Multitasking.  Productivity.  Using technology to achieve both.  IPhone tethering can solve a number of problems.  Last year when preparing to give a presentation in Hilton Head on technology in the law office, I worried that WiFi would not be present in the seminar room.  I had planned to stay in touch with my office and my clients while out of town and I wanted, no, needed, internet access.

After some research and a trip to eBay, I purchased a 3G connect card for my laptop.  There are many versions; a USB ‘dongle’ that sticks out of the computer or PC or Express cards that fit into the machine.  Essentially, this is cell phone hardware that allows your laptop to connect to the internet over the 3G or EDGE cell network.  My service plan allows for 5 Gb of data transfer for the grand sum of about $60.00 per month.  Not free certainly, but not a sum that will break the  bank.

Now with tethering, I can use my iPhone in place of that card.  I no longer need to carry extra hardware.  I don’t have to pay that extra charge on my phone bill.  Since I didn’t buy the connect card through my cell provider, I’m not tied into an extended contract and can cancel at any time.

But tethering solves many other problems.  My summer weekend hideaway offers free WiFi, but it is so slow that it is usable.  (Not all WiFi services are equal.)  I don’t have to use that.

I can use the tethering feature to connect to my office network with my iPhone, through a VPN, and access my office server from anywhere.

I can fax through that VPN to the fax server on that office network so faxes appear to come from the office instead of where I happen to be at the moment.

I can print to any printer in the office while I am away.  That means a client can come in to sign documents that I have drafted without waiting for me to return there to print or faxing the document from the nearest Kinko’s.

I can video-conference with the laptop’s built-in camera, through the iPhone tether, to anyone.

I can place a Skype phone call through the laptop, through the iPhone tether without paying AT&T for the long distance call!  All free.  Did I say that I like free?  Free, free, free!

The possibilities are endless.  What can you do with a tethered iPhone today?

Note that this tutorial was valid and wonderful in 2009 when originally published.  iOS has evolved significantly, to the extent that there are many other means of tethering your iOS device – including ponying up a few bucks to the carrier each month or buying an app.  This article is current, so don’t try this at home.

Tethering is the process by which you can connect your cell phone to a computer as a method of connecting to the internet. This is most helpful when there is no WiFi available and there is no other internet access. Tethering is built into the latest version of the iPhone OS. You can set it up without hacking or “jail-breaking” the iPhone.

Follow the step by step instructions here:

1. On the iPhone, goto help.benm.at in Safari.
2. On that web page, scroll down to Mobileconfigs -> Downloads -> USA -> ATT and install the profile.
3. On the iPhone, go to Settings -> General -> Reset -> Reset Network settings (this step is to enable Visual Voicemail).
4. Restart the iPhone just in case, especially if it does not reboot at this point.
5. Turn on Bluetooth on the iPhone in Settings -> Bluetooth.
6. On the iPhone, turn on tethering in Settings -> General -> Network -> Internet tethering.
7. On the Mac, click on BlueTooth icon in upper right menu bar or in System Preferences -> Bluetooth.  Choose “Set up a BlueTooth Device”
8. Setup and pair the Mac with the iPhone, make sure the iPhone is in BlueTooth discoverable screen.
9. Click on BlueTooth icon again in upper right menu bar, choose your phone from the drop-down menu and connect to network.
10. Oops, my mistake, there is no step 1o.

Now the steps for a Windows machine are a little different requiring trips to the Control Panels folder, but the concepts are the same.

You can undo the process at any time by going in your iPhone Settings -> General -> Profile -> Remove ATT profile and restart the iPhone.  If you want to use USB instead of BlueTooth, skip all the BlueTooth steps and just click on WiFi in the upper right-hand menu bar, open Network Preference and choose Ethernet Adaptor (en5).  Everything installs itself.

USB tethering is automatic when you plug the iPhone into the laptop using the USB cable.   You will see a blue bar at the top of the iPhone screen that says internet Tethering.  A few warnings though: AT&T doesn’t currently support tethering so don’t expect to call them or Apple for help; and the lastest beta version of the iPhone OS (3.1) is rumored to disable tethering until AT&T can figure out a way to charge for it.

Photo courtesy of mag3737.