Turn a Windows 7 desktop to Wifi AP via Microsoft Virtual Wifi miniport adapter

Introduction

Windows 7 introduces a new virtual driver for WiFi network that create a virtual WiFi AP to share network / Internet connection for any WiFi device.  The network adapter is named as Microsoft Virtual Wifi miniport adapter.

Before Windows 7, Adhoc wireless connection is a common WiFi connection that may only connect to one WiFi device only.  The Windows Virtual WiFi connection may connect to up 8 WiFi devices.

Check support of Virtual Wifi

The virtual network adapter should install automatically in Device Manager once your WiFi adapter is activated:

A new Wireless Network Connection (e.g.: Wireless Network Connection 2 in the following example) should configure as well:

Everything is ready up to this stage, continue the configuration to turn on the virtual WiFi AP and start sharing your network connection.

Please note that there is no GUI tools to configure virtual WIFI connection.  All commands should type in command line console under Administrator privilege.

Configure Virtual WiFi connection

Choose a SSID to identify your virtual WIFI AP and set a password for it.  Type the following command in command line console running as administrator to start configure:

C:\Windows\system32>netsh wlan set hostednetwork mode=allow ssid=MyWifi key=password keyUsage=persistent
The hosted network mode has been set to allow.
The SSID of the hosted network has been successfully changed.
The user key passphrase of the hosted network has been successfully changed.

Make sure the physical Wifi adapter is enabled before start the Virtual WiFi connection:

C:\Windows\system32>netsh wlan start hostednetwork
The hosted network started.

The Virtual WiFi connection (MyWifi, in this example) is active:

The Virtual WiFi connection is ready to accept connection now.  Use any other WiFi device (Smartphone, other notebook, PC) to check if the MyWifi connection appears the WiFi connection list.

Please note that the virtual WiFi connection does not connect to any Internet connection yet.  All WiFi connection to MyWifi is isolated in the MyWifi network only.

Share Internet connection to Virtual WiFi connection

Enable Internet Connection Sharing for virtual WiFi connection allow Internet traffic be served for virtual WiFi client.  First, identify the network connection with Internet access:

Open properties page of the Network Connection with internet access and set the following:

1. “Allow other network users to connect through this computer’s Internet connection.
2. Set Home networking connection to “Wireless Network Connection 2” (The connection should be Virtual WiFi Connection).
3. Click OK to commit changes.

The Virtual WiFi connection should have access to Internet now:

Other WiFi device connect to virtual WiFi connection should be able to access the Internet immediately.

Virtual Wifi AP not started after reboot

The Windows 7 Virtual WiFi connection is not persisted when machine reboot.  You should start the virtual WiFi connection each time machine has rebooted:

C:\>netsh wlan show hostednetwork

Hosted network settings
-----------------------
    Mode                   : Allowed
    SSID name              : "MyWifi"
    Max number of clients  : 8
    Authentication         : WPA2-Personal
    Cipher                 : CCMP

Hosted network status
---------------------
    Status                 : Not started


C:\>netsh wlan start hostednetwork
The hosted network started.

Stop virtual WiFi connection

Run the command to stop connection:

C:\>netsh wlan stop hostednetwork
The hosted network stopped.

Uninstall virtual WiFi adapter

It is not necessary to uninstall virtual WiFi adapter as the uninstall is not permanent.  The virtual WiFi adapter will be installed once your reboot machine.  If you mean to uninstall the virtual WiFi adapter for current session, try this:

C:\>netsh wlan set hostednetwork mode=disallow
The hosted network mode has been set to disallow.

Side Effect: Unable to access network share after update Microsoft Virtual WiFi Miniport Adapter

There is a side effect if Microsoft Virtual Wifi Miniport Adapter has been updated.  The network share may not be accessed and “0x8004005 Unspecified error” may prompt:

This is due to the “Client for Microsoft Networks” service is missing from the network connection.  Reinstall service “Client for Microsoft Networks” will solve the error:

Configure Windows 7 IIS7 for ISAPI DLL

Windows 7 IIS7 require some configurations to get ISAPI DLL works.  It is not that straight forward compare to IIS 5.

Install IIS 7

1. Go to Control Panel | Programs and Features | Turn on Windows features on or off (require privilege mode).
2. Check “Internet Information Services and make sure “ISAPI Extensions” and “ISAPI Filters” is checked as well.
3. Click OK button to start installation.

After finish install IIS 7, open your favorite web browser and enter URL http://localhost/ to make sure the IIS is working and running.  You might need to check your firewall setting and add exception for port 80 TCP traffic if necessary.

Configure for ISAPI DLL

Add Virtual Directory

First, you may need to add a virtual directory to host your ISAPI DLL:

1. Open Internet Information Service Manager (require privilege mode)
2. Right click on “Default Web Site” node and click “Add Virtual Directory” of popup menu:

Enter “Alias” and “Physical Path” of the virtual directory:

Enable ISAPI for Virtual Directory

To enable ISAPI for the virtual directory:

1. Select the virtual directory node (e.g.: “ISAPI” in this example). 
2. Double click the “Handler Mappings” icon. 
3. Click “Edit Feature Permissions…” in Actions panel
4. A “Edit Feature Permission” dialog prompt out
5. Check “Execute”.
6. Click OK button to commit the changes.

Enable Directory Browsing for Virtual Directory

This is optional but is convenient.  To enable Directory Browsing for a virtual directory:

1. Select the virtual directory node (e.g.: “ISAPI” in this example). 
2. Double click the “Directory Browsing” icon.
3. Click “Enable” in Actions panel.

Edit Anonymous Authentication Credentials

1. Select the virtual directory node.
2. Double click the “Authentication” icon.
3. Click to select “Anonymous Authentication” item.
4. Click “Edit…” in Actions panel.
5. A dialog will prompt out.
6. Checked “Application pool identity” and press OK button to commit changes.

Enable ISAPI modules

1. Click on the root node.
2. Double click the “ISAPI and CGI Restrictions” icon.
3. Click ”Edit Feature Setting …” in Actions panel.
4. Check “Allow unspecified ISAPI modules” option.  This option allow any ISAPI dll to be executed under IIS.  If you don’t use this option, you will need to specify a list of ISAPI DLLs explicitly.

Edit Permission for Virtual Directory

1. Select the virtual directory node (e.g.: “ISAPI” in this example). 
2. Right click on the node and click “Edit Permission” of popup menu.
3. A Properties dialog prompt out.
4. Switch to “Security” page
5. Click Edit button to show Permission dialog.
6. Add “IIS_IUSRS” into the permission list.

Enable 32 bits ISAPI DLL on IIS 7 x64

This is only require if you are using IIS7 x64 and would like to run 32 bits ISAPI DLL on the IIS.  If your ISAPI DLL and IIS7 is both x86 or both x64, you may skip this step.

1. Click “Application Pools” node.
2. Click “DefaultAppPool” item
3. Click “Advanced Settings …” from Actions panel.
4. A “Advanced Settings” dialog prompt out
5. Set “Enable 32-bits Applications” to True
6. Click OK button to commit changes

If you didn’t enable this options for 32 bits applications, you may encounter the following errors when execute the ISAPI from web browser:

HTTP Error 500.0 - Internal Server Error

The page cannot be displayed because an internal server error has occurred.

HTTP Error 500.0 - Internal Server Error
Module    IsapiModule
Notification    ExecuteRequestHandler
Handler    ISAPI-dll
Error Code    0x800700c1
Requested URL    http://localhost:80/isapi/isapi.dll
Physical Path    C:\isapi\isapi.dll
Logon Method    Anonymous
Logon User    Anonymous 

You may now deploy your ISAPI DLLs into the virtual directory and start execute the library from web browser.

DataSnap and ISAPI DLL

You may create Delphi DataSnap ISAPP DLL library and deploy on IIS.  From time to time, you may encounter compilation error during development or deployment time if you have consume the ISAPI DLL.  This is because the ISAPI DLL invoked will cache in the application pool.  You are not allow to overwrite the ISAPI DLL while it’s being cached.

To overcome this problem, you need to perform Recycle operation:

1. Click “Application Pools” node.
2. Right click on “DefaultAppPool” item and click “Recycle…” item.

Deploying as ISAPI DLL is encourage during deployment stage as IIS will cache the ISAPI DLL for performance consideration.

However, the caching might not feasible during development stage as recycling need to be performed while overwrite the ISAPI DLL either by frequent compiling or overwriting.  You may consider compile the server modules as CGI application in development time.  Each invocation of CGI is a separate OS process and won’t be cache by IIS application pool.

Install CGI on IIS

1. Go to Control Panel | Programs and Features | Turn on Windows features on or off (require privilege mode).
2. Check “Internet Information Services and make sure “CGI” is checked.
3. Click OK button to start installation.

Enable CGI Module

1. Click on the root node.
2. Double click the “ISAPI and CGI Restrictions” icon.
3. Click ”Edit Feature Setting …” in Actions panel.
4. Check “Allow unspecified CGI modules” option.

Consume DataSnap Server Methods via URL

The DataSnap server methods are using JSON as data stream via REST protocol.  For example, a simple EchoString server method defined as:

type
  {$MethodInfo On}
  TMyServerMethod = class(TPersistent)
  public
    function EchoString(Value: string): string;
  end;
  {$MethodInfo Off}

implementation

function TMyServerMethod.EchoString(Value: string): string;
begin
  Result := Value;
end;

To access this method compiled in ISAPI DLL via URL, the URL is something like

http://localhost/datasnap/MyISAPI.DLL/datasnap/rest/TMyServerMethod/EchoString/Hello

and the response text will be:

{"result":["Hello"]}

Likewise, a CGI URL is

http://localhost/datasnap/MyCGI.exe/datasnap/rest/TMyServerMethod/EchoString/Hello

 

Reference:

1. DataSnap 2010 HTTP support with an ISAPI dll; Author: Tierney, Jim

Apache HTTP Server: Configuration

Apache HTTP Server is a famous open source web server.  The default configuration file is located at “/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf”

Server Side Includes (SSI)

SSI (Server Side Includes) are directives that are placed in HTML pages, and evaluated on the server while the pages are being served. They let you add dynamically generated content to an existing HTML page, without having to serve the entire page via a CGI program, or other dynamic technology.

To enable SSI in Apache HTTP, add the following in conf file:

AddType text/html .shtml
AddHandler server-parsed .shtml

<Directory /data/www>
    Options +Includes
</Directory>

If the index file is a SSI file, you should add this line too:

DirectoryIndex index.html index.html.var index.shtml

Virtual Host Configuration

The term Virtual Host refers to the practice of maintaining more than one server on one machine, as differentiated by their apparent hostname. For example, it is often desirable for companies sharing a web server to have their own domains, with web servers accessible as www.company1.com and www.company2.com, without requiring the user to know any extra path information.

In order not to mess up the httpd.conf file, we may store the virtual host configuration in a separate file. (eg: /etc/httpd/conf/httpd-vhosts.conf)

/etc/httpd/conf/httpd-vhosts.conf

NameVirtualHost *:80

<Directory /data/www>
    Options +Includes
</Directory>

<VirtualHost *:80>
    DocumentRoot /data/www
    ServerName www.company1.com
    ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /data/www/cgi-bin/ 
</VirtualHost>

We then use Include directive in httpd.conf by adding a line near the VirtualHost section:

Include conf/httpd-vhosts.conf

Restart the Apache HTTP Server

Remember to restart the Apache HTTP Server for changes you did:

# service httpd restart