Overview

Main Window

    The WakeOnLan main window contains a table of all computers on the network right now, as well as all computers it knew during its last launch. The table is updated whenever a Mac is starting/waking up/sleeping/shutting down, and after each 'Scan'. Select a computer by clicking on it, or by typing the first characters of it's name.

    WakeOnLan relies on the existing Mac OS X network infrastructure tools to discover all informations. Only Bonjour, ARP and SMB are used, which causes very little network traffic. The columns are:

    - Type, indicates how WakeOnLan learned about this computer. Note that the computer type might not always be correct; in such a case please set the type manually using the 'Computer/Set Type' menu.

    Home, the Mac running WakeOnLan
    Mac, a computer running Apple File Sharing
    AirPort, an AirPort Base Station
    Unix, a computer running Unix or Linux
    Windows, a computer running Windows SMB file sharing
    Printer, a network printer
    Router, a gateway router
    Internet, a computer learned via .Mac
    Manual, a manually added computer
    Unknown, an undefined computer

    Other attributes are:

    - Name, can be edited by double clicking it. To remove the user defined name and display the network name again, double click it, delete the name, and press return. Note that the Home entry's name can't be changed.
    - Group, arrange computers into groups by selecting 'Set Group' from the 'Computer' menu. Group names are defined in WakeOnLan Preferences.
    - IP Address, it's IP address (Note that IPv6 addresses are not upported)
    - Mac Address, the hardware address of it's Ethernet card
    - Awake flag, indicating if a computer is awake right now. If you wish the 'Awake' flag to be more accurate, select a 'Awake Status Interval' in the WakeOnLan Preferences, which will ping all known computers frequently (not recommended for big networks).
    - Favorite flag, double click to choose your favorites
    - Hidden flag, double click to hide certain systems (like routers)

    Rearrange the column however you like by dragging their title. Hide or show column using the Preferences panel. Here you can add more columns, which are hidden by default:

    - Timer, scheduled wake up calls for this computer, setup schedule by selecting 'Schedule Wake Up...' from the 'Computer' menu.
    - Port, the UDP port number used by the wake up packet (default is 9)
    - Remarks, any free form text you wish.

Waking up a computer

    Select the computer in the host table, and click the 'Wake Up!' button. The Awake flag will change to 'Yes' soon. Note the comments in the 'Preparation' help section for how to prepare the remote computer. Be sure the remote computer is setup for remote wake up, as described here.

Putting a computer to sleep

    Select the computer in the host table, and click the 'Sleep!' button.

    Note: Mac OS X will ask you twice for the user and password of the remote system (due to AppleScript). You need to use an admin account of the remote Mac to put it to sleep.

    If you don't want to type this every time, select the 'Add to keychain' button to make Mac OS X remember it. The login panel is provided by Mac OS X, as well as the keychain. WakeOnLan does NOT get or store any user names or passwords.

    If the remote Mac does not fall asleep, check out the Sleep-OnLan setup and troubleshooting page here.

Scan for all computers in your LAN

    If the remote computer doesn't show up at all (not even with it's IP address), it indicates you never had any traffic to it. In such a case, ask WakeOnLan to send 'ping' packets to all computers in your LAN (on all interfaces with a hardware address, like Ethernet or Airport, but not modem), by clicking 'Scan'.

    The default is to scan for all computers in your LAN. If you want to limit this to a range of computers, select "Only computers within the range" and specify the first and last IP address to scan for.

    Note: If your Mac is not directly connected to the IP network address you provide, Scan has no effect. This might also be the case if you are using VPN tunnels. Why is this? The arp protocol required to get Mac addresses does not run across different IP networks. And without its Mac address, no computer can be woken up. In such a case, run WakeOnLan once in the remote network, then export the computer list, and import it to WakeOnLan in your home network.

    After that, any awake computer in your LAN should show up, even Unix or Windows boxes. If it still doesn't it's either turned off or sleeping, or there's a router or firewall in between.

Adding and Deleting of computers manually

    If you do have a computer on your LAN which is not recognized by WakeOnLan (even after 'Scan'), add it manually by selecting 'Add' from the 'Computer' menu. Similar, delete computers from the list by selecting 'Delete' from the 'Computer' menu. Note that deleted computers will show up again if they are present in the network; to permanently hide them double click in their 'Hidden' row.