UMA on Public WiFi

Hey,

I've been scouring the forums (and internet) for way to solve my dilemma. Hopefully someone can help me.

Just signed up with T-Mobile yesterday and got the Curve 8900 ... been spending a lot of time with it trying to figure everything I can out about it. There is only one problem. The only place I cannot get service is at my desk at work (a state government office building).

There is public WiFi available and I can use that to access the internet (and apparently use BB Messenger) but I can't access UMA over it.

I've read a lot of guides on how to set up a Home Hotspot/router but I haven't seen anything relating to public WiFi and UMA. Is this even possible? I've contacted my department's InfoSystems department and they don't seem to have a clue about UMA despite offering Blackberry support.

Am I hosed on this? Is there something I can do on my end or would something have to be done on the internet provider's end? It's very annoying that the one spot I cannot make/receive phone calls is at my desk.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

here is a stupid question but is the public wifi an open network or is there security associated with it? also what happens when you scan for wifi networks?

There is no password for the WiFi. It's primarily to benefit employees of Legislature when they're on the move (specifically with their laptops) but members of the public are free to use it as well if they so choose.

When I scan for networks it shows up and I have no problem connecting to it, using Browser in Hotspot (WiFi) mode, or even using BB Messenger. The phone just won't make phonecalls.

I have the same problem at my workplace. The problem is that the network is probably configured to block the IPsec protocol. UMA requires that protocol. Everything else works peachy.

I had a situation like this. I work at a university. The wireless internet is public and unsecured. They use a authentication page. I could see a good strong unsecured connection but could not connect via the usual methods. Here's what worked for me:
Scan for network, add found network. Open browser, do the authentication thing. Wait a few seconds, boom uma will appear. Hope this helps somebody!
cd

Could you please expand on "open browser, look for authentication page". Opening browser requires entering a URL.

If there's an authentication page it should automatically redirect to that page when you enter a URL. So just try to enter a Web address as usual.