Continuing my work with mobile website testing, here are the steps to create a local Wi-Fi network from a Mac laptop. This allows mobile phones and tablets to connect through the laptop for either a proxy configuration (like Charles), or passive monitoring (like tcpdump or Wireshark). Read on to learn how to set this up quickly…
In some recent mobile website testing (e.g., using Fiddler to capture Android web traffic), I’ve found it helpful to create a local Wi-Fi network on my Windows 7 laptop. This allows connecting mobile phones and tablets and ensuring the network traffic flows through the laptop, allowing a proxy configuration (like Fiddler), or passive monitoring (like tcpdump or Wireshark). Read on to learn how to create this local Wi-Fi test setup.
In a previous note about monitoring HTTP traffic from Android tablets, I recommended using a 3rd-party app to change the settings. Now the latest software update for my Galaxy Tab 10.1 allows this directly, so these are some updated instructions and screenshots.
I didn’t realize there was a separate app for this, but had wondered if there was a way to return to browser downloaded files. Within Downloads, I found over 65MB of files, some of which I downloaded over a year ago. With a few taps I cleaned them all out. These are treated separately and outside of the browser cache, so if you download a lot you should periodically clean them up.
Taking screenshots from an Android device is similar to other platforms, although a bit more setup is needed. With a little bit of additional editing, your screenshots can look clean and professional. To get your PC ready for taking Android screenshots, refer to addictive tips for a good set of instructions; setting up a Mac is a similar process. In the instructions below, we’ll clean up the extra icons that appear in the notification area (the top left corner of the screen) when the device is connected via a USB cable. In this example screenshot, notice the extra icons that…