Presentations:
Frank Keeney gave a demonstration of a Bluetooth serial adapter and showed the internal makeup of the popular Rootenna, which is a panel antenna with a built-in enclosure for rooftop Wi-Fi placements: Just add Power-Over-Ethernet.
Meeting Notes:
Stay tuned…
Watch archived videos of the show with Real Player:
Stay Tuned…
Special Thanks to the following:
Pasadena IHOP and their big meeting room
Presentations:
Mike Outmesguine and Frank Keeney will have several short presentations on the following…
Tech gifts for the Holidays - We’ll have suggestions of what you should put on your holiday shopping list.
Bluetooth Serial adaptors - No more serial cables? I’ll have a pair to show how to eliminate some of serial cables that you use. http://www.gridconnect.com/bluetooth-rs232.html
Practical uses of GPS - Use them for work and play. I always use the GPS as an excuse to bring more electronic “toys” on vacation. Plan trips, log your tracks and display in your favorite mapping program including a demonstration of plotting your GPS tracks in Google Earth. Plus a demo of the latest version of MS Streets and Trips.
Internet Access Emergency? - We’ll show what you need to bring on your trip to make sure you have Internet access almost everywhere you go.
Plus get an up close and in depth look at Able-Comp’s ruggedized wireless laptops and the new Flybook V3 subnotebook with swiveling touchscreen and built-in GPRS cellular internet.
Meeting Notes:
Stay tuned…
Watch archived videos of the show with Real Player:
Stay Tuned…
Special Thanks to the following:
Pasadena IHOP and their big meeting room
Presentations:
Laptop Spectrum Analyzer, Live Demonstration by Greg Barone of Cognio:
Cognio’s ISMS provides full, real-time spectrum (2.4GHz and 4-5GHz, 900MHz soon) and protocol visibility to unlicensed wireless networks, allowing customers to quickly troubleshoot unlicensed wireless performance problems such as interference and quickly identify denial of service attacks that are invisible to all other unlicensed wireless management products. Cognio’s solution, built upon Cognio’s patented SAgE cognitive radio technology, reduces operating costs, improves unlicensed wireless security, and makes unlicensed wireless networks ready for mission critical applications.
Data sheet: http://www.cognio.com/pdf/isms_mobile_72dpi.pdf
Meeting Notes:
Stay tuned…
Watch archived videos of the show with Real Player:
Stay Tuned…
Special Thanks to the following:
Pasadena IHOP and their big meeting room
Frank Keeney & Mike Outmesguine started the meeting. Frank spoke about the LAAWRN wireless research network. This is a network that will span greater Los Angeles. We will work on spanning across mountains and down into valleys. Clients would need high-gain antennas to link up to the site. We are doing this in the spirit of research and sharing. Frank made it clear that, as a research network project, this is not a replacement for high-speed internet through a wireless ISP or other high-reliability methods. Expect downtime as we all experiment! (more…)
This was not only the General Meeting, but the Second Annual Los Angeles WarDrive-In, too!
We did not have a formal presentation this meeting. Frank and Mike gave an overview of the plan for the night and introduced plans for the Los Angeles Area Wireless Research Network.
During the sit-down portion of the meeting, all present asked and fielded questions. Plenty of good questions! (more…)
Full house again! 80 people were at the meeting tonight. Some were watching the proceedings out in the front room via the live video feed over the wireless LAN. Up to 30 people were using the wi-LAN at once! We repositioned the Wi-LAN gear and used the Linksys WSB24 booster to give full coverage throughout the restaurant. Link quality: Excellent!
Frank Keeney & Mike Outmesguine started the meeting. Mike introduced us to the new stickers - chewing through about half of the stock in one night! There was a lot of interest in stickers and T-shirts. We’ll definitely make something available over the Internet and at the meetings.
Frank talked about the live streaming video setup and the Mitsumi Wavit11 product. He used the Wavit11 during the meeting to send the video up to the internet over the wi-LAN. Remember, it’s tiny (about the size of a deck of cards,) and everything about it is tiny - except its features.
Fran McGrath then stepped up to show us how ColorBroadband set up the Long Beach HotZone. Great presentation and a lot of Q&A on how it works, how they did it, how they got permission, and where it’s going from here - Long Beach Airport, of course!
Bao C. Ha brought out the OpenBrick computer. This thing is very nice, and low-cost! This sparked a lot of questions and Bao passed one around for everyone to ogle. Watch the video and check out the digipix for a closer look.
Wow! Lance from WilTel announced something spectacular for the wireless community in North America. I have to clear what I can say here, but watch the video to get it first-hand. In the meantime, click here to see WilTel’s map. [update will be posted here and on the discussion list when available.]
Jack Unger made an announcement that his book, Building License-Free Wireless Wide-Area Networks, will be in stores March 11th!
We stopped the meeting, broke into groups, and some of us lingered in the parking lot until midnight. (more…)
Full house! 73 people were at the meeting tonight. Most people found a seat, but a few found Standing Room Only.Frank Keeney started the meeting and introductions. Frank passed around an article about Michelin tires embedding RFIDs into the rubber of the tire making it easy to track the tire and vehicle. Mike Outmesguine spoke some more about RFIDs and privacy issues. And covered the privacy issues of GPS enabled devices and the concept of jamming GPS signals for personal privacy. Mike read a news article about a car rental company using GPS units to control renters, “when we get a rental [car] that is out of bounds, we shut the vehicle down, send a tow-truck and just go and get it.” This kind of company policy encourages underground countermeasures like Personal Area Jammers. (more…)
Mike Outmesguine introduced the group to RFID tags (Radio Frequency Identification), and talked about some of the positive and negative ramifications of easily tracking serialized merchandise.
Then Frank Keeney talked about his recent purchase of a 3G cellular data package. Very exciting!
Craig Arnold presented some information on the ReefEdge Connect System, and the Dolphin WLAN management freeware. Also, Craig spoke about the recently announced installation at Cal Lutheran University.
Allen Lee made a very interesting presentation on the Wacal non-line-of-sight wireless networking product that covers a 15 mile radius from a single RF tower. The speed is about 120kbps, and the cost is tiny. If the system works as advertised, this could be what municipalities need to replace CDPD. hmmm… (more…)
First, Frank Keeney went over the SoCal Linux Expo. We set up a wireless network so anyone at the expo could use the Internet free with a wi-fi card. We had a booth and showed off all kinds of wireless gadgets. [see write-up here].
Frank & Mike Outmesguine then went over some recent pricing plans and hardware available for the various data services offered by cellular carriers nationwide (esp. SoCal). We focused on data plans using what is coming to be called the third generation wireless, or 3G. We grouped these types of 3G data services into two groups: Cell phone and cable, and PC-Card.
Frank covered the plans offered by the carriers with several cell phones capable of being used as a modem for your laptop or PDA. You could order the phone service, and use a special cable to connect a computer directly to the internet at speeds of about 100k. (more…)
Like the topic says, Jack covered many functions of a spectrum analyzer. This may be the ultimate tool for an RF engineer. Jack showed us how it worked, what it does, and significantly, how to use it in deploying a wireless network. If you’ve never used an SA before, watch the video from the link below and prepare to be amazed. If not for the price tag, no wi-head should be without one.
Frank went over a few items of importance. Most significantly is the shutting down of AT&T’s wireless CDPD network by June 2004. Plus they will stop all new sales March of 2003 (4 months!) This will have major impacts to tried-and-true systems used by many vertical markets and the public sector (trucking, carriers, emergency, public infrastructure, etc.) AT&T would like all of these CDPD devices to be changed out for their GSM/GPRS (2.5G) cellular data service. However, at this time, there is no service plan cost-effective enough to allow a changeover. AT&T does not have an unlimited data plan in place. And the other major cellular providers that do have unlimited plans, have strict license agreements preventing commercial use. Oh well. Time marches on. We will all scramble to find a data solution before the shutdown. And we’ll love it!
Frank also talked briefly about the CTIA conference in Las Vegas. And The Wireless WarDrive-In was a smash hit. See links below.
People hung out for most of the night as always, swapping war stories, asking questions offline, that sort of thing. As always, a great place to share and enjoy! (more…)
