[GLLUG] Charity WiFi, a bit off topic

[James Courtier-Dutton]

On 26 March 2018 at 17:10, stuart taylor <stuart.taylor at linuxmail.org> wrote:
>
>
> Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2018 at 11:41 AM
> From: "James Courtier-Dutton" <james.dutton at gmail.com>
> To: "stuart taylor" <stuart.taylor at linuxmail.org>, "The mailing list for the
> Greater London Linux User Group" <gllug at mailman.lug.org.uk>
> Subject: Re: [GLLUG] Charity WiFi, a bit off topic
>
> On Sat, 24 Mar 2018, 15:54 stuart taylor via GLLUG,
> <gllug at mailman.lug.org.uk> wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'd like some advice, please. I voluteer at a charity and have got them
>> all using Linux on their computers. Now they want me to install a WiFi
>> system for them. They have recently refurbished part of the building and
>> wish to turn it into a meeting room for 20-25 people. The current broadband
>> WiFi doesn't reach up to the meeting room, so will need some additions.
>>
>> My local pub uses something called Open Mesh, has anyone used these, and
>> are they any good?
>>
>> Stuart
>
>
> Hi,
>
> It is a shame that during the refurb, they did not think to add ethernet
> sockets in each room.
> It would have been very easy to add wifi then.
>
> While wifi is good, sometimes, having a physical ethernet cable in a meeting
> room is a great thing to have, when everything else fails.
>
> Now the wifi.
> The question is:
> 1) Will users be happy having to switch to a different access point when
> they move rooms, or
> 2) would they prefer the wifi network to take care of that for them.
>
> (2) is often preferable, but tends to be more expensive.
> I actually don't know why (2) is more expensive, if support for it was added
> to every wifi router, then it would be cheap.
>
> With (2) the wifi network has a single central controller, and then
> distributed antennas.
> This permits the system to determine where every client PC/Phone is, and
> ensure that the most efficient method is used to communicate with it. I.e.
> Automatically use the closest antenna.
>
> Kind Regards
>
> James
>
>
>
> There will be special guest logins for the meeting room, so it will be 1).
> I did suggest physical cable and sockets, but the facillities  coordinator
> was against this and I couldn't be bothered to argue. I might revisit this.
>

I would strongly suggest getting at least 1 physical cable to the
room, to handle the wifi router in the room.
You will need a power socket for the wifi router also.
Also, if you are running 1 cable, run 2 at the same time (the cost is
the installation, and not the cable cost really), in case one fails
over time, you can just use the other.
Also, there are some legal requirements around phones, so you might
need a phone in the room and patching phones through the network
cabling is easy.
I think the legal requirement is that in case of emergency, there must
be a working phone nearby to call 999.

I find running the cables under the floorboards, or above the ceiling
tiles is the easiest.

If you can get the ethernet cable, and power to above the ceiling
tile, you can hide the router above the ceiling tile and you won't
know it is there.

The ceiling tile option is quite good, because it hides everything
away in the ceiling, and you don't have to dig out wall sockets.
Just make sure it has ventilation, so it does not get too hot and
cause a fire risk.

I have designed wifi for entire warehouses and there it is far more
complex, with things like noisy machines and metal structures
interfering with wifi.

Kind Regards

James