Getting WPA2 keys into a Windows 8 phone.

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FYI: WP8 does not support WPS which I don’t care for anyway.

So to connect to a WPA2 network you apparently have to enter the key into the Wi-fi settings. Typing a 64 random character key isn’t any fun since it can take up to 3 taps per character (between changing alpha case and switching between the alpha and numeric keyboards). But even if you don’t mind that sort of thing, the WP8 keyboard apparently doesn’t have all the characters that may be in a key that you have no ability to change, for example there is a ~ in a key for a network I need to use and no ~ on the WP8 keyboard. In addition, while playing around with different keys, it seems some characters on the WP8 English keyboard don’t have the same hex values as the English keyboard in a Windows 8 PC. Oh and did I mention WP8 Wi-fi settings has a short attention span and doesn’t allow you enough time to enter a very long complex key if you type as fast as I can?

I have searched the internet for more than 8 solid hours trying to find how the heck I can get a key from my PC into my W8P (without sending it out over the internet) so I can paste it into the wi-fi settings. I find nothing but some other people with the same problem although sometimes stated differently and NOT a single solution. Its as if Microsoft thinks nobody uses keys that aren’t easy to type and therefore easy to break.

The solution is probably easy but It’s eluded me so far.

Anyone know how to accomplish this?

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There are several options, really, but they all go through the internet, although I don’t see how that would be an issue.

1. Email it to yourself and open the email in the phone. Copy and paste, done.
2. Write the key in a new SkyDrive OneNote notebook (open SkyDrive from your PC and create a new Notebook using the OneNote web app). This will sync with the phone and you can open the note in your phone and copy and paste the key.
3. Windows Phone as the mobile version of Word. Save the key in a new Word document created on Skydrive. Process similar to 2, just with Word instead of OneNote.
4. If you phone service provider allows for texts to be sent from a webpage (mine does), paste the key into a SMS and text it to yourself.

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Thanks Administrator. I had already considered some of those but as I said want to avoid sending the key out into the world.

But isn’t it always the case? Now something I tried earlier without success worked, although I suspect it may be working now because some problematic characters are no longer in the key I’m using. I copied a text file containing the key from my PC via USB to the phone document folder, opened it in Office on the phone and copy pasted the key into the wi-fi setup. As I said, I did change the key during my trial and error efforts. I have to assume some random characters in the original key did not translate well on the WP8 side or possibly Office on the phone messed with the formatting – I did notice WP8 Office broke an earlier key that contained a dash at the dash but wrapped differently with the dash removed.

So while I managed to get the phone connected to the network, I don’t feel confident it will work the next time the key changes – without possibly removing some characters from the generated key. And if I’m right, someone would be up a creek if they had no control over the network key.

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I keep all my passwords, including a huge 64 bit hex password for a work network on LastPass ($1 / month if you want mobile access). Info is kept encrypted.

I must confess, though, that I don’t see a problem sending such a password, inside a document. It would be really surprising if the communications were intercepted.

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LastPass is good for the web, however I prefer to use SplashID, which locally encrypts my PW vault.

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LastPass also encrypts locally stored data.

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