Researchers Identify Wi-Fi Dead Zones Cheaply 37
schliz writes "A new technique developed by HP Labs and Rice University could lower the cost of identifying 'dead zones' in large wireless networks. The technique '[combines] wireless signal models with publicly-available information about basic topography, street locations, and land use.' This enables Wi-Fi architects to test and refine their layouts cheaply before a network is deployed by focusing measurement efforts on areas that potentially could be dead zones. The technique requires only about one-fifth as many measurements as a grid sampling strategy."
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We have the greatest government in the world, then.
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Hey, I'm thoroughly convinced! Aren't you?
So they just asked Christopher Walken? (Score:2, Funny)
50/50 (Score:5, Interesting)
This is one of those technologies that is a kick in the pants and a pat on the back. It'd be nice not to have to find the weak spots (and work around them), but on the other hand, it would be nicer if dead zones were impossible by default. That's not possible with Wifi in its current iteration, due to the power consumption required and the spectrum assignment operational constraints being non-uniform globally [wikipedia.org].
Even with almost sci-fi advances in wireless data transmissions, we still have a long way to go before we can get steady signals nearly anywhere and yet fluid pockets of global communication will be necessary, in a world market that could collapse, eventually.
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We do have tens of hits a day.
This is nothing new (Score:3, Informative)
The software is called Decibel Planner [bvsystems.com]
All the data we use is publicly available(although not free and definitely NOT cheap).
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You beat me to it. Such a process is used for every RF spectrum. It is NOT news. "Lowering the cost" - makes me wonder wtf they were thinking to not use this in the first place? RF engineering is an old profession.
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I've been using radio mobile [pe1mew.nl] and it does a great job for my needs
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Back in the day we used to use MSI Planet. One of the RF engineers printed up a projected plot of the whole SF bay area and put it up on the wall. It was very cool to look at the dead spots and how coverage impacted coverage long with reflection and other problems.
A friend also runs http://www.wirelessmapping.com/ where they will run projected plots for coverage of almost any RF output.
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Exactly, I am a propagation engineer and have been working through this very challenge for 20+ years. There are a multitude of commercially available products out there to create an area coverage.
I use TAP (Terrain Analysis Program) and it is quite expensive ($20 K with all of the bells and whistles). Almost all of the data sources I use are available at no cost. LULC (land use,land classification) for vegetation types I modified TIA TR8 (revised) to calculate vegetation losses more accurately into the GHz
Obligitory... (Score:5, Funny)
What do you mean I'm fired? You found a better way to do this?
Required... (Score:1)
Obligatory*
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http://www/portableapps.com/apps/internet/firefox_portable [www]
Link repost (Score:1)
Re:Required... (Score:4, Funny)
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Set up a Linux VPS server. Let the SSH daemon listen on port 443. From home, mail yourself a VNC client and Putty. Run the VNC viewer at work and using PuTTY, tunnel the traffic to the VPS server.
Hard and fast grammar rule (Score:1, Informative)
publicly-available
Never hyphenate with an adverb ending in -ly.
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Cheapest way is this: (Score:1)
Step One: Take a business laptop or two with a wireless card (preferably with Linux installed, but we can understand...)
Step Two: Walk around the city streets carrying it. Ignore people who look at you strangely.
Step Three: Every block, take a look at your wireless receiver. Write down your signal strength. If you are in an alleyway, pay the local hobos or pay cash to the local drug dealer (note that both add cost to the mission)
Wait, the wireless network needs to be setup? Never mind then...
old science (Score:2)
link to original research paper (Score:2, Informative)
Network triangulation... (Score:2)
Would it not be possible for each wi-fi base station to be able to measure the signal strengths of other base stations? The topology of the network would be given from the different signal strengths Then it would be possible to identify holes through the connectivity data of the mesh.
A totally baked idea. (Score:1)
Yeah, the US Army plots signal coverage areas and plans retransmission of radio signals based on this type of topographical information. We have been doing it for like, decades. You know, when there were people taking grid samples for topographical data, back before imaging satellites put those guys out of business.
This is common knowledge in the RF world. I think WiFi providers have just been too smart in the wrong areas of expertise for their own good. Sampling works, but a good understanding of RF theory
As opposed to what? (Score:1)
What the hell are they talking about, if the guy carries a laptop with him and hitches a ride with the guy from Verizon, they could pretty much do the same thing in the same places, we could even offer the guy from Verizon a bit more money and he could carry a device like a palm pilot that just checks for wifi connections, 2 birds with one stone.....seriously please, why should the public pay or even worry about for the big companies plight on making their products and services better???
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Because it has a direct effect on the cost of service. News items like this are intentionally initiated by the company, its candy for the stock holders, makes the stock holders feel all warm and fuzzy inside.