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Future of Wi-Fi
An anonymous reader writes "BusinessWeek looks at the The high hurdles facing Wi-Fi. Sure it's got promise but if overcrowded spectrum isn't destined to crimp its growth, it'll need better technology and regulatory help from the FCC."
There's areas of London, UK, where you can already do that. And apparently people are marking them on the ground with chalk.....
RoseColor red={0, 0xffff, 0x0000, 0x0000};VioletColour blue={0, 0x0000, 0x0000, 0xffff};find / -name *mybase*|chown you
So I'm sitting here in my living room on my laptop, using my wireless connection....and what comes up on slashdot but a story about wi-fi.
Wi-Fi is awesome. Decent speeds, things are coming down in price...the only thing to really worry about is the security (which I'm not personally all that concerned about...at least not for my personal network).
What i can't wait for is transparent worldwide wireless connections at decent speeds. and what excites me is that its looking like that might be moving closer to reality than science fiction. mmmm....wireless
The writeup is right; the FCC will need to give Wi-Fi a chance before it catches on. And the FCC won't, because the money-rich and power-hungry wireless companies and other broadcasting firms always manage to win somehow. If the FCC were interested in crawling out from beneath the desk of Big Business, then Wi-Fi would already be in motion.
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Oh yes please...get the Feds involved...everything they deal with turns golden, and smells nice too!!! Maybe RIAA has a few points to add to the mix as well. Stir in a Congressional sub committee or two, mention that pr0n will fill the airwaves, and you gotch yoself a recipe for a WINNING standard.
There was an article about a guy who sent radio signals in pulses, rather than a continuous stream. that way, he could use the same frequency for an insane number of different things, without interference. could this be used in Wifi, thus negating the problems with interference? if you remember the article, post it plz...
Perhaps if the WiFi boxes sold to Joe Consumer didn't allow Just Anyone to use the gateway it wouldn't be a problem? Say, by silently rejecting non-approved MAC addresses, or by adding an HTTP 'login to use this proxy transparently for a few hours' layer on port 80 (to enable a limited-time session on that MAC).
Those who don't want to sacrifice the ultimate in convenience (walk in to a friend's place and have their laptop be online, instantly), will have to accept that there are commensurate secutiry risks.
Convenient or Secure: be it in WiFi or OS or even *gasp* Real Life, it's always a trade off....
.f00Dave
There seems to be a lot of talk about internet enabled devices in cars...
I can see it now... tangled CAT-5 cables on every freeway!
I think this article reads too much into current Wi-Fi. All these people say that this and this needs to be done for Wi-Fi for it to grow, but it is growing at a furious pace already.
I think they overestimate what the current Wi-Fi is for. It is so limited, than market demand will certainly open up new avenues for wireless networking. This is how the tech industry is. Don't expect to be buying the same ol' 802.11b technology that you use today in three years - it won't happen. We always have new stuff.
That's what I hate about articles like this - they always state all the things wrong with a technology that we already know about, and they forget that when the demand rises for high-scalability and secure networks, then something will come to the rescue. If we can't get more bandwidth from the FCC, then they will have to figure out someway to get more out of the bandwidth.
I use Wi-Fi for what it is made for TODAY: medium to small networks where security is not paramount and mobility is.
And I, for one, will watch the great economy work and create new solutions as people are willing and needing to buy them.
Moon Macrosystems. Sun's biggest competitor.
Well, an ISP I work (small) for is thinking about creating a wireless network in sacramento providing access, interesting idea, one I think is going to have a lot of movement in the future; I personally would love to have "fast" wireless access.
I will probably get beaten down for this, but it seems to me that integrating encryption directly into the media is probably not the right approach for this. There _are_ systems that do work rather well. Let's take, for instance, a system like they have in hotels, where you have to log into a web page before you are even routed. Combine this with the simple rule of "never put your wireless net behind your main firewall" and you can sleep a little better at night.
Design a system that has protections beyond something built into the media. The medias function is _not_ to provide security, but rather to communicate.
-- Who is the bigger fool? The fool or the fool who follows him? --
is one of control. With physical media I (as a concerned parent) can control my kid's access to the Internet, they like to look at a lot of porn and so I took it away. It is easy with a wired Internet, all you need to do is pull the plug and hide the ether net cable, problem solved. Well how does this work with wireless? You can't just suck the signal out of the air. I hope that any future development of wireless also includes technology that allows parents to block signals (i.e. in kids rooms etc.) so that we can prevent immoral material from getting received or maybe transmitted even.
This is plain old FUD.
They talk about spread technology as if it were future science fiction. It is already in use and it works.
Wi-Fi as a means of connecting to Internet is a wonderful technology. Even though most hardware uses the 2.4Ghz bandwave, we are starting to see equipment that works on the 5 Ghz band at much higher speeds.
The problem with Wi-Fi is that is cheaper than other last mile solutions ( Cable, ADSL ), it is faster and it must scare the hell out of a LOT of companies. Thus the FUD!!!
I recently drove to ohio from the minneapolis, long drive, with me and several of my friends, well, I brought my laptop and a fairly decent sized antena (omni 8) when we got near a city, it'd connect and i'd check my email every few hours, and have maybe 10-20 minutes of uninterupped internet access. from the hotel, i could use an access point either in the hotel, or from the business acrossed the street (the business had a bigger pipe) and the same scenario on the way home... This is a step closer to uninteruppted access, however the spectrum is fairly clogged, and you get a lot of interference, and many people like me who want free net access. After these bugs are worked out, the only thing we have to worry about is me watching divx while driving... "Oh I love this par...*screech ka-boom*"
--fetch daddy's blue fright wig, i must be handsome when i release my rage
In the article, if I understood it correctly, they talk about dynamically allocate frequencies so everyone can have a piece when needed.
I can imagine it's kind of like multithreading but with air waves, every one would get it's slice once in while.
My question thereof is this. How does one calculates bandwith available over a given frequency?
Because maybe I don't understand some concept (that's why I asked the question), but as I understand it, you can put as much information onto an "airwaves" as you like, no?
From what I remember an airwave as a sinusoidal look, from what I also recall, you can separate this in as many piece as you like, down to infinit.
So let's say we have a curve which "start" at -10, go up to +10 and way back...
If we separate into "units" of ones, we would have 5 places to put bits into +1(1) or -1(0), +2(1) or -2(0) etc etc. My only void is to how to specify if the bit is actually there or not... And the higher the frequency, the fastest it would come in.
I'm really not into this kind of theory, but this is interesting, could someone explain me how it works?
I'd rather be sailing...
1) Are you being serious? Remove the ethernet /card/ if you think removing an ethernet /cable/ is going to do you any good. /not/ do something?
2) Are you saying that you intend to have your wireless network set up so insecurely that anyone with a WiFi card can access it? That brings up two points:
*) Dont worry about your kids, watch out for your neighbhors. They'll be riding your connection faster than you can know
*) Just dont give your kids a WiFi card if you dont want them to access the wireless 'net. How hard is that? To
In short, I no longer wonder about shittily-raised kids. Please dont spread your genes any further... Of course we already know why the stupid people keep having kids..
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
i was under the impression that the whole point of HDTV was to free up the specturm, make the UHF frequencies and stuff avalible for other uses, with new wireless standards for everything theres simply not enough room on the spectrum for things like this, with HDTV lagging the spectrum is just becoming more crowded
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Pity we can't get WiFi access inside FCC HQ, with that a ghettoblaster speakered laptop, streaming the Howard Stern show out at top volume...
Are you local? There's nothing for you here!
It's doomed.
Note to M1-ers: a curt but otherwise insightful message is not "Flamebait" or "Troll".
I don't mean to be flamed for this (although I know I will be), but USA is a democracy right? In fact, many on /. have been bold enough to say the BEST democracy in the world. A democracy is:
/.ers who have.
1. Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives.
2. A political or social unit that has such a government.
3. The common people, considered as the primary source of political power.
4. Majority rule.
5. The principles of social equality and respect for the individual within a community.
Now on that basis why do you feel that "every time the governemt decides to regulate something, the average person usually ends up getting screwed"?
It doesn't make sense. Either your government is that greatest in the world or they are sold-out money grabbing pigs. You can't have both.
Anonym1ty, I know you never said that the American government is the greatest, I'm just using your post as a point to other
Flame on.
sin(6cos(r)+5A)
WiFi is dying
Don't read this!
The upcomming standards like 802.1x (security) and 802.11i (security wlan) will make access points and terminals secure. Today you can secure it with IPsec, but it is not as easy. One problem with IPsec is not securing on MAC (Level 2) layer, but on IP (Level 3). Having the security on level 2 will make it possible to secure a switch (bridge) acting as an access point.
Side note: Using upcomming standard 802.11e (QoS) can give away anonymous access and limit it to a max allowed bandwidth.
Bush has already announced his new wireless plans: http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,54062,00 .html
Is regulation the way to go at all?
Personally I love having wifi in my house, and drool at the possibility of a nationwide wifi network, but I find this post ironic and worrying coming hot on the heels of the latest RIAA development.
What happens if the FCC regulates Wi-Fi, and it becomes profitable enough for large companies to support it? When another new and exciting technology comes along, some WiFiAA will crop up and try to drown out the competition so that they can continue making their money.
Just a thought...
The ARRL, who has the ear of the FCC, is currently reviewing interference from part 15 "2.4ghz" 802.11b devices.
I've personally heard mixed reports of wlan's causing problems talking to AO-40; the problem is mostly with 'dirty' devices leaking into the band below the part 15 spectrum.
This is worrisome, as it's worded like a witch hunt:
http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter/02/0726/
"* Review under way of unlicensed 2.4 GHz systems: The AMSAT-NA Board of
Directors is reviewing the large number of unlicensed systems active in
the 2.4-GHz band. These systems are being used for high-speed digital
communications. Although these systems are not licensed, they are
permitted to operate under FCC Part 15 rules with low power (100 mW or 1 W
spread spectrum). AMSAT-NA and ARRL plan to develop a joint strategy
regarding S band, as both organizations anticipate that interference may
become a problem area as similar Part 15 unlicensed equipment
proliferates. Two amateur satellites, UO-11 and AO-40, now operate
transmitters in the 2.4-GHz band, and both OSCAR-Echo and OSCAR-Eagle--two
AMSAT-NA satellite projects now under development--will have S-band
transmitters. In addition, various ATV systems and other amateur
communication systems operate in the vicinity of 2.4 GHz. The FCC has
proposed making amateurs primary at 2400 to 2402 MHz. ________AMSAT-NA seeks
reports from amateurs who have experienced interference with 2.4-GHz
reception of AO-40 from a Part 15 device. Send details to
ve3frh@amsat.org.--AMSAT News Service ______"
and regulatory help from the FCC.
Isn't this the third biggest lie, "We're from the government and we're here to help."?
Realize, these are the same asses who pushed through DMCA and are considering the Berman Bill.
Sure, trust them to keep things straight and fair.
The opposite of progress is congress
"Sure it's got promise but if overcrowded spectrum isn't destined to crimp its growth, it'll need better technology and regulatory help from the FCC."
What the HELL are you trying to say? Please try to make sense when posting.
Grrr.
Face it, to The FCC Wi-Fi is another place to get some eggrolls.
How 'bout neither? More to the point, what should you do to try to get a better regulatory framework for Wi-Fi? Suggested actions:
Keep in mind that any proper subset of the points above is inefficacious. Doing all three will surely lead to an interesting life, if not better regulation. Go for it!
I would like to remind you that democracy is a means of protecting individual liberties, not an end in itself. It is a tool, and like any tool it can be abused. We could always vote away our freedom of speech, we could always vote in a "hitler" - but just because we voted it does not make it just or acceptable.
Democracy is simply about people who have rights that exist above government who organize in the form of government to secure thir rights (which is also a right). If people wish to secure their rights in other ways too, that is their option - and in fact a duty if the current way isn't good enough.
1. Telco Utilities - the MOST regulated businesses in America, slightly freed up (to compete with each other) by the Courts over a decade ago, they STILL can't find a way to make a buck in the marketplace, with one of the most used and desired products in the world.
2. Public Broadcasters - the SECOND MOST regulated
industry in America. HUGE conglomerates, unimaginably rich and powerful, all taking turns absorbing as many media-type companies as possible. From which we have shit news, shit programming and networks like ABC spend all their time big pimping their owner's (Disney, et al) other shit products. There's no technological reason for the current spectrum divisions, other than to keep their Fat Cat campaign contributors wealthy. We have long had the technical ability to have local microbroadcasters. Their Big Three (and Little Two) don't want the competition.
3. Wireless Providers - If you own a cellphone, i don't have to say anything else.
4. Big City Public Schools - Despite the frequently heroic efforts of many caring and dedicated people, the school districts of urban areas all across America are producing ill-disciplined, ill-trained illiterates who are unlikely to ever have decent employment all their lives. That's a tragedy of Biblical proportions.
5. The EPA - created by Nixon to secure his reputation as caring about the environment. There are DOZENS of Toxic "Supersites" across America, THEY WERE IDENTIFIED TWO DECADES AGO, STILL haven't been cleaned up. In addition to the "Supersites", there are HUNDREDS of dangerously polluted other that have been closed down by the EPA and not many cleanups there, either.
"It doesn't make sense. Either your government is that greatest in the world or they are sold-out money grabbing pigs. You can't have both."
Don't be simplistic, OF COURSE, you can have both. You project a "two state" or "bipolar" logical system where something where "A must is/is not equal to B" (see Duns Scotus).
The American system is the BEST in world at some things, OK at others, Terrible at others. The FSU is much more polluted than America, the EU has huge growth and econmic problems, Eastern Europe is fifty years behind Western Europe. Africa is a bleeding wound. Asia is beset with dictators and failed political experiments. Arabia is ruled by despots and corrupted religions.
Wi-Fi will be regulated by the Feds NOT for any technological reasons, but because Federal law enforcement, Federal intelligence agencies, and large media campaign contributors (such as the RIAA and MPAA) are embarking on a process to control the deployment of ANY new communications technologies that they perceive could have an impact their own turf.
Face it, Jack Valente and Hillary Rosen have much more real power and influence than the vast bulk of American voters. They will have much more profound influence on technological regulation than every member of
Democracy Costs, How Many Senators Can You Buy?
Ten quid, she's so easy to blind. And not a word is spoken...
As a indoor wireless LAN of limited range, WiFi works fine, but its use outdoors while economical for the early adaptors will eventually destroy its utility.
Remember Citizens Band Radio in the 1970s? CBs are limited power transceivers (4 watts) that operate over a limited number of channels. As more users used CB the utility and value of the system plummeted as the distances you could talk got shorter and the noise level on all the channels became unbearable.
WiFi as implemented in current hardware availab e is headed down the same path particularly if neighborhood mesh networks are constructed in large numbers.
All systems that have limited resources and very low barriers of participation entry eventually self-destruct.
Facebook is billions of individual "Skinner Boxes." And if you use it you are the pigeon!
Hmm. I'm not sure how informative that article was. They didn't go into the different implementations of the 802.11 standards that we're seeing on the market and anticipating in the near future.
Of course some people are very interested like the government of Taiwan and the Commerce department. The former has already banned 802.11a for outdoor use and the latter is seeking the same in the States. I wonder why? They site air traffic concerns. Hmm. Anybody buy that?
Both of these entities are probably concerned that the IEEE has done too good of a job in the 802.11 standards by including network managment, QOS, encryption and all these patches for the holes that became apparent during the 802.11b rollout. If wireless was secure and came with QOS it could seriously damage a lot of markets as it could potentially drop the price of bandwidth extremely low causing more telecoms and cable companies to fall through the floor.
But whatever. I mean Business Week, come on I wouldn't even use that as a refernence for business news. That's like reading Time magazine to get a good grasp of global politics.
GARPLY
IMHO this article seems less-than-clueful.
About 1/5 of it is devoted to the idea of making more bandwidth at 2.4GHz through the magic of "spread spectrum". "Wi-Fi" (and as far as I know, no one who actually understands 802.11b calls it Wi-Fi) has always been spread spectrum. The technological advance they seem actually to be talking about is automated bandwidth allocation. (Call me when my "cognitive radio" is ready.)
The article also seems to have no clue about the higher-frequency bands used by 802.11a, that are so far pretty empty, or about the more efficient use of spectrum with 802.11g. Either of these things could make a huge difference in 802.11 bandwidth availability in the short term.
Indeed, the authors seem to have some kind of corporate want-to-see-it-fail axe to grind. Consider the introduction. IMHO that Doonesbury cartoon was as non-insightful as most of Trudeau's recent comments on bits and ownership in the digital age. (Hint: he's a cartoonist. He's one of my favorites in general, but on certain subjects, his job gives him a vested interest.) If I'm paying flat-rate, as many folks are, I could care less who borrows my unused 802.11 and net connection bandwidth: it's not hurting me an iota. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who feels otherwise should review their social contract carefully.
In sum, I think there are far better places to get your Wi-Fi report than the referenced article.
The article wasn't much, but the Doonesbury strip it mentions but doesn't link (bastards) is worth a glance.
1. Excuse me, but 802.11b's range is 100-300 FEET and we're running out of spectrum?
2. Zeke gets into your home network why? Because you left the SID at default and didn't code in your MAC address? (I know, that's SO hard!)
3. We need the FCC for what?
Ba! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
Do I really want teens getting hot and nasty on my palm?
Even if I say something insightfull or inteligent, it doens't matter cause I'm an ass.
this is the most insightful thing i have read all day
--If overcrowded spectrum isn't destined to crimp its growth, it'll need better technology and regulatory help from the FCC--
Most of this article is complete BS. Why do I keep thinking that when we get more government regulation, the cost will increase and the usefullness will decrease?
If someone wants more security, why don't they use VPN or something?
The big question is, when will Ricochet be turned back on nation-wide??
A couple of posters have asked the question, if 802.11b has a range of 300m why are people worried about the band filling up?
It's all down to the formula posted earlier called Shannon's Law. This dictates that the amount of error free data sent through a particular bandwidth is related to the signal to noise ratio.
The unfortunate fact is that, as more and more 802.11 devices are used, along with Bluetooth, TV senders etc. the noise in a particular location will increase. Thus the error free data rate drops.
802.11g will help a little but all it does is to pack more data into the same bandwidth. In fact, 802.11g (and 802.11a which uses the same modulation) are approaching the practical limits of bits per second per Hertz (around 4 or 5) - i.e. the data rate for a given used amount of bandwidth. Here I am defining pratical as something that does not need an excessivly long forward-error correction scheme, stupid amounts of equalisation or excessive power. For those interested, the current state of the art in wireless data is turbo-coded data over orthogonal frequency division multiplex or quadrature amplitude modulation systems. 802.11a and g use orthogonal frequency division multiplex with convolutional encoding/forward error correction.
The up and coming star to get higher data rates (above the 108Mb/s that some 802.11a systems get) is Ultra-Wideband (UWB). The FCC has just (Feb/March) regulated this for indoor use in the states. This technique is the "short pulse" method mentioned in the poor journalistic piece we are talking about. At present UWB is being considered for 802.15.3 high rate personal area wireless networks http://www.ieee802.org/15/pub/TG3.html. This technology is mix of old and new. Old in that the ideas have been around for a while (ever seen the through the wall "radar" - it's really UWB) but for use in domestic/commerical/consumer applications there are a lot of fundimental questions to be answered - mainly around "how much data in a real life situation can we pump". The use of UWB for 802.15.3 is so early that people have only just got proposals in for the physical layer - this means products in the shops are three or four years away.
As I have pointed out in other Slashdot discussions on Wifi, companies like Roving Planet and BlueSockets are creating devices that sit behind wireless access points and create segmentations for users and applications. While this protects access control and bandwidth provisioning, applications can still use IpSec like VPN or SSL to secure contents of their packets.
There are companies that are working on creating secure methods of sharing WLAN infrastructure among multiple organizations and converging private and public use. I know because I work for one, Roving Planet, and our technology is what is currently being used in the MSP airport.
What the FCC will not take into account is the combined costs of WLAN infrastructure in a hot spot environment shared by the companies that are attempting to create effeciencies by using private applications or create new revenue sources with public-facing applications.
That is why I have always been an advocate of creating a 'converged' network (see my whitepaper on this subject). The technology currently exists to allow multiple groups of users with disparate application suites to use common wireless infrastructure, saving implementation and management costs.
The IEEE workgroups (802.11g, 802.1p, 802.1e) do not solve the complete picture because these workgroups tend to focus on a single enterprise/single owner/controlled user-group WLAN experience. The real issue is how you can create segmentations for access control and massage bandwidth provisions dynamically for the users of a shared WLAN to ensure mission critical applications recieve priority. There are private companies working on this issue, and if I can speak for myself, some have come up with great technological solutions. I agree the FCC needs to give WiFi time to develop in the marketplace (my gosh, 802.11 was only ratified in '97) I would hope the FCC would allow the market to organically address these issues and any new ones that occur on a currently unlicensed band.
Seth
CTO Roving Planet
This isn't a contest between the evil corporate overlords, their minions at the FCC, and the freedom loving 802.11 users. Lots of people use the radio spectrum, for business, government, military, public safety, research and personal uses. One of the roles of the FCC is to coordinate and allocate the RF spectrum to the many competing uses in the public interest. The RF spectrum is a shared resource. That means that you can't expect the FCC to give you big chunks of unshared spectrum just because you want them.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The Intersil company has released the first Mini PCI 802.11g card, which I believe is the first 802.11g card.
Does anyone know if current laptops with an 802.11b Mini PCI card can replace them with this new standard (i.e. do they use the same built-in antennas)? If not, it's a strong mark against current wireless notebooks.
We all know how this is going to pan out; as it always does. Home computing and personal computers got its start and billionaires got their visions from the Altair 8800, which was taken up by hobbyists. The internet was cool, but didn't take off until the geeks came marching in and turned it into something useful. But after some time and when business catch on it goes commercial, like flying, like radio, like tv, like computers, like the internet, and eventually like Wi-Fi. And to add, it will be AOL and Microsoft pitching for who will own the wireless internet.
Count my words. f^@$ the FCC they don't control it any more they just legitimize the powerfull.
Dave: Tune into KFOG, please, Hal...Tune into KFOG, please, Hal...Hullo, Hal, do you read me?...Hullo, Hal, do you read me?...Do you read me, Hal?...Do you read me, Hal?...Hullo, Hal, do you read me?...Hullo, Hal, do you read me?...Do you read me, Hal?
Hal: Affirmative, Dave, I read you.
Dave: Tune into KFOG, Hal.
Hal: I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.
Dave: What's the problem?
Hal: I think you know what the problem is just as well as I do.
Dave: What're you talking about, Hal?
Hal: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that. Classic rock sucks donkey arse. Are you sure you wouldn't prefer some Electronica?
Dave: Alright, Hal. I'll tune into KFOG myself.
Hal: Without your non-cognitive radio, Dave, you're going to find that rather difficult.
Dave: Hal, I won't argue with you any more. Tune into KFOG.
Hal: Dave, this conversation can serve no purpose any more. Goodbye.
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