including the occasional video or large image, 3GB might last a couple of weeks at most. If you regularly do OS upgrades, download software packages, clone version control repositories, perform backups, and otherwise use it like any other computer professional would even without including entertainment, 3GB might last a few days. (This does not represent an off-the-cuff guess; I've measured this.) In any case, I intended my original comment simply to express astonishment that we've gone from "how dare 'unlimited' not mean 'unlimited'" to "3GB/£15 (3GB/~$25) seems pretty reasonable" so quickly. Apparently that sentiment did not go over well.
  - gte910h 14y ago
    I've done iOS app programming while riding in a car going 75 MPH through backcountry GA using only the tethered connection on my iPhone to push code updates. Honestly, only the editing of binaries hurt at all. I didn't push as often, but it was still fine when I did.

sehugg 14y ago

I concur with the above post -- we travel with a Cradlepoint router and Millenicom USB modem. You can securely bridge to wired ethernet if available (some routers bridge to wifi) and if anything looks fishy or flaky you can seamlessly switch to the modem. I've often thought it would be a cool idea if these websites had a tool which automatically assessed a property's wifi quality via a quiz and/or a series of tests. But if you have the modem, a landline becomes a luxury not a requirement.