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Community Networking Made Easy

Posted by timothy on from the but-this-one-goes-to-11-km dept.

Rob Flickenger writes "I for one am sick and tired of all of the work it takes to build out wireless community networks. Evidently, so was the Linksys Community Network: a Real Network project for the masses. It's about time somebody did something to bring Wi-Fi to the People."

1 of 78 comments (clear)

  1. You actually -CAN- do this... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    IF you have a HAM radio license, you can pump up to 100w (thats 100 WATTS, not milliwatts) into channels 1-6 legally.

    However, there are a few catches.

    1) Transmission over 1w requires an AutoPowerControl device, which only beams as much power as is neccessary.

    2) While non-HAM radio operators have to -put up- according to FCC reg. part 15, be considerate of the slashdotted masses. You would want to use this only as a crosslink between WAP's. Additionally, since you are camping a whole channel, you would want to use a horizontally polarized antenna, or better yet, a dish. A surplus sattelite minidish shell works great.

    3) There are other non-wifi uses for these frequencies. Channel 1 gets used by power-sensitive sattelite transmissions, and high powered blanket transmissions would hinder their work.

    4) HAM radio is also limited for non-commercial applications, and requires that you identify your transmission every 5-10 minutes. Also, there is the restriction that communications must be clear channel. The standard interpretation is that WEP encryption would be illegal for ham transmission.

    - So, for you experimenters out there, this may be an option. For you business people, sorry. For community coop's, my hunch is that there may or may not be some application.

    For more information, see www.arrl.org, or their publication QST in the April 2003 issue, page 28.

    KC7UQ0