Overview

Configuration instructions for UniFi Network Application (controller) with version below 7.4.

Prerequisites

Before starting the installation, please make sure that you meet the following requirements

• "UniFi Network Application" (the controller) has to be always online. A mobile app, which you might have used for initial configuration is not enough. You'll need either a hardware controller (e.g. UniFi Cloud Key Gen2) or a software controller running on your server or externally hosted.

• You will need direct access to the controller in order to upload files in one of the steps below. You'll need to be in the same local network as your controller (remote access through https://unifi.ui.com/ is not enough) or have SSH access to the server that your controller is running on. More on uploading the files here.

Compatibility

Social WiFi has been tested and is proven to work on the following configurations:

UniFi Network Controller

• versions 5.x, 6.x, 7.0-7.3 (tested up to 7.3.83)

In Network Application versions 7.4 and higher, the Guest Portal tab has been removed from the legacy interface, which also makes installing Social WiFi impossible. There is a separate installation guide for those versions.

Access point firmware

• versions 4.0.48 or newer (tested up to 6.2.44.14098)

An example working setup consists of a UAP AC Lite device running firmware version 5.43.36.12724 and UniFi Network Controller version 7.2.92.

Known issues

• In certain setups there's a noticeable delay when authenticating guests, which can take up to 60 seconds. The delay comes from the UniFi controller, not the Social WiFi service, so there's nothing we can do to make it work faster. Based on our experience, the issue is more visible when using externally hosted controllers and much less so when using a hardware controller that has only one site configured.

Firewall troubleshooting

Symptom: after connecting to the WiFi network, on the last step which is clicking the "Connect to the internet button" you're not getting connected to the internet.

Solution: it might be the case that you have a firewall that blocks traffic between the WiFi device and the controller. You might either have explicit blocking rules on the firewall, or simply have separate VLANs for the guests and the controller and the traffic between them might be blocked as well. In this case you have to unlock specific ports. For example:

• TCP 8880 (portal redirect port for HTTP)

• TCP 8843 (portal redirect port for HTTPS)