Party of Five Brandon Hoffman Kelly Koenig Azam Masood Phil Nwafor Facilitating a Wireless Culture: A Discussion of Applications and Challenges MSIT 413: Wireless Technologies Party of Five Brandon Hoffman Kelly Koenig Azam Masood Phil Nwafor

The Game Plan Overview Fulfilling a need Solution fit Applications And the alternatives are? Case Studies Solution deep dive Q & A

Wireless, Airports, & Mesh Phil Nwafor Wireless, Airports, & Mesh

Everywhere, Anywhere… Wireless availability has become an afterthought

Example: Airport Business travelers = captive audience This means a ready-made market Since airports are municipally controlled, one party is awarded airspace via RFP process

Infrastructure Challenges Space shared by multiple parties Building infrastructure: Walls, architecture, material components.

Best Fit: Wireless Mesh Networks Comprised of > 1 physical node with a bi-directional pathway between nodes. Nodes can be gateways to the Internet “Cloud” = Collection of several nodes

Wireless Mesh Networks Advantages Higher Network Coverage Reliability and Robustness (Self-Heal) Lower Infrastructure Costs Lower Deployment & Infrastructure cost due to reduction in # of access points as a result of Multihop structure!

Due to modularity can increase capacity ceiling! (Scalability) Expand, Expand, Expand Due to modularity can increase capacity ceiling! (Scalability)

‘Self Healing’ Fault diagnosis algorithm Threat analysis leads to efficient algorithm design

Generations 1st Generation = Pre-IEEE

Competing Technologies Azam Masood Competing Technologies

WiFi Large Market Adaptation and Penetration Reasonable pricing Non-Standard global spectrum assignments Limited range Complex security

WiMax Greater Range than WiFi Almost 5x more throughput than WiFi Newer Technology. Companies/Industry starting to give closer look Higher capital cost (replace current hardware infrastructure)

EDGE Larger Coverage area (Leverages 2.5G signal towers) Low-throughput (384 kbps) Higher capital cost (Infrastructure, Bay stations, antennas, hardware)

UMTS Higher throughput (3.5 Mbps) Larger Coverage area (Leverages 3G signal towers) Higher capital cost (Infrastructure, Bay stations, antennas, hardware)

HiperLAN No compatible consumer products in market Largely ignored by industry despite > data rates Security No compatible consumer products in market Requires Line-of-sight

Bluetooth Great for connected small personal devices (printers, mouse, etc) Lower range and throughput as compared to WiFi

Kelly Koenig Business Applications & Case Studies $ ? € 2 % 9

Muncipal Projects: WiFi Business models Tax Funding Provider Funding Hybrid

Municipal Projects: WiFi Future goals and challenges

Case Study: O’Hare Airport Business Travelers Airport Vendors Airlines

Case Study: Chicago CTA WiFi Mesh Network 10 Rail yards (Over 282 Railcars) Real-Time Maintenance Information

Case Study: Starbucks Change in WiFi Provider Updated business-model to drive customer traffic

Brandon Hoffman Technical Solution

Planning Phase CRITICAL!

Planning Aspects Site Survey including noise floor and edge frequency devices Propagation through building materials/people Antenna placement and type due to noise, SNR, and propagation. What exists behind the walls (if any)

Autonomous Access Points More than air interfaces Function as complete network nodes

LWAPP Access Points aka Controller-based systems perform air interface functions Split MAC functions with controller Handled centrally by a wireless switch or controller

LWAPP “Split MAC”

Mesh Nodes (Refresher) Dependent on each other to hop back to gateway nodes Require a stable clean frequency for backhaul traffic.

AWPP Adaptive Wireless Path Protocol Cisco’s new proprietary mesh protocol Mixes LWAPP with AWPP

Important notes Mobility is more effective in controller-based systems MIMO before MIMO for better mesh backhaul

Wrap-up The business application, location, and environment will dictate the specific technology that should be used to effectively deploy the wireless data network Low Cost, High Adaptability

Q & A QUESTIONS?