Slashdot Mirror
Lanlink Linking The Coasts
Dan Bricker writes "A guy in Parma Heights, Ohio has a website to promote an idea of linking the east coast to the west coast using standard off-the-shelf 802.11 equipment. He is aiming for a July 4th, 2006 first coast-to-coast ping. This project appears to be totally volunteer based, With no other stated reason than fun with pringle cans and bad weather, and do it just to do it. Can this be done? What real world applications does this have?"
The problem with the pringle cans is that you get too much power out of the can, over the FCC maximum for unlicensed users on the band (ISM 2.4GHz). If you were to get a bunch of Ham radio operators, it might be more feasable.
As I walk through the valley of death I fear no one, for I am the meanest sonova bitch in the valley!
I have never heard about Hands Across America (probably because I was 7).
Anyway, here's a link for those that were drinking out of juice boxes in 1986.
http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id248.htm
It's hard to believe that such a thing was possible.
A speech...
Read the last paragraph.
Requirements - May not at any point attach to the real Internet. To be part of LL, a member must abide by any rules or guidelines laid out. In order for a project of this magnatude to work, there must be standards and rules followed.
He's trying to set up a network, not an ISP. There are myriad reasons not to connect this project to "The Real Internet", both legal and technical.
Your hope of open hotspots for WWW surfing and hacking etc. will likely go un-apeased by jumping on this network, unless of course it proves so popular that it becomes a "Second Internet".
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
It depends on what the gain and such is of the antenna. With an omni, maybe, but with a wave-guide cantenna you are probably safe.
See here for details
Besides, I think this is definately more doable that hands across america. With the possible exception of the rockies/cascades etc, just set up some cantenna's, and aim it off into the horizon. With GPS and such, it should be easy to coordinate. A handful of people at each horizon, should do it... How far away is the horizon anyways? I know I can see the buildings in downtown from here, and its like 20 miles from here.
Indeed... However, all it takes is one internet uplink and the packets will get through. It doesn't take much, just one computer with a wireless card, that also happens to be connected to the internet. Perhaps this will happen enough that there will be constant connectivity.
It might gain popularity, but it's fundamental design prohibits anything resembling the current internet. It is imposible to get a world-wide network without commercial backing, and the free-ness of this would eliminate much profit. Also, rural areas would be completely cut off.
Perhaps more importantly, this network would be verymuch unreliable... $20 in equipment to make a device that interrupts all 802.11b/g signals in the area. That's not going to be a good thing if EBAY wants to put a site up...
About the only thing this network would be good for is P2P applications... Gnutella would do just fine, since it can handle hosts disconnecting, can download from multiple sources, and most importantly, people don't demand real-time connectivity, so being off-line for a short time wouldn't be much of a problem.
Add to that the fact that your connection is free, faster than 99% of internet connections, and doesn't really need to be used for anything else at the same time, and it all indicates Gnutella would do very very well.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The routes:
Eastern Section
Central Section
Western Section
Interesting side note: I was looking at the area around my hometown of San Antonio, TX (on the Central map) and noticed a spur of the route leading to LBJ's ranch near Blanco/Johnson City Texas. These tower routes were designed to facilitate cross-country communications for the public but they also had a wartime mission--keeping the President in commo during WW3.
Standard 802.11b ethernet won't get this accomplished. There's no way. Can a packet ping from the east to west and back again in 255ms? with Wifi?
I don't think so. I think we should observe the way
Amature Radio Operators have ran packet radio stations. We'd need to write drivers that would
emulate a packet radio connection. There's will be
too many hops to implement a 802.11 WiFi solution.
We would have to go with packet switching.
We'd be able to use WiFi hardware, but all the drivers would need to be written to emulate packet switching.