Does the Glowforge store the connection settings are do you have to re create each time you use a different device? Just trying to get a jump on things since mine has yet to be shipped.
2 Likes
You can use as many devices as you wish since the connection from your PC, phone, etc. is not to the GF cutter but is to a server somewhere else. The number of network connections to the GF laser cutter is one I believe. If you move it to another location you have to re-link to the new router. At least I believe that’s how it works.
3 Likes
as @rpegg said. think of it like accessing your email; you won’t need to set anything up, besides logging in on each successive device, once you’re up and running.
2 Likes
Do you mean a different client device (e.g. your phone, laptop, etc) or do you mean a different WiFi device (e.g. a WAP)
If it is the latter yes it is a full setup each time (not hard), but you can connect clients from anywhere at any time (even at the same time - ish) from any browser without any pre-setup.
2 Likes
Are you talking about connecting the Glowforge to multiple WiFi or connecting devices to IT? For the former, it just holds one. There are instructions on how to switch to another connection. The latter, you can connect, I think, as many devices as you’d like. But I don’t know how practical that would be. I have certainly started something on my computer and then switched to my tablet to finish things up.
EDIT: Looks like @henryhbk’s a faster typist than I.
1 Like
What I had in mind was being able to use my 4g phone and or 4 g tablet along with my computers. I have the same carrier for my phone and tablet, but I have computer in different locations that or on different routers. So if I understand it Glowforge can use any device on the same network, but 4g from phone or tablet is a separate setup unless I add my computer as a client. At least I think that is it.
i’m having a bit of a hard time parsing that.
if you mean doing design work, accessing the glowforge, etc. it doesn’t matter what connection you use once the glowforge is setup and online and working. you can access it from any internet connection, whether on your home wi-fi or your phone or tablet.
if you mean using your phone’s internet as a shared hotspot to get the glowforge online, that’s possible, but you’ll need to ‘set it up’ every time you want to switch the network connection around.
does that make sense?
Your Glowforge can connect to your phone or tablet and use these devices as a a gateway to the internet or it can get connected to any wifi router you have access to. It is easy to pair the Glowforge to a wifi access point, router or mobile hotspot. You have to have a device able to access the Glowforge ad hoc network during the initial pairing though. Once the computing device directs the Glowforge to the correct wifi internet access, supplying the correct password, normally the computing device automatically drops the ad hoc connection once the Glowforge has its own wifi access and the computing device then reconnects with the normal wifi network. Sometimes your computing device might have to rejoin the wifi network manually though.
Any device on any network, as long as it is connected to the internet will be able to log into the Glowforge browser app and access the Glowforge user interface and manage the Glowforge laser, as long as the Glowforge is turned on and is connected to the internet by some wifi access point… The device used to manage the interface (computer, laptop, phone, tablet) does not have to be on the same network as the Glowforge.
The computer or mobile device really isn’t a client of the Glowforge in itself. So you aren’t logging into the Glowforge laser. You are logging in to Glowforges servers that host the interface.
I hope I have clarified this for you. I can be hard to get the terminology clear.
2 Likes
It’s all internet-based. Any connection to the internet will do. If your Glowforge is in Pennsylvania, turned on, and connected to the internet… and you’re in California with your phone or whatever and you connect to the internet… you’re golden. You’re just going to a website.
The Glowforge will only connect to the SSID it was configured with during setup. You can not preset secondary or tertiary SSIDs. If you need to switch from the initial one configured during setup. You have to reset it via the Glowforge itself. Which then drops it into the same state as stock. (Which is ADHOC mode (Where it presents itself as an access point and you connect with a device such as a wifi enabled desktop, notebook, tablet or mobile device.)
4 Likes
Once your Glowforge is set up and on the WiFi, you can access it from any network in the world using any device. Those client devices do not need to be on the same network as the Glowforge.
Actually that is one advantage of the cloud. I can do the same with my 3D printers by port mapping to OctoPrint, but I tend not too because of the security implications of putting an RPI server on the internet.
On the other hand the GF firmware better be secure if it is on my home network but connected to the internet and is embedded Linux.
My ISP, BT, has a scheme where you can enable a public Wifi hotspot from your home router in return for being able to use anybody’s Wifi router that has opted in as well. I might put the GF on the public WiFi instead of my private network so it doesn’t pose any security risk.
Given that none of the setup instructions involve setting up port-forwarding at the router, it seems unlikely to be an issue. The laser needs to initiate an outbound connection. Now if the Glowforge servers get compromised in order to take control of local lasers when they open their connections, that’s a different ball of wax entirely.
It’s not like I’ve run Wireshark against the thing though, so I don’t know for sure. I’m basing this line of speculation entirely upon the fact that setup does not require poking an inbound hole in the firewall.
Frankly, for that reason, putting the Laser onto the public network seems even more risky rather than less.
Yes I can see your point but are embedded Linux distributions, not configured as servers, immune to viruses?
Pretty much, yeah.
2 Likes
The bigger concern ought to be DNS poisoning. If your laser is on a network that our hypothetical malicious attacker can connect to, that person could hypothetically listen on promiscuous mode with one wifi interface and respond with a DNS A-Record on the other as soon as it needs to, pointing the GF to some other server.
2 Likes
Thanks. I will keep it on my internal network then.
This distinction - between having to open ports for forwarding at the firewall, or relying on the device in the network to initiate an outbound connection and taking advantage of NAT - is something that can be leveraged on e.g. OctoPrint, as well. I know some folks on these forums use OctoPrint and OctoPi, and I used to have my OctoPi tunnel out from the makerspace so I didn’t have to make any firewall changes.
I had no idea that could be done. I know next to nothing about networking at the higher levels. I have coded from the driver level up to IP / UDP from scratch.
This is just setting up an SSH tunnel and a cron job on the pi to make sure it’s up.
1 Like