vpn

A wifi zone I occasionally use (college) employs a VPN. When you first connect, it quarantines you to a page or two telling you how to use it. Then offers a link whereby you download/auto-install a cisco app ("VPN Client 5.0.0..."), watch it reboot, then use a temp ID and PW it offers you "...until midnight".

This all works great, but when I go back to the zone on a new day, click on the client I still have, and try to connect, it says "timeout" or "refused by host", stuff like that. Oddly, the ID/PW showing under preferences are NOT the temp ID/PW the system uses, but rather "public/******". What's that all about? But even if I overwrite them, it still can't connect.

If I let my quarantined connection download and auto-install a fresh copy, however, I connect just fine. What's the deal here? Does a "client" represent ONE SESSION somehow? Isn't there some way to use the 10M app which is just SITTING THERE in the first place?