Alternative Wireless Networks 74
Elvis Maximus writes "Technocrat.net has an interesting piece on an effort in London to create a wireless alternative to traditional ISPs called consume.net. Similar projects discussed include guerilla.net, SFLAN and SeattleWireless."
Interesting both from the technological and legal sides.
check out MANET (Score:1)
If done well, then it seems that we could bring back a little freedom back to the internet.
If a wireless network became popular enough, then we could see free(as in speech and maybe pretty cheap), cooperative, wireless networking popping up in metropolitan areas.
Metricom's "Ricochet" system (vapor marketing) (Score:2)
I live in the DC metro area and actually contacting Metricom here is quite a chore.
The last time I looked at their website (several weeks ago) there were no prices for service listed. When I called, I sat on VM hold for AGES and was never able to speak with a human to find out how much they want per month (their system told me to call back later and hung up).
They are still at 28.8 kbps in this area and have been promising 128 "soon" for about 3 years, still not here.
I was going to use 2 or 3 channels for a vehicle project, but TDB now, they will not get my business nor will they be a sponsor.
Yet another example of a great theory that did not survive contact with reality.
Visit DC2600 [dc2600.com]
Re:Modem pooling (Score:2)
The only problem is that in order to get decent routing behavior (you want the path through the modems to be transparent) you'll need at least one dedicated server with a good connection to be a routing proxy -- all the modem connected users are masqed behind it, and it forwards packets along the least congested route.
I'm grinning like a fool in love. This is just soo cool. I hereby present you with the Joho prize for coolest idea of the day -- typically presented in the afternoon, but today we make an exception.
Re:Problems I see with this... (Score:1)
Of course this doesn't prevent people from trying to jam the station, but if your using something like spread spectrum, this too isn't much of an issue.
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Air License? (Score:1)
"What is not free, however, is a license to use air -- or more specifically, the airwaves. And it is licenses for the wireless spectrum -- offered through government-controlled public auctions --that are embroiling U.S. corporations in massive and sometimes hotly contested bidding wars. "
Anyone want to start our own wireless ISP? (Score:1)
Wireless Internet and private networking (Score:1)
Re:Wireless LAM. (Score:1)
You need tall things to do this (Score:2)
At least one end of an RF link needs to be well-sited and engineered. Cell sites and broadcast stations are in high, well-chosen locations with good antennas, so that they work with remote units in lousy locations with poor antennas. This is the basic limitation on peer-to-peer RF systems. However, if you have access to tall things to hang antennas on, it can work. Today, though, it's hard to find a tall thing that isn't overgrown with cellular antennae. People with tall things now want to be compensated for antennas on them. And there's more public opposition to putting antennae up every year.
I'd once toyed with this idea as a net for video games, with all the video game boxes in a neighborhood linking up. I'd also thought of a way to do legal "pirate" radio, with boom boxes acting as relay stations using spread-spectrum in a junk band. But without well-placed base stations, there will be too many dead spots.
Metricom [metricom.com] probably has the cutest approach to this problem. Their service uses little boxes attached to street lights, and operates spread-spectrum in the 900MHz band. Most of the nodes are RF-only relays; only a few have wired connections to the Internet. They provide a good, although low-bandwidth, flat-rate mobile Internet service.
Re:Interested in SoCal/Los Angeles (Score:1)
What class license have you? Because, remember, anything above 300 GHz is free space for hams and is probably unpopulated.
Another advantage? Tiny, high-gain antennas. Imagine a two-meterlong Yagi giving you a 10.. 20.. 30+ dB gain. You could EME your network packets!
"These are the ramblings of a damned lunatic. I am to be thinkink about super-footooristik designes for werld Konkwest."
Re:Problems I see with that (Score:1)
lasers are coherent; they have very low beam dispersal. Light beams that cross don't interact. active tracking of targets can acheive excellent great accuracy.
right:
The points about needing to be careful about not blinding someone is well taken; these things are regulated for a reason. Likewise, rain and fog are serious bummers.
Re:If dirt world communities behaved like online o (Score:1)
works great for unix - it's just IEEE 802.11 wireless networking, no worries. and now, for your added viewing pleasure, the base-station configurator exists for windows as well. see:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ABSConfig/
for starters.
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Re:If dirt world communities behaved like online o (Score:3)
If the AirPort is truely IEEE 802.11 compliant (as it claims), you should be able to use _any_ vendor's 802.11 compliant hardware with it. And other vendors support other hardware and operating systems.
For you Linux types: Enterasys' [enterasys.com] wireless offerings [enterasys.com] include linux drivers [enterasys.com]
Wireless Access up and running in Dublin, Ireland (Score:1)
Only problem is if someone decides to stick a building or something in the line of sight to the base station your gonna loose bandwith. Even if it's a misty or foggy day bandwith drops.
They sent out engineers to my company and they got up on the roof and took some digital pictures and stuff, but it turned out that there was a few buildings in the line of sight so it was a non-starter for us.
It still looks promising even if it scares the telcos into reducing the cost of a fixed line.
Re:ISPs and Wireless LAN Technology (Score:1)
Although, I suspect the future will more more like the user will look up the ISP's number on Visor (given Palm's zero innovation mode currently) and select the number and the Visor will call over a packet switched network and complain that his 2.4 GHz Internet connection is down. =)
Thanks for the links!
Jayson Pifer j@zeo.com
Problems I see with this... (Score:2)
Lasers:
(1) Weather. If it's rainy (Seattle), smoggy (L.A.) or snowy (Canada), then you have problems. Also, other 'obstacles' like pigeons and such can be fairly hazardous to a connection...
(2) Precision. Laser transmission has to be fairly precise, or you're going to lose packets. Which is not a good way to promote the efficiency of your product. ("We only lose 30% of your information")
(3) Power. Laser transmission can be very ineffective, power-wise, and the further it has to travel, the tighter the beam (what with precision and all) has to be. You have to be careful about power output in open areas.
(4) Interference: What happens if two or more lasers cross? Packet data swaps? Corruption of data? Nothing?
Now, mind you, in a relatively small, enclosed area (I believe an arcology has been mentioned), it might be more feasible.
Radio peer-to-peer:
(1) Available frequencies: If every 'user' is on their own sub-frequency, in large metropolitan areas, you can run out of sub-frequencies rather quickly. What with radio traffic already there, you have to be able to devote a frequency to a user that can be assured of less then a fixed amount of interference.
(2) Jamming: If you're using a radio peer-to-peer, it's possible to be jammed fairly easily. It's fairly simple to set up a broad-band radio jammer to mess with local radio stations right now (with most, if not all of the parts available at Radio Shack). It may not work over a very wide area, mind you, but it can be done.
(3) Privacy: Radio peer-to-peer, unless properly encrypted, can be 'listened' in on by practically any other user of a radio ptp. And with the right software, encryption can be circumvented, for the most part. After all, you have to be able to insure that the receiver can read it. You can't just send a PGP key with this, because potentially, anyone could 'see' it.
If you're out in the middle of East Armpit, Texas, this becomes less of an issue, but in major metro areas, you'll have all kinds of d00dz playing around with their toys.
IMAO, radio peer-to-peer is not the way to go for now, but for all I know, all of my concerns have been addressed already. Laser transmission offers it's own problems as well, which I really can't see certain ways around. The last thing I want is a 'laser grid' in the sky full of information. Too many possibilites that something could go wrong.
Kierthos
Portland Wireless (Score:1)
Thanks!
Re:Problems I see with that (Score:1)
wonderful proofreading today.
Re:Problems I see with this... (Score:2)
1. Check this thread http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00/09/12/1242
2. The HAM radio encryption limit is not anything like what you say. It is a legeslated restriction. You are not "allowed" to encrypt on amature frequencies by law, not by physics.
You can easily use any encryption method you like across a TNC (terminal node controller) packet connection. As long as you do not mind breaking the law. If you use public key encryption it will work just fine (well, as fine as TNC gets anyway). The radio can care less if the bursts are gibberish or human readable.
However, you can signal hop and use any method you like for that, so long as the data is not encrypted. Check some of the Off the Hook archives for this info, bernieS gave a nice brief outline of this method on a show from last year or so.
3. Several news stories recently have covered breakthroughs in laser networking. However, moving your house to a line-of sight path to the hub may not be practical.
Visit DC2600 [dc2600.com]
Re:Local networks? (Score:1)
That's what's happening to your legal rights online.
Boycott Britain! Screw the
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Re:Wireless Problems (Score:2)
Funnily enough I actually posted this to /. before I posted it to technocrat.net, ho hum :))
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Almost right. What would go under one roof would be Seattle minus all the things that only exist because Seattle isn't all compactly tucked under a roof. The parking and driving infrastructure go right away, of course, as does all the space taken up with lawns. Lots of things that are repeated over and over again so there's always a close one can be repeated fewer times when everything's close.
But remember that the point is not to pack more people in. The point is to free up all that extra space to be open land, available for agriculture, parks, wetlands to protect the water supply and provide habitat, and so on.
And your Bluetooth idea might well work especially well in an arcology. If you have a wireless network access point in each room you still need to have it connected (either wireline or wireless) into the greater network. That might be easier in an arcology.
By the way, you can find more info about arcologies on the Arcosanti home page [arcosanti.org].
Re:Modem pooling (Score:2)
But here you have a network where you can have a huge amount of gateways to the internet (modems, ISDN, ADSL, cable), most of which where the person 'dialed up' will be using either a fraction or none of the connection (right now I'm reading a several 100K /. page, modem idle) all that bandwidth could be being used.
I thought initially there would have to be some checks, i.e. if I wanted to download sunsite for fun, well I wouldn't want people using my connection, but umm then there are all those other people doing nothing...
I'd say this is, or at least should be, the way of the future. Taking the power back :)
The main problem I can see so far is that there is nothing centralised, these are all isolated projects, and when it comes to linking them there will be IP conflicts etc.
Also is the software available yet? stuff like BGP going through masqued gateways, or tunneled over the internet.
Really regretting the fact that I spent the day setting up IMAP on my server and missed this thread while it was still alive.
So it goes....
Re:Modem pooling - Downside (Score:2)
or taking a wild guess and saying there probably is, where is it? me want
Re:Sounds like amateur radio packet relay concept (Score:2)
hawaii- (Score:1)
Look.ca is already doing this (Score:3)
They're doing full, bi-direcional wireless in test markets now - but they already have uni-directional with a modem for the uplink, which still works well with laptops.
Wireless LAM. (Score:1)
When will something like this come to Sweden? I know there have been some trying with test panels and stuff...
Local networks? (Score:1)
As a resident of the greatest city in the world (/me ducks) I'm going to be following the progress of this with interest. It makes a lot of sense to be using available technology in such a way that it can simulate a broadband connection using much more portable wireless devices.
Whilst London isn't likely to suffer from a lack of broadband when it finally takes off over here, there are a lot of places where it'll be years before phone companies decide it will be worth the cost to install it. In rural areas and third world nations lacking vital infrastructure, this sort of network could provide communities with many of the advantages of broadband technology.
Wireless Problems (Score:2)
Modem pooling (Score:3)
One of the benefits not mentioned in the article is that there's greater reliability since each computer has many ways of communicating with the 'net.
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Interested in SoCal/Los Angeles (Score:1)
Sounds like amateur radio packet relay concept (Score:1)
who, what, when, where? (Score:1)
Re:Problems I see with this... (Score:1)
(2): if you're CDMA, it's not easy. Also, it's kinda illegal, so if people actually used these things, the FCC people with their scopes will come knocking at your door.
(3): end to end encryption. enough said.
OT, I know, but still cool (Score:1)
Re:Wireless Problems -BZZZZT (Score:1)
10foot dishes on a 300 foot tower transmitting at 1KW to reach 90KM away.
so wireless has a problem ONLY when it is low power Pro-sumer level equipment. Big commercial equipment has no problems whatsoever.. (ask the phone company they do wireless point to point everywhere!)
If dirt world communities behaved like online ones (Score:4)
This securitygeeks story [shmoo.com] covers how to setup a very basic AirPort wireless network that can communicate at great distances as well as 128 bit encryption.
As far as I know you still have to use a Mac to use the AirPort base station, but it does not look like it would be impossible to hack for UNIX use (perhaps it already has been and I just missed the news).
Anyway, the point is that the hardware and the software is already here, all we need to do is band together and use it.
Visit DC2600 [dc2600.com]
Re:check out MANET (Score:2)
Also, a silly plug, we (the monarch group [cmu.edu]) haven't updated our latest internet draft because we've been busy writing working code =) Another interesting protocol is DSR: http://www.monarch.cs.cmu.edu/ietf.html
minor point, re PGP (Score:1)
The thing about public key encryption, though, is that anyone can see the public key... On a two-way communication system, what happens is one peer generates a key pair and sends its public key to the other, which then does the same. When you encrypt a message with someone's public key, it can only be decrypted using their private key, which only they have. (The private key is never transmitted.) So the two peers use each other's public key to encrypt messages to each other.
That's what makes PKE so cool, IMO. You need never transmit a secret, so even if someone's listening in when you send your key, all they can do is encrypt messages to you, not decrypt messages from you.
Re:Modem pooling - Downside (Score:1)
Re:Sounds like amateur radio packet relay concept (Score:1)
Who cares about ISPs? (Score:2)
SeattleWireless is not an ISP. (Score:1)
WDSL Up and Live (Score:1)
They cover Hamilton, Burlington, Oakville, Mississauga, Stoney Creek, Grimsby, Beamsville, Carlisle & Waterdown.
3Mbit/s 2-way business access
cheers
homemade 10 mip wireless plans (Score:1)
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
The domed city, I think, is one of science fiction's more pessimistic inventions, and doesn't seem at all likely.
(Note to self, when reading this archive in 60 years under a dome: way to predict the future, genius.)
Australian Link (Score:1)
Re:Modem pooling - Downside (Score:2)
Wow, it'd be like having your own private internet. I'll setup an ARIN analog to dole out private ips. Then I'll create a new country code '.ryan' for my internal machines. Since my domain server will proxy DNS lookups everything will work out fine. Then I'll make my own napster server and a private usenet. An IP parallel universe. Cool! Right out of a sci-fi novel.
Are there any large scale VPN alternate universes out there?
Ryan
Re:Wireless LAM. (Score:1)
This article doesn't say much (Score:1)
Wireless Internet is going to be big in places where it is physically possible to do so at a better rate than what the telephone and cable companies can or are willing to charge. The UK in general is crippled by BT. Rural areas in the United States have unreliable voice service on their phone lines, much lessdata, and cable doesn't exist. I have a friend who works for a wireless Internet company in Duluth, Minnesota (not a HUGE city) that is successful for those very reasons:
Superior Broadband, Inc. [superiorbroadband.com]
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Guerilla.Net (Score:1)
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Re:A similar project in Norway (Score:1)
Did the moderator who modded this up check out the link first?
Interesting model...but can it work? (Score:3)
Essentially they want to create a high speed and low cost wireless intranet within their area. It would be nice to have something similar to a local free high speed network in your home town. Fast file sharing and quick access to those within your networks limits.
However, I saw no mention of any type of bandwidth provisions... it would seem as if they would be relying on network providers to peer with them... If this is the situation, I would seriously doubt anyone would give away bandwidth for free.
This sounds like a nice idea, but I have a difficult time grasping of how you would get this to work properly. IMHO relying on others to contribute is usually a bad idea.
With a select and dedicated group of individuals who would give a damn if the network runs and maintain their part...this could work... so it would seem this is left to the hobbyist and small organizations to implement for themselves.
Re:Modem pooling (Score:2)
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Arcologies (Score:1)
Also, within a wireless isp range, could protocols be established so my Bluetooth devices can connect to the net? I'd love to be able to have a Bluetooth enabled Crosspad send the notes I'm taking right to my computer at home.
Re:Wireless Problems (Score:1)
Re:ISPs and Wireless LAN Technology (Score:1)
Although most ISPs are happy to "flood the spectrum with enough RF to bake a potato at 500 yards", there are some who are approaching it with a more cautious and thoughtful approach, utilizing passive receive amplifiers rather than transmit amplifiers; using directional antennas to eliminate radiated interference and sectored antennas to allow maximum coverage. Not everyone is tilting OMNIs from the top of a building to reach a customer below (although some do think that UFO's need bandwidth too
Although the band will get chewed up by the abusers, the rest of us will continue to plan our networks, and continue to run long after the has-been ISPs are gone or have switched vendors yet again.
Re:Wireless Problems (Score:1)
Re:Look.ca is already doing this (Score:1)
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Okay, so maybe we won't have one big domed megagopolis, but I can see several larger structures created from the physical linking of many buildings. So it wouldn't be a planned arcology, but an arcology of convenience. Through this interconnectedness, wireless systems may not be necessary, but between arcologies, a wireless system might be an answer. I don't know, I'm just riffing, so don't quote me on anything.
Re:ISPs and Wireless LAN Technology (Score:1)
Another thing that they're talking about is implementing ip6. Hooray!
I don't think you get the point... (Score:2)
Look.ca is trying to be a big fat ISP. It is only interested in your money not your freedom. consume.net and guerilla.net are trying to make you your own ISP giving you your freedom. Just because Look is wireless doesn't mean that it is the same.
DudeMan
Re:Wireless Problems -BZZZZT (Score:3)
-Alison
Re:Modem pooling - Downside (Score:2)
True, you may have larger aggregate bandwidth; however, any individual connection can only download/upload at the modem rate. Special exceptions can be made when you own the servers on the other ends of modems, but in a normal circumstance, it's not possible. In which case the whole system is kinda pointless, and everyone would be better off with their own modems.
Untrue
I personally had 4 modems dialled into the same NAS on my provider (with different accounts) and the link speed was a little under the theoretical maximum for a single modem *4. This was because the NAS allowed pooling. This was back in the 2.0.x days of the Linux kernel and the program which enslaved the individual ppp links was a little kludgy, but it worked wonders. So long as the other end is a Total Control center or a Cisco AS5200/5300, you should be fine, so long as the guy running it kept modem banding enabled. :-)
Re:Arcologies (Score:3)
In a city where there are hundreds of possible receptors, how can I prevent someone from stealing my notes as I send them back to my computer?
That is not a technical problem. Just use public key encryption to exchange session keys. The real problem has been export limits and companies who figure that the stupid lusers they sell to won't know the difference anyway.
The first problem is less of an issue now in the U.S., the second just requires clueful users finding clueful vendors or Free software.
Re:Arcologies (Score:1)
Re:Look.ca is already doing this (Score:1)
No Mac required (Score:2)
Re:If dirt world communities behaved like online o (Score:1)
ISPs and Wireless LAN Technology (Score:3)