Connecting wired-only ARUBA (VPN) to Public Wireless?

[WAARHEID]

Hardware:
Aruba RAP-3WNP-US (wireless has been disabled)
Cisco IP Phone 7942
IBM Lenovo Thinkpad L440

I am a 100%-telecommuting corporate worker-bee with no administrative rights on any of this hardware. I love the system I've been provided with in that it works beautifully at home and in most hotel rooms - with the caveat that it has to have a hi-speed wired rj-45 port to connect to. I plug the Aruba into the router/lan, plug the Cisco Phone into the Aruba, and plug the Thinkpad into the Cisco phone and everything just works, without any user inputs/logins/passwords - I'm just automatically connected to all of the corporate assets like I would be if I was in a cubicle at the home office. It does not, however, work with wireless networks anywhere: hotel, coffee shop, cigar bar, airport... even the WIFI in my home which uses the same router as the wired connection which does work (Netgear WGR614 v9 with access through Scientific Atlanta Cable modem using Roadrunner). And it's not as though I'm not allowed to access the corporate VPN wirelessly. I am allowed to access it wirelessly, but directly through the Thinkpad using a user-inputed password protected gatekeeping system. The problem is that without the Aruba I can't use my phone/voice-mail and I greatly prefer the ease of a login-free connection via the Aruba. The irony is that the Aruba I have was specifically designed to allow the same VPN access via WIFI connections, but it was disabled during the provisioning process by my IT department. I've asked them how I can turn the WIFI back on, or if they'll re-provision it with WIFI on. They respond that the policy is to restrict the Aruba based "tunneling" access to wired connections. I then ask what the rationale for the policy is, especially when some employees (like me) are given broad access via WIFI using their laptops. Then I get radio-silence, crickets - they can't/won't offer an explanation. Very frustrating. So, my question is this:

Is there a piece of intermediary hardware that I could use to "trick" the Aruba into thinking it's "pluged-in" to a wired hi-speed connection while actually being connected to WIFI? Preferably something small that will fit in my already somewhat crowded road-going case that carries the Aruba, Cisco Phone and ThinkPad now.

 

[bill001g]

Not sure why they would care if the wan/internet connection came in over wireless. Mostly I suspect because they don't want to support it.
All you need is a device called a client-bridge. These are the same devices they use to give tv or game console that only have ethernet wireless access.

The main issue I see is most wifi is not truely open. It requires you to put in some form of room number or special code via a web page. Since the aruba device most likely blocks you ability to get directly to the internet you may not be able to see that page to fill it in......this is also why they likely decided wireless was too hard to support on a router.

 

[WAARHEID]

All you need is a device called a client-bridge. These are the same devices they use to give tv or game console that only have ethernet wireless access.

The main issue I see is most wifi is not truely open. It requires you to put in some form of room number or special code via a web page. Since the aruba device most likely blocks you ability to get directly to the internet you may not be able to see that page to fill it in......this is also why they likely decided wireless was too hard to support on a router.

What you're saying makes perfect sense and I get it that any attempt at adding new hardware to my existing setup might ultimately fail to work, but I'm motivated to experiment because I'd like to get this working on WIFI if possible. Would it be possible to find a two-port client-bridge and use a wired connection to my tablet to get to and then past the WIFI access login screen for the local WIFI and then plug the Aruba into the second port on the bridge once the bridge has established the WIFI connection using the tablet?

A quick search for "Client Bridge" on Amazon yields almost 3,100 results. Most of which are labeled as multipurpose "Router/AP/Client/Bridge/Repeaters", most of which seem to be small enough to fit my case size needs but, the prices seem to be all over the place. There seem to be plenty in the $15-35 price range, so I'm ok with spending $20 on a failed experiment but the 5-in-1 thing is making me nervous. Any suggestions on a model that is just a client-bridge (preferably with at least two ports) and not 3 or 4 other things as well?

 

[bill001g]

The problem will be how do you get both the aruba and your pc to have the same mac address. Although most use ip address you would have to somehow either use the same mac so the ip/mac mapping in their router works correctly.

You could use a router that would then give different private ip to the arua and your pc but share the ip that was given out by the hotel. The new problem that creates is now you have to pass the vpn tunnel though your router and the hotel router. It should work but it just gets more and more complex.

This would be a router that can accept its wan port as wifi. There are a couple that can do it. Mostly these are sold as travel routers. Still it takes reading the fine print.

I tend to take the somewhat easy way out and use devices you can load dd-wrt on. I know it can do the function and I have played with it enough so I can get things done. It tends to be rather overwhelming when you first start.

 

[bill001g]

Maybe a option would be to use something like a ubiquiti nanostation. These are designed for outdoor bridge use but they can run in router mode. I am pretty sure the can take the wireless as the wan. I have only used them in bridge mode so I am not 100% sure.... they do have a router mode I do know that.