• Using Airplane Mode
• Using HomeGroup to share resources on a home network
• Using Credential Manager to share with older Windows-based PCs
After making major improvements to its networking infrastructure in Windows XP with Service Pack 2 a decade ago, Microsoft has been evolving this technology in subsequent Windows versions. In Windows 8, you see the most refined version of this technology yet, with new Metro-based interfaces for connecting to wired and Wi-Fi wireless networks. Windows 8 also includes a Metro-based front end to the HomeGroup network sharing scheme, which takes on all new importance in this release thanks to Windows 8’s Microsoft account sign-in capabilities.
More revolutionary, however, is Windows 8’s support for the cellular data networks that are becoming more and more ubiquitous thanks to the rise of smartphones, tablets, and other modern computing devices. Windows 8 treats this network type specially, with an understanding of their metered nature that will help users avoid overage charges and automatically switch to more efficient—and less costly—networks when available.
What Was Old Is New Again
All of the networking functionality you’re familiar with from Windows 7 is present in Windows 8, though some of these interfaces have been updated to accommodate the new Metro environment that sits at the core of this new OS. Features that carry forward to Windows 8 include the following:
• HomeGroup sharing: In addition to older, traditional network-based resource sharing techniques from previous versions of Windows, Windows 7 added a simple new scheme called HomeGroup sharing. This makes it easy to share digital media content, documents, and printers on a home network. Because of the move to Microsoft account-based sign-ins in Windows 8, HomeGroup sharing is more important than ever in this release, so we explore this topic in more detail later in the chapter.
• Network and Sharing Center: This complex interface provides a single place to go to view, configure, and troubleshoot networking issues, and access new and improved tools. It’s still there, virtually unchanged in Windows 8. If you’re lucky, you will never need to use it.
If you’re unlucky, you can access Network and Sharing Center via Start Search. Or, right-click the Network notification icon in the Notification Area and choose Network and Sharing Center from the pop-up menu that appears.
The Network and Sharing interface also includes a feature called Network Map that visually shows how your PC is connected to the Internet and other devices, an issue that is particularly important to understand when troubleshooting.
• Seamless network connections: In Windows XP, unconnected wired and wireless network connections would leave ugly red icons in your system tray, and creating new connections was confusing and painful. Now Windows connects to secure networks automatically. Windows will also automatically disable networking hardware that isn’t in use, a boon for mobile computer users on-the-go who want to preserve battery life.
The interface for managing wireless networks is now a Metro experience. Since it’s new, we’ll discuss that in the next section.
• Network explorer: The old My Network Places explorer from previous versions of Windows has been replaced and upgraded significantly with the new Network explorer. This handy interface supports access to all of the computers, devices, and printers found on your connected networks, instead of just showing network shares, as XP did. You can even access network-connected media players, video game consoles, and other connected device types from this interface.
• Network locations: Windows 7 featured a Set Network Location wizard that would appear whenever you connected to a new wired or wireless network for the first time. This wizard let you set multiple complex network characteristics under the hood by providing a simple list of choices for the type of network you were connecting to: Home, Work, or Public. Home and Work were essentially the same, in that both opened up sharing between your PC and other PCs and devices on the network. Public, meanwhile, was for public network connection, like the Wi-Fi connections you might run into at cafes, airports, and similar locations.
In Windows 8, network location is handled differently and, believe it or not, it’s even easier than before. Now, there are only two states, and instead of forcing the user to think about the network type, you choose between whether you want to share or connect to devices. We explain this functionality and how to configure it on a per-connection basis in the next section.
Connecting to and Managing Wired and Wireless Networks
With the move to a Metro-based infrastructure in Windows 8, many core system tasks now occur within that interface rather than in the classic desktop environment. So while many of the advanced networking features from Windows 7 are still present, largely unchanged, in Windows 8, the most frequently-needed features for connecting to and managing networks—both wired and wireless (Wi-Fi/802.11-style)—have changed.
Using Wired Networks
A wired Ethernet network is the simplest type of network to connect to, from the perspective of Windows at least. That’s because Microsoft is making a big—and usually correct—assumption with this type of connection. And that’s that anyone who signs in to Windows using a local or Microsoft account and then connects a network cable to the PC is doing so on their own home network. And that network, by definition, is trusted, a private network type, and one in which being able to share with other PCs and connect to devices is not only safe, but desirable.
Connecting to a wired network is as easy as plugging an Ethernet cable into your home router on one end and the appropriate port on your PC on the other. When you do, a few things happen. Under the hood, Windows establishes the connection and enables sharing and device connections. Then the Network icon in the Notification Area (of the Windows desktop) changes to indicate that you’re connected, similar to the way it did in Windows 7.
If you click this Network icon, a new Metro-style interface, the Networks pane, will appear. This interface, shown in Figure 13-1, will help you manage not only wired networks, but also wireless (Wi-Fi) and cellular data networks.
Figure 13-1: The new Metro-style Networks pane helps you manage networks of all kinds.
The Networks pane is important enough that you may need or want to access it from the Start screen or a Metro-style app. To do so, you must first enable the Settings bar (Winkey + I being the easiest way) and then select the Network icon at the bottom of that pane.
